1Or do you not know, brothers (for I speak to those who know the law), that the law has authority over a person for as long as he lives? 2For the married woman is bound by law to her husband as long as he lives. But if her husband dies, she is released from the law concerning the husband. 3So then if, while the husband lives, she is joined to another man, she is called an adulteress. But if the husband dies, she is free from the law, so that she is not an adulteress, though she is joined to another man.

4Therefore, my brothers, you also were made dead to the law through the body of Christ, that you would be joined to another, to him who was raised from the dead, that we may bear fruit to God. 5For when we were in the flesh, the sinful passions which were through the law, worked in our members to bring forth fruit for death. 6But now we have been released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in newness of the Spirit, and not in oldness of the letter.

7What should we say then? Is the law sin? Absolutely not. However, I would not have known sin, except through the law. For I would not have known covetousness, unless the law had said, "Do not covet." 8But sin, taking opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin is dead. 9I was alive apart from the law once, but when the commandment came, sin became alive, and I died. 10The commandment, which was for life, this I found to be for death; 11for sin, taking the opportunity through the commandment, deceived me, and through it killed me. 12Therefore the law indeed is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous, and good.

13Did that which is good, then, become death to me? Absolutely not. But sin, that it might be shown to be sin, by working death to me through that which is good; that through the commandment sin might become exceeding sinful.

14For we know that the law is spiritual, but I am fleshly, sold under sin. 15For I do not know what I am doing. For I do not practice what I desire to do; but what I hate, that I do. 16But if I do what I do not want to do, I agree with the law that it is good. 17So now it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me. 18For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwells no good thing. For the desire is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. 19For the good which I desire, I do not do; but the evil which I do not desire, that I practice. 20But if what I do not desire, that I do, it is no more I that do it, but sin which dwells in me.

21I find then the law, that, to me, while I desire to do good, evil is present. 22For I delight in God's law in my inner being, 23but I see a different law in my members, warring against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity under the law of sin which is in my members. 24What a wretched man I am. Who will deliver me out of the body of this death? 25Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ, our Lord. So then with the mind, I myself serve God's law, but with the flesh, the sin's law.