Nomos #72

Nomos comes from a root meaning “to parcel out” or “to apportion,” and in ordinary Greek denoted any established law or custom, whether civic or religious. In the New Testament it most often translates the Hebrew Torah and refers to the Law of Moses given at Sinai — sometimes the whole Pentateuch, sometimes its specific commands, and occasionally the Old Testament as a whole.

Biblical Usage

Jesus is careful to distance himself from any suggestion that he came to discard the Law: “Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil” (Matthew 5:17). Paul, writing after the resurrection, gives the Law a specific diagnostic role rather than a saving one: “by the law is the knowledge of sin” (Romans 3:20), and he pictures it as a “schoolmaster” whose supervision was meant to lead Israel to Christ, “that we might be justified by faith” (Galatians 3:24).

Theological Significance

Paul’s most pointed statement is that “Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to every one that believeth” (Romans 10:4) — a claim Christians have long debated in translation and scope, since “end” can mean termination, goal, or fulfillment. What is not disputed is Paul’s larger point: the Law reveals God’s righteous standard and exposes human failure to meet it, while righteousness before God comes through faith in Christ rather than through nomos-keeping, a distinction that runs through the entire argument of Romans and Galatians.