Romans 13:1 is an oft-quoted passage in Christian scriptures. A small sentence nestled in the middle of a powerful letter from Paul the Apostle to a church in Rome, these few words have been taken to mean a lot of things they simply could not mean in the context of the letter, Paul’s other letters, the entire body of New Covenant scripture, or the whole Bible.
Here is a list of 13 things that Romans 13:1 doesn‘t say:
- Be in allegiance to ruling authorities.
- Be in explicit pride for ruling authorities.
- Be in fearful reliance on ruling authorities.
- Be in deferential favor of ruling authorities.
- Be in non-critical consent to ruling authorities.
- Be in unqualified obedience to ruling authorities.
- Be in prophetic endorsement of ruling authorities.
- Be in conforming identification with ruling authorities.
- Be in full compliance with the wills of ruling authorities.
- Be in no dissent against the machinations of ruling authorities.
- Be in celebration of the glory demanded from ruling authorities.
- Be in complicity to the geopolitical preeminence of ruling authorities.
- Be in faith of an inevitably selective divine carte blanche for ruling authorities.
What it says is “be in subjection to ruling authorities,” which means to be a subject. A subject is merely a citizen that is anything but the supreme ruler.
For further reading, check out The Christian Exile.
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