Romans 3:20
Romans 3:2020Therefore no one will be justified in His sight by works of the law. For the law merely brings awareness of sin.
Jehovah's Witnesses tend to contextualise narrowly, reading 'by works of the law no human being will be justified' as referring only to the Mosaic Law ceremonial code — circumcision, dietary laws, sabbaths — rather than to moral obedience in general. This allows the JW claim from argument 154 to stand: if Paul is only dismissing ceremonial works, then the moral obedience described in still earns salvation. The Watchtower's two-stage framework from argument 158 also downplays this verse: present standing may come by faith, but final survival through Armageddon depends on continued obedience, effectively treating as a limited statement about the old covenant rather than Paul's universal conclusion about human inability.
is Paul's own verdict after the prosecution that began in . The strategy in argument 154 traces the flow: indicts the Gentiles, indicts the Jews, and delivers the universal conclusion — 'by works of the law no human being will be justified in his sight.' This directly answers the hypothetical of : the doers of the law would be justified if there were any, but Paul's conclusion is that there are none. The key insight is that and use the same verb family (dikaioo) and the same future orientation, but reach opposite conclusions — because the class of 'doers of the law' is empty. Argument 158 reinforces this: Paul is not contradicting himself between chapters; he is building a case. If meant obedience earns justification, then — in the same letter, by the same author — would be a flat contradiction. Reading them together reveals Paul's rhetorical structure: the law's standard is real, but no one meets it.