Romans 10:7

Paul is paraphrasing Deuteronomy 30:12-13 — The commandment is not hidden from thee, neither is it far off. It is not in heaven, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go up for us to heaven? ... Neither is it beyond the sea, that thou shouldest say, Who shall go over the sea for us? — but he makes one deliberate substitution. *Sea in Deuteronomy becomes abyss in Paul. The shift is theological: he wants to align the impossible journey downward* with Christ's own descent to the realm of the dead. The pastoral move is the heart of Romans 10. Justification by faith does not require us to make the impossible journeys (up to heaven, down to the abyss) — because Christ has already made both. The word that saves is near thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart (Romans 10:8, quoting Deuteronomy 30:14). The same word later patristic writers called the descensus ad inferos — Christ's descent to the dead between Good Friday and Easter — is here held up as the proof that the journey we cannot make has already been made for us.

• Deuteronomy 30
• Ephesians 4
• 1 Peter 3
• Revelation 9