Reconciling Righteous Zacharias and Elizabeth with Universal Sin

At first glance these passages appear to conflict. Luke 1:6 declares that Zacharias and Elizabeth "were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord." Romans 5:12, however, affirms that sin entered through Adam and that "death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Add Romans 3:10---"There is none righteous, no, not one"---and the tension seems even sharper. To reconcile them, we must clarify (1) what "righteous" means in Luke 1:6 and similar texts, (2) what Paul means when he says "all have sinned" and "none righteous," and (3) how righteousness functioned under the law as opposed to the present age of grace.

subsection*1. Different Questions: "Have You Sinned?" vs.~"Are You Righteous?"

A key distinction is frequently overlooked in Christian discussion. There is a significant difference between:

• Asking, "Have you ever sinned?" and
• Asking, "Are you righteous before God?"

Many theological systems, especially influenced by Calvinism, tend to treat these questions as if they are the same, but Scripture does not. One can be a sinner by nature and experience and yet come, through God's appointed means, to a status of righteousness before God.

"Righteousness" in Scripture is often a judicial declaration---a verdict, not a claim that the person has never sinned. That is true in both Old Testament and New Testament usage.

subsection*2. Righteousness as Judicial Declaration under the Law

Israel's law provided a covenantal framework in which a person could be judicially declared righteous. Righteousness in this context means being in right standing with God according to the stipulations of the covenant.

Luke 1:6 says of Zacharias and Elizabeth:

"And they were both righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord."

Several points stand out:

1. Their righteousness is defined covenantally: they walked "in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord."
2. This description is not merely their self‑assessment; it is presented in Scripture as a legitimate statement about their standing.
3. Their righteousness does not mean they had never sinned; it means the law's own system for dealing with sin had been properly followed, and they stood in right relationship to God within that covenant.

The law itself promised this kind of standing. It did not present an impossible standard merely to drive people to despair. For those within that system, there was a clear, workable way to be "righteous" in its terms:

• Obey the commandments as a pattern of life.
• When sin occurred, follow the prescribed sacrifices, offerings, and rituals.
• Live faithfully within the covenant relationship.

In other words, righteousness under the law was not the absence of any sin across a lifetime, but covenant faithfulness, including correct response to sin as defined by the law.

Zacharias and Elizabeth, therefore, embody what might be called Torah righteousness. They are real examples of people who, within the Mosaic framework, fulfilled what the law required.

subsection*3. "All Have Sinned" and "None Righteous" in Their Context

Romans 5:12 states:

"Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned."

This verse is affirming universal participation in Adam's fallen condition and universal involvement in sin. It is not denying that God, within his covenants, can declare certain individuals righteous.

Similarly, Romans 3:10 says:

"As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one."

This is often taken in a strictly universal, ahistorical sense: at all times, in every sense, absolutely no one has ever stood righteous before God. But Paul is quoting a specific Old Testament context (from the Psalms/Prophets), in which the prophet is describing a particular generation or situation in Israel where no one was seeking God, none understood, all had turned aside.

In that prophetic setting:

• "There is none righteous, no, not one" is a situational judgment about Israel's then‑present spiritual condition.
• Paul uses that passage to show that Israel, as a whole, stands under sin just as Gentiles do, and that the law cannot now be appealed to as a shield of superiority.

This does not cancel out the many Old Testament passages where certain individuals are described as righteous, blameless, or upright, nor does it erase Luke 1:6. It describes a broad moral condition, not a denial of every individual exception within specific covenants and times.

So, "all have sinned" in Romans 5:12 speaks to the universality of sin and death in Adam, not to the impossibility of ever attaining covenant righteousness by God's own standards under the law.

subsection*4. How Could Sinners Be Righteous under the Law?

The law contained built‑in provisions for dealing with sin. A person could be:

• A sinner by nature and by act.
• Yet, by obeying the sacrificial system, confession, and ritual requirements, be cleansed and restored to right standing.

Old Testament and Second Temple texts repeatedly affirm that:

• Sacrifices, when offered in faith and obedience, secured forgiveness.
• The worshiper was declared clean, forgiven, or "righteous" in a legal sense.

So one could say:

• "All have sinned" (Romans 5:12).
• And simultaneously, "Zacharias and Elizabeth were righteous before God, walking in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord" (Luke 1:6).

These statements operate at different levels:

• Romans 5:12: the universal human condition in Adam---everyone is touched by sin and death.
• Luke 1:6: the covenantal status of two faithful Israelites under the Mosaic system---righteous according to that covenant's stipulations.

The existence of sin in someone's past does not mean they cannot be judicially declared righteous after God's appointed means of atonement and cleansing have been applied.

subsection*5. Righteousness under the Law vs.~Righteousness in the Age of Grace

Another key distinction concerns dispensations---what God is doing and requiring in different ages.

Under the Mosaic law:

• Righteousness is tied to Torah obedience and faithfulness.
• The law provides concrete, physical, cultic mechanisms (priests, temple, sacrifices) by which sinners can be restored to righteousness.

In the present age of grace, the situation is altered:

• The law, as a covenantal administration with priests and sacrifices, is not functioning.
• There is no legitimate altar in Jerusalem, no Levitical priesthood operating according to the law, no temple for the mandated offerings.
• Therefore, no one today can be "righteous" in the sense of fully keeping the Mosaic system; its necessary instruments are absent.

Paul's insistence in Romans that "there is none righteous" can be understood, in part, as the announcement that no one is now righteous under the law, because the law's system has been transcended and set aside as the way of standing before God. A new economy, the dispensation of grace, has begun.

subsection*6. Righteousness and the Body of Christ

For those in the body of Christ today, the language shifts:

• We are not presented as people who have fulfilled the Mosaic law.
• Rather, we are those to whom God is not imputing sin and to whom he credits righteousness in Christ.

Consider Romans 5:18:

"Therefore as by the offense of one judgment came upon all men to condemnation; even so by the righteousness of one the free gift came upon all men unto justification of life."

And 2 Corinthians 5:21:

"For he hath made him to be sin for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him."

Here, righteousness is not something we have earned by law‑keeping. Instead:

• Christ, the one truly righteous man, provides a "free gift" that leads to "justification of life."
• We are "made the righteousness of God in him."

This is different in character from Luke 1:6. For Zacharias and Elizabeth, righteousness is covenantal obedience under the law. For members of the body of Christ:

• Our righteousness is vicarious and positional---we are counted righteous because we are in Christ, the righteous one.
• Our sins are not imputed to us; instead, his righteousness is counted to us.

There may even be a sense in which the technical term "righteous" in its law‑code sense properly belongs to Israel's legal framework, while for the body of Christ the preferred language is "justified," "accepted," or "made righteous in him," not "righteous under the law." In any case, the mechanism and the covenant are not the same.

subsection*7. Reconciling the Texts

With these distinctions in place, we can reconcile Luke 1:6 and Romans 5:12:

1. All humans are sinners in Adam. Romans 5:12 affirms that sin and death have passed upon all. Zacharias and Elizabeth were no exception. They were born into Adam's fallen race and, at various points, committed sins.
2. Under the Mosaic law, sinners could become covenantally righteous. The law provided a system by which sin could be forgiven and a person could be restored to a standing of righteousness before God. Zacharias and Elizabeth, by faithfully walking "in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord," stood as genuinely righteous within that covenant.
3. "None righteous" in Romans 3:10 has a contextual scope. It describes the spiritual condition Paul is addressing---Israel and Gentiles alike under sin---not denying every individual case of law‑based righteousness affirmed elsewhere in Scripture.
4. In the present age, righteousness is in Christ alone and apart from law‑keeping. Today, no one becomes righteous by the law, both because the law's system is not in force as a standing covenant with us and because God has introduced a new way---justification by grace through faith, with Christ's righteousness imputed to the believer.

So Zacharias and Elizabeth were truly righteous people in the sense of covenantal Torah righteousness. At the same time, they were part of fallen humanity of whom it can rightly be said, "all have sinned." Sin does not preclude the possibility of being judicially declared righteous when God himself provides and honors the means of cleansing he has established.

Those two truths sit comfortably side by side once we distinguish between universal sin in Adam, covenantal righteousness under the law, and the distinct gift of righteousness in Christ in the present dispensation.