What is the PB's understanding of the 'creature' in Rom 8:19?
Is it all of creation? Is it Christians? Is it the Jews? I lean toward the whole of creation but from what I read the Reformers were not quite in agreement.
Charles Hodge from Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans:
That ‘ktisis’ here, is to be taken, not as meaning the whole human family, nor the heathen world, nor all rational creatures, but the whole creation with which we are immediately connected-the earth, and all its tribes of beings, man excepted-is the opinion of the great majority of commentators of all ages.
It is best of all by "the creature" to understand the Gentile world. "The creature" here, and "the whole creation", must be the same; now the phrase "the whole creation", or "every creature", as it may be rendered, signifies the nations of the world, in distinction to the Jews..."
