What is the role of the law in the Christian life? This has been and remains today an issue that lies close to the heart of Christian ethics, as may be seen, for example, in the recent conversations between Lutheran and Reformed theologians in America. Superior biblical exegesis and improvements in historical research have facilitated some heartening breakthroughs on issues that have divided these communions in the past. Among the theological problems still unresolved, however, is that which is the subject of the present treatise: the relation between law and gospel.