Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Argument on the Epistle to the Romans
There are two parts of this epistle. The first, from the beginning up to the end of chapter XII, is dogmatic, and it discusses the question of the works of the law and of grace: namely, whether justice and salvation have been granted to the Jews alone (as they themselves boasted) on account of the merits of the works of the law; or rather to all nations without exception, without any merit of works of the law or of nature, granted freely by God, that through faith in Christ and through His grace they may be justified, and then by cooperating with faith and grace they may live justly and holily, and so attain eternal salvation.
For about this matter the Jews were contending with the Gentiles, the Gentiles boasting of their philosophy and moral virtues, on account of their justice; while the Jews were peddling the works of the law, and the fact that they were descendants of Abraham, to whom the Messiah and salvation had been promised, so that, if the Gentiles wished to obtain these things, they would have to be circumcised and become Jewish proselytes. The Apostle here rebuts both, showing that the Jews most grievously sinned against the law of Moses, and the Gentiles against the law of nature, and that both stood in need of a redeemer; and therefore that the Messiah was freely promised to both, by whose faith and grace they are freely justified.
Now this is the division of the whole epistle. In the first five chapters the Apostle restrains the pride both of the Jews and of the Gentiles, and shows that the latter have violated the law of nature just as the former have violated the law of Moses. And therefore all are under sin, and consequently in need of Christ the Saviour; and that justice is to be sought and hoped for from the faith and grace of Christ, not from the works of the law or of nature.
Secondly, in chapter VI, he teaches how they ought to advance in the justice received through Christ, and to resist their vices: for, as he says in chapter VII, after justification concupiscence remains in the just man, which the law made known, but the grace of Christ restrains and overcomes.
Thirdly, in chapter VIII, he enumerates the fruits which we obtain from the faith and justice of Christ.
Fourthly, in chapters IX, X, and XI, he teaches that the Gentiles have been called and elected to justice, and the Jews have been rejected from it; because the Gentiles were willing to believe in Christ, while the Jews were not, but sought justice in the law of Moses and not in the faith of Christ, and laid claim to it for themselves as the posterity of Abraham, as though owed to them by hereditary right.
Fifthly, in chapter XII, he passes on to morals and exhorts to the exercise of the Christian virtues, and finally, in chapter XVI, he closes the epistle with greetings.
Note first: This epistle was written after both of those to the Corinthians, as St. Chrysostom rightly noted and as is clear from 1 Corinthians chapter XVI, 2, where Paul exhorts that a collection be made for the poor of Jerusalem; whereas in this epistle to the Romans, chapter XV, 25, he indicates that the collection has already been made. Yet this epistle is placed first by the Church, either on account of the pre-eminence of the Roman Church, as Catharinus thinks. Hence St. Irenaeus, Book III, chapter 1, hands down that St. Paul together with St. Peter evangelized at Rome, and with him founded the Roman Church, just as he also consecrated it with him by his blood and martyrdom. Or, as St. Augustine supposes in epistle 105 to Sixtus, because it commends the grace of faith, which is the head and beginning of all graces. Or, as Theodoret holds, on account of the exact teaching of every kind.
Note secondly: Probably Salmeron, vol. I, prolegomenon 35, at the end, holds that this single epistle of Paul was written in Latin. First, because the Apostle writes it to Latins: for he himself, by the gift of tongues infused in him, also knew Latin. Secondly, because his amanuensis was Tertius, chapter XVI, 22, which is a Latin name. You will say: Why then does he so often Graecize here? I reply: Because hitherto he had been engaged among the Greeks, and so was inclined toward Greek. On the contrary, Bellarmine, in Book II On the Word of God, chapter VII, and others commonly, contend that all Paul's epistles, except the one to the Hebrews, were written in Greek. Certainly St. Chrysostom and the Greeks follow the Greek text as if it were the autograph. The Syrian does the same. Add to this that Paul in this epistle does not contrast Roman to Jew and Barbarian, but Greek, chapter I, verses 14 and 16. For he writes from Greece, where, living among Greeks, he had already grown accustomed to the Greek language, and so he also writes in Greek to the Romans, because for these, as for others, the Greek tongue was at that time familiar and elegant, as I will say at chapter I, verse 16. Therefore Paul does here just as if some Frenchman or Belgian were to write from France into Belgium to the Louvainers or Antwerpers in French. Thirdly, the same is confirmed by the fact that this epistle abounds in Graecisms, and that our Latin text often appears to be expressed from the Greek word for word, indeed to the letter and accent: as that which is in chapter I, 31: "Without affection, without covenant, without mercy," — who does not see that it is expressed to the letter from the Greek words ἀστόργους, ἀσπόνδους, ἀνελεήμονας? For if Paul had written in Latin, he would in Latin have said clearly: Inhuman, covenant-breakers, unmerciful. We shall see similar Graecisms in chapter I, 7, 8, and following: so that this epistle plainly seems to be written in Greek style and phrasing.
Fourthly, here too there seems to be the sense and agreement of the interpreters, both Greek and Latin. For all of them appeal, when the reading is doubtful, to the Greek text, as if to Paul's autograph. But if the Greek text is of ambiguous and varied meaning, the interpreters also vary in their exposition: nothing of the sort happens with the Latin: for example, Romans chapter I, verse 1, the Greek ὁρισθέντος Chrysostom and the Greeks render as, who has been declared; but our Interpreter and the Latins translate and read, who has been predestined. For the Greek ὁρισθέντος signifies both. But if Paul had written in Latin, who has been predestined, there would here be no dispute, no variation, no doubt; the case would be decided in favour of the Latins, all the Latins would summon the Greeks to Paul's Latin autograph: which nevertheless nobody has hitherto done.
I add, however, that it is probable that Paul's Greek autograph was soon translated into Latin speech by Tertius, or by another interpreter whom, as I have said elsewhere, Paul always had at hand, and so was transmitted to the Romans and Latins; for the reasons of Salmeron's earlier opinion suggest this. And for this reason, namely on account of the harshness and obscurity of the interpreter, Diodorus of Tarsus thought this epistle was written more disjointedly and obscurely than the others, as I will say at chapter XVI, 22. In a like manner St. Mark, who had written his Gospel in Latin at Rome, is said to have translated it into Greek at Aquileia, the original of which is even now preserved at Venice, as Peter Bishop of Aquileia testifies in his Catalogue, Book IV, chapter LXXXVI. Likewise Irenaeus, whom all agree to have written in Greek, being Greek, some think was soon translated into Latin by some intimate interpreter of his, among whom is Fevardentius in his preface to Irenaeus: for the antiquity and gravity of his Latin style seem to suggest this.
Finally, this epistle was written in the year of Christ 58, as Baronius says, at Corinth, sent through Phoebe, as the Greek, Syriac, and Royal Latin Bibles have at the end of the epistle, when St. Peter had already departed from Rome by command of Claudius into Britain; then certainly Paul confirmed the Romans, who were deprived of their pastor and were quarrelling among themselves over the questions already mentioned, taught them and brought them back to concord. Whence it is not surprising that Paul does not greet Peter in this epistle, since he was absent from Rome.
Synopsis of the Chapter
Paul, commending his apostolate and the Gospel, greets the Romans, and earnestly desires to visit them and to preach to them.
Hence secondly, verse 16, he teaches that the Gospel and the faith of Christ are the power of God unto salvation for everyone who believes; for the just lives by faith.
Whence thirdly, verse 18, he teaches that the Gentiles before Christ, although they had recognized God from creatures, did not nevertheless worship Him, but idols, and were therefore handed over by God to a reprobate mind, and fell into the abominable crimes which he here enumerates. Therefore he teaches that all before Christ were subject to sin and to the wrath of God; so that he may thence conclude that all stood in need of the Gospel, of the faith, and of the grace of Christ the Redeemer.
Vulgate Text: Romans 1:1-32
1. Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an Apostle, set apart unto the Gospel of God, 2. which He had promised before by His Prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3. concerning His Son, who was made unto Him of the seed of David according to the flesh, 4. who was predestined the Son of God in power according to the spirit of sanctification by the resurrection of the dead, of Jesus Christ our Lord: 5. through whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all the Gentiles for His name, 6. among whom you also are called of Jesus Christ: 7. to all who are at Rome, beloved of God, called to be saints. Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and the Lord Jesus Christ. 8. First indeed I give thanks to my God through Jesus Christ for you all: because your faith is proclaimed in the whole world. 9. For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit in the Gospel of His Son, that without ceasing I make remembrance of you, 10. always in my prayers: beseeching, if by any means at length I may have a prosperous journey, by the will of God, to come unto you. 11. For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual grace, to strengthen you: 12. that is, that I may be comforted together in you, by that faith which is mutual, both yours and mine. 13. But I would not have you ignorant, brethren: that I have often proposed to come unto you (and have been hindered hitherto), that I might have some fruit among you also, even as among other Gentiles. 14. To the Greeks and to the Barbarians, to the wise and to the unwise, I am a debtor: 15. so (as much as is in me) I am ready to preach the Gospel to you also that are at Rome. 16. For I am not ashamed of the Gospel. For it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first, and to the Greek. 17. For the justice of God is revealed therein from faith unto faith: as it is written: The just shall live by faith. 18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all impiety and injustice of those men who detain the truth of God in injustice: 19. because that which is known of God is manifest in them. For God has manifested it to them. 20. For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; His eternal power also and divinity: so that they are inexcusable. 21. Because, when they had known God, they did not glorify Him as God, or give thanks; but became vain in their thoughts, and their foolish heart was darkened; 22. for, professing themselves to be wise, they became fools. 23. And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into the likeness of the image of corruptible man, and of birds, and of fourfooted beasts, and of creeping things. 24. Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness: that they should dishonour their own bodies among themselves: 25. who changed the truth of God into a lie; and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen. 26. For this cause God delivered them up to shameful affections. For their women have changed the natural use into that use which is against nature. 27. And in like manner the men also, leaving the natural use of the woman, have burned in their lusts one toward another, men with men working that which is filthy, and receiving in themselves the recompense which was due to their error. 28. And as they did not approve to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense, to do those things which are not convenient, 29. being filled with all iniquity, malice, fornication, avarice, wickedness, full of envy, murder, contention, deceit, malignity, whisperers, 30. detractors, hateful to God, contumelious, proud, haughty, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, 31. foolish, dissolute, without affection, without covenant, without mercy. 32. Who, having known the justice of God, did not understand that those who do such things are worthy of death; and not only they who do them, but also they who consent to those who do them.
Verse 1: Paul, a Servant of Jesus Christ
1. Paul. — Concerning this name many here bring forward many things. First, some think this name to be Greek, and that it signifies rest, or rather one at rest, derived ἀπὸ τοῦ παύειν, that is, from resting. Just as on the contrary Saul (says Ambrose) signifies restlessness: for σάλος in Greek is the same as commotion. For Saul was restless, a disturber and persecutor of the Church.
Secondly, St. Jerome, in Hebrew Names, holds the name Paul to be Hebrew and to signify wonderful: for this is what the Hebrew פלא pele signifies, whence Paul. Others interpret Paul as worker, from the root פעל paal, that is, he worked.
Thirdly, others hold that the name Paul is mixed from Hebrew and Greek and signifies the mouth of the trumpet, or rather the mouth of the flute, as if it were forged from פה pe, that is, mouth, and αὐλός, that is, flute. Again St. Damasus, in his Poem on St. Paul, thinks that Paul changed the name of Saul into Paul at baptism. But against this is the fact that after Acts chapter IX, where Paul is baptized, he is always called Saul, up to chapter XIII. Therefore after baptism he long retained the name of Saul: therefore he did not take the name of Paul at baptism. Finally Origen thinks that Paul was of two names, and that at his circumcision both the name of Paul and that of Saul were imposed on him, just as Matthew was called Levi.
But I reply and say: It is more true that Paul is a Latin and Roman name, and again that Saul assumed this name of Paul at Acts XIII, 9, where with Barnabas he was set apart and designated Apostle of the Gentiles, namely, as soon as he began to preach to the Gentiles, that is, to Paul, the Proconsul of Cyprus, on whom he first chanced from among the Gentiles and whom he converted: so that, as I said, in order that to him and to other Gentiles Paul might more easily insinuate himself as a Roman citizen even by his name, Paul, I say, who desired to become all things to all men, that he might gain all; for this reason on the occasion of this Sergius Paulus, as I have said, he changed the Jewish name of Saul, by a slight change of one letter, into the Roman name of Paul.
That this is so is conjectured from the fact that until his apostolate to the Gentiles and the conversion of Sergius Paulus, he is always called Saulus, or Saul, after Saul the first king of his tribe of Benjamin, because he was acting among the Jews: but after that conversion of Sergius Paulus he is always called Paul, because thereafter he acts among the Romans and the Gentiles, as it were, the teacher and Apostle of the Gentiles. So St. Augustine, Book VIII Confessions, chapter III; St. Jerome, in the epistle to Philemon, Bede and Salmeron here, and Lorinus on chapter IX of Acts, verse 18.
Therefore Sergius Paulus did not impose on Saul his own name of Paul out of friendship, as some would have it; just as Josephus admits that he received the name Flavius from the Flavian family of Titus and Vespasian: when rather Sergius Paulus, as a catechumen and disciple, ought to have received his name from Paul, as from his teacher: just as St. Cyprian assumed the name of Caecilius from Caecilius the presbyter, by whom he was baptized: but only on the occasion of that Paulus who bore a similar name, and whom Paul first converted from among the Gentiles, did he, of his own accord, take the name of Paul among the Gentiles.
Hence it is plain that the etymology of Paul is Latin, and that Paulus means the same as small, tiny, modest. Hence Sigonius, in his Roman Names, is the authority that the name Paul stuck to the Aemilian family from his small stature; as if Paul were saying: I was once Saul to the Jews, now to you Romans I am the Roman Paul: of old before Christianity I was tall and proud, like another Saul; now made a Christian, I am little Paul; little, I say, both in body, and still more in lowliness of mind. So St. Thomas and St. Augustine, in the book On the Spirit and the Letter, chapter VII. And on Psalm LXXII: "Paul, he says, first Saul, afterwards Paul, that is, first proud, afterwards humble. For Saul, from which the name of Saul is taken, you know was a proud and unbridled king. The Apostle did not change his name as if from some boastfulness; but from Saul he was made Paul, from proud, modest. For Paulum means modest." And in book I On the Words of the Lord, sermon 13: "You yourself are Paul, in yourself small, in the Lord great; in yourself weak, in the Lord most strong. You shall be exalted, because you are not ungrateful."
Wherefore the fact that St. Jerome, in the place already cited, considers the name of Paul to be a name of victory and triumph, although in actual fact this name may indeed be so taken; nevertheless this is not the true reason of this name from the mind and intention of Paul, who, as I have said, took the name of Paul not so much from a desire for sublimity as for familiarity and humility. I will here cite the words of St. Jerome, because they are beautiful: "As Scipio, he says, when Africa was subdued, took to himself the name African, and Metellus, when Crete was subjugated, brought back the surname Creticus, and the Roman Emperors even now are called from the subjugated nations Adiabenici, Parthici, Sarmatici; so also Paul, sent to the preaching of the Gentiles, brought back the trophies of his victory and raised his standard from the first spoil of the Church, the proconsul Sergius Paulus, so that he might be called Paul instead of Saul." More fittingly St. Augustine, sermon 25 On the Saints, vol. X: "Paul, he says, suffers what Saul had done. Saul stoned, Paul was stoned. Saul beat the Christians with rods, Paul received for Christ five times forty stripes save one. Saul persecuted the Church of God, Paul was let down in a basket. Saul bound, Paul was bound. And while Paul, raging, sought to diminish the number of Christians, he too came to be added to the number of the Confessors."
The Apostle therefore, as he himself says, "was weak in bodily presence." For he was Paul, that is, little, both in name and in body; but great in talent, mind, virtue, and deeds. "For the mind is not measured by the body," but transcends the body. Well and truly says the Wise Man, Ecclesiasticus XI, 3: "The bee is short, μικρά, that is, smallest, among flying things, and her fruit holds the beginning (πρωτεῖον, the first place, the chief rank) of sweetness." So St. Jerome was small in body but lofty in soul, as his Life in Ribadeneira and others has it. The same St. Augustine intimates of himself, in his homily On the Transfiguration of the Lord: "I beseech you, he says, by the Lord, that the unsightliness of a poor little man may not offend you, provided that, on whatever occasion, he may wipe away from your hearts the filth of sins." And in sermon 6 among the common ones: "I beseech you, brethren, etc., to pray for me, small and tiny," etc. St. Antoninus, a marvel of memory, as well as of holiness and of miracles, received his name from his small stature: for he was called Antonius. Indeed, as the Poet says,
Major in exiguo regnavit corpore virtus.
(Greater virtue has reigned in a small body.)
And on the contrary:
Nulla in tam vasto corpore mica salis.
(Not a grain of salt in so vast a body.)
And Cicero: "Each one with the most vigorous body is furthest from wisdom." Experience commonly teaches that great souls dwell in small bodies. For virtue united is stronger than itself divided. But the virtue of the soul in a small body is united, in a large body it is divided and dispersed. And for this reason magnanimity is naturally easier for the small than for the great, but humility is more difficult. Elegantly and wisely St. Gregory Nazianzen, writing to Nicobulus, who reproached his wife Alypiana, the daughter of Gorgonia the sister of Gregory, for her small stature, writes back thus, epistle 153: "You assail Alypiana before us with quibbles as being small and unworthy of your tallness, O great and vast and giant-like one, both in form and in strength. Now at last I understand that the mind is not subject to measure, and that rocks are more excellent than pearls, and crows nobler than nightingales. But you, indeed, enjoy your great size and your cubits." Then he adds: "But if you add this also, that she is bent for the sake of prayer, and through immense agitations of mind has perpetual familiarity with God; what will you here boast of your loftiness and your bodily measure? See her timely silence, hear her speaking, observe how not unbecoming she is, how, as a strong and vigorous woman, what advantages she brings to domestic affairs, how loving of her husband; and then you will say with the Laconian: Certainly the mind does not fall under measure, and one ought to have one's eyes turned from the external man into the internal. So you will cease to mock her as small, and will judge your marriage fortunate and happy."
Servant of Jesus Christ. — "Servant," namely an honorary one, who is called in Hebrew משרת mescaret, that is, minister, of whom I will say more at Philippians chapter I, verse 1.
Called to be an Apostle, — that is, called to the apostolate, an Apostle by calling. For in Greek it is not the participle κεκλημένος, that is, called, named; but the noun κλητός, that is, one summoned by name. Hence the Syrian renders קריא ושליחא karia vaschelicha, that is, summoned and Apostle, as if to say: Called out by God and an Apostle of God. Thus St. Chrysostom. So the Spaniards boast that they are criados del Rey, that is, servants of the King, summoned by the King, called ones of the King. Hence, on the testimony of Hesychius, one called is said to be noble. He alludes to Isaiah XLVIII, 12, where for what we have: "Hear, Israel, whom I call," the Hebrew is מקראי mecorai, that is, called by Me, as Aquila, Symmachus, Vatablus and others render it: for Israel was a type of St. Paul and of the faithful. See what was said there. Again Paul here alludes through the Hebrew and Syrian name scelicha, that is, Apostle, to his former royal name Saul. For Saul in Hebrew signifies the one called and asked for, namely by God for the kingdom, just as our Saul here, from the same tribe of Benjamin, was called and asked for the apostolate: and it is a Hebrew paronomasia, as if to say, Paul: I who was once Saul or Saul, am now scelicha, that is, called to the legation and Apostolic office. In like manner in the word karia, that is, called, he alludes to the twelve princes called by God and Moses, that they might preside over the twelve tribes, Numbers I, 16, as I said there. Wherefore the exposition of Anselm here is irrelevant, by which he holds that Paul calls himself not an Apostle, but called to be an Apostle, out of zeal for humility, as if to say: I do not call myself an Apostle, but I am called and said to be an Apostle by others: just as St. Bernard out of humility wished to be called and named not Abbot, but called Abbot of Clairvaux: for the Greek text contradicts this exposition, as is plain from what has been said.
Note first: Acts IX, Paul was called by Christ as Apostle, that is, legate, sent by Christ throughout the whole world to evangelize and teach the Gentiles, to found and govern the Churches of Christ, of which I will say more on verse 5.
Note secondly: Besides the twelve Apostles, who in Matthew X were called by Christ while living on earth and were sent to preach the kingdom of God, the name of Apostle was also extended to Paul, Barnabas, Silas, Luke, Mark and others, who obtained almost the same office as those first twelve called by Christ. Hence St. Jerome, in chapter I on Titus, verse 1, looking up at the title of Apostle in Paul and the Apostolic dignity, says: "What Paul says of himself, an Apostle however of Jesus Christ, seems to me of like nature as if he had said, Praetorian prefect of Augustus Caesar, master of the army of Tiberius. For just as the judges of this age, in order that they may seem nobler, take their titles from the kings whom they serve and from the dignity by which they swell up; so also the Apostle, claiming for himself a great dignity among Christians, prefixed himself with the title of Apostle of Christ, in order that by the authority of the very name he might strike fear into those who would read, indicating that all who believed in Christ ought to be subject to him." For the Apostles received from Christ authority and command over the whole world and over all the faithful.
Note thirdly: Paul, by this name of Apostle, as if by the title of an office of dignity and profession, is wont to introduce himself to his own at the beginning of his epistles. For just as kings and princes preface their letters: We Albert, by the grace of God Archduke of Austria, Duke of Brabant, etc.; so Paul: "I Paul, by the grace of God and the calling of Christ an Apostle;" not however intruded into the apostolate by myself, or by friends, or by lay power; for this is proper to false apostles and heretics, as St. Cyprian teaches in his book On the Unity of the Church: "These, he says, are they who of their own accord set themselves over rash strangers without the divine dispensation, who constitute themselves as overseers without any law of ordination (note the term Ordination, which indeed is received not from a magistrate but from Christ Jesus and His vicars the Bishops, by the laying on of hands by the ancient rite in the sacrament of Order), who, with no one giving them the episcopate, take to themselves the name of Bishop." Indeed St. Paul, Hebrews V, 4: "Neither does anyone, he says, take the honour to himself, but he who is called by God, as Aaron was." And Jeremiah, censuring and blaming false prophets who intrude themselves through friends or kings, says thus, chapter XXIII, 21: "I did not send the Prophets, yet they ran; I did not speak to them, yet they prophesied." For just as it belongs to the magistrate to ordain civic affairs and civic prefects; so it belongs to Bishops to ordain sacred things and sacred Prelates: for this is the hierarchical order of the Church instituted by God. "It is written, says Ambrose, Book V, epistle 33 to his sister Marcellina: The things of God to God; the things of Caesar to Caesar; to the Emperor pertain the palaces, to the priest the Church: the right over the public walls, O Emperor, has been entrusted to you, not over sacred things." And Hosius to Constantius: "To you, he says, God has committed the Empire; to us He has entrusted the things which belong to the Church."
Set apart unto the Gospel of God, — as for an arduous and sublime matter, which transcends every measure and rule of nature. The Holy Spirit again seems to allude to the Hebrew etymology of the name of Paul. For as Saul, or Saulus, signifies one called and asked for the Apostolic office, so פלא pele (whence Paulus) signifies arduous, excellent, wonderful, and therefore set apart from the common crowd. The same is suggested by the Greek ἀφωρισμένος; for ἀφορίζειν signifies to set something aside and to segregate it as outstanding, that is, as a chosen instrument, such as Paul was. Hence physicians too call selected, rare, and outstanding maxims ἀφορισμούς. So Christ, Isaiah IX, 6, is called פלא pele, that is, wonderful, outstanding, set apart. And the angel announcing the birth of Samson to Manoah, Judges XIII, 18: "Why do you ask, he says, my name, which is wonderful," in Hebrew, which is פלא pele.
Verse 2: Which He Had Promised Before by His Prophets
2. Which He had promised before by His Prophets in the holy Scriptures concerning His Son. — As if to say: The Gospel is not new, nor recently invented, nor fabricated from my brain or that of any other man, but instituted and decreed by God from eternity, and therefore long ago promised through all the holy Prophets as a rare, wonderful, salutary, divine, most certain and most true thing; inasmuch as it has been confirmed and corroborated by the time of so many ages: for truth is the daughter of time, says Cicero, Book II On the Orator.
Verse 3: Who Was Made Unto Him of the Seed of David
3. Who was made unto Him of the seed of David according to the flesh. — The Syrian, Valla, and Erasmus translate, who was begotten, or born. But our Interpreter renders better, who was made: for in Greek it is not γενηθέντος, or γεννωμένου from γεννάω, that is, I beget; but γενομένου from γίνομαι, that is, I become. Hence St. Cyril, in Book XI of the Thesaurus, in the middle, says that the whole Most Holy Trinity is called and is ἀγένητον, that is, uncreated, unmade, or not created, not made; but the Father alone is and is called ἀγέννητον, that is, unbegotten; and thus the Fathers here interpret Christ as not born but made; as Tertullian, Against Praxeas; Irenaeus, Book III, chapter XXXII; St. Augustine, Book II On the Trinity, chapter V. For the word made more signifies the human nature of Christ against Marcion, and that Christ did not bring it from heaven into the Virgin, as Valentinus held; but in the Virgin, and...
Verse 4: Who Was Predestined to Be the Son of God
4. Who was predestined to be the Son of God. — "Who was predestined," in Greek ὁρισθέντος, which both the Syriac and the Greek aptly and plainly render: who was declared and acknowledged to be the Son of God. Thus Chrysostom, Theophylact, Oecumenius, Origen, Theodoret; indeed Toletus thus expounds the Latin praedestinatus, or defined, namely not as to the thing itself, but as to the knowledge of men, so that praedestinatus is the same as certified, made certainly known to men, as if to say: Christ has been demonstrated and declared above the other Saints, who are sons of God by adoption, since He alone is the natural Son of God. But this is to twist the Latin word praedestinatus into praedemonstratus, or declaratus. Wherefore in this sense Ambrose better understands here the word declarari, when he expounds thus: Christ, hidden in the Incarnation, was predestined that He might be declared the Son of God in the Resurrection. Secondly, more correctly and more profoundly, our Translator — whatever Calvin may protest — renders the Greek ὁρισθέντος as qui praedestinatus est, and so read St. Irenaeus, bk. III, ch. XXXII; Hilary, bk. VII On the Trinity; Augustine, bk. On the Predestination of the Saints, ch. XV; Ambrose and others. For the Greek ὁρίζειν, although among profane authors it often means to declare, nevertheless on the authority of St. Dionysius, bk. On the Divine Names, ch. V, throughout Scripture it means to define, to establish, to predestine; as in Acts II, 23: "Him, being delivered by the determined counsel and foreknowledge of God," in Greek ὡρισμένῃ βουλῇ. Acts X, 42: "He it is who has been ordained judge of the living and the dead," in Greek ὡρισμένος κριτής. Acts XVII, 26: "Determining appointed times," in Greek ὡρισμένους καιρούς.
Add: Even though Origen, Jerome, Tertullian, Cyril, Theodoret, Chrysostom, and Oecumenius read in Greek ὁρισθέντος, which is literally destinatus est, namely from eternity — which in substance is the same as what our Translator renders praedestinatus est — nevertheless others, such as Ambrose, Augustine, Irenaeus in the places already cited, Epiphanius (heresy 54, at the end), and Athanasius (bk. III On the Assumption of the Man) clearly read in Greek προορισθέντος. Now this, taken literally, is the same as praedestinatus est, but not as praedeclaratus est. For that it cannot be rendered so here is plain from what follows; the prefix prae would introduce a false sense.
Where note: Origen thinks that Christ alone is called ὁρισθέντα, that is, destined, because before He was born as man, He was God and the Son of God; while we are called προορισθέντας, that is, predestined, because we did not exist before we were born. But this distinction is more subtle than true and solid; for here destinatus is the same as praedestinatus, as I have already said. Wherefore Origen does not rightly expound this passage thus, as if Paul were saying: Christ, existing as the Son of God, was destined to be the prince and firstborn from the dead, namely, that He might exercise divine power upon them and give them the Spirit of sanctification and vivification.
The sense therefore of the Apostle is, as if to say: The man Christ, who was made of the seed of David, that is, to whom was given the essence and existence of human nature, was predestined to this end, that He might subsist in the person of the Son of God; that is, Jesus was predestined to this, namely that He who was to be the son of David according to the flesh might also be the Son of God according to hypostasis: that is, it was predestined that this man, who is called Jesus and is the son of David, should at the same time be the Son of God, since indeed it was predestined that this man should be assumed by the Son of God and hypostatically united to Him, so that He should be at once man and God, or son of man and Son of God. So St. Augustine, On the Predestination of the Saints, ch. XV; Anselm, Eleventh Council of Toledo, ch. 1, and the Scholastics in many places, Part III, Question XXIV.
You will say: The pronoun who refers to the Son of God, who was just mentioned. But the Son of God is not predestined to become the Son of God, because He was always the Son of God. So Calvin.
I answer: The pronoun who refers to the Son of God, not formally but materially, that is, not insofar as He is the Son of God, but insofar as He was made according to the flesh from the seed of David, as was just stated; that is, it refers to this man Christ, who was assumed by the person of the Word, and is the Son of God. For this man was not from eternity the Son of God, but was predestined to be the Son of God, just as in time He was made the Son of God.
Where note that Sacred Scripture speaks of Christ in such a way that now it speaks of His divinity, then passes to His humanity, and again returns to His divinity. Hence it comes that to Christ are given attributes which are proper to God, and immediately others are attributed which apply only to man. This is clearly seen in Hebrews I, 2, where the Apostle speaks thus: "In these last days (God) has spoken to us by His Son, whom He has appointed heir of all things." Behold, here he speaks of the Son as He is man; and immediately he speaks of the same, as He is God. For he adds: "Through whom He also made the worlds, who being the brightness of His glory;" and again returns to the same Son inasmuch as He is man, when he immediately adds: "Having made purgation of sins, He sits at the right hand of Majesty on high."
You will say secondly: This man includes not only Christ's human nature but also His person, which is the Word; and the relative who cannot refer to the human nature, because then one would have to say which (qua); therefore it refers to the person. But in Christ there was no other person than the divine person of the Word; and this could not be predestined to union with the Word. For thus it would have been predestined that the same be united with the same, that is, the same with itself: which is impossible. Hence the Doctors generally say that only the human nature was predestined and raised to this union with the Word. This is Toletus's argument, by which he contends to prove that here praedestinatus must be expounded as declaratus.
I answer: The relative who refers to the human nature of Christ in the concrete, that is, to this man, not as subsisting, but as existing from the seed of David. For although materially the same subsists in the person of the Son of God, as was just stated; nevertheless in this new proposition, the mind from there — that is, from this subsistence and person of the Word — abstracts, and conceives this only as an existing man, not however as subsisting or personated, until the predicate Son of God is added. So it happens in every essential proposition; for in such a proposition the subject is always really the same as the predicate, but distinct in concept and as it were separated; as in man is animal, the lion is a brute.
I answer secondly: The pronoun who can refer to the person of this man, or to this supposit of Christ's humanity confusedly, abstracting from the fact that it is the same divine supposit of the Son of God. For although in reality the supposit of humanity and of divinity is the same in Christ, nevertheless in our concept, which we express by this proposition, the one can be conceived apart from the other, and so as it were be separated and abstracted; that is, that I should conceive this same supposit in the subject only insofar as it is the supposit of humanity; but in the predicate I should conceive the same insofar as it is the supposit of divinity, that is, of the Son of God. So that the sense is: it was predestined that the person of Christ as man should not be human, as is the case of other men, but should be the same with the person of the Son of God. So Francisco Suarez teaches subtly and learnedly, Part III, Question XXIV. And in this sense it is plain that of Christ, not only the human nature but also the person, in a confused or abstract sense, was predestined, as Suarez and St. Thomas teach in the same place.
Finally St. Thomas, Part III, Question XXIV, and the Scholastics note that this predestination of Christ was the means, end, and exemplar of our predestination: because, as Augustine says, On the Predestination of the Saints, ch. XV: "By that grace any Christian man becomes a man from the beginning of his faith, by which grace that Man from His beginning was made Christ. From the same Spirit He too is reborn, from whom the other was born. By the same Spirit there is wrought in us the remission of sins, by which it was brought about that He should have no sin": namely, both to Christ and to every Christian this is given without any merits of anyone, by the sheer grace of God.
In power according to the spirit of sanctification from the resurrection of the dead, of Jesus Christ our Lord. — First, St. Chrysostom and the Greeks explain this thus, as if to say: Christ was declared to be the Son of God, firstly, in, that is, from, the power of His miracles; secondly, because He gave the Holy Spirit; thirdly, from the resurrection from the dead, because thence He rose up as it were Lord of death.
Secondly, Theodoret and Toletus explain it thus, as if to say: Christ was declared to be the Son of God through the power conferred on the Apostles by the Holy and sanctifying Spirit, by which they confirmed Christ's resurrection by wondrous signs and deeds: and this took place after the Lord Himself had risen from the dead. To this belongs Ambrose's exposition: Christ, he says, was predestined through the Holy Spirit to be made manifest as the Son of God, in the power by which He rose from the dead.
But our Translator, as I said, renders it not declaratus but praedestinatus est. Of this our version, then, the sense is: Christ "was predestined to be the Son of God in power," that is, with divine power (for the Greek is δύναμις, not ἀρετή, and in stands for cum; for so the Hebrews often take ב for עם), namely, that, although He was the son of David according to the frail and weak flesh, He should have nevertheless both divine power and divine hypostasis; that is, that through this power this man, united to the Word, might work miracles, remit sins, sanctify men: which power He had according to, that is, through and from, the divine nature, which is the "Spirit of sanctification," that is, the fountain of all sanctity; or more plainly, from the Holy Spirit, who carried out this whole work of union of man with God in Christ, and so sanctified Him that He gave Him the power of sanctifying all men. This power of the Holy Spirit chiefly showed itself and was made manifest "from the resurrection" from the dead, that is, in the resurrection, by which Christ raised up Himself and other dead. Whence concerning this Christ then said, Matthew XXVIII: "All power is given to Me in heaven and on earth." And John, Apocalypse V: "Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and divinity and wisdom." Thus St. Augustine and the interpreters generally.
Some also explain it thus: Christ was predestined to be the Son of God, "in power," that is, in the hypostatic union, which was a most excellent work of the power of both God the Father and of the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier: through which mighty union God Himself and the Holy Spirit brought about the resurrection of the dead, and caused that Christ and the other Christians should rise from bodily death to the blessed life, while sinners should rise from the death of sin to the life of grace. This exposition is more subtle; yet it follows and coheres with the former, which is plainer and more solid. Note first that here there are ellipses: for the words habuit, patuit (He had, it was made plain) must be supplied. See canon 37.
Note secondly that resurrection, in Greek ἀνάστασιν, can be taken here both passively, by which Christ rose, and actively, by which Christ caused Himself and others to rise. So Ambrose.
Note thirdly the Hebraism, "of Jesus Christ our Lord," that is, His own or of Him: for the Hebrews, in place of the demonstrative pronoun, often repeat the antecedent noun. Paul therefore here adds the words of Jesus Christ, both to express and teach that this name is proper to the Son of God of whom he has been speaking, and because He held the most sweet name of the Saviour as His delight, and consequently always had it in His heart and on His lips.
Finally St. Anselm, and from him Salmeron, probably, plainly and easily explain this passage thus: that Christ is here said to have been "predestined to be the Son of God," not simply and absolutely, but with the addition, namely, "in the power of the resurrection," that is, predestined to rise; "in power," that is, in the power, glory, and majesty of immortality; so that then, as it were fully and perfectly, the Son of God would appear to be regenerated and reborn glorious and immortal — as if Paul were saying: It was predestined and defined by God that Christ as man should be the Son of God, not in infirmity and humility, such as He appeared at the beginning, being born, living, and dying, but in the power and glory of the resurrection: namely, that He should rise from the dead and be the immortal Son of God, and show forth the glory of the Godhead through His body; which was done through the Holy and sanctifying Spirit, who, just as in the Incarnation He sanctified Christ's soul through grace and glory, so in the resurrection He sanctified Christ's body through immortality and glory, and consequently the whole Christ fully and perfectly. "Christ," says Anselm, "who was predestined according to the flesh (since God from eternity predestined that His Word should become flesh, and that, raising up that flesh, He should glorify it), was predestined to be the Son of God in the power of immortality and might, concerning which, after the resurrection, He says: All power is given to Me in heaven and on earth." For when He Himself says of the elect that they are sons of God, because they are sons of the resurrection, why should not He much more — who "according to His divinity is naturally always the Son of God" — in the resurrection, according to His humanity, be said to have been made the Son of God? Whence also the Father, raising up the Son, said to Him: "Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee," Acts XIII, 33. This sense appears plain and attractive, and escapes the difficulties about the predestination of Christ brought forward shortly before; but it somewhat narrows, deflects, and enervates the general words of the Apostle, namely, that Christ is the Son of God not absolutely, but in the power and glory of the resurrection, and that He had then only the Spirit of sanctification, which the Apostle here attributes to Him absolutely. Therefore the prior explanation already set forth, though somewhat more difficult, seems nevertheless to be more genuine, and more in accord with the mind and phrase of the Apostle, and more sublime, solid, and universal.
Verse 5: Through Whom We Have Received Grace and Apostleship
5. Through whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations for His name. — Maldonatus, in his manuscript notes which I have seen at Rome, judges this to be a hendiadys: "grace and apostleship," that is, the grace of apostleship; and rightly. Hence also, from verse 1 of nearly all the epistles of St. Paul, with St. Chrysostom and Origen, note against Calvin and Erasmus, that apostleship signifies not only a legation and mission, or the function of mission and legation, as its etymology suggests, but also signifies the office, power, and primary and supreme dignity in the Church. For as the Legate of the Supreme Pontiff is now called Nuncio, or Apostolic Legate, and this is a great dignity: so likewise the Apostles were called and were in fact legates of Christ, Matthew XXVIII, 19, and by this very fact obtained supreme authority in the Church: "We are ambassadors for Christ," says Paul, II Corinthians V, 20. The Apostles, therefore, were the first ones from Christ, were taking Christ's place, and represented the person of Christ: as the king's legate represents the king himself. Therefore, although all the Apostles were subject to St. Peter, as Pontiff and head of the Church, and had to obey him, nevertheless they had power equal to his: Firstly, of preaching the Gospel throughout the whole world, "for obedience to the faith among all the Gentiles," that is, that the faith might be obeyed by all the nations, namely, that the Apostles by their preaching might bring all the Gentiles to submit, believe, and obey the Gospel. So St. Chrysostom and others. Secondly, of founding Churches everywhere, that is, of creating bishops and presbyters, instituting the rite of sacred things and of the Sacraments, and disposing the entire order of the Church. Thirdly, of commanding, prohibiting, and punishing any of the faithful. Add fourthly, of writing canonical books. Whence Paul prefixes to his letters this title of his dignity and power, saying: "Paul, called to be an Apostle"; as the Legates of the Pontiff now do, saying: "We Octavius by the grace of God Apostolic Legate."
You will say: If in these four offices all the Apostles were equal to St. Peter, how then was Peter the head of them and of the whole Church?
I answer: because St. Peter could command the other Apostles as their superior; and if they erred, it was Peter's task to correct them; and if they disagreed, it was likewise his task to settle their disputes, and moreover to assign to each his burdens and provinces. So St. Cyprian, On the Unity of the Church. Thus ἐπισκοπή, or the episcopate, is not only a function, but also the very episcopal dignity, or prelacy. Whence Psalm CVIII says: "Let another receive his bishopric," where the Hebrew is פקדתו pekuddato, that is, let another receive his prefecture.
Some refer this to ad obediendum. Whence the Syriac translates: that all the Gentiles may obey the faith of His name. But more aptly you may refer these words to we have received the apostleship, as if to say: In the name and in place of Christ we have received the apostleship, and discharge a legation. So Ambrose; or, as Chrysostom and Theophylact: "We have received the apostleship for His name," that is, for the spreading abroad and divulging of the glory and faith of the name of Christ.
Verse 6: Among Whom Are You Also the Called of Jesus Christ
6. Among whom are you also the called of Jesus Christ. — "Called," that is, called by name, as it were servants or sons of Jesus Christ. So in the next verse: "To the called saints," he says, that is, to those called to sanctity, called to Christianity, that they may be holy. For all Christians are by their calling holy, because they have been called to sanctity; and, if they wish to respond to their calling, they ought to strive after sanctity, and to be holy. See what was said on verse 1.
Verse 7: To All That Are in Rome — Grace to You and Peace
7. To all that are in Rome. — There is here a hyperbaton and a disturbed order. For these words must be referred to the beginning of the chapter: "Paul, the servant of Jesus Christ"; whence some take all the words from verse 2 to here as a parenthesis. See canon 37. Next, the verb wishes or prays must here be understood, as if to say: "Paul wishes that to all who are at Rome there be grace and peace," understanding again, may it be fulfilled, or be multiplied; or certainly when he says, "Paul to all who are in Rome," understand, he writes this epistle.
Grace to you and peace from God our Father, and from the Lord Jesus Christ. — Tertullian, in book V Against Marcion, chapter V, notes that this was the salutation of the Jews, whom Christ followed: שלום לכם schalom lachem, peace to you, that is, may all things prosperous and favourable be to you. But this was the salutation of the Apostles: "Grace and peace to you," because they were heralds of the grace brought through Christ. The Roman Pontiffs and preachers and Religious have followed the same custom, prefacing their sermons and letters with grace and peace; and the Pontiffs also with the Apostolic benediction.
Note secondly: "Grace" is not only the benevolence and favour of God (as Beza will have it), but also that which follows from it, since it is not empty but liberal and efficacious, namely grace and every gratuitous benefit of God by which man is directed to salvation: such as faith, hope, charity, the virtues and their increase, the remission of sins, illuminations of the intellect, impulses of the will to a pious life, good works, perseverance in them, and finally life eternal itself.
"Peace" here is understood as that peace which the just soul has with God; likewise peace of conscience, so that the conscience, formerly disturbed by the thought of its sins and the terror of God's wrath, now, with sins remitted by the grace of God, may be at rest, and being at rest may serve God.
Morally, St. Chrysostom on II Timothy I, 1 notes that Paul's salutations are not only signs of benevolence, but also causes of blessing and grace. "It suffices," says Chrysostom, "for Paul's salutation alone to fill with grace the one who is so saluted." For the salutations of the Saints are silent prayers and blessings, powerful and efficacious, which obtain from God those goods which the Saints invoke upon those whom they salute: whence Christ, Matthew X, commanded the Apostles to bless and to invoke good upon their hosts in their salutation: "Entering into a house," He says, "salute it, saying: Peace be to this house." And lest you suppose this salutation to be only verbal and ceremonial, He adds its fruit and efficacy, saying: "And if indeed that house be worthy, your peace shall come upon it." Of such great worth is it to be saluted by the Saints. So the Blessed Virgin by her salutation filled Elizabeth and John the Baptist with the Holy Spirit, Luke I, 44. See here how powerful, how desirable, and how to be sought after is the salutation of the Saints.
Verse 8: First Indeed I Give Thanks to My God
8. First indeed I give thanks to my God. — St. Gregory Nazianzen, in his Apologeticus, says: τάξις ἀρίστη παντὸς ἀρχομένου καὶ λόγου, καὶ πράγματος, ἐκ Θεοῦ τε ἄρχεσθαι, καὶ εἰς Θεὸν ἀποπαύεσθαι. The best order, he says, of every undertaking, both of speech and of business, is to begin from God and to end in God, that we may sing to God: "From Thee is the beginning, in Thee shall it end."
Through Jesus Christ, — as our mediator, from whom faith, grace, and all good things, for which we give thanks to God, come to us, says Ambrose; and as our High Priest, by whose oblation all our things are pleasing to the Father, says Origen; and consequently our thanksgiving also is pleasing to the Father through Christ, who as Priest offers it to the Father.
For you all: because your faith is proclaimed in the whole world. — As if to say: I give thanks to God, whose grace is your faith. For your having believed in Christ has been brought about, not by yourselves, but through the grace of God. Again I give thanks to God, because by His grace it has come about that your faith — that is, the fame, excellence, and constancy of your faith, namely that you, who are at Rome the masters of the world, have believed the Gospel and persist generously and advance in it — is published throughout the whole world subject to the Romans, or wherever the name of the Romans is celebrated, as Chrysostom and Theodoret say.
Jerome teaches that this opinion and praise of Paul concerning the Romans applies not only to those present and to the Romans of that age, but also to their posterity, in book III Against Rufinus, chapter IV: "Unto the Romans," he says, "praised by the Apostolic mouth, perfidy has no access," nor has it had from St. Jerome's time until now: for never until our own times has heresy occupied Rome as it has other cities. Truly Tertullian, in his book On the Prescription against the Heretics, chapter XXXVI: "You have," he says, "Rome, whence authority too is at hand for us: how happy is that Church to which the Apostles poured forth their whole doctrine with their blood."
Wherefore St. Jerome, in the preface to book II on the Epistle to the Galatians: "Do you wish to know," he says, "O Paula and Eustochium, how the Apostle marked out each province with its own characteristics? Even to this day the same vestiges either of virtues or of errors remain. The faith of the Roman people is praised: where else is there such zeal and frequency in flocking to churches and to the tombs of the Martyrs? where the Amen so resounds in likeness of heavenly thunder, and the empty temples of idols are shaken? Not that the Romans have any other faith than that which all the Churches of Christ have, but because in them devotion is greater and simplicity in believing."
But St. Cyprian says something more, namely that these things were spoken prophetically by St. Paul, foreseeing the constancy of the Romans in the faith in future ages. For so he says in epistle 57 to Cornelius, where he commends Cornelius's and the Roman people's strength of faith in the time of the Decian persecution: "While there is one mind and one voice among you, the whole Roman Church has made confession; the faith has shone forth, dearest brethren, which the Blessed Apostle proclaimed concerning you, and proclaiming aloud your future merits, while he praised the parents he was challenging the children."
St. Chrysostom goes further here, and presses the word annuntiatur (is proclaimed), when Paul says: "Your faith is proclaimed in the whole world," namely that, just as the Roman Church, with Peter and Paul preaching, had believed, so after the manner of that Church as it were the mother, the other Churches and nations were to believe what she had believed. "Paul did not say," says Chrysostom, "It is manifest, but, Your faith is proclaimed; making it plain that to what was said nothing was to be added or taken away. This is the work of an angel or messenger, to deliver only those things which are spoken: wherefore the priest is called an angel, because he announces not his own things, but only those which he has received from him by whom he is sent: although Peter preached elsewhere, yet Paul reckons his deeds to be his own."
Hence among the ancients "Roman," not only among the orthodox, but also among heretics, was the same as Catholic. So Jocundus the Arian to King Theoderic: "If," he said, "you slay Armogastes with the sword, the Romans will proclaim him a martyr"; Romans, that is, Catholics. So Victor of Utica reports in the Vandal persecution, where he also commemorates another martyr who, when asked by the same Arians about his faith, replied, "I am a Roman"; a Roman, that is, a Catholic. In like manner Ricimer the Goth and Arian writes to the Ligurians: "If he is a Catholic, he is a Roman." Theodosius the Emperor too, in a letter to Acacius of Beroea: "It is fitting," he says, "for you, who are approved priests, to be of the Roman religion." The true and just cause of this nomenclature, as well as of the preeminence and constancy of the Roman Church, is that St. Peter transferred his episcopate from Antioch to Rome, and constituted and placed in the Roman Church, along with the episcopate, the primacy itself and the very rock of the faith and of the Church; and this "by divine counsel," says St. Leo, sermon 1 On the Nativity of Sts. Peter and Paul, namely that the Gospel and the faith might most swiftly spread from Rome, as from the head and citadel of the empire, throughout the whole world, and once spread might be preserved. For Rome was ἐπιτομή τῆς οἰκουμένης, as it were an epitome and compendium of the whole world: for in Rome dwelt natives of all nations: whence Polemon, cited by Galen, calls the Roman people ἐπιτομὴν τῆς οἰκουμένης. Other ancients address Rome as παμβασίλεια (universal queen), the dwelling of virtues, the head of the world, queen of cities, mother and nurse of heroes, fatherland of laws, goddess of lands and of nations, our common fatherland, fatherland of all — Rome which, as the Poet sings, Aeneid VI:
Imperium terris, animos aequavit Olympo.
Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento.
(She equalled her empire to the lands, her spirit to Olympus. Thou, Roman, remember to rule the peoples by thy sway.)
Whence also fittingly Roma, in Greek ῥώμη, signifies strength, but in Hebrew sublimity and loftiness, from the root רום, which means high, exalted, as St. Jerome notes, in book II Against Jovinian, where he thus addresses Rome: "I will address you, who have wiped out by your confession of Christ the blasphemy written upon your forehead, mighty city, city mistress of the world, city praised by the voice of the Apostle: interpret your name. Roma is either a name of strength among the Greeks, or of sublimity according to the Hebrews."
Wherefore from the Roman Church, as from the mother, the other Churches and nations were bound to believe what she had believed. St. Irenaeus teaches that the truth of the faith and of the Apostolic tradition is to be sought from her, in book III, ch. III: "Since," he says, "it is very long in such a volume to enumerate the successions of all the Churches; nevertheless, by indicating the tradition which it has from the Apostles and the faith announced to men, coming down through the successions of bishops even to us, of that greatest and most ancient Church, known to all, founded and constituted at Rome by the two most glorious Apostles Peter and Paul, we confound all those who, in whatever way, whether through evil self-pleasing or vainglory, or through blindness and evil judgment, gather otherwise than they ought. For with this Church, on account of its more powerful principality, it is necessary that every Church should agree, that is, those who are faithful from everywhere, in which always by those who are from everywhere has been preserved that which is the tradition from the Apostles."
Verse 9: For God Is My Witness, Whom I Serve in My Spirit
9. For God is my witness, whom I serve in my spirit, etc. — Paul here shows his exceptional affection for the Romans, that he may thus more easily insinuate and instil himself and his teachings into them. Now this affection was the cause that moved Paul to give thanks to God for the faith of the Romans. For the causal word for indicates this cause.
Whom I serve, — whom (God) I worship with latria; for in Greek it is ᾧ λατρεύω, which word in the usage of the Church means worship due only to God, as to the Lord of all. Thus St. Augustine, in book X On the City of God, ch. I. In like manner δουλεία (dulia) is rendered to the Saints by theological usage: nor does dulia exclude latria, but rather includes it. For as love of neighbour does not hinder, but rather includes and is referred to the love of God; so also dulia and the honour of the Saints is referred to the honour of God; that He, who is wonderful in His Saints, may be honoured in them; just as a king is honoured when his princes and friends are honoured, with an honour, namely, inferior to that with which the king is honoured in his own person.
Note "whom (namely God) I serve," in Greek λατρεύω, with great reverence and solicitude indeed; and therefore he adds, saying: "In my spirit"; for they say λατρεύειν is derived from λα, a particle which augments in composition, and τρεῖν, which is to tremble.
In my spirit, — as if to say: I serve God and worship God in spirit and mind, not in Judaic ceremonies. For so Christ commanded the Father to be adored in spirit and in truth, John IV, 23: so Origen, Chrysostom, Theophylact.
Secondly, not without reason others by the πνεῦμα, or spirit, here understand the vital spirit, as if Paul were saying: I expend my life and all my spirits, my sweat and blood for God; even to the last breath I serve God, and labour and contend for Him.
Verse 10: That I May Have a Prosperous Journey
10. That somehow at length I may have a prosperous journey in the will (that is, through the will) of God to come unto you, etc.
Verse 12: To Be Comforted Together in You
12. That is, to be comforted together in you, by that faith which is yours and mine together. — For "to be comforted together," the Greek is συμπαρακληθῆναι, that is, that we may both receive consolation and joy together, through the mutual communication of faith. So Chrysostom and Theodoret.
Secondly, more aptly Origen refers the "to be comforted together" to the "confirming," as if to say: I desire to see you that I may confirm you by instructing and teaching you in the faith of Christ; and this confirmation of mine may become our mutual consolation, from the common faith — mine and yours — now increased and confirmed through me. This sense is gathered from the next verse. Hence also it is plain that our Translator more correctly renders συμπαρακληθῆναι as "to be comforted together," than do Bucer and Beza, who render it "to exhort one another"; for the Apostle wished not to receive exhortation, but to give it to the Romans, as he says in the next verse. By this he also tacitly checks the pride of the Romans, as Chrysostom says, and insinuates that they need His instruction and admonitions: but consolation he wished both to give to the Romans, and in turn to receive from them.
Verse 13: I Am Ready to Preach the Gospel to You Also
13. So (as much as is in me) I am ready to preach the Gospel to you also, — as if to say: As far as it pertains to me, readiness is at hand; and as the Syriac renders, מרחפט merchappat, I am eager to evangelize you.
Verse 14: To Greeks and to Barbarians I Am a Debtor
14. I am a debtor to Greeks and Barbarians, to the wise and the unwise. — "Barbarian" is a Greek word, and made by the Greeks by onomatopoeia. Therefore by the Greeks, who were devoted to wisdom and eloquence, every man was called a barbarian who spoke any language other than Greek; and on this account even the Romans were barbarians to the Greeks. Whence Paul here, who up to that time had lived among the Greeks, after the Greek manner and phrase, opposes Barbarians to Greeks. So Cicero too, in book II On Divination, divides all peoples into Greeks and Barbarians. Whence Plautus also in the prologue of the Asinaria calls the Latin language barbarian. Of this I shall speak again on I Corinthians XIV, 11.
Chrysostom and Theophylact here note Paul's modesty, in that he says: "I am a debtor," as if to say: An indeclinable debt of evangelizing lies upon me. For this office of preaching has been entrusted and committed to me by God. Whence in I Corinthians IX, 16, he says: "Woe is me, if I preach not the Gospel!"
Verse 16: For I Am Not Ashamed of the Gospel
16. For I am not ashamed of the Gospel, — as the Jews are ashamed, who despise the Gospel of Christ crucified and Saviour, and hold it as a scandal; and as the Gentiles do, who deride it as folly, I Corinthians I, 23. Tertullian, in book V Against Marcion, ch. XIII, reads: "For I am not ashamed of the Gospel."
This word of Paul was generously and aptly used by the most illustrious Count Palatine, Paul Kostka, brother of Blessed Stanislaus Kostka, as is related in his Life. He, after his parents had died, being heir of vast and noble domains, following his brother, despised all that he had for love of Christ and bestowed it on the poor; indeed he built and endowed, among other things, a hospitable house, in which he himself wished to live, die, and be buried among the poor, that he might most closely follow Christ poor and His Gospel which proclaims the poor blessed, emulating the old example of St. Paula the Roman; and therefore he ordered to be inscribed on his sepulchre among them: "I am not ashamed of the Gospel." Signifying that the life of poverty, though ignoble to the world, freely chosen by him because he had devoted himself to the school and book of Christ, not of the world, was not for him a cause of blushing but of splendour, since the heavenly Master had shown and indeed had made it desirable and glorious by deed and by word. Wherefore among the Princes of Poland he obtained a great fame of sanctity, and stirred them by a like pious sense of evangelical poverty and perfection. For St. Ambrose splendidly says, in book I On Offices, ch. XXX: "No one," he says, "ought to be ashamed if from being rich he becomes poor, while he gives bountifully to the poor; for Christ became poor, although He was rich, that by His poverty He might enrich us." A word therefore worthy of a Christian prince: "I am not ashamed of the Gospel."
For it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes, — as if to say: The Gospel — that is, not the very word or writing of the Gospel, but the preaching and the faith, or rather the thing preached through the Gospel, namely Christ's death, merits, Sacraments, precepts; promises — although these are a shame, a scandal, and a laughingstock to unbelievers, nevertheless to us they are the strength and power of God; for in Greek it is δύναμις, through which God powerfully works salvation in believers, that is, faith, justice, and life eternal.
Luther objects: Therefore faith alone saves and justifies. I answer, I deny the consequence. Faith you will ask what is here understood by the justice of God.
Origen, Ambrose, and Chrysostom answer that there is understood that justice by which God is just in Himself: namely, that by which He justly renders to the just their reward, and to the impious and unjust their punishment, as Origen would have it; or, as Ambrose, that by which He is just in Himself, that is, truthful in His promises; or, as Chrysostom, that by which He is just in Himself, that is, good and kind to men on account of Christ.
Secondly, Theodoret: The justice of God, he says, is that by which Christ, by the strictness of justice, made satisfaction to God the Father on our behalf.
Thirdly, genuinely and most aptly, St. Augustine, in his book On the Spirit and the Letter, chapter 9: The justice of God, he says, is divine justice, not Jewish, not philosophical, by which namely God justifies us through Christ, and by which He truly makes us just in the eyes of God: this justice is revealed and clearly taught in the Gospel of Christ. In a similar manner is taken "salvation," in Psalm 3:9, where it is said, "Salvation is of the Lord," by which namely He makes us safe, that is to say, It is the Lord's to save and to give us salvation.
Note here in passing that this saying of the Apostle can also be extended to the salvation of the body; for it is generally true: for the Gospel is the power and instrumental cause of salvation and life not only future but also present, and that not only by voice but also in writing. For, as St. Augustine teaches, in tract 7 on John, the written codex of the Gospel, when applied to the sick, heals their ailments. "When your head aches," he says, "we praise you if you place the Gospel on your body and have not run to a binding charm." St. Thomas gives the reason, II-II, Question XCVI, article 4: "The word of God," he says, "is not of less efficacy than the relics of the Saints; but we use relics for healing; therefore in like manner, indeed in greater measure, it is permitted to use the written word of God, that is, the Gospel, for the same purpose."
Hence the custom arose among the faithful of carrying about the Gospel of St. John against poisons, witchcrafts, sicknesses, and other evils. But the Apostle here properly speaks not of bodily, but of spiritual salvation, which the Gospel procures not only by voice and preaching — which the Apostle here properly intends — but also by writing. Hence we sing of Blessed Cecilia: "Virgo gloriosa semper Evangelium Christi gerebat in pectore" ("The glorious Virgin always bore the Gospel of Christ in her breast"). No doubt that through it she might procure for herself fortitude for martyrdom, and convert her husband and other enemies of the faith to the faith: which indeed happened. Hence also in the Life of St. Barnabas the Apostle we read that his body was found under the Emperor Zeno in Cyprus, having upon his breast the Gospel of St. Matthew written by Barnabas's own hand: for it seems that Barnabas wished this Gospel to be buried with him, that he might have it as it were a heavenly pledge of the resurrection promised in the Gospel. But the Apostle, as I have said, here speaks of the Gospel not as written, but as preached.
To the Jew first (because first and chiefly the Gospel was announced by Christ and the Apostles, Matthew 10:5, to the Jews, to whom Christ had been promised) and (that is, afterward) to the Greek, — that is, to the Gentile: for because the Greeks after Alexander spread their language and rule very widely, hence "Greek" is the same as "Gentile." So St. Augustine, epistle 200.
Note: The conjunction and here signifies "afterward," or "secondly": for it is opposed to first. See Canon 23.
Verse 17: From Faith Unto Faith — The Just Shall Live by Faith
17. For the justice of God is revealed therein (in the Gospel).
From faith unto faith. — First, St. Anselm expounds this in a threefold manner: first, from faith in one God, unto faith in the Trinity; secondly, from faith in the first coming of Christ to save, unto faith in His second coming to judge; thirdly, from faith in the humanity of Christ unto faith in His divinity.
Secondly, St. Augustine, in his book On the Spirit and the Letter, chapter 11: From the faith, he says, of those who preach, unto the faith of those who hear and believe.
Thirdly, St. Thomas: "From faith unto faith," that is, he says, through the faith of Christ which is necessary for salvation in every age, that is to say, From the faith of the fathers, unto the faith of their descendants.
Fourthly, St. Ambrose: From the faith, he says, of God who promises, unto the faith of man who believes the promises of God.
Fifthly, Theodoret and Oecumenius: From faith, they say, in things past in Christ, unto faith in things future in us.
Sixthly, more aptly, Origen, Chrysostom, Theodoret, and Toletus: From the obscure faith, they say, of the Old Testament, unto the clear faith of the New Testament, to which that old faith leads us as a tutor.
Seventhly, Bede: From faith, he says, here obscure, unto faith, that is, unto clear vision in heaven. So also St. Augustine, book II Questions on the Gospels, chapter 39.
Eighthly, and most aptly, Theophylact, Oecumenius, Adam, and Pererius: "From faith," they say, beginning and imperfect, "unto faith" that is progressing, perfect, formed by charity, or in a similar way increasing, whether in itself intrinsically, or extrinsically through charity into other virtues which faith arouses; that is to say: In the Gospel is revealed true justice, which exists and progresses from faith unto faith, that is, which begins, is nourished, and grows through a faith that increases day by day, until it leads the believer to salvation — for that is the power of the Gospel, as has been said before. And this sense fits most closely with what follows: "As it is written, the just shall live by faith," as will be plain there: and this is here a most simple and most frequent Hebraism.
For so the Hebrews signify the increase and growth of a thing by doubling the thing through the preposition "in"; as in Psalm 83: "They shall go from strength to strength," that is, they shall go on in the increase and growth of every virtue. With a similar sense, in II Corinthians 2:16, it is called "a savour of death unto death, and a savour of life unto life." And in chapter 3, the last verse: "We are transformed," he says, "from glory unto glory," that is, into greater glory. Likewise in this epistle, chapter 6, verse 19: "You have yielded," he says, "your members to serve uncleanness unto iniquity," that is, to the increase of iniquity, so that from one wickedness you might rush headlong into another. The same phrase occurs elsewhere in many places.
As it is written (Habakkuk 2:4): but the just shall live by faith, — that is to say, The life of grace by which the just man lives, first, begins from faith alone; secondly, it grows and is perfected by faith, though not by faith alone, but by faith growing into a living faith of grace and charity, through the observance of the commandments, so that you may do the things which faith commands. For otherwise it is contradictory to live without life, or without living faith. Just as therefore it is said in Proverbs 4:23 that life proceeds from the heart, that is, that man lives and draws life from the heart, because namely the heart is the root of life, and is in man the first to live and the last to die — yet by this the brain, lung, liver, stomach, and the rest are not excluded from this, that man also lives and draws his life from them: so likewise it is said that the just man lives by faith, because faith is the beginning, root, and as it were the heart of the spiritual life of grace; yet by this hope, charity, and the other virtues are not excluded from this, that the just man also lives by them. See canons 2 and 3.
Here Paul cites the prophet Habakkuk, who in chapter 1, having complained gravely about the prosperity of the impious — namely that the impious Chaldeans were most fortunate in victories and empires, and on that account were tyrannically lording it over the people of God, that is, the Jews; and that God seemed to neglect His own pious and faithful people, and indeed human affairs altogether — God answers him in chapter 2 that He will shortly show His providence and judgment, namely that He will send Cyrus, who shall subdue and overthrow the impious Babylonians, and shall liberate and save the pious Jews, as Antonio de Guevara rightly notes there, and as is plain from verse 5 and following. By Cyrus, however, he allegorically understands Christ, and the Holy Spirit chiefly intends to signify Him by these things — Christ, who, with Babylon, that is, the kingdom of impiety and the devil, having been overthrown, will thence draw out and save the true spiritual Israelites, that is, the faithful Christians: "If it tarry," says Habakkuk 2:3, "wait for it: because it shall surely come (namely, God the just Judge and Avenger, both of the impious, like the Babylonians, and of the pious and faithful, like the Jews, through Cyrus, and far more truly through Christ), and it shall not be slack. Behold, he that is unbelieving, his soul shall not be right in himself: but the just shall live in his faith." For St. Paul allegorically explains these words concerning Christ, in Hebrews 10:37, when he exhorts them to constancy in the faith from the second coming of Christ to judgment: "Yet a little while," he says, "and He that is to come (in Greek ὁ ἐρχόμενος), will come," etc. For Christ is wont to be called ὁ ἐρχόμενος, that is, "He who is to come," as our Interpreter renders it: as is plain from Apocalypse 1:4; Matthew 11:3; John 1:15; Acts 19:4.
Hence it follows, first, that Habakkuk is speaking of faith in general, by which we believe God in any matter whatsoever, and by which the Jews properly believed God through Habakkuk and the other Prophets, who was promising liberation from the Babylonian captivity through Cyrus. For by this faith in God, every just man begins, continues, and progresses to live piously, justly, holily, peacefully, and divinely; while in every tribulation and misery, by this faith and hope in God, he sustains, preserves, and increases the life of his soul. He says therefore: "The just shall live by faith," that is to say: He who is unbelieving and unjust displeases God, and consequently shall not live with the true, right, peaceful, and happy life of faith, of grace, of present justice and future glory — because he has me as an enemy; and because he places and fixes his hope and his fear not in God, but in men and in human helps, and in created things; hence he shall be restless, shall live miserably, and shall always be tossed about by them: but the faithful and just man, who has believed God and these prophecies of mine from God concerning Cyrus the liberator and his antitype Christ, shall live a right, sweet, quiet, happy, holy, and untroubled life; because, fixed in God, who is true life, and in God's promises through faith and hope, he shall be dear to God and the object of God's care.
It follows, secondly, that the Apostle rightly applies this saying of the Prophet, "The just shall live by faith," to faith in Christ: both because true faith is that which God has sanctioned and instituted; now God has sanctioned that the true faith is faith in Christ the Redeemer; and also because faith in Cyrus allegorically represented faith in Christ. For the Holy Spirit intends, through Cyrus and the liberation wrought by Cyrus, to represent Christ, and the redemption by Christ by which Christ imparts to His faithful life, justice, grace, and glory; so that in Christ this saying is most truly verified, "The just shall live by faith (in Christ)."
It follows, thirdly, that it makes no difference whether you read absolutely with Paul, "The just shall live by faith;" or whether you read "in his faith," as the Hebrew, Aquila, Symmachus, and Theodotion have it; or whether you read "in my faith," as the Septuagint translate; for they themselves read in the Hebrew אמונתי emunati, while others read אמונתו emunato, that is, "in his faith." For faith, which in itself is faith, is ours subjectively, because it inheres in us; but it is God's objectively, because it has God for its object. For one believes that Christ is the Redeemer, because God has said and revealed this.
It follows, fourthly, that Habakkuk speaks not of the life of the body but of the soul; not of natural but of supernatural life, namely that of grace and justice, by which the just man, in so far as he is just, lives. For of that life St. Paul here, indeed the Prophet himself, expounds this saying: for he opposes these two things, namely "to live," which he attributes to the just man and to faith, and "not to have a right soul," or to displease God, which he attributes to the unbeliever and unjust; for he says: "He who is unbelieving, his soul shall not be right in himself," for which the Septuagint translates, "my soul shall not be pleased" (that is, shall be displeased); but the just man shall live by his faith. Therefore conversely by "to live" he understands to have a right soul by which you may please God; in such a way, namely, that from thence you may dare to hope for help, liberation, and salvation from God as from a friend and benevolent one — both bodily through Cyrus, and rather spiritually through Christ.
It follows, fifthly, that Habakkuk and the Apostle speak both of the inception of the supernatural life, or of first justification, and of second justification, or of the increase of justice and of the spiritual life, as will be plain on Hebrews 10:38.
For this saying, "The just shall live by faith," is general and universal, pertaining both to Jews and to Christians; both to sinners, who are justified for the first time, and to those who are already justified. For the whole spiritual life of these begins, is preserved, and grows through faith. Although therefore Habakkuk applies this saying literally to the Jews captive in Babylon, who believed God promising Cyrus as liberator; yet he brings it forward as a general statement, and a kind of common axiom or proverb: which therefore is rightly applied also by Paul to Christians. Add to this that those Jews were types of Christians. Again, the Jews, by that faith of theirs as has been said, were not only preserved in the life of grace and justice already received, but by the same faith began and disposed themselves to this life, if they were not yet justified. For by believing and hoping in God their liberator and protector, they were gradually approaching God, and disposing themselves to God's grace and friendship, especially when faith in Christ — who was here foreshadowed by Cyrus — was added. Wherefore Paul rightly applies this saying both to those already just and to those who are still to be justified. In like manner he applies to both that text of Genesis 15: "Abraham believed God, and it was reputed to him unto justice," as I shall say in chapter 4, verse 3.
Lastly, since in the Hebrew it is said, "The just shall live in his faith," "his" signifies the cause both inchoating and preserving life; for the sense is: The just man continues to live in his faith, just as in the same he began to live. Thus we say: An animal lives by its own warmth, that is, continues to live as it has begun. This man lives in his foulness, that is, continues to live in the same foulness in which he began to live; the same, I say, generically, although in the individual, and indeed in the species, the foulness in which he continues to live is often different from that in which he began to live. In the same way, always "The just man lives in his faith," that is, the just man, as he began, so continues to live in the same faith — the same, I say, as to its formal and generic object, which is to believe God; although as to its material and specific objects, the faith which inchoates is often one, and the faith which continues the life of grace and justice is another. For the faith which inchoates justice is properly and most immediately faith in Christ the Redeemer; but the faith which continues and increases justice can be any other faith — as here the faith was by which the Jews believed God promising liberty through Cyrus.
Generically therefore it is true, "The just man lives in his faith," that is, the just man, believing and hoping in God, begins to live spiritually, begins to have a right soul by which he may please God; and again, continuing and progressing in this faith and hope of his in God, he likewise continues and progresses in spiritual life, in rectitude and justice of soul, in the grace and friendship of God, that he may please God more and more.
Verse 18: For the Wrath of God Is Revealed from Heaven
18. For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and injustice of those men, who hold back the truth of God in injustice.
"For" is put for "but," and γάρ for δέ, says Maldonatus in his manuscript Notes. But better take it properly and causally. For here the Apostle proves what he had said, namely that the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believes, and that the justice of God is revealed therein: that is, he proves that Christ and Christ's Gospel and faith are necessary for justice and salvation. That he intends to prove this is plain from the causal word "for," which signifies that he is here adducing the reason and cause of what he had immediately before said, that is to say: I rightly said that the true justice is revealed through Christ's Gospel, and that it is the power of God unto salvation: because, on the contrary, the impiety and injustice of unbelieving men is revealed both in the same Gospel, and by experience, and above all shall be revealed on the day of judgment; it shall be revealed, I say, that all men who were destitute of the faith of the Gospel held back the truth of God in injustice, and therefore are sinners, impious, and unjust, and consequently are subject to the wrath and eternal vengeance of God. So St. Chrysostom, Theodoret, and Oecumenius.
This saying of the Apostle is, as it were, his general thesis, and the first principle from which he proves that all men, as sinners, have needed Christ the Redeemer and Christ's Gospel and faith. He proves this thesis by induction; namely, that all Jews without the faith of Christ have held back the truth of God in injustice, and are sinners, he proves in the next chapter; but that all the Gentiles have held back the truth of God in injustice, and are sinners subject to the wrath of God, he proves here in the following verses, from the fact that all worshipped idols; all, I say, not only the simple and the common folk, but also the wise and the Philosophers, whom he here most vigorously and most sharply attacks. And from this he concludes in chapter 3, verse 23, that for all, both Jews and Gentiles, to attain justice and salvation, the faith and grace of Christ are absolutely necessary — which is the aim of this whole discourse of Paul, and indeed of this whole epistle.
Who hold back the truth of God in injustice. — Note: He does not say: Who hold back the truth of God in error and ignorance, although this also is true; for before Christ men attributed many errors to God, such as that God is corporeal, that He acts by fate, that He does not care for human affairs; but Paul says: "Who hold back the truth of God in injustice," because most men before Christ, although they recognized the truth of God — namely that there is one true God, the maker and ruler of the universe — yet did not worship this God, but most unjustly gave the just worship due to God to creatures and idols. Therefore they as it were imprisoned the truth and held it back with the bars of an iniquitous will, lest it should go forth into effects and works conforming to the truth that was known; and thus they did violence to it and inflicted upon it the greatest injury. So St. Chrysostom and St. Augustine, sermon 55 On the Words of the Lord according to John. These therefore held the judge as it were in chains, nor did they permit the legislator impressed upon their mind by God — namely, the dictate of right reason and truth — to dictate rightly.
The same does any sinner do tropologically, while he acts and sins against the dictate of truth and reason. Whence St. Basil, in his Shorter Rules, question 65, asks: "How does anyone hold back the truth in injustice?" and he answers: "Whenever, with the goods given to him by God, he abuses them to his own will — which vice the Apostle denied was in himself when he said: For we are not, as many, adulterating the word of God. And: For neither have we used at any time the speech of flattery, nor in the speech of avarice (God is witness), nor seeking glory from men, neither from you, nor from others."
Verse 19: Because What Is Known of God Is Manifest in Them
19. Because what is known of God is manifest in them: for God has manifested it to them. — Here Paul meets an objection. For someone will say that the Gentiles did not hold back the truth of God in injustice, because they did not know it: for whence would they have come to know the true God? The Apostle answers, and plainly asserts that they could and ought to have known God and the truth of God; nay, that they actually did know Him. Because this truth is naturally open and manifest, and nature itself teaches and dictates it. God therefore through the light of nature manifested this truth to them, which they nevertheless by their own malice held back in injustice. Therefore Paul says: "What is known of God," in Greek γνωστὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ, that is, what can be naturally known of God — for example, that God is one, eternal, the prince and avenger of the world.
It is manifest in them. — "In them," that is, to them, in their mind, intellect, conscience. The Syriac translates ידיעתה דאלהא גליא הי בהון idiata dalaha galia hi behon, that is, the knowledge of God has been laid open in them; and that, as Chrysostom rightly says, homily 9 To the People, not through angels, not through Prophets, not through Evangelists; but because the invisible attributes of God the creator are perceived through what has been made, being understood. So also the other Fathers to be cited shortly. Almost only Anselm, with some more recent writers, adds that God manifested this truth, or Himself, to the Gentiles by a light not only natural but also supernatural — as if without supernatural light and without faith the Gentiles could not, through the light of nature alone, recognize that there is one true God. But this is contrary to the mind of the Apostle and of the Fathers, who assert that God manifested Himself to the Gentiles through creation and created things. For from these the Gentiles could and ought to have recognized God the Creator through the light of nature. Some add: "in them," that is, they say, in their soul and mind, and indeed in the whole man, the power and majesty of God most greatly shines forth and is known; for man is the mirror and image of God. But this is too narrow. For the Apostle adds that the creator can be known generally from any creature.
Verse 20: For the Invisible Things of Him Are Clearly Seen
20. For the invisible things of Him, from the creation of the world, are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made; His eternal power also and divinity. — You will ask, what are these invisible things of God, and what is the power and divinity of God?
Origen answers, first: The "invisible things" of God, he says, are the angels; the "power" of God is the might by which God rules all things; "divinity" is the essence of God, which contains the universe. But here there is no discourse about angels, but only about God: for there preceded, "What is known of God;" and there follows: "His eternal power also and divinity" (namely, of God).
Secondly, therefore, St. Thomas explains and distinguishes these three thus: "Invisibilia" of God is the invisible divine essence, which is known by the way of negation; "virtus" of God is the power of God, which is known by the way of causality; "divinitas" is to be the ultimate end and supreme good to which all things tend, which is known by the way of excellence. But this is a more subtle than solid exposition: for "divinitas" is nothing other than the divine essence.
Thirdly, St. Ambrose, in book II On the Holy Spirit, chapter 2, and Cyril, in book I of the Thesaurus, chapter 5, and Anselm here explain it thus: "Invisibilia" is the invisible Father, "virtus" is the Son, "divinitas" is the divine goodness which is attributed to the Holy Spirit. But this is by accommodation: for literally, it is certain that the Philosophers did not know the Most Holy Trinity from creatures; and that without faith, light, and supernatural revelation it cannot be known; yet given faith, man can perceive in creatures certain traces and as it were shadows of the Most Holy Trinity. So what the Platonists obscurely and faintly knew of God and the Word of God, and what Trismegistus said: "The Monad begot the Monad, and reflected its ardour upon itself," that is to say: The Father begot the Son, and by loving Himself reflectively breathed forth the Holy Spirit — all this they learned from Moses and the Hebrews, as Eusebius teaches in book X On the Preparation for the Gospel, chapter 1, and book XIII, chapter 10: hence Plato was also called "the Attic Moses."
I say therefore: The "invisible things" of God are God's spiritual attributes, such as His being eternal, immense, omniscient, best, greatest; the "power" of God is the might by which Almighty God is the efficient cause of all things, ruling and providing for them; "divinity" is the essence and majesty of God — namely that God is the first most perfect Being, on whom all things depend, from whom all goods are sought, and by whom all evils are turned away; that God is the ultimate end of all things and μακάριον (the blessed one), most especially of human beings, and is therefore to be worshipped with the worship of latria, with prayers, vows, sacrifices, and thanksgiving.
Where note: "Power," as it were the might of God, is likewise contained among the invisible things of God: for it is, equally as the others, an attribute of God; yet Paul here expresses it before the others, because among the other attributes that one most especially shines forth and is resplendent in creation and in created things. So, in Mark 16:7, the angel says to the women: "Go, tell His disciples, and Peter;" not because Peter was not a disciple, but because among the disciples of Christ he stood out as first.
You will say: In I Corinthians 1:21, the contrary of this saying is uttered, namely that the world in the wisdom of God did not know God.
I answer: Paul there is speaking of the practical knowledge of God, which is joined with the love and worship of God, not of the speculative.
Secondly: Even speculatively the world did not know many of God's attributes, because it turned its mind away from Him and blinded itself by vices: yet it could and ought to have known them.
From the creation of the world, through the things that are made, they are clearly seen, being understood. — By "creation of the world," Anselm understands man, who is lord, participant, knot, and bond of every creature. For man, from himself and from his parts and powers both of body and of soul, can especially know his creator God.
Secondly, more plainly, more generally, and better, Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, and St. Augustine, in tract 2 on John, take "creation of the world" to mean the fabric and creation of the world, or rather the very things created in the world, or the world itself, which is the creature of God. For the Greek κτίσις signifies both — namely both creature and created things, and creation itself.
Note: The word "understood" signifies that there is need of discourse, comparison, and inference, so that through sensible works and created things we may ascend to the knowledge of the invisible things of God. And this is what is said in Wisdom 13:5: "By the greatness of the beauty and of the creature, the creator of them may be seen so as to be known" (in Greek ἀναλόγως, that is, by analogy). The Syriac translates besachala, that is, they are perceived and seen by the intellect, the things which are invisible to the eyes of the body. The Greek beautifully suggests the same by paronomasia; for it has τὰ ἀόρατα νοούμενα καθορᾶται, that is, "invisible things are seen," namely through creatures, as it were διὰ κατόπτρου, that is, through a mirror.
Hence it is plain, first, that the proposition "God exists" is not self-evident, namely from the terms themselves: just as, when the terms are known, it is self-evident that one and two make three; but for one to know that God exists, there is need of discourse, namely of inferring from the things that are made the maker Himself, God. So Scotus and St. Thomas, part I, Question II, article 1. Whence St. Bernard, sermon 31 on the Canticle: "So great, he says, is this variety of forms and multitude of species in created things — what are they but rays of the Godhead? showing indeed that there truly is One from whom they are; yet not at all defining what He is: thus you see what is from Him, but not Himself. But when from Him whom you do not see you see other things, you know without doubt that He whom one must seek truly exists: so that grace may not fail him who seeks, nor negligence excuse him who is ignorant. But this is the common manner of seeing. For it is at hand, according to the Apostle, for everyone who uses reason to perceive the invisible things of God by understanding them through the things which have been made." Hence the same, in the book On the Interior House, chapters 12 and 13, teaches that the mirror for seeing God is the soul gazing upon itself: "In vain," he says, "does he lift up the eye of his heart to see God, who is not yet fit to see himself. For it is necessary first to know the invisible things of your spirit, before you can be fit to know the invisible things of God. And if you cannot know yourself, do not presume to apprehend the things which are above you. The chief and principal mirror for seeing God is the soul gazing upon itself."
Secondly, from this passage, and from Wisdom 13:5, it is plain that by the natural light it can be known that God is one, that He is free, that He has providence not only in the universal but over each particular man. For to Him alone are thanks to be given by every one — which is what the Apostle here urges, in the following verse. So St. Chrysostom, Ambrose, Bede, Anselm, and St. Dionysius, chapter 7 On the Divine Names, and St. Augustine On the Spirit and the Letter, chapter 12.
The Gentiles themselves learned and taught the same thing by experience itself: for Trismegistus said that the world is the book of divinity and the mirror of divine things, in which God, as it were the supreme Apelles, has clearly expressed and painted Himself. In this study so much did St. Anthony engage, as Athanasius testifies of him, and the other dwellers of the desert: and not only St. Bernard, St. Francis, and other Saints; but also Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, and all the Philosophers. The same Orpheus recognized and taught when he said: "The machine of the world is music and admirable harmony, proclaiming and praising God; for the heavens declare the glory of God." This also is the music of the heavens which Pythagoras proclaimed.
Whence Philo, in his book On the Unity of God, and on the double Temple, calls the world the temple of God: "There is to be reckoned," he says, "another temple of God, the highest and the true — namely this whole universe, whose sanctuary is heaven, the most excellent in the whole nature of things; whose votive offerings are the stars; whose priests and sacristans are the angelic powers, similar to unity by the principle of sincerity: but the other temple is made by hand," etc. See on this matter the beautiful discussion of St. Chrysostom, homily 9 To the People; and St. Basil, at the beginning of the Parables of Solomon; Anselm here; Bernard, at the beginning of book V On Consideration; the author of the Soliloquies, chapter 31, in volume IX of the works of St. Augustine; and Prosper, in the book On the Calling of the Gentiles, chapter 1, which book is falsely ascribed to St. Ambrose: "Which is," says Prosper, "a testimony which always served the Lord, and never has been silent of His goodness and power, unless the unspeakable beauty of the whole world, and the rich and orderly bestowal of His ineffable benefits? — through which to human hearts were offered, as it were, certain tables of the eternal law, so that on the pages of the elements, and in the volumes of the times, the common and public doctrine of the divine institution might be read.
"The heaven therefore, the sea, the earth, and all things that are in them, were proclaiming the glory of God by the harmonious concert of their kind and arrangement, and by perpetual preaching they spoke the majesty of their author: and yet the greatest part of men did not understand this voice," etc. Hence truly and piously St. Augustine: "The heavens," he says, "and the earth cry out, O Lord, that we should love You;" and, "You have made us, O Lord, for Yourself, and our heart is restless until it rests in You." So he himself, in book I Confessions, ch. I.
Verse 21: They Have Not Glorified Him as God
21. When they had known God, they have not glorified Him as God, or given thanks (to God for the fabric of the world, and for the creation and preservation of themselves and of all things for their own use), but became vain (in Greek ἐματαιώθησαν, that is, became vain and empty) in their thoughts. — In Greek διαλογισμοῖς, that is, in the inquiries and discourses which they had made from creatures concerning God the creator; namely, because, leaving these aside, they turned to worship vain idols, which were not God. So St. Chrysostom, Origen, Theodoret.
Secondly, "they became vain" in their thought and knowledge of God, because they did not pursue the end and fruit of the knowledge of God — which is honourable action (about which St. Bernard discourses beautifully in sermon 36 on the Canticle) and the worship of God. Hence "and their foolish heart was darkened," and they became foolish, because they rejected true wisdom — which consists in practice and piety — and most foolishly held and worshipped idols as gods.
Thirdly, from St. Augustine, Anselm: "they became vain," he says, that is, they became proud through this knowledge of God. But the first sense is the best, and the genuine one in this place. For thus Paul explains himself in verse 23.
Verse 23: They Changed the Glory of the Incorruptible God
23. They changed the glory of the incorruptible God, into the likeness of the image of corruptible man, and of birds, etc. — That is to say, These sophists, blind and foolish, took the glorious name of divinity, the adoration and confession which they ought to have rendered and exhibited to the immortal God, and turned them and placed them "in the likeness" (for the Greek ἐν ὁμοιώματι can properly be taken for "in likeness"), or, "into the likeness" (taking ἐν for "into," as it is often taken), or assimilation "of the image of a man," that is, into the image of a man, not natural, but made by art and assimilated; that is to say, These sophists worshipped idols in place of God. So St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Oecumenius. Wherefore Erasmus and Beza do not rightly expound "into the likeness" or assimilation thus: because, they say, the Gentiles assimilated the incorporeal God to corporeal things, such as man, oxen, crocodiles, because in these...
Of birds, and of fourfooted beasts, and of serpents. — For that the ancients worshipped birds, serpents, cats, crocodiles, and even garlic, leeks and herbs, and even Stercutius, Cloacina, the Plague, the Fever, and other things still more absurd than these, as gods, St. Augustine teaches at length, book III On the City of God, chapter XII, and book IV, chapter X and following, and book XVIII, chapter XV. Whence Juvenal too, in his next-to-last satire, thus mocks the Egyptians for worshipping their onions as deities:
Porrum et caepe nefas violare ac frangere morsu.
O sanctas gentes, quibus haec nascuntur in hortis
Numina!
(It is wickedness to violate the leek and onion or to break them with a bite. O holy peoples, for whom such Deities are born in their gardens!)
Note here: Many Gentiles thought that the very idols of wood and stone were gods; some however who were wiser, as the Philosophers, knew that the idols themselves were not gods, and that only in the idols themselves were the gods represented: yet all, both these and those, did not adore the true God in the idol, as in an image, as Calvin would have it, but the very idols themselves they adored as God or some Deity, and believed they ought to be adored; and this, because they thought the idol either to be the body of God, or to be the likeness of God, and that God was similar to the idol and had similar members, or that it was the place and seat of God, to which God as it were naturally adhered and was present. Finally, they all reckoned the idol to have something of divinity, so that when they went to it, they thought they were going to the gods, as Cicero says, book I On the Nature of the Gods; and this because they saw the idol speak and give oracles. Except here a few of the wisest Gentiles, who worshipped idols not from the heart but from fear of their own laws, and to keep the people in their duty by fear of the gods, as Cicero himself there testifies.
They sinned therefore first, because they worshipped the demon, as the soul of the idol, in place of God, although from the false oracles, evil counsels, his own confession, and other circumstances, they could and ought to have recognized that he was not God but a demon.
They sinned secondly, because they adored, propitiated, and invoked the very idols as though they were something of God; for this, whatever Calvin may deny, is most clear from Psalm CXIII, Baruch VI, and Wisdom XIV. The Fathers expressly teach the same — Tertullian, Lactantius, Justin, Athanasius, Athenagoras, Cyprian and others — who everywhere mock the Gentiles for worshipping stones and wood as gods, as the Indians and Japanese still do. The idol therefore has nothing in common with the image of Christians, which has nothing of divinity, but only the bare nature of an image, which is to represent its prototype, as St. Basil and Damascene teach.
Note secondly: Although Catharinus has good hope and esteem concerning the salvation of Socrates and Plato, yet Xenophon and Plato teach that Socrates sacrificed to the gods of the Greeks, and among other things a cock to Aesculapius. So Plato judged that the same gods should be worshipped, because the law of the Gentiles so commanded, as Eusebius testifies, book XIII On the Preparation of the Gospel, chapters VIII and XI. So too Seneca praises sacrifices, not as pleasing to the gods, but because commanded by the laws, as St. Augustine testifies, book VI On the City of God, chapter X. The same Plato, in the Epinomis, attributes divine worship to the heavens, the stars, and the demons. Finally Trismegistus teaches that the images of demons should be worshipped, that they may do good, as St. Augustine notes, book VIII On the City of God, chapter XXIII. The same Cicero taught that they should be worshipped from fear of political laws, book I On the Nature of the Gods. Behold to what point human weakness and blindness slip, even when learned, if it forsakes God and is forsaken by God — so that the Apostle rightly thunders against them here.
Verse 24: Wherefore God Gave Them Up to the Desires of Their Heart
24. Wherefore God gave them up to the desires of their heart, unto uncleanness. — "Wherefore," as if to say: As they handed over the glory of God to serpents, and to other unclean and ignominious creatures, so also God handed them over to uncleanness, "that they might inflict dishonour," in Greek τοῦ ἀτιμάζεσθαι, that is, that they might dishonour "their own bodies." Note: God so handed them over, not properly by sending them or impelling them to evils, as Calvin would have it: for this is a blasphemy too evident and atrocious against God and His infinite goodness and holiness; but God handed them over to sins because He permitted them to their own concupiscence, to the demon, and to occasions of sin, that they might disgrace their body by fornication and adultery. Whence in Psalm LXXX, the Lord explaining the same says: "I let them go according to the desires of their heart, they shall walk in their own inventions." Thus St. Augustine, book V Against Julian, chapter III, and On Grace and Free Will, chapter XXI, teaches that God hands over sinners to perverse desires when He not only does not apply grace but also sets occasions and stumbling blocks of sinning (though for another and pious end), upon which He foresees they will dash themselves more gravely and shamefully through their own malice — but does not pre-define, predetermine, or impel. Such occasions are riches, honours, delights, with which God heaps the impious, that they may use them well; yet He knows that they will not do so, but will abuse them unto sins. See canons 14 and 15.
Beza objects: God as a judge hands over the impious to the executioner, namely to sin; therefore He not only permits, but positively hands them over to sin.
Reply: Man permits sins in one way, God in another: man negatively, God positively: for God holds the wills of all men most tightly bound, as it were, by the hand of His omnipotence, like a wolf or wild beast bound by a rope, which He must positively loosen for the will to be able to act badly. Whence this loosening and permission is rightly called an action and a handing-over, especially when it is done by God as avenger, to punish a preceding sin, as I said in canon 21.
Hence the Theologians teach that the sins which follow are the punishments of preceding sins. So the Master of the Sentences, in book II, distinction 36, and Augustine, book Against Julian, chapter V, where he thus says: "Crimes are avenged by crimes, and the punishments of sinners are not only torments, but also increases of vices." And on Psalm LVII, on the verse Fire fell upon: "Between the first sin of apostasy," he says, "and the last punishment of eternal fire, the things in between are both sins and the punishment of sin." And a little above, on the verse of the same psalm, Your hands devise iniquity, he teaches that there is a certain bond, as it were a chain, of sins among themselves, in which some are the cause of subsequent sins, others the punishments of preceding ones — on which subject see also St. Gregory, book XXV Moralia, chapter IX.
Verse 25: They Changed the Truth of God into a Lie
25. They changed the truth of God into a lie, — that is, into a lying false idol; for εἴδωλον in Greek is a vain thing, empty, shadowy, deceptive and lying; and so the idols lie when they say they are gods, and they are the lying shadows of gods: about which I shall say more on I Corinthians VIII.
Verse 26: God Gave Them Up to Passions of Dishonour
26. Wherefore God gave them up to passions of dishonour. — In Greek, εἰς πάθη, that is, to pathic and shameful lusts, namely that against nature not only males and pathic boys are mingled with males; but, as follows, also females with females, transgressing all the limits of nature and decency. So Ambrose, Theodoret, Anselm and others. This perverse and insane lust is called πάθος, not only because in it the passive lust corresponds preposterously to the active; but also because this passion is so vehement, that the man immersed in it is so absorbed by it that he seems rather to suffer than to act, and is like a horse neighing after a mare and raging toward her. Now indeed Philo, book II On the Contemplative Life, records that the Gentiles, not only the common people, but also the Philosophers, and namely Socrates, laboured under this infamous vice of paederasty. Indeed Laertius, in the Life of Socrates, records that in the trial in which he was condemned to death by two hundred and eighty votes, he was accused first of rejecting the ancestral Gods and introducing new divinities; secondly, of corrupting youths against right and law. The same vice Laertius, Gellius (book XVIII, chapter II, and book XIX, chapter XI), and Plutarch (in the book On Educating Children, near the end) ascribe to Plato: although Cardinal Bessarion, Plato's defender, tries to clear him from this vice, in book IV Against the Calumniator of Plato, chapter II. St. Chrysostom adds that Solon and other Philosophers not only practised paederasty, but praised it as if honourable and sanctioned it by laws, and decreed that free-born men, not slaves, might practise it; as if paederasty were not for slaves, but only became the free, and was itself a free and liberal art. Such monsters our age too has seen and brought forth, born of heresy. Against these St. Chrysostom thunders here and the Fathers often.
Finally, that you may see how very true this judgment of the Apostle is, and that the Philosophers were most impure and most filthy, hear from Diogenes Laertius alone, in order, the emblems of each on this matter.
Periander, he says, abused his own mother Cratea, book I.
Socrates was a favourite of Alcibiades, book II.
Theodorus says the wise man would publicly couple with prostitutes without shame or suspicion.
Phaedo, captured by enemies, gave himself over to infamous gain.
Stilpo, besides his wife, used Micarete as a concubine.
Menedemus is noted as having been too familiar with the lover of Asclepiades.
Aristippus, book IV On the Ancient Delights, says that Plato was captivated by love of Stella the astrologer and of Dion: others add Phaedrus, others also Alexis. More about him Laertius has, book III.
Bion of Borysthenes openly consorted with the prostitutes Theodota and Phylete: likewise he shamefully loved two youths, Demetrius and Myrleanus Leochares. Whence by Aristo of Chios he was called Corruptor of Youths. The same man would adopt youths in order to abuse them, book IV.
Aristotle loved the concubine of Hermias, and sacrificed to her, book V.
Demetrius Phalereus, who was honoured with 360 bronze statues, was shamefully suffered (abused) by Cleon.
Antisthenes said that the wise man would consort with whatever women were most beautiful, book VI.
Diogenes said that women and children ought to be in common.
Zeno decreed wives in common in the republic, book VII.
Chrysippus, in his book On the Republic, bids one couple with mothers, daughters, and sons.
Eudoxus was a favourite of Theomedon the physician, book VIII.
Epicurus had as favourites the harlots Leontium and Themista, and Pythocles, a handsome youth, book X.
Let our politicians and naturalists go now, and proclaim these Philosophers as upright men, and canonize them as holy and blessed, whom Asmodeus auctioned off as bondsmen of unspeakable lust, and consigned to Orcus. Excellently St. Bernard, against Peter Abelard the platonizer, epistle 109 to Pope Innocent: "Where," he says, "while he sweats much how he may make Plato (Abelard) a Christian, he proves himself a heathen."
Their women changed the natural use into that use which is against nature. — Note, by a diabolical invention women, in the manner of men, actively couple with women. Seneca teaches this and more, epistle 95: "Women," he says, "when they have equalled the licence of men, have equalled the vices of male bodies as well: they are no less wakeful, no less hard-drinking, they challenge men with oil and wine, and in lust they yield not even to males, having been born to suffer. May the Gods and Goddesses ill destroy them, who, having devised so perverted a kind of unchastity, mount men." By the Greeks these women were called Tribades, that is rubsters (frictrices), whom Tertullian mentions in the book On the Pallium. Whence τριβαδικὴ ἀσέλγεια is the name for that insane and wicked lust of the tribades, the inventress of which is believed to have been Philaenis, and on this account Sappho was ill spoken of. Of these things the most impure Lucian treats, in the dialogue Clonarium and Leaena. These things, though unwillingly, I have written for this end, that confessors may know how great is the abyss of lusts, and may know that women too, like men, commit the sin of softness (mollities), as Galen, physicians, and experience teach; and just as they practise it on themselves, so they practise the same on others in unspeakable ways.
Receiving in themselves the recompense (which was due) of their error. — For "recompense" the Greek has ἀντιμισθία, that is, a recompense or wage according to merits; so that, because against the order of nature, with dishonour to the Creator, they had forsaken Him and turned to the idolatry of the creature, for this cause they were justly permitted by God to invert the order of nature likewise in the act of generation, and to disgrace themselves with shameful lust. So Anselm.
Furthermore, the Wise Man also teaches that idolatry is the cause of lust and obscenity, chapter IV, verse 12: "The beginning," he says, "of every fornication is the seeking out of idols, and their invention is the corruption of life;" and this, first, because the idols were worshipped with those ceremonies which incite men to every obscenity, as is plain from the rites of Priapus, Venus, and Bacchus. And this with God permitting it as a punishment of idolatry, as Paul here says. Secondly, because idolaters, as Ambrose says here: "Worshipping a careless God, and one therefore to be neglected, are more dulled, and made readier to admit every evil." For concupiscence blazes up when it does not fear God as avenger. But who would fear a wooden or stony God? Thirdly, because, as St. Athanasius says, oration Against the Idols: "Idolatry was instituted from the desire of those who, full of debaucheries and shameful deeds, are represented in their figments." For when adulterous Jupiter is worshipped as God, who does not think it lawful, indeed beautiful, to commit adultery, since in that matter he is like his god? St. Athanasius adds: "And nearly all cities teem with all lusts, on account of the savagery of morals which they see in their gods; nor is there in this kind of gods one whom you may call chaste. Of old certainly the Phoenician women used to prostitute themselves before the idols, dedicating their gain to the divinities, persuaded that the deities were appeased by harlotry, and that the prosperity of things sprang from it." The Babylonian, Syrian, Median, Persian, Lydian and other virgins did the same, as I said on Baruch VI, 42. St. Athanasius continues: "Men also, having renounced their sex, and no longer enduring to be males, affected the nature of women, as though they would thereby do something honourable and pleasing to the mother of the gods. But all live in most shameful things, and seem to undertake among themselves a contest of depravity, and, as St. Paul said, Their women changed the use."
Hence it is plain that the punishment of unbelief, impiety and heresy is monstrous lust, and the cause of this is: First, because where there is no faith, there is no grace of God; where there is no grace of God, there is no chastity, but every concupiscence: so that Luther rightly said that intercourse is as necessary to a man as food, and everywhere among the Innovators this axiom resounds, that chastity is impossible, because indeed to Luther and the heretics it is impossible. Truly therefore did St. Jerome say, book II Commentary on Hosea chapter IX: "It is difficult to find a heretic who loves chastity, even if he commends it in words and bears it before himself."
Secondly, because heresy and unbelief arise from pride, and the punishment of pride is lust, just as the reward of humility is chastity. Whence the most efficacious remedy for chastity is humility. For this is the just ordination of God, that if the mind submits itself to God and to those to whom it owes submission, it also has its own body in subjection to itself; but if it refuses to be subject to God and to God's vicars, it also feels its own body rebellious against itself, as Gregory beautifully teaches, book XXVI Moralia, chapter XII: "Thus, thus," he says, "the proud were to be struck with a just retribution, that, because in their pride they prefer themselves to other men, by their luxury they sink down to the likeness of beasts of burden; for man, when he was in honour, did not understand, he was compared to the foolish beasts, etc. Within, then, God sees what exalts the mind, and therefore He permits to grow strong without that which He may cast down; therefore by the guarding of humility must the cleanness of chastity be preserved. For if the spirit is piously held down beneath God, the flesh is not unlawfully raised above the spirit: and the contrary. Whence also the first disobedient Adam, as soon as he sinned by pride, covered his shameful parts." So that virgin, of whom Palladius in the Lausiac History, chapter XXXIV, possessed by the demon of pride, was deserted by the angel of temperance, and shamefully fell.
Verse 28: God Gave Them Up to a Reprobate Sense
28. As they did not approve (in Greek οὐκ ἐδοκίμασαν, that is, it did not please them, it did not seem good to them, they did not care) to have God in knowledge (that is, says Ambrose, to believe that God cares for our affairs; or, as others have it, to have God before their eyes, that they might intend to please and serve Him. But more simply and more properly St. Chrysostom, Theodoret and Toletus thus explain, as if to say: As they did not care to know the true God truly, that they might rightly think of Him, but adhered to idols, and recognized and worshipped these in place of God; so likewise justly), God gave them up to a reprobate sense, that they should do the things which are not fitting. — For, as St. Gregory teaches, book XXV Moralia, chapter IX: "Those who err in the knowledge of God are justly handed over so that they err equally in their actions;" those who do not preserve the mind and reason from error expose themselves to bestial thoughts and vices, both because, when the leader errs, the companions err: now knowledge is the leader of action; and because in withdrawing from God they withdraw from virtue and grace; and because where there is no knowledge and fear of God, there unbridled concupiscence reigns.
Note: Paul calls "a reprobate sense" a wicked and perverse mind, which approves things not to be approved, and disapproves and rejects things to be approved (for this is the Greek ἀδόκιμος), e.g. which judges and approves softness (mollities), fornication, vengeance, drunkenness, as things to be sought and pursued; and at last, when the mind has been blinded by the habit of sinning, it judges these very things scarcely to be sins, and to be lawful.
The whole elegance of this passage consists in the paronomasia and antithesis of the verb δοκιμάζειν and the epithet ἀδόκιμον, as if to say: Because they rejected the knowledge and worship of God, hence they were handed over to a reprobate and perverse mind: ἀδόκιμος therefore signifies that they were not without judgment, as Beza translates (for this is a lesser evil, and often natural), but were of a depraved, distorted and perverse judgment, by which they judged unspeakable crimes to be lawful and honourable.
Verse 29: Filled with All Iniquity, Deceit and Malignity
29. Filled (that is, that they might be filled: for "filled" depends on the verb "gave up," as if to say: By this very fact, that God gave them over to a reprobate sense, it was brought about that they should be filled, and were filled) with all iniquity, deceit and malignity. — For "malignity" the Greek has κακοηθεία, which, says Aristotle, is the vice by which all things are taken in the worse part: others render it "harshness of manners"; but this is signified by the word "unsociable" (incompositi), which follows. The Syriac renders it "fraud."
Verse 30: Hateful to God, Contumelious, Proud
30. Hateful to God. — θεοστυγεῖς, that is, hateful to God, or haters of God, from whom God shrinks back, or who execrate God. St. Cyprian, epistle 68, reads "shrinking back from God," for στυγέω signifies to shrink back; whence Styx, the marsh of hell, is so called from horror.
Lifted up. — ὑπερηφάνους, that is, boasters and braggarts.
Verse 31: Foolish, Unsociable, Without Affection
31. Unsociable. — ἀσυνθέτους, that is, uncivil, of barbarous manners, alien from every honest society and conversation, turbulent, who cannot be settled in a city or family with others. So Suidas, drawing from Demosthenes. Oecumenius renders it, separating themselves from all, that is, pursuing and opposing all with hatred.
Without affection. — ἀστόργους, that is, inhuman, who, as Theophylact, Oecumenius and the Syriac say, love no one and have no friend. Thus in India toward Peru there are certain Indians called Uri, who so flee from men, that when asked who they are, they answer that they are not men but Uros, as the eye-witness Joseph Acosta reports, book II On the New World. Such was the man of whom the Satirist says, "he neither loves, nor is loved by any." Again ἀστόργους may be rendered, without piety, that is, impious toward parents and kinsmen.
Without covenant (fidelity), — that is, covenant-breakers. The Apostle here piles up a synathroismos, by an accumulation of things, to show how great an evil is the ignorance and neglect of God, and into how many and how great crimes the Gentiles fell through this neglect of God.
Without mercy, — that is, unmerciful and cruel, who in Hebrew are called אכזרי aczari. The Syriac renders, those with whom there is no covenant, no charity, no peace, and finally no mercy in them.
These therefore are the fruits of idolatry, unbelief and heresy.
Verse 32: Who, Having Known the Justice of God
32. Who, when they had known the justice of God, did not understand (would not understand, consider, and persuade themselves practically), that they who do such things are worthy of death; and not only they that do them, but they also that consent to them that do them. — Kemnitz, Valla, Erasmus and Faber wish here that our text be corrupt, because the Greek so reads: εἴτινες τὸ δικαίωμα τοῦ Θεοῦ ἐπιγνόντες ὅτι οἱ τὰ τοιαῦτα πράσσοντες ἄξιοι θανάτου εἰσίν, οὐ μόνον αὐτὰ ποιοῦσιν, ἀλλὰ καὶ συνευδοκοῦσι τοῖς πράσσουσι, that is, those who, having known the justice of God, namely that those who do such things are worthy of death, not only do them, but also consent to those doing them. For to consent thus is greater and worse than to do. For it comes from malice, while to do often flows from mere weakness. So also St. Chrysostom, Theophylact and Oecumenius read and explain. But that the Greek copies vary and varied of old is plain from Oecumenius, Origen and certain manuscripts. Again Ambrose agrees in all things with our Translator, as do Sedulius, Haymo, Anselm, Hesychius (book VI on Leviticus XX), Pope Symmachus (in his Apologetic against Anastasius the Emperor), and St. Cyprian (book I, epistle 4). Finally our reading is plainer and easier in understanding, and therefore more probable. For the Apostle seems here to censure the wiser Philosophers, who, although they knew the worship of idols and the other vices already mentioned to be evil, and did not commonly do or perpetrate them, nevertheless approved them when done by others, or dissembled them, either from fear of the laws, or from love of pleasing themselves and fear of displeasing those same persons. See what was said on verse 23.