Cornelius a Lapide
Table of Contents
Synopsis of the Chapter
Hitherto the Apostle has explained the infirmity of the law, of sin, and of concupiscence: here he expounds the powers of grace and of the Spirit of Christ, that is, how great goods are bestowed upon the just through Christ and the Spirit of Christ.
First, then, from what has been said, he concludes that those who are engrafted into Christ by faith and grace are free from all guilt and condemnation, namely those who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the Spirit.
Whence secondly, at verse 12, he proves with many arguments that we ought to live according to the Spirit which we have received — the Spirit, I say, of adoption, in which we cry: Abba, Father — who makes us sons of God and co-heirs with Christ of the future glory.
Whence thirdly, at verse 19, he shows how great and how desirable this glory is, inasmuch as not only every creature, which in this life is subjected to vanity, sighs for it, but also those who have received the firstfruits of the Spirit.
Whence, at verse 26, he asserts that the Spirit helps our infirmity, and intercedes for us.
Finally, at verse 28, he magnifies the charity of God toward those who love Him, by which all things work together unto good for them — those, namely, whom He foreknew and predestinated to be made conformable to Christ, and for whom He delivered up Christ unto death. From which, at verse 33, he concludes: Who therefore shall separate us from the charity of Christ?
Vulgate Text: Romans 8:1-39
1. There is now therefore no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not according to the flesh. 2. For the law of the spirit of life, in Christ Jesus, hath delivered me from the law of sin and of death. 3. For what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, God, sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and of sin, hath condemned sin in the flesh, 4. that the justification of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit. 5. For they that are according to the flesh, mind the things that are of the flesh; but they that are according to the spirit, mind the things that are of the spirit. 6. For the wisdom of the flesh is death; but the wisdom of the spirit is life and peace. 7. Because the wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God; for it is not subject to the law of God: neither can it be. 8. And they who are in the flesh, cannot please God. 9. But you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. 10. And if Christ be in you, the body indeed is dead, because of sin; but the spirit liveth, because of justification. 11. And if the Spirit of Him that raised up Jesus from the dead, dwell in you; He that raised up Jesus Christ from the dead, shall quicken also your mortal bodies, because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you. 12. Therefore, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. 13. For if you live according to the flesh, you shall die: but if by the Spirit you mortify the deeds of the flesh, you shall live. 14. For whosoever are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons of God. 15. For you have not received the spirit of bondage again in fear; but you have received the spirit of adoption of sons, whereby we cry: Abba (Father). 16. For the Spirit Himself giveth testimony to our spirit, that we are the sons of God. 17. And if sons, heirs also; heirs indeed of God, and joint heirs with Christ: yet so, if we suffer with Him, that we may be also glorified with Him. 18. For I reckon that the sufferings of this time are not worthy to be compared with the glory to come, that shall be revealed in us. 19. For the expectation of the creature waiteth for the revelation of the sons of God. 20. For the creature was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of Him that made it subject, in hope: 21. Because the creature also itself shall be delivered from the servitude of corruption, into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. 22. For we know that every creature groaneth and travaileth in pain, even till now. 23. And not only it, but ourselves also, who have the firstfruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for the adoption of the sons of God, the redemption of our body. 24. For we are saved by hope. But hope that is seen, is not hope. For what a man seeth, why doth he hope for? 25. But if we hope for that which we see not, we wait for it with patience. 26. Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmity. For we know not what we should pray for as we ought; but the Spirit Himself asketh for us with unspeakable groanings. 27. And He that searcheth the hearts, knoweth what the Spirit desireth; because He asketh for the saints according to God. 28. And we know that to them that love God, all things work together unto good, to such as, according to His purpose, are called to be saints. 29. For whom He foreknew, He also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of His Son; that He might be the firstborn amongst many brethren. 30. And whom He predestinated, them He also called. And whom He called, them He also justified. And whom He justified, them He also glorified. 31. What shall we then say to these things? If God be for us, who is against us? 32. He that spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, how hath He not also, with Him, given us all things? 33. Who shall accuse against the elect of God? God that justifieth. 34. Who is he that shall condemn? Christ Jesus that died, yea that is risen also again; who is at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us. 35. Who then shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation? or distress? or famine? or nakedness? or danger? or persecution? or the sword? 36. (As it is written: For Thy sake we are put to death all the day long. We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.) 37. But in all these things we overcome, because of Him that hath loved us. 38. For I am sure that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor might, 39. Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Verse 1: There Is Now Therefore No Condemnation to Them That Are in Christ Jesus
1. THERE IS THEREFORE NO CONDEMNATION (nothing worthy of damnation, nothing damnable, no damnable guilt: thus the Council of Trent, Session V, Canon 5, even if they should feel the motions of concupiscence) FOR THOSE WHO ARE IN CHRIST JESUS, — that is, those who are justified and engrafted into Christ in baptism through faith, hope, and charity. With justification, therefore, the guilt of damnable fault does not remain, but rather the guilt of punishment, namely the obligation to temporal punishment. Hence it is clear, first, that neither concupiscence nor anything else in the regenerate is sin worthy of damnation; second, that justifying grace and baptism not only cover or shave off sins, but utterly erase and remove them; and third, that we are truly justified, not covertly, not by imputation.
You will say: How then does St. Augustine say, in Book I Against the Two Letters of the Pelagians, chapter XIII, that concupiscence in the just passes in guilt but remains in act? I answer: The meaning is that concupiscence, which was original sin, or rather was joined with it, with the guilt of this sin wiped away in baptism, remains in act. For it is clear that the guilt of original sin being remitted in baptism, concupiscence remains actively for the struggle. For St. Augustine seems to have thought that concupiscence in the unregenerate is original sin itself, the contrary of which many doctors teach, and this seems truer. For original sin, like habitual sin, seems to consist not in concupiscence itself, but in moral turning away from God, which remains from a past act, either of Adam or one's own; and thus St. Augustine can be explained, that he calls this aversion the guilt joined with concupiscence, which passes when in baptism it is removed and remitted, while concupiscence itself nevertheless remains.
2. THE LAW OF THE SPIRIT OF LIFE IN CHRIST JESUS (that is, through Christ Jesus) HATH DELIVERED ME FROM THE LAW OF SIN AND OF DEATH. — For "hath delivered" Tertullian, in De Resurrectione Carnis, chapter XLVI, reads "hath emancipated." For we were as it were slaves of sin and death, but by Christ we have been emancipated and given liberty.
Now "the law of the spirit of life," that is, the law of the life-giving spirit, namely, the law of grace and charity through Christ has delivered me from the law of sin and death, that is, from the dictate, right, dominion, and guilt of concupiscence; so that, although I feel it, I do not yet consent. Thus St. Augustine, Book I Against the Two Letters of the Pelagians, chapter X, Theophylact, Anselm, and others. For concupiscence is the law of sin, because it is the tinder, as I said, soliciting to sin: consequently it is the law of death, because the wages of sin is death. Others, "from the law of sin," that is, they say, from the law of Moses, which was the occasion of sin and death. For so he calls it in chapter VII, verse 6. But the former sense seems plainer and more germane; for a little before, in the preceding chapter verses 23 and last, he called concupiscence the law of sin; but concerning the law properly so called the Apostle absolutely subjoins, saying:
3. FOR WHAT WAS IMPOSSIBLE TO THE LAW (the Mosaic, also the natural and the Decalogue, in which it was weak THROUGH THE FLESH), — as if to say: Inasmuch as the law was powerless and invalid because of our flesh infected with sin and concupiscence, which it could not heal. Thus Theophylact. Differently Origen, who by "flesh" understands the gross, literal, and carnal understanding of the law; and he places this weakness and impotence of the law in the fact that it was impossible to observe all the ceremonies of the law according to the flesh, that is, according to the letter. But this sense seems irrelevant and improper. For this weakness was not of the law, but of man.
GOD SENDING HIS OWN SON (in Greek πέμψας, that is, when He had sent, as if to say, His Son being sent) IN THE LIKENESS OF SINFUL FLESH, — that is, of sinful flesh, as if to say: God, sending His own Son, supplied and made up for the impotence of the law and the flesh; or by Hebraism, sending, that is He sent Christ, that He might assume human flesh similar to the sinful flesh of other men. Thus Theophylact. Namely, Christ was born mortal, suffered the troubles of our life and death, which are due to sinners. Whence He was also prefigured by the bronze serpent erected by Moses, Num. XXI, inasmuch as although He seemed to have the venom of sin, in reality He did not have it.
Wherefore the Commentary ascribed to Jerome is not good: "flesh of sin," that is, he says, in which there was sin, but a proclivity to sin. Wrongly also the Manichaeans interpret the likeness of sinful flesh as not true flesh but apparent and similar flesh: because Christ, they say, assumed not true but phantastic flesh. For, as St. Basil well noted, Epistle 65, the Apostle does not say: in the likeness of human flesh, but of sinful flesh; and Tertullian, Book V Against Marcion, chapter XIV: "The likeness," he says, "pertains to the title of sin, not to a falsehood of substance. For he would not have added 'of sin' if he wished the likeness of substance to be understood, so as to deny the truth. For he would have placed only 'flesh,' not 'of sin' as well: but since he so constructed it, 'of sinful flesh,' he both confirmed the substance, that is the flesh, and referred the likeness to the vice of substance, that is to sin." And a little earlier: "God willed to redeem the flesh of sin with a similar substance, that is fleshly, which would be like to sinful flesh, although it itself was not sinful. For this also will be the power of God, to perfect salvation in an equal substance."
AND BY SIN HATH CONDEMNED SIN IN THE FLESH. — St. Augustine, Book III Against the Two Letters of the Pelagians, chapter VI, brings forward three expositions, of which the first is: "by sin," that is, through sin, that is, the expiatory victim of sin, namely, through His crucified body, He condemned, that is abolished, took away sin. So also Origen. For thus elsewhere often "sin" metonymically signifies the victim destined for expiating sin, as I shall say at II Cor. V, last verse.
The second is: "by sin," that is, through the sin of the Jews, by which they crucified Christ, sin was destroyed.
The third, "by sin," that is, through the flesh of Christ, which was similar to sinful flesh, He destroyed sin. But the Greek περί contradicts this, which signifies not "through" but "concerning."
The fourth is Anselm's: "by sin," that is, by His own death, which was the effect of sin, Christ condemned sin. But this too is remote and foreign.
The fifth is Theophylact's: "by sin," that is, for sin, or for the sake of overcoming and abolishing sin, "He condemned," that is, destroyed and took away "sin in the flesh" by dying in His flesh: but the Greek περί does not signify "for the sake of." Add that this sense seems tautological.
Sixth, Hilary on Psalm LXVII: Christ, he says, condemned sin, that is the devil, "by sin," admitted into Christ's flesh, because he was the author of His death. But this also seems inconvenient and harsh, namely that the demon himself should be called sin, since sin is taken properly here, both shortly before and frequently throughout.
Seventh, best of all, St. Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact: Christ, they say, suffering and dying in the flesh, condemned and took away sin, as guilty of sin, in that it unjustly inflicted violence on Christ, and slew Him innocent, because it saw Him having the likeness of sinful flesh: for this reason sin was justly deprived of its dominion which it had over other men. For he who extends his hand to what belongs to others, is justly deprived of his own. It is a prosopopoeia: for sin here is deprived of its kingdom as a tyrant. Thus Christ by His death condemned and slew death. Similar is John XVI, 8, where it is said that the Holy Spirit shall convince the world of sin, of justice, and of judgment.
4. THAT THE JUSTIFICATION OF THE LAW MIGHT BE FULFILLED IN US. — As if to say: That we may fulfill all that the law commands, as just and due. Others take δικαίωμα for δικαίωσις, as if to say: That the justification from sins which the law required might be fulfilled in us, and this is plainer. Hence it is clear that by nature and law alone, without the grace of Christ, man in this corruption cannot fulfill the entire law and entire Decalogue.
5. THEY THAT ARE ACCORDING TO THE FLESH, MIND THE THINGS THAT ARE OF THE FLESH (that is, they think about, love, seek, feed and delight themselves with them); BUT THEY THAT ARE ACCORDING TO THE SPIRIT (spiritual men, living according to the spirit), MIND THE THINGS THAT ARE OF THE SPIRIT, — that is, savor: for in Greek the same word is used as before, namely φρονοῦσιν, as if to say: Carnal men pursue, approve, choose, seek carnal goods: but spiritual men seek spiritual goods, that is, that they direct their pursuits, cares, and actions according to the law of charity; that they comply with the motions and instincts of the Holy Spirit, and arrange their life and morals according to them; that they love not earthly but spiritual and eternal goods, and seek them with all zeal; for to feel and savor here are actions not so much of the intellect as of the appetite and will.
6. FOR THE WISDOM OF THE FLESH IS DEATH, — that is, to be wise and to live according to the flesh brings death both of body and of soul; both present, and most especially eternal. This sense is clear from the Greek text, verse 5, where φρονεῖν τὰ τῆς σαρκὸς is to savor carnal things. Whence he calls this prudence, or wisdom, that is, this savoring, φρόνημα. So the prudence of the spirit is to savor and live according to the spirit. Whence in the next verse he calls the same prudence wisdom. For there in the Greek the same word is φρόνημα. Therefore these four are the same here, namely savoring, feeling, wisdom and prudence: which signify nothing other than love, affection, care, and zeal of the flesh, that is of carnal things; or of the spirit, that is of spiritual things.
Note the causal word "for": from this it is clear that the Apostle here gives the cause of the preceding statements, namely of what he said in verse 4, that the justification of the law is fulfilled in those who walk not according to the flesh but according to the spirit. The cause is this, that prudence, that is, the love and zeal of the flesh, brings death: from this it follows that the same brings not justice, but sin: for sin is the cause of death, and inseparably joined with death; but prudence and zeal of the spirit brings life and peace: from this it follows that the same also brings justice, since it is the cause of life, and necessarily joined with life and peace.
"The prudence of the flesh," says Anselm, "is to cover the heart with machinations, to veil the meaning with words, to show false things as true, to demonstrate true things as deceptive, to seek the heights of honors, to rejoice in the vanity of acquired temporal glory, to repay evils inflicted by others manyfold; when forces are at hand, to yield to none who resist; when the possibility of virtue is lacking, whatever it cannot fulfill through malice, this to feign with a peace-disturbing goodness. But the prudence of the spirit, that is the wisdom of the just, is to feign nothing by displays, to open the meaning with words, to love true things as they are, to avoid false things, to bestow goods freely, to bear evils more willingly than to do them, to seek no revenge for injury, to suffer insults for the truth, to consider it gain." Where note, these are only part of the prudence of the flesh, and these among the Latins are properly called the prudence of the flesh: for the Greek φρόνημα, as I said, extends to all carnal affections, savorings, and loves.
BUT THE PRUDENCE OF THE SPIRIT (is) LIFE AND PEACE. — That is, to savor, to love, to pursue spiritual things obtains eternal life and peace, that is the income of all goods and the tranquil possession of them, Rom. II, 7.
7. BECAUSE THE WISDOM OF THE FLESH (to savor carnal things) IS AN ENEMY TO GOD. — Here he gives the reason why the prudence and wisdom of the flesh brings not life but death, namely because it itself is an enemy to God and to the divine law: but our life of soul, especially the blessed life, depends on God, and is given to God's friends, not to enemies; for God punishes His enemies with eternal death.
8. AND THEY WHO ARE IN THE FLESH (who serve and fulfill the affections of the flesh, who live carnally), CANNOT PLEASE GOD. — "But" is taken for "for": for here he gives the cause why the prudence and wisdom of the flesh is an enemy to God, namely because God, who is most pure spirit, hates and detests the impure affections and works of the flesh, whence it comes about that those who are carnal cannot please God.
9. You are not in the flesh, but in the spirit. — As if to say: You are not carnal, you do not seek carnal things, you do not love them, but spiritual things: for the soul is more where it loves than where it animates. Thus St. Leo, Sermon 1 On the Resurrection: "Although," he says, "we have been saved in hope, and still bear corruptible and mortal flesh, we are nevertheless rightly said not to be in the flesh, if carnal affections do not dominate us; and rightly we lay aside the name of that thing whose will we do not follow."
IF SO BE THAT THE SPIRIT OF GOD DWELL IN YOU. — Behold what it is to be in the spirit, namely that the Spirit of God does not pass through, but dwells and fixes a permanent seat in someone.
Note, Spirit here signifies both the Holy Spirit and the spirit of charity and grace communicated and infused in us by the Holy Spirit: for the latter cannot be separated from the former; for the Holy Spirit dwells in our soul through the spirit of grace. Beautifully St. Augustine in the Sentences, n. 168: "Just as," he says, "that which makes the flesh live is not from the flesh but above the flesh; so what makes the soul live blessedly is not from the soul but above the soul: because as the soul is the life of the flesh, so God is the blessed life of man."
NOW IF ANY MAN HAVE NOT THE SPIRIT OF CHRIST, HE IS NONE OF HIS. — Note here, that the Spirit of Christ and of God is the same, and consequently Christ is God. Again, if this is the Spirit of Christ, equally as of God, therefore the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Son equally as from the Father, says St. Ambrose, Book III On the Holy Spirit, chapter IX. Let each one here examine whether he feels in himself the spirit, affections, loves, and zeal which Christ had in Himself and expressed in His life, that he may see whether he is of Christ, or rather of the world, or of the devil. For the Spirit of Christ is humble and heavenly; the spirit of the world is vain, earthly, and carnal; the spirit of the devil is proud, arrogant, and envious.
IF CHRIST BE IN YOU, — through His Holy Spirit, and His grace and charity.
10. THE BODY INDEED IS DEAD, BECAUSE OF SIN. — "Body dead," in Greek is νεκρόν, that is mortal, subject to the necessity of death.
St. Augustine notes, against the Pelagians and Philosophers who teach that man would have died even before the fall, and dies from natural necessity (which Eugubinus also taught on Genesis II), that here the Apostle says the body is dead not because of nature, but because of sin. Second, that it is called dead, not mortal, because before the fall it could be mortal, although not going to die, namely if it had persisted in innocence. Therefore it is dead after sin, that is, it has been made subject to the necessity of death so briefly and certainly that it is as if already held and called dead. Thus St. Augustine, Book I On the Merits of Sins, chapter IV.
BUT THE SPIRIT LIVETH BECAUSE OF JUSTIFICATION. — Our Interpreter reads ζῇ, that is, liveth. Now they read ζωή, that is, life, as if to say: The Holy Spirit, who in Himself is living, and is the essential and uncreated life itself, is the cause of our spiritual life, and communicates it to us, while He makes us live the life not of the flesh but of the spirit in charity and grace. Thus St. Chrysostom, Ambrose, Augustine, and others read and understand: and what follows favors this sense. For in the next verse, spirit is understood not as ours, but as the Holy Spirit, the same, as it seems, as here.
But our Interpreter, Origen, and Theodoret read, "the spirit liveth," that is, our mind lives, both now in the life of grace; and lives, that is shall live, in the life of glory at the resurrection: just as the body is now dead because of sin. Liveth, I say, "because of justification:" in Greek διὰ δικαιοσύνην, that is because of justice, namely that it may serve justice, says Origen. For he himself thinks that "because of" here signifies the final cause. But more aptly "through" or "because of" (for in either way you may translate it) signifies either the formal cause (for the formal cause of spiritual life is justice, or infused grace), or the meritorious, in this sense, as if to say: It liveth, that is, our body shall live in the resurrection and in heaven because of justice. For justice merits this life, for its reward and prize is glory and eternal life. For in like manner the body is said to be dead because of sin, namely because by the merit, or rather demerit, of sin we incur the punishment of death.
11. AND IF THE SPIRIT OF HIM (the Spirit of the Father) DWELL IN YOU: HE THAT RAISED UP JESUS FROM THE DEAD (God the Father Himself), SHALL QUICKEN ALSO YOUR MORTAL BODIES, BECAUSE OF HIS SPIRIT THAT DWELLETH IN YOU. — "Shall quicken," namely in the resurrection, that is, He shall give you immortal and glorious bodies: for otherwise the reprobate too shall then be quickened, but unto punishment.
Note the phrase "because of His indwelling Spirit." For from this it is clear that the Holy Spirit dwelling in us through the spirit of charity is the cause of resurrection and of glorious life. For this Spirit is in Himself life, animating, vivifying, and quickening all things; and therefore as Christ's body, so also ours He shall quicken in us at the resurrection, if He Himself dwells in us. Therefore here Paul signifies that justice is the moral and meritorious cause of the resurrection. So Molina, On the Work of the Six Days, disputation XXVIII.
12. THEREFORE, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh. — Supply: but we are debtors to the spirit, to live according to the spirit. Note the word "therefore": for the Apostle gathers this conclusion from what has been said, as if to say: I have said up to now that you are not in the flesh, but in the spirit, and have been transferred by Christ from the flesh to the spirit: for Christ has introduced a new life of the spirit. Therefore, since in baptism we have bound ourselves to live for Christ, as our parent and head, it follows equally that we are bound and debtors not to the flesh, to live carnally, but to the spirit, to live spiritually: for Christ both is and lives not in the flesh, but in the spirit.
13. IF YOU LIVE ACCORDING TO THE FLESH, YOU SHALL DIE; BUT IF BY THE SPIRIT (through the spirit) YOU MORTIFY THE DEEDS OF THE FLESH, YOU SHALL LIVE. — Here the Apostle proves by six arguments that Christians must live not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit; and he proposes them in the next six verses. The first is in this verse: because if they live according to the flesh, they shall die the death of Gehenna and the eternal death; but if they live according to the spirit, they shall not die, but shall live the blessed and eternal life.
The second is in verse 14, because if they live according to the spirit, they shall both be called and shall be sons of God.
The third is in verse 15, because for this they have received the spirit of adoption, namely that they may live according to the spirit.
The fourth is in verse 17, because if they do this, they shall be heirs of God.
The fifth is in verse 18, because the sufferings which we endure to defend the spiritual life are not worthy compared to the future glory which shall be revealed in us.
The sixth he indicates in verse 20, because otherwise, if they serve not the spirit but the flesh and creatures, they shall serve vanity: for all flesh and creature is subjected to vanity and corruption.
Beautifully St. Augustine, Sermon 13 On the Words of the Apostle: "The Epicureans," he says, "placed their happiness in the flesh and in the pleasures of the flesh; the Stoics in the soul, namely in their own virtue. The Epicurean said: It is good for me to enjoy the flesh; the Stoic said: It is good for me to enjoy my own mind; the Apostle said: But it is good for me to cleave to God. The Epicurean errs, the Stoic is deceived. For then the soul lives rightly if it lives not according to the flesh, nor according to itself, but according to God. For as the soul is the life of the flesh, so God is the life of the soul."
Note the phrase "you shall mortify." For carnal desires and acts of concupiscence live in our appetite, by which we vitally desire wines, sexual pleasures, honors, and other carnal things. But these very things must be tamed, restrained, and uprooted by continence and mortification, namely by resisting and suppressing them; which cannot be done unless we mortify these desires, that is, bring death to them. For they ought to die, that they may no longer live, but that virtue and continence may live in us. And hence it is that these concupiscences, being vital, cannot be mortified without great feeling and pain of soul. For they cling more vitally to the soul than the tooth to the head, indeed than the soul to the body itself: if therefore the tooth cannot be torn from the jaw, and the soul from the body without huge pain, it follows that these vital concupiscences also cannot be torn from the appetite and soul without huge pain: for it is necessary that here as there, death and the pain of death intervene.
14. FOR WHOSOEVER ARE LED BY THE SPIRIT OF GOD (not as brutes, but as men endowed with reason and liberty), THEY ARE THE SONS OF GOD. — Whence St. Augustine, Sermon 13 On the Words of the Apostle: "Someone will say to me: So we are acted upon, we do not act. I answer, rather, you both act and are acted upon; and then you act well, if you are acted upon by the good. For the Spirit of God, who acts you, is a helper to those who act. But no one is moved if nothing is done by him. For the Spirit helps our infirmity." The same, in the book On Correction and Grace, chapter II: "Let them understand," he says, "if they are sons of God, that they are led by the Spirit of God, that they may do what must be done; and when they have done it, let them give thanks to Him by whom they are led. For they are led that they may act, not that they themselves do nothing, and for this it is shown to them what they ought to do; that when they do it as it must be done, that is with love and delight in justice, they may rejoice that they have received the sweetness which the Lord has given, that their land may yield its fruit." See the same in The Conflict of the Soul, vol. IX. As therefore Samson was led, seized by the Spirit of God, to perform heroic deeds of strength, whence before Samson undertook them, sacred Scripture says: "The Spirit of the Lord rushed upon Samson;" so likewise the just and holy are led by the Spirit of God to spiritual works, as heroic works.
15. YOU HAVE NOT RECEIVED THE SPIRIT OF BONDAGE IN FEAR. — In Greek εἰς φόβον, that is unto fear, as if to say, says St. Chrysostom and Theodoret: You have not received the spirit of slaves to fear, like the Jews, who were restrained from sins by fear of punishment; that you should be driven by fear of punishments to fulfill the law of God.
You will ask: What is this spirit of fear? It is the law, says St. Augustine, Sermon 13 On the Words of the Apostle. Second and more plainly, it is the Holy Spirit, says Anselm, who gave the Jews the law of fear, as to slaves; but to us He gives the spirit of love, grace, and pardon, as to sons. Third and most plainly, the spirit of fear is the servile spirit which the Jews received, that they might obey the law as slaves. Therefore the spirit of fear is the very fear infused by God into the Jews, which led and impelled them as slaves to fulfill what was commanded, and which is added to explain the Hebrew, or rather the Chaldean, Abba. Hence the Royal and Roman Bibles enclose pater in parentheses. Thus it is said in John I, 38: "Rabbi (which is interpreted Master);" and John IX, 7: "from Siloam (which is interpreted Sent)." For Paul here alludes to the Gospel of St. Mark, which he knew to have been written at Rome and to be known to the Romans. For in Mark XIV, 36, it is said Abba (that is to say), Father. For Christ did not say in Greek or Latin pater, but only said in Hebrew, or rather in Syro-Chaldaic, Abba, which Mark explains by saying pater. But the Apostle touches on these two languages here, and at Galatians IV, 6, says St. Augustine, De Spirit. et Litt., ch. XXXII, and Anselm, in order to signify that God is the same, and that with God the adoption of the Jews and of the Gentiles is the same. For Abba is the idiom and word of the Jews, pater of the Greeks and Gentiles.
Verse 16: The Spirit Himself Gives Testimony to Our Spirit That We Are the Sons of God
16. THE SPIRIT HIMSELF GIVES TESTIMONY TO OUR SPIRIT, THAT WE ARE THE SONS OF GOD. — "Gives testimony," in Greek συμμαρτυρεῖ, that is, He bears witness together with our spirit. This first can be taken as if the compound verb were placed for the simple, so that "co-testifies" means the same as "testifies," as our Interpreter and the Greeks render it.
Secondly, it can be taken properly, so that "co-testifies" means that He testifies together with our spirit, as though Paul here brings forward two witnesses of our sonship, namely the Holy Spirit and our spirit. As if to say: The Holy Spirit together with our spirit testifies that we are sons of God, namely while He stirs up us and our spirit so that we say: Abba, Father.
Note: this testimony of the Holy Spirit, by which He testifies to us that we are sons of God, is not certain with the certainty of faith, as the heretics would have it; for the Council of Trent condemns this, as does the Apostle, I Corinthians IV, 3, and elsewhere; nor is it even certain with infallible certainty, as Catharinus and Cajetan would have it; but it is only certain with conjectural certainty, which certainty, however, grows with sanctity, so much so that Andreas Vega, Ruard, and Pererius following them, hold that some very holy men, without a special revelation of God, from the signs and affections of the Holy Spirit which they experience in themselves to be very frequent, clear, and efficacious, have a certainty — not indeed infallible, such that they would dare to swear they are in God's grace — but such and so great as to exclude all fear and dread of the opposite, not only from affection and trust, but also from understanding and persuasion: so that such men know as certainly that they are in the grace of God as we know certainly and believe that Constantinople or Alexandria exists, from the fact that everywhere all men say that those cities exist and are.
"The Holy Spirit," says Bernard, sermon 2 on Pentecost, "gives to the soul, first, the pledge of salvation, namely the testimony that you are a son of God; secondly, strength of life, that in labors, vigils, and in all observances you may walk delightfully; thirdly, the light of knowledge, that when you have done everything well, you may consider yourself an unprofitable servant, and whatever good you find in yourself, you may attribute to Him from whom every good is."
Note here, that grace and adoption, and its operations and effects, though they be common to the Holy Trinity, are nevertheless appropriated to the Holy Spirit, because the Holy Spirit proceeds through will and love, and the first and notional act is love: otherwise in reality, just as the Holy Spirit gives and communicates Himself to the just, so also do the Father and the Son, and the Holy Trinity adopts them as sons unto Itself, and dwells in them. For this is what is said in John XIV, 23: "We will come to him, and We will make Our abode with him."
ABBA, FATHER, — ὁ πατήρ, that is, Father, is the nominative, which the Syriac thinks is here placed by amplification (auxesis) instead of the vocative. For he himself translates אבא אבון abba, abun, that is, abba, our father.
Secondly and properly, as if Paul should say: Abba, which signifies father. For pater is in the nominative case.
You will say: This testimony is from the Holy Spirit, therefore it is altogether certain.
I reply: In itself indeed it is certain, but to us it is not certain; because we are not entirely certain that it is from the Holy Spirit, and not from the devil. Hence I John IV, 4 says: "Try the spirits if they be of God," or of the devil, of nature and imagination. For daily experience teaches that very many are deceived in this. For all heretics boast of the Holy Spirit; yet they teach and believe contrary things, and are divided into very many sects, and each one certainly persuades himself that he is led and illumined by the Holy Spirit, when it is clear that very many — nay, all — are deceived: for the Holy Spirit does not teach or inspire contrary things, especially erroneous and heretical things. If they can be deceived in faith and in the certainty of their faith, much more can they be deceived in the certainty of grace and charity. Hence I Corinthians IV, 4, the Apostle doubts about himself, saying: "I am not conscious to myself of anything, yet am I not hereby justified." The Apostle therefore here, by this testimony of the Holy Spirit, does not wish to introduce a special faith concerning the justice of each faithful one, but only wishes to strengthen our hope. But hope does not require full certainty of its object, but rather is joined with the uncertainty and fear of losing it.
You will ask: What is this testimony? Origen first answers that it is this, that we experience that we fulfill the law of God out of love, not out of fear.
Secondly, Ambrose and Anselm answer that it is the imitation of God and Christ; for through it we become like God, and consequently sons of God.
Thirdly, Theodoret answers that this testimony is sacred doctrine, which teaches that those obedient to God as to a Father, and invoking Him, are sons of God.
Fourthly, Sedulius answers that it is the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. For He testifies that we are sons of God.
Fifthly, St. Chrysostom and Toletus answer best, that this testimony is the cry of which the Apostle spoke in the preceding verse; for while we cry with filial affection: Abba, Father, through the Holy Spirit, the cry itself of ours, and the Holy Spirit, the author of this cry, witnesses with us, as the Greek has it, to the spirit, that is, to our mind, that we are sons of God — especially if there be added a pious life, contempt of the world, desire of heavenly things, innocence, peace of conscience, to hear and think gladly of God and the things of salvation, zeal for God's honor and the salvation of souls, to suffer many things for God, and especially if, as Cajetan shrewdly noted, one feels these two things in oneself: first, the love of God by which he is prompt to obey the Holy Spirit; secondly, a continual fatherly governance of God, by which He directs him to good works, and guards him with stronger graces; St. Gregory, lib. I Dialog. ch. 1, adds thirdly humility, if it be joined with other virtues; St. Basil adds fourthly an immense hatred of sin, and zeal to extirpate it both in oneself and in others. For thus he himself, in question 296 in the Shorter Rules, asks: "By what reason," he says, "can it be persuaded to any soul that it is free from sins" and purified, and consequently is the friend and daughter of God? And he answers: "If anyone perceives in himself that affection of soul similar to David's, with whom it is: I have hated iniquity and abhorred it; or perceives that he has attained to that precept of the Apostle, who said: Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth, fornication, uncleanness, lust, evil concupiscence, and covetousness which is the service of idols, for which the wrath of God comes upon the children of unbelief; so that he can truly say: A perverse heart has not cleaved to me; the malicious one departing from me, I knew not." Then for this hatred of sin he gives this sign: "Furthermore one understands that he is placed in such affection, if even against sinners he has imitated that admirable and dread-filled mercy of holy men, as David indeed, with whom it is: I saw the prevaricators and pined away; and the Apostle, who says: Who is weak, and I am not weak? who is scandalized, and I am not on fire? Whenever therefore one, in his own or in others' sins, has perceived himself to be affected in soul in the manner we have said, then without doubt let him believe himself to be free from sin," and consequently to be in grace, and so to be a son of God.
Finally St. Bernard gives three signs similar to these, in his sermon De quatuor orandi modis: "But perhaps you may ask, he says, whence or how you may know, whether you have obtained this indulgence. Doubtless, for the sake of preserving humility, divine piety is wont to so dispose, that the more one progresses, the less he reckons himself to have progressed." And after a little: "Then the Lord said to the paralytic: Arise, take up thy bed and walk. And so do you also first, if you now arise by desire of the heavenly things; secondly, if you take up your bed, that is, lift up the body from earthly pleasures, so that the soul is no longer carried by its concupiscences, but rather it itself, as is fitting, governs it, and bears it where it would not; thirdly, if you finally walk, forgetting the things behind, and stretching forward to those which are before, with desire and purpose of progressing: do not doubt that you have been healed; for you could not have risen, if the burden had not been somewhat lightened, nor take up the bed, unless more unburdened; because it is not possible to walk in the fervor of conversion with the grave weight of sins."
From these signs and testimonies there arises in our soul a conjectural certainty of our righteousness and sanctity, which ought to suffice us, and no other is to be sought: for God wills our hope to be mingled with fear, and to keep us anxious and in suspense, so that we may not grow torpid through security, but with fear and trembling, vigilantly and studiously work out our salvation. Hence beautifully St. Gregory, epist. 186, which is the 22nd of book six, to Gregoria, chamberlain of the Empress, who asked that full certainty (such as our Innovators promise) and a revelation concerning the remission of her sins be given to her, writes back thus: "As to what your sweetness has added in her letters, that you are troublesome to me until I write that it has been revealed to me that your sins have been forgiven, you have asked a thing both difficult and even useless. Difficult indeed, because I am unworthy that a revelation should be made to me: useless, however, because you ought not to be made secure about your sins, except when on the last day of your life you will be no longer able to lament those same sins. Until that day comes, suspicious and ever trembling you ought to fear your faults, and to wash them with daily tears." Then in this same matter he confirms it by the example of St. Paul, saying: "Certainly the Apostle Paul had already ascended to the third heaven, had also been led into paradise, had heard secret words which it is not lawful for man to utter; and yet still trembling he said: I chastise my body and bring it into subjection, lest perhaps, when I have preached to others, I myself should become a reprobate. Does he still fear who is already led to heaven, and is he unwilling to fear who is still living on earth?" Finally he adds the cause of this uncertainty, when he says: "Consider, sweetest daughter, that security is wont to be the mother of negligence: therefore in this life you ought not to have a security through which you might be made negligent. For it is written: Blessed is the man who is always afraid. And again it is written: Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice unto Him with trembling. Therefore in the brief time of this life it is necessary that trembling hold your mind, that it may afterwards rejoice without end through the joy of security."
Verse 17: And If Sons, Heirs Also; Heirs Indeed of God, and Joint Heirs with Christ
17. AND IF SONS (we are of God, therefore) HEIRS ALSO — we are of God. You will say: Therefore good works are not necessary. For if eternal life befalls us by inheritance, therefore not from the merits of good works.
I reply: I deny the consequence, because the sonship of God and the right of inheritance, received in baptism, and consequently the right to the heavenly inheritance, are to be preserved and increased by good works, especially of patience; by which we may merit the same inheritance and glory, and the increase of glory. For thus God has ordained, that whoever does justice, may be just and an heir of God, and that such great happiness and glory should befall us with Christ only through labors, pains and crosses, and great and much patience. Hence the Apostle adds: "Yet if we suffer with Him (suffer with Christ), that we may also (with Him) be glorified together." Vigorously St. Cyprian, sermon 2 On Zeal and Envy: "If among men, he says, it is joyful and glorious to have sons resembling them, and then it delights more to have begotten them, if the offspring successively corresponds to the father by like features: how much greater is the joy in God the Father, when one is so spiritually born, that by his acts and praises divine generosity is proclaimed?" And St. Augustine, epist. 83 to Consentius: "Let us think that we are the more like God, the more we can be more just by participation in Him."
Note: The Apostle here exhorts the faithful to patience and the works of patience by twelve arguments: for each of his words has weight, and most of them suggest a new reason and stimulus.
For first he says: Yet if we suffer with Him, as if to say: Christ our leader goes before us on the cross; why should we not follow Him as noble soldiers under the standard of the cross?
The second is, when he adds: That we may also be glorified together, as if to say: Not just any glory, but the very glory of Christ the Son of God, we shall obtain as our reward, so that, just as the passion with Christ was common to us, so also the glory may be common.
The third is, what he says in verse 18: The sufferings are not worthy, as if to say: With a small suffering you will buy immense glory, as if you should buy the whole world for an obol. If even some enemy should throw crowned coins or gems on your back, you would not grieve, but rejoice, and gather them; and, as St. Juniper used to say: With such stones I would wish to be stoned from Paris all the way to Orleans. These gems, these precious stones, are tribulations.
The fourth is, what he adds in the same place: Of this time, as if to say: With a momentary suffering you will buy a blessed eternity.
The fifth is verse 19: For the expectation of the creature waits for the revelation of the sons of God, as if to say: All creatures suffer and wait with us, that through our patience they may obtain glory and renewal with us. Therefore we ought to suffer both by their example and for their benefit, because by our patience we shall procure this glory for all.
The sixth is what he says in the same place: It awaits the revelation of the sons of God, as if to say: We have begun to be sons of God, but it behooves us to perfect this sonship, that through patience we may obtain the adoption and inheritance of the sons of God in heaven.
The seventh is what he brings forward in verse 22: Every creature groans and is in labor even until now, as if to say: Other creatures from the beginning of the world even till now suffer, but man only for the brief time of his life: why then should he not bravely bear the brief cross which other creatures have constantly borne for so many ages?
The eighth, which he has in verse 23: Awaiting the redemption of our body, as if to say: This wretched and afflicted body will become impassible and glorious through patience: therefore let us courageously embrace this patience.
The ninth is verse 24: By hope, he says, we are saved, as if to say: We have a sure hope, that we shall soon be freed from every suffering: let this hope arouse our spirits to endure any hardships. "O you who have suffered grave things, God will give an end to these also," and a swift end.
The tenth is: The Spirit, he says, helps our infirmity, and intercedes for us: why then with such a Helper and Supporter should we not bravely take up our cross on our shoulders?
The eleventh is verse 28 and following: To those who love God, he says, all things work together unto good. Let us therefore cheerfully bear infamy, sicknesses, hunger, hardships, persecutions, all evils; because God will convert all these things to our good.
The twelfth is verse 29, that the patient are predestined: for God has predestined His friends and elect to be conformed to His Son, as in patience, so in glory. Finally if God is for us, who is against us?
Verse 18: The Sufferings of This Time Are Not Worthy to Be Compared with the Glory to Come
Verse 18. THE SUFFERINGS OF THIS PRESENT TIME ARE NOT WORTHY (St. Augustine reads: are unworthy) TO BE COMPARED WITH THE GLORY TO COME, — namely insofar as they are human and temporal sufferings: yet the same insofar as they are supported by Christ's grace and merits, or insofar as these sufferings are undertaken and borne through the grace of Christ. I explain: if you consider the nature, force, dignity of our sufferings, in themselves, and as they are of our free choice, when they are borne freely and voluntarily; if you consider their bitterness, multitude, duration and other natural circumstances, they are not worthy of the future glory; but if you consider these sufferings as informed by the grace and charity of God, and as flowing from it, or as undertaken and borne from the love of God, faith, hope, worship, obedience and Christian patience, thus they are worthy of the future glory: for thus they are acts of grace, charity, patience, etc.; and grace is the seed of glory. Therefore just as a seed, though small in itself, yet has the seminal force and efficacy to produce flowers, leaves and fruits: so both passion and action flowing from the grace and charity of God, though small in itself, has nevertheless force and efficacy to produce both physically and dispositively (for grace is a disposition to glory and connatural to it), and rather morally and meritoriously, the heavenly and blessed glory.
Hear St. Augustine in the Sentences, num. 272: "Let the world rage and roar, he says, let it rebuke with tongues, let it flash with arms; whatever it does, how small that will be compared to what we are about to receive? I weigh what I suffer against what I hope for: this indeed I feel, that I hope for; and yet incomparably greater is what is hoped for, than what is taken away. Whatever it is that rages against the name of Christ, if it can be overcome, it is bearable: if it cannot, it serves to obtain the reward more quickly; and the faithful one passes from the end of temporal evil into the perception of the eternal good." By the same dilemma St. Sebastian the martyr (as is contained in his Acts) persuaded SS. Mark and Marcellian, who were most bitterly tempted by their parents and were already wavering, to constancy in faith and martyrdom, saying: Every labor and grief of this life of dying for Christ is either slow and long, or sharp and intense. If sharp, it is brief, and cannot last long, and accelerates death; if slow, it is bearable. Stand therefore bravely, endure both slow and sharp pains, because these will bring forth for you a crown and joy as immense as it is eternal.
Again: "If daily, says the same Augustine, serm. 2 On the Feast of All Saints, we ought to undergo torments, if we ought to endure even Gehenna for a short time, so that we might be worthy to see Christ coming in glory, and to be associated with the number of His Saints, would it not be worthy to suffer everything that is sad, that we might be made partakers of so great a good and so great a glory!" See the same, serm. 37 and 44 On the Saints. Hence St. Francis used to say: "So great is the glory which I await, that every penalty delights me, every sickness, every humiliation, every persecution, every mortification." And Abibus, deacon and martyr, as is contained in his Acts, when in the persecution of Licinius about the year of Christ 316 he came to the city of Edessa, confirming all in piety and constancy in the faith, was taken by Lysanias, lacerated with claws, hung up, and all his limbs distorted and dislocated. When asked by the President what utility the torments procured him, which were so consuming his body, he answered with Christ: "Our things, he said, do not consist of the present time, nor do we follow only those things which are seen. But if you also should wish to look to the hope and the reward promised to us, perhaps you too will say with Paul: The sufferings of this time are not worthy of the future glory which shall be revealed in us." For which cause, cast into the fire and receiving the flame in his mouth, the martyr returned his spirit to God.
Here also belongs that saying of St. Gregory, lib. VI Moral., ch. VIII: "Holy men, he says, are despised outwardly, and as if unworthy bear all things, but trusting themselves worthy of the supernal seats, await with certainty the glory of eternity." John Moschus relates in the Spiritual Meadow (which book is cited in the Second Nicene General Synod), ch. CXXX, that Abbot Athanasius heard choirs praising God, and when he wished to enter to them, he heard: "No one enters here who is negligent: depart, fight, despise the vanity of the world."
Beautifully and aptly St. Bernard, On Conversion to Clerics, ch. XXX: "The sufferings of this time, he says, are not worthy compared to the past fault which is remitted, to the present grace of consolation which is sent in, to the future glory which is promised to us." And elsewhere: "For four reasons we owe our whole life to Christ. We owe ourselves wholly to satisfaction for past sins, wholly to the Creator, wholly to the Redeemer, wholly to future glory. Behold four creditors, to whom we owe ourselves wholly."
Verse 19: For the Expectation of the Creature Waits for the Revelation of the Sons of God
19. FOR THE EXPECTATION OF THE CREATURE AWAITS THE REVELATION OF THE SONS OF GOD. — Note, the τὸ "for" gives the reason for the preceding, as if to say: Most certainly in us, and in the whole world, this glory will be revealed, because every creature most eagerly awaits it: and this desire seems innate and implanted in it by God: which, as God has implanted in it, so He will also fulfill.
EXPECTATION. — In Greek ἀποκαραδοκία, that is, solicitous, anxious, as Theophylact says, and as it were an expectation with head erect and outstretched. St. Hilary, lib. XII De Trinitat., translates it "distant," Ambrose "frequent expectation," namely from the beginning of the world. For this Greek word is composed of ἀπό, that is, "from," and κάρα, that is, "head," and δοκεῖν, that is, "to see"; because those who greatly desire to see something, with head outstretched, repeatedly look forward or look up on high, as toward mountains or to heaven, as if expecting the desired thing thence.
Note the emphasis: He does not say: The creature awaits, but: The expectation of the creature awaits; as if to say: The creatures so eagerly await this glory, that they seem to be expectation itself.
OF THE CREATURE. — First, Origen, Theodoret and Nazianzen, oration 1 Against Julian, and Cyril, lib. III Thesauri, ch. 1 and VII, by "creature" understand the angels, who serve the vanity and servitude of corruption — not their own, but of men, especially of the elect — and shall be freed from this servitude at the resurrection of men. But this exposition seems distorted and almost violent: for the angels, since they are blessed, cannot properly be said to be subjected to vanity on account of the vanity of men, and to be in it unwillingly, and to be freed from it, as D. Thomas rightly noted.
Secondly, St. Augustine here in the exposition set forth above, and lib. LXXXIII Quaestionum, Quaest. LXVII; Anselm, Gregory, lib. IV Moral., ch. XLI; Andreas Masius, on Joshua ch. VI, verse 15; Catharinus and Cajetan here: every creature, they say, that is, every man, who is the knot and bond of every creature, and the microcosm, and the miracle of the world, as Trismegistus said: because indeed man participates something of all creatures, namely from the elements being, from plants vegetative life, from animals sensation, from angels reasoning; and thus all creatures suffer in man and with man, and desire to be freed therefrom. For man, who willingly forsook the state of constancy, pressed down by the just weight of mortality, unwillingly serves vanity, that is, the mutability of his corruption. Thus "creature" is taken for man, Mark last chapter, verse 15. Likewise also St. Augustine above: Creature, he says, that is, the unbelieving man, will be freed from the servitude of corruption, that is from sin; because he will be called to the faith, and will become a son, that he may afterwards obtain the liberty of the glory of the sons. But the Apostle here speaks of liberation from corruption — not of sin in this life, but of mortality in the future.
Thirdly, and best, "creature" is here taken properly. For in verse 22, it is opposed to men and to the sons of God. Thus St. Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, Œcumenius, Ambrose, lib. IV Hexameron; Hilary, lib. XII De Trinit.; Sotus, Adam, Pererius and Toletus. Therefore creatures here are the heavens, the elements and all things created; so that it is a prosopopoeia, as if Paul said: All creatures most eagerly with natural appetite await the time when they shall be endowed with the glory of the sons of God, that with those whom they have served, as their masters, they themselves also may receive their glory, renewal and perfection, as servants. Thus a tree, by an appetite not rational, not animal, but natural, is said to await its fruit, and a seed its harvest. As if the Apostle said: And this is a great argument, that the glory prepared for us is immense and inestimable, that all creatures, even insensible ones, pant wholly toward it.
Verse 20: The Creature Was Made Subject to Vanity, Not Willingly
20. THE CREATURE IS SUBJECTED TO VANITY NOT WILLINGLY, BUT BY REASON OF HIM WHO SUBJECTED IT IN HOPE, — "Vanity" here is the defect of mutability, and the servile works, the labors, sufferings and corruptions, with which creatures are occupied for man's sake, as appears from what follows. Hence Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact and Œcumenius say that the heavens are corruptible — understand in quality, not in substance.
Secondly, Erasmus translates the Greek ματαιότητα as "frustration," as if to say: Nature does not attain what it intends, while it propagates one individual from another, lest the species perish, by this thing aiming at as it were a kind of immortality; but in vain: nor will it attain it before our resurrection.
Thirdly, Origen, lib. I Periarchon, VII: Vanity, he says, here are the bodies into which souls existing before the body have been thrust on account of their sins; and such bodies are also the sun, moon, nay even the earth and the heavens. For all these have souls, which existed before them, and consequently they themselves can sin, and shall undergo the judgment of Christ as well as men. These bodies therefore properly await the resurrection, and that they may be freed from corruption, properly hope and groan. This is the heresy of Origen, of which Epiphanius, heresy 64, and St. Jerome to Avitus, absurd indeed and absurd. For it is against all reason, philosophy, experience.
NOT WILLINGLY, — that is, not of its own accord (as the Commentary ascribed to St. Jerome reads, and Hilary cited above), that is, not by natural inclination: for every creature naturally loves its own being, and to be preserved, and its own perfection, and therefore abhors this vanity and corruption. Thus D. Thomas. The creature therefore is subjected to this vanity not by its own will, but on account of Him (God and the ordinance of God) who subjected it to this vanity, for man's sake, namely that it may serve him in this mortal state.
IN HOPE, — under the hope of liberation and of change for the better in the common resurrection and renewal of all men and things.
Verse 21: The Creature Shall Be Delivered from the Servitude of Corruption into the Liberty of the Glory of the Sons of God
21. THE CREATURE SHALL BE DELIVERED FROM THE SERVITUDE OF CORRUPTION, INTO THE LIBERTY OF THE GLORY OF THE SONS OF GOD. — First, Ambrose reads "in liberty," namely when it shall be in that, as if to say: When it shall have obtained liberty, that is, incorruption. So also Theodoret.
Secondly, St. Chrysostom: "in," that is, "on account of," or in commendation of the liberty and glory of the sons of God. For just as the nurse of a royal child, when the child is crowned, herself for his sake partakes of the royal goods: so likewise, when man shall be endowed with glory, the other creatures which served man shall partake of his glory, says Chrysostom.
Thirdly and more plainly, "into the liberty," that is into the imitation, or to the example of the liberty of the sons of God, that the other creatures may receive a certain similar liberty, stability and immortality. The "into" therefore signifies the exemplary, or even final cause. Thus Pererius and Toletus.
Note: "Liberty of glory" here is the same as "glorious liberty." Secondly, this liberty is not of nature, nor of grace, but of glory; it is the liberation from all misery, infirmity, affliction, corruption, and so from every evil of soul and body, of guilt and punishment.
Verse 22: We Know That Every Creature Groans and Travails in Pain, Even Till Now
22. WE KNOW THAT EVERY CREATURE GROANS AND IS IN LABOR EVEN UNTIL NOW. — Hence certain heretics in St. Augustine, Quaest. LXVII among the LXXXIII, handed down many impious and inept things about angels, e.g. that all are in pain and groans, until we men are wholly freed from all misery. But these things are frivolous; and the Apostle does not speak of angels, as I said, but of inanimate and irrational creatures. As if to say: All inanimate creatures anxiously and with great pain await the end of evils. For it is a prosopopoeia, as St. Chrysostom and Theophylact note, by which the Apostle signifies two things: first, the continuous and great sufferings, corruptions and mutabilities of creatures; secondly, their vehement aversion from them, so that if they had sense, they would groan as if in labor, and that from the beginning of the world and the fall of man even until now.
Verse 23: Ourselves Also, Who Have the Firstfruits of the Spirit, Groan within Ourselves
23. AND NOT ONLY IT, BUT OURSELVES ALSO, WHO HAVE THE FIRST FRUITS OF THE SPIRIT, EVEN WE OURSELVES GROAN WITHIN OURSELVES, AWAITING THE ADOPTION OF THE SONS OF GOD. — Note τὸ "having the first fruits of the spirit." First St. Augustine, lib. LXXXIII Quest., Quest. LXVII, explains thus: As if to say: We Christians, who have offered ourselves as it were as first fruits to God.
Secondly and better, St. Ambrose and Anselm, as if to say: We Apostles, who have received the first and chief gifts of the Holy Spirit, and seem admirable to you, yet groan under this burden of the body.
Thirdly and best, St. Chrysostom, Theodoret and Cyril, lib. XIV Thesaur. ch. 1: All Christians, they say (especially of that primitive Church), with righteousness receive the first fruits of the spirit, because they have and foretaste the first fruits and richness of the spirit, namely true knowledge of God, and love, and the hope of true happiness, and that often with an abundance of divine consolation; for this grace and this pious and Christian life are the first fruits of redemption and liberation from sin, to which will be added consummate grace, namely of happiness and glory, and the perfect redemption and liberation from every evil, which shall come to pass at the resurrection: for this will be the redemption of our body from death and every misery, for which we groan and pant. For Paul here speaks not only to the Apostles, but to all Christians, as is clear from verses 15 and 24.
ADOPTION. — Note: In the first instant of justification charity and grace are infused into man, by which man becomes a partaker of the divine nature, and consequently acceptable to glory, and an heir of God; and therefore by this very fact one becomes an adoptive son of God, just as Christ is the natural Son of God, as is clear from verse 17. Therefore our adoption, by which we are adopted as sons and heirs of God, comes to us in justification itself.
What then the Apostle here says, that this adoption is to be given only in heaven, understand this of consummated adoption, which is the very possession of the right and inheritance to which we have been adopted, namely the redemption of our body, which will be partly the liberation from mortality and concupiscence, and partly the glory of the body flowing from the glory of the soul: thus St. Chrysostom and St. Ambrose, Epistle 22. Adoption therefore is begun here, but will be perfected in heaven. In a similar manner the Apostle speaks of salvation in two ways; for in Titus 3:5 he says: "He saved us through the laver of regeneration"; but here, on the contrary, he says: "By hope we are saved." For the reasoning concerning salvation is the same as for adoption: namely, salvation begun is the righteousness by which we are saved from the death of the soul, that is, from sin; this happens to us in baptism, as he himself says in Titus 3. But perfected salvation from all misery and evil will come to us in heaven: hence we do not yet possess it, but hope for it; and this is what he here says: "By hope we are saved," as if to say, We hope for the salvation which we have begun here through grace, to be completed in us through glory in heaven.
Verse 24: For We Are Saved by Hope
Verse 24. FOR BY HOPE WE ARE SAVED. — The word "for" gives the reason why he said we await this adoption of the sons in heaven, namely because we are not yet saved in fact but only in hope: for through hope we strive toward the salvation which we hope to attain in heaven. Hence it is clear that not faith alone, but also hope is required for salvation.
For a tropological reading see St. Augustine, sermon 25 On the Words of the Apostle, on long-suffering and constant hope.
But hope that is seen is not hope. — As if to say: Hope, that is, the thing hoped for, if it is at hand, if it is possessed, is no longer hoped for. The Apostle passes from the act and habit of hope to its object; for the one is connected with the other. These things hang together with what follows. For with these words the Apostle consoles the faithful, who suffer many things here on account of the hope of glory; for the afflicted mind often suggests to the afflicted man: Where is what you hope for? You see your evils which you suffer, but you do not see the glory for which you suffer. The Apostle here meets this suggestion saying that we see present evils, but do not yet see future goods, but must hope for them and await them through patience.
FOR WHAT A MAN SEES, WHY DOES HE HOPE FOR? — Why should he hope? As if to say: In vain does one hope for what he already sees, holds, and possesses. For there is here a catachresis in the word "sees"; for to see is here put for any kind of perceiving, knowing, enjoying, possessing. Thus it is commonly said that someone "sees" an inheritance, that is, enters into and possesses it. For sight is the most certain and noblest of all the senses, by which the mind, as it were, touches and possesses the objects seen. For the Apostle is not speaking of the vision of God, but of the glory of the body to be possessed: for this is the redemption of our body, as I said.
Note: you may rightly turn these words of the Apostle in the same manner against the special faith of the heretics, if namely you argue thus: The repentant sinner is bidden in Scripture to hope for pardon through Christ, therefore he is not certain of it: for what a man sees, why does he hope for? Beautifully St. Augustine, sermon 29 On the Words of the Apostle, compares hope to an egg: "For hope," he says, "has not yet arrived at the reality, and an egg is something, but it is not yet a chick."
Verse 26: Likewise the Spirit Also Helps Our Infirmity
Verse 26. LIKEWISE THE SPIRIT ALSO HELPS OUR INFIRMITY. — It is asked here to what the word "likewise" pertains. I answer: it pertains to all the effects and gifts of the Holy Spirit which the Apostle has up to this point recounted in this whole chapter. For he said in verse 11 that "the Holy Spirit dwelling in us will quicken our mortal bodies," and in verse 14 that "the Spirit makes us sons and heirs of God." Again in the same place he said that the Holy Spirit makes us cry: Abba, Father. Finally in verse 23 (to which the Apostle here especially refers) he said that we, having the firstfruits of the Spirit, groan, awaiting the adoption of the sons of God. Now he says further that besides this the Holy Spirit also helps our infirmity which we endure, as if to say: I have hitherto said that the Holy Spirit works various things in us, and especially makes us groan and sigh after heavenly glory: now I say that the same Spirit, just as He works in us the things already mentioned, so likewise works in us strength and aid, by which He helps our infirmity.
Again the word "and" here is the same as "besides" or "in addition," as if to say: The Holy Spirit, besides the groaning, hope, and patience which He works in us, in addition also helps our infirmity in this very groaning, namely so that with great alacrity and fortitude we may bear the infirmities of soul and body and of this corruptible life, on account of which we groan and sigh to heaven, and so that we may constantly overcome them, chiefly through prayer. For the Holy Spirit teaches us what to pray, and from what infirmities we ought to ask and pray to be delivered, from which not to be delivered but to be strengthened in them. For that the infirmity of prayer is here especially being treated is clear from the causal word "for," which he adds saying: "For we know not what we should pray for as we ought." For prayer for us is the remedy of our infirmities, by which to overcome them.
Here is the tenth argument, as I said at verse 17, by which the Apostle stirs the faithful to patience, namely, that in every suffering and infirmity we have the help and aid of the Holy Spirit, who strengthens and consoles us in every tribulation, and who pleads for us with unutterable groanings.
Note first: It is proper to the Holy Spirit and to God to help us. Hence Cicero, in book II On the Nature of the Gods: "Jupiter," he says, "that is, the helping father, is by the poets called the father of gods and men, and by our forefathers the best and greatest (Optimus Maximus); and indeed 'best,' that is, most beneficent, comes before 'greatest': because it is a greater and surely a more pleasing thing to do good to all than to have great wealth."
Note secondly: There are nine principal infirmities of man arising from sin, against which the Holy Spirit gives strength. The first are diseases, hardships, and any evils whatsoever inflicted on body or soul; in these the Holy Spirit strengthens us, that we may receive them from the hand of God and praise God in them.
The second is in the intellect: ignorance of what here and now must be done or shunned; and improvidence, of what a man ought to provide for or guard against in the future.
The third is in the will: weakness in loving solid and eternal goods, which are hidden from us; and in despising present and fleeting goods, which strike and entice the senses.
The fourth is in the memory: weakness in remembering both the benefits of God, that we may be grateful for them; and the judgments of God, by which He punishes the wicked and rewards the good; and the precepts of God; and our own sins, that we may be pierced with sorrow for them and repent.
The fifth weakness is in the spirit and concupiscible appetite, that the spirit may resist the concupiscence of the flesh.
The sixth is in the irascible: that we may restrain anger, hatred, and vengeance against those who harm or revile us.
The seventh weakness is in undertaking difficult and heroic works.
The eighth is in persevering in the service of God and the first fervor.
The ninth is in praying to God as we ought. With this ninth especially, as I said, the Apostle here deals.
FOR WE KNOW NOT WHAT WE SHOULD PRAY FOR AS WE OUGHT. — In six ways one errs in praying: First, if we ask for a temporal good which will be harmful to the soul. Hence St. Augustine in his Sentences, sent. 212: "He who faithfully prays to God for the necessities of this life," he says, "is mercifully not heard. For what is useful for the sick man, the physician knows better than the patient. For if he asks for what God commands and promises, what he asks will surely happen; because charity will receive what truth prepares." Secondly, if we pray to be delivered from some temptation or evil (as Paul from the thorn of the flesh) which is profitable to us for humility and other virtues. Thirdly, if we ask anything from ambition, as the sons of Zebedee asked for the first places in the kingdom of Christ. Fourthly, if we ask anything from indiscreet zeal, as the same desired fire to be sent down from heaven on the Samaritans who rejected Christ. Fifthly, if what is asked for is more useful to be deferred, so that through this delay zeal for prayer and the merit of perseverance and virtue may grow in us. Sixthly, and especially, if we ask for a particular state, or life, or certain way of life: e.g. to live in religious life, in the priesthood, in marriage, when God knows that another state is more suited to us and our temperament, that in it we may be saved, or attain more glory. For very many are damned in marriage and in the world, who would have been saved in celibacy, and conversely. Hence the best prayer is to ask daily that God may rule and lead us by those means and ways which have not the scandal of sin; by which He foresees us going straight to the end, that is, eternal life, and being holier and more blessed in it, so that in every matter, before we undertake it, we may pray with the Prophet: "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do? My heart is ready, O God; show me Thy ways, O Lord, and teach me Thy paths"; and with King Jehoshaphat, 2 Chronicles 20:12: "Since we know not, O Lord, what we ought to do, this alone is left to us, that we may direct our eyes to Thee"; do Thou direct me through those ways, duties, exercises, actions, and sufferings, by which Thou foreseest that I will come to heaven and to greater glory: thus piously and wisely Pererius and Salmeron.
THE SPIRIT HIMSELF PLEADS FOR US WITH UNUTTERABLE GROANINGS. — You will ask who this "spirit" is. First, Lyranus answers that it is the angel: for the guardian angel pleads for us. But in this whole chapter Paul makes no mention of the angel, and although throughout this chapter he often names the spirit, he never means the angel.
Secondly, St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Oecumenius take "spirit" as a spiritual man, namely a minister of the Church, to whom in the primitive Church the grace of praying for the people, who often would have asked useless things, was given by the Holy Spirit; such as the priest or deacon now is; for to that minister of the primitive Church the deacon has now succeeded, who supplicates for the people and ministers to the priest and the Church.
Thirdly, St. Augustine, tract 6 on John: "The Spirit," he says, "that is, charity itself, groans; charity itself prays"; against this He does not know to close His ears, who gave it. Thus St. Anselm also explains, following Augustine according to his custom.
Fourthly, Theodoret holds that "spirit" is the grace of the Holy Spirit, by which, being stirred, we pray; or that it is the spirit of prayer.
Fifthly, others hold that the "spirit" is the higher part of the soul illuminated and aided by the grace of God, which is called the spirit, and is contrary to the flesh, Galatians 5:17. For this part teaches us to ask according to God, that is, those things which please God, and to reject those things which are pleasing to the flesh; and the more the flesh covets its pleasures, the more does the spirit groan and pray more urgently for us for those things which it sees to be salutary for us: hence the Pagans say that the mind always pleads for the best things. This sense is fitting and convenient: for thus the Apostle often takes this name "spirit."
Sixthly, best and most plainly the "spirit" here is the Holy Spirit Himself: for it is He who helps our infirmity, and who teaches us what we ought to pray, since we ourselves often know not this: hence the Apostle opposes this Spirit to us, or to our spirit, as it is ours, that is, natural and human. This is the sense of most of the Fathers, as of Origen here, of Nazianzen, oration 5 On Theology; of Ambrose, Epistle 23 to Horentius; of Hilary, on Psalm 64; of Augustine, Epistle 121, which is On Praying to God, ch. 15, and others.
You will ask secondly, how the Holy Spirit pleads for us? First, Arius and Macedonius answer that, because the Holy Spirit is not God but lesser than the Father, He therefore properly prays the Father and pleads for us. St. Augustine in Book I Against Maximinus, after the beginning, and others, refute this heresy.
Secondly, St. Augustine, Epistle 121 On Praying to God, ch. 15; Gregory, Book II Morals, ch. 22, and Anselm: The Holy Spirit, they say, pleads, that is, makes us plead and groan, so that it is a Hebraism in which the Qal stands for the Hiphil. Thus in Matthew 10:20 it is said: "The Spirit of your Father, who speaks in you," that is, who makes you speak. Origen here illustrates this sense with a beautiful comparison: "Just as," he says, "a teacher, in order to teach letters to a wholly unlearned pupil, lowers himself to the boy's rudeness, and first pronounces the letters and goes before the boy, so that the boy, repeating what the master pronounced, may learn the same thing: so the Holy Spirit, when He sees our spirit disturbed by the perturbations of the flesh and not knowing what to pray as is fitting, Himself as a teacher sends forth the prayer first, and infuses it into our mind, which our spirit (if indeed it desires to be a disciple of the Holy Spirit) follows; He Himself proposes and stirs up groanings in us, by which our spirit may learn to groan, that he may again make God propitious to himself." These and more, Origen.
Thirdly and genuinely, the Holy Spirit pleads, that is, He sets forth the desires of His friends and their unutterable groanings in the consistory of the Most Holy Trinity as a Paraclete, that is, our advocate, with great urgency, great weight, and great authority. For all these things the Greek ὑπερεντυγχάνει signifies, that is, He pleads above and beyond: for ὑπέρ denotes the preeminence of the Holy Spirit in pleading, as though He Himself presides over all pleadings, and is, as it were, the master and prefect of the petitions of supplication of ours before God: and the Latin postulare, says Ulpian in book I, title On Pleading, is to set forth one's own desire, or that of one's friend, in court before him who presides over jurisdiction. In a similar way, in verse 34, the Son is said to intercede for us. Thus Nazianzen, oration 2 On the Son, who instead of ὑπερεντυγχάνει translates πρεσβεύει, that is, He acts as ambassador, performs an embassy, and as our ambassador, intermediary, and interpreter, the Holy Spirit pleads for us. Thus also expounds St. Thomas, Part III, Question 21, article 4.
Now the Holy Spirit sets forth these prayers and these groanings of ours to the Most Holy Trinity, by this very fact, that the Trinity knows them through the divine understanding, and by the intellect speaks them forth with affection and love before the Most Holy Trinity: for although this understanding and speaking is essential and common to the three Persons, it is nevertheless attributed either to the Son, when it is bare and alone; or to the Holy Spirit, when it is joined to love and proceeds from it, as happens here. For charity, love, and grace are attributed to the Holy Spirit, as wisdom is attributed to the Son, and power to the Father. See St. Thomas and the Doctors, Part I, Questions 37 and 38.
WITH UNUTTERABLE GROANINGS. — First, St. Ambrose, Epistle 23: "unutterable," he says, that is, heavenly and divine: for these groanings are of the Holy Spirit, whose power, efficacy, and manner of acting and pleading is unutterable.
Secondly, St. Augustine in the place already cited: "unutterable," he says, that is, unknown: for we groan and sigh after the glory which we do not see and do not know. Thus also Anselm.
Thirdly, Toletus: "unutterable," he says, that is, hidden and inexplicable; because indeed the Holy Spirit often through our groanings asks and obtains other things, indeed contrary to those which we desire and ask. For the particular ways which are fitting and suitable for each one to go straight to heaven are often unknown to man and ineffable, and known only to the Holy Spirit. Hence the Apostle adds about Him saying: "And He who searches the hearts knows what the Spirit desires."
Fourthly, properly and genuinely, these groanings, which the Holy Spirit Himself excites in us and, when excited, proposes to the Most Holy Trinity, are called unutterable, because the interior affection of charity stirring up those groanings is greater than any external speech; so much so that holy men cannot utter and often cannot speak it, especially while with the most ardent groaning they desire heavenly glory and its most perfect peace. Thus the Apostle groans ineffably, first, from weariness of exile and of this dying body, saying: "Wretched man that I am, who shall deliver me from the body of this death?" Secondly, from desire of heaven, saying: "I desire to be dissolved and to be with Christ." Thirdly, from grief and desire for the salvation of others, and of those perishing, saying: "Who is weak, and I am not weak?" and: "I wished to be anathema for my brethren." From what has been said it is clear that these unutterable groanings are in us subjectively; but in the Holy Spirit they are partly effectively, because He produces them in us, and partly objectively, because He Himself sets them forth and proposes them to Himself and to the whole Most Holy Trinity, while He pleads for us. Again, from this passage learn that the gift and efficacy of prayer consists not in words, but in groaning, affection, desire, ejaculatory prayers, and fiery sighs.
Verse 27: He That Searches the Hearts Knows What the Spirit Desires
Verse 27. HE WHO SEARCHES HEARTS (namely God the Father) KNOWS WHAT THE SPIRIT DESIRES: BECAUSE ACCORDING TO GOD HE PLEADS FOR THE SAINTS. — These things hang from what immediately precedes, as if to say: I have said that we know not what we should pray, but that the Holy Spirit inspires our prayers in us and offers them to God and pleads for us: and this befits us and is most useful. For we ourselves often do not understand our prayers, and through them we ask things harmful or useless to us: but the Holy Spirit understands them, and through them does not intend to obtain for us anything except what is profitable and salutary for us. Now God knows, regards, and attends, not to what we desire, but to what the Spirit desires and intends to obtain for us from God, through the prayers which He suggests to us. Furthermore, that the Holy Spirit intends only what is good and salutary for us is clear from this, that He Himself "according to God pleads for the saints," namely because for them He asks for those things which are according to God and the mind and will of God, and which are pleasing, holy, and accepted to God; and these are salutary for us. Thus St. Chrysostom, Theodoret, Ambrose. Otherwise Origen: The Holy Spirit, he says, pleads according to divinity, or insofar as He Himself is God: but Christ pleads according to humanity, or insofar as He is man. But this is rather foreign and does not sufficiently cohere with what precedes; for what reasoning is this: The Father knows what the Spirit desires, because the Spirit Himself, as He is God, pleads for the saints?
Verse 28: To Them That Love God All Things Work Together unto Good
Verse 28. NOW WE KNOW THAT TO THOSE WHO LOVE GOD ALL THINGS WORK TOGETHER UNTO GOOD, TO THOSE WHO ACCORDING TO HIS PURPOSE ARE CALLED SAINTS. — Toletus connects these things with what immediately precedes, as if Paul were saying: That the pleading of the Holy Spirit is efficacious and profitable to the saints themselves is clear from the effect: for whether what they ask is granted to the saints or denied, the Spirit nevertheless always obtains and effects that all things work together unto good for them, as we know and experience to be done in fact. But according to this sense, instead of "now we know," he should have said "for we know," or "hence also we know." Rather, therefore, the Apostle seems to connect these things with verses 17, 18 and following, where he treats of the sufferings, afflictions, vanity, corruption, and hardships which the saints endure in this life, and on account of which they groan and sigh for heaven, as if to say: Many things, as I said, the saints suffer in this life, yet all things work together unto good for them: let them therefore courageously and with cheerful spirit endure all these things. For here is the eleventh argument of the Apostle, by which he stirs the faithful to patience, as I said at verse 17. "All things" therefore, that is, all tribulations, says Ambrose and Jerome, for the Apostle has hitherto been treating of these. St. Augustine, in the book On Rebuke and Grace, ch. 9, adds that "all things," even the sins of the saints work together unto good. "For the predestined," he says, "rise from a fall more humble, more cautious, and more fervent"; so also Anselm and St. Thomas explain, following St. Augustine.
Thus on the contrary St. Augustine, sermon 78 On the Times and Soliloquies, ch. 28: "To the wicked," he says, "and the reprobate all things work together unto evil, and their very prayer is turned to them into sin." Understand this not properly and per se, but accidentally, namely because every grace and all gifts of God, and consequently even prayer itself, fall to the reprobate as a graver fault and graver damnation, by this very fact, that they abuse these gifts of God, while they are unwilling to use them and through them to convert themselves and procure their salvation. For this is a great ingratitude on their part, a neglect and contempt of the grace of God.
Add that the reprobate often pray wrongly, namely for those things which serve to fulfill their concupiscences and lusts: or, if they pray for things which are good, they do not pray seriously, but are obstinate in their impiety, and harden themselves in it more daily; and so they profit so little from prayer and from all things that they rather become worse, and so turn all things into greater hardness, and consequently their own damnation. But these things are beyond the mind of the Apostle, who here treats not of sins but of tribulations, as I have said. For his mind is to exhort the faithful and the saints to endure all tribulations bravely, because they yield and cooperate unto good for them.
Note, the Greek συνεργεῖ can be translated either in the singular "cooperates" or in the plural "cooperate," so that the sense is: The Holy Spirit cooperates all things unto good for those who love God, and makes all things, however sad and adverse, yield to them unto good; so reads and understands Theodoret.
St. Bernard notes, in the sermon On the Deception of the Present Life, that for the saints all things cooperate not according to their pleasure, not for delight, but for good. Because often they are forced to endure things contrary to themselves and their appetite, things harsh and grievous; yet these very things, namely vexation, pain, diseases, death, and all bitter things, although not for the saints' pleasure, do yet cooperate for their good, whether of patience, or of humility, or of continence, or of other virtues, and for the good of glory both present and eternal. Thus persecutions yielded to the Martyrs unto the good of heroic fortitude and the laurel of martyrdom, and unto an example and incentive to others, so that by them the Church has always grown. Hence Prudentius sings, in hymn 4 in honor of the Martyrs of Caesaraugusta:
Nor did any of our fury depart without praise,
Or empty of bright blood:
The number of the Martyrs always grows
Under every hailstorm.
"We become more numerous," says Tertullian in the Apology, "as often as we are reaped by you: the blood of Christians is seed." And St. Jerome, in his epistle to Theophilus: "By persecutions, he says, the Church has grown, by martyrdoms it has been crowned." And St. Cyprian, sermon 5 On the Lapsed: "Behold, he says, the white-robed cohort of Christ's soldiers, who by steady combat have broken the ferocity of urgent persecution, prepared for the endurance of prison, armed for the toleration of death. You have resisted the world bravely, you have offered a glorious spectacle to God, you have been an example to the brethren who shall follow. With what joyful bosom does mother Church receive you returning from battle! how blessed, how rejoicing she opens her gates, that you may enter in united ranks bearing trophies from the prostrate enemy! With the triumphing men come women too, who in fighting with the world also conquered their sex. Virgins come with the doubled glory of their warfare, and boys passing their years in virtues, and likewise the rest of the surrounding multitude follows yours," etc.
And these triumphs God has often illustrated in this life by miracles. The Emperor Leo the Isaurian ordered the hand of St. John Damascene to be cut off, with which he had written in defense of the cult of holy images: the Blessed Virgin restored this severed hand to him as he prayed before her image. The Arians in Africa mutilated the tongues of orthodox Confessors: these afterward, by God's miracle, speaking without a tongue just as before, celebrated the divinity of Christ. The Emperor Theophilus, an iconoclast, cast a certain monk Lazarus, then a most celebrated painter, into chains after torturing him cruelly, because he had painted holy images: when, recovered from his wounds, he again devoted himself to the pious work of painting, he ordered his hands to be burned with red-hot plates: but by God's command it came about that he afterwards painted just as well, as if he had suffered nothing.
Whoever therefore unjustly suffers calumnies, reproaches, blows, losses, illnesses, etc., endure, overcome: make these adversities instruments of virtue and glory. "The elect," says St. Gregory, "advance in temptation, and what the devil prepares for them unto ruin, this God converts for them into glory." For the Apostle cannot deceive, indeed the Holy Spirit through him promising and saying: "To those who love God all things work together for good." Wherefore St. Augustine in the Sentences, sentence 458: "The enemies of the Church," he says, "if they receive bodily power to afflict, they exercise her patience: if they merely oppose by thinking ill, they exercise her wisdom; and that even enemies may be loved, they exercise her benevolence: because God works all things together for good for those who love Him."
TO THOSE WHO ACCORDING TO HIS PURPOSE ARE CALLED HOLY, that is, to those who are called to holiness. See what was said at chapter 1, verse 1.
You will ask, what is this "purpose," and who are said to be "called according to purpose."
First, Origen, Theodoret, and the Commentaries ascribed to St. Ambrose and Jerome explain this as follows: all things work together for good to those who love God, namely to those who are called to this love by God according to a purpose not of God, but their own; because God called to His faith, grace, and friendship only those whom He foresaw would, by their own purpose, that is, by their ready will, accept this faith and grace offered by God. But St. Augustine, writing everywhere but especially in the book On the Predestination of the Saints, splendidly refutes and confounds this as a kind of Pelagian dogma.
Second, St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, and Oecumenius understand here in like manner the purpose not of God, but of the men themselves who are called by God; so that this their good purpose is not indeed the cause and reason why they were called by God, but yet is the condition and determination of those who are called, as if Paul said: Not for all the called do all things work together for good, but for those who by their own purpose consent and obey to God's calling: this is said without error, but apart from the Apostle's mind. For the Apostle here does not understand the purpose of men, but of God Himself.
Whence third, most excellently St. Augustine, in the book On Rebuke and Grace, chapter VII, and everywhere else, Anselm and others, take this purpose to mean the eternal good pleasure of God, His liberal decree, His voluntary and gratuitous appointment, which in Acts 2:23 is called "definite counsel," and this is clear from the fact that in 2 Timothy 1:9 and elsewhere Paul opposes our works to this liberal purpose and grace of God. The purpose therefore is the liberal and gratuitous counsel and decree of God, by which God from eternity, out of His mere goodness and clemency, proposed, established, and decreed to call men lost through sin, by Christ, unto grace and holiness, without any merit of theirs, as the Apostle explains at length in Ephesians 1.
Note: "According to purpose" is an epithet signifying the cause of the love, direction, and protection of the just, namely why all things work together for good for them, because God loves, directs, and protects them according to His purpose, that is, seriously, from the heart, and with a certain purpose. Whence the same persons here are "those who love God" and "those who are called holy according to purpose," as is clear from the Greek τοῖς ἀγαπῶσι τὸν Θεόν, and τοῖς κατὰ πρόθεσιν κλητοῖς. As if to say: To those who love God, and conversely loved by God, as having been called by God to faith and love by the purpose of His benevolent heart, all things, with God directing them to the advantage of His beloved, work together for good. Neither the Greek πρόθεσιν, nor the Latin "propositum," includes or implies anything else. For thus we say: I purposed to do this, that is, I established, I decreed; this is my purpose, that I should call you to dinner; those whom the king loves with purpose, no one can harm or hurt. Hence the Apostle, in 2 Timothy 1:9; Ephesians 1:5, 9, 11; Romans 4:5, and elsewhere, expressly opposes this purpose of God to the works the Jews boasted of.
When therefore he says we are called according to purpose, he only wishes to exclude the merit of works, as if to say: That we are called to faith, grace, and holiness must be attributed to God's liberal purpose, will, and grace, not to our merits. Thus in Luke 2 it is said: "Peace (be) to men of good will," in Greek εὐδοκίας, that is, of the divine good pleasure and benevolence, where "of good will" is not a particle limiting "to men," as if to say: Peace be to men, not all, but only to those who are of good will, as some explain: but it is a causal particle. For it gives the cause why, when Christ was born, peace is to be wished for and given to men; because God has destined and decreed to display His good will, that is, His benevolence, reconciliation, and friendship to men now through Christ. So Theophylact, Euthymius, and others on that passage. For what the Apostle here calls πρόθεσιν, that is, "purpose," Luke in chapter 2 calls εὐδοκίαν, that is, "good pleasure."
Verse 29: Whom He Foreknew, He Also Predestinated to Be Made Conformable to the Image of His Son
29. FOR WHOM HE FOREKNEW AND PREDESTINED TO BE MADE CONFORMABLE TO THE IMAGE OF HIS SON, THAT HE MIGHT BE THE FIRSTBORN AMONG MANY BRETHREN. — First, the Pelagians, whom here Theodoret, Chrysostom, and Theophylact seem to favor, used to explain this passage thus, as if Paul said: Those whom God foreknew and foresaw would, by His call and grace if it were given to them, well use their own free will, these He predestined to this calling, grace, justice, and holiness of life, that they might be conformed to Christ in it. But St. Augustine, writing sharply against the Pelagians everywhere but especially in the book On the Predestination of the Saints, refutes this error. And the reason is that the first grace is mere grace, nor does God give it to us because He foresees we shall be holy, but that we may be holy, as the Apostle says in Ephesians chapter 1, verse 4.
Second, some Scholastics, in Part I, Question XXIII, explain it thus, as if Paul said: Those to whom God gratuitously decreed to give glory before foreseen merits, these He predestined that they might receive merits by which to earn it. But on this reasoning others with Ambrose and Haymo, by equal right, supply the contrary in this way: Those whom God foreknew would be devout, holy, and conformed to Christ in life and sufferings, these He predestined to be conformable to Christ in glory; for this is what the verb "foreknew" properly implies. For foreknowledge is of our own things and works which we do, just as predestination is of God and of the divine choice and will.
Third, others expound this passage of God's conditional foreknowledge. Thus Dionysius the Carthusian and Ludovicus Molina, in Part I, Question XXIII, art. 4, disp. 1, memb. 11, as if Paul said: Those whom God foreknew by conditional foreknowledge would be, by the freedom of their own choice, conformed to Christ in holiness; would be such, I say, not absolutely, but on the supposition, namely if for His part God should will to give them His grace and the helps which He afterwards mercifully gave them: these He also predestined to be such, namely by absolutely decreeing to give and bestow on them at His own time that grace and those helps by which they would in fact be sanctified and conformed to Christ.
Fourth, not improbably and quite aptly Gabriel Vasquez, in Part I, Question XXIII, explains thus: Those whom God foreknew would be His friends and beloved through His grace, these He also predestined to suffer and be made conformable to His Son in patience, as the One who endured so many labors and afflictions for us. From this the Apostle leaves it to be inferred that just as God made all the sufferings and crosses of Christ work together for His good and glory, so likewise He will turn the sufferings of His saints and beloved, to which He predestined them along with Christ, into good and glory for them. So Origen and Cyril in Oecumenius. For this is what the Apostle here intends to prove: for in this chapter he exhorts the faithful to the endurance of sufferings from hope of the fruit and glory to follow, as is clear in verses 17, 18 and all that follow. Then the Apostle adds: "But those whom He predestined, these He also called; and those whom He called, these He also justified; and those whom He justified, these He also glorified;" by which words he reviews all the means through which God has led the faithful themselves to this end of suffering for Christ and to this conformity by which they are conformed to the suffering Christ. For to this patience and conformity to Christ God first called them: then through tribulations He justified and sanctified them more and more; and finally, after so many labors and afflictions had been bravely overcome, He made them with Christ glorious, celebrated, and great. For the Greek ἐδόξασε, which our Interpreter renders "glorified," others render "magnified," or "made us great": so Vasquez.
Fifth, Toletus explains thus, as if to say: Those whom God foreknew would be His own and would love Him, these He also predestined to be conformed to Christ; that, as Christ is the natural Son of God, so they themselves might be sons of God by adoption, through grace, charity, friendship, and patience in this life, and by persevering in these, through glory in the life to come; and thus be conformed to Christ the natural Son of God in the adoption of grace, patience, and glory.
Note here: God's "to know," in the phrase of the Apostle and of Scripture, is practical, and connotes God's favor and affection, as is plain in chapter 2:2; Galatians 4:9; 1 Peter 1:2, and 2 Timothy 2:19; whence "He foreknew" is "He fore-loved," say Origen and St. Augustine, and the foreknown are the same as the fore-loved; whence elsewhere too the Apostle says "He has known," that is, knowing-loves, "the Lord those who are His." God therefore here properly foreknew that these faithful ones would be His own, and would love God, and conversely He foreknew them, that is, foreknowing they would be His friends and lovers, He fore-loved them, as if to say: All things work together for good to those who love God and friends of God, because God foreknew that they would be His own and His lovers, and foreknowing they would be such, He fore-loved them: and on this account He also predestined them to be conformed to His Son, both in grace and patience, and in the other. For just as God cooperated even the most bitter torments with His Son and turned them into good, so also for these His adopted sons He, the same God, will cooperate and turn into good all things, however hard and bitter.
But to me, weighing this passage often and at length, this seemed to be the plainest sense, the most obvious and fitting, and therefore the genuine one: namely that this verse and this sentence be joined with the verse and sentence immediately following, as if it depended on it and there its sense be completed, because the Apostle here, as is his custom, expatiates on the word "predestined," to explain of what kind and how great this predestination is, and to what God predestined them, namely to this, that they be conformed to His Son: on this account the discourse begun in this verse he breaks off, and to complete it he resumes the same in the following verse saying: "But those whom He predestined," as if to say: Those, I say, whom He foreknew and predestined, as I said in the preceding verse, these He also called.
That this is the sense is proved first, because the manner of speaking here and in the following verse is different; for here he says: "Those whom He foreknew and predestined," but in the following verse he says: "Those whom He predestined, these He also justified." Therefore "foreknew and predestined" are not to be torn apart, but joined, and referred to the same thing, namely to "to be made conformable to His Son." For otherwise the Apostle would have said: "Those whom He foreknew, these He also predestined," just as a little later he said: "Those whom He predestined, these He also called."
Second, that this is the sense is plain, because in this sense nothing needs to be supplied, but the sense stands of itself, and is full and clear in itself; whereas the others must supply many things, like "whom He foreknew," namely would love God: where again they must supply "these He also predestined."
Third, because this sense answers to Paul's manner and spirit, who is wont thus to run on and be carried away, and after many things to return and resume what was said before, as I have shown at chapter 5, verse 12. Only this could be objected to this exposition, that in this sense the word autem (but/however) is used for inquam (I say): which seems new and unusual. But to this it is easily answered, that this enallage of adverbs is not new but frequent in the Apostle, as I have shown in Canon 25.
Note first, the conjunction "et" (and) here gives an auxesis or a cause, and means the same as "yes indeed," "yes also," or "because, since," as if to say: Those whom God foreknew, yes indeed predestined to this, that they should be conformed to His Son; or those whom God foreknew would be conformed to His Son, because He predestined them to this: for this foreknowledge, being absolute, is posterior to predestination as an effect to its cause: for God foreknows we shall be conformed to His Son because He has predestined us to this, and called and led us by His grace. Both verbs, therefore, namely both "foreknew" and "predestined," directly and expressly look to "being made conformable to His Son"; indirectly, obliquely, and tacitly "foreknew" looks to those who love God: "predestined" looks to the "purpose," about which the Apostle dealt in the preceding verse, for this eternal purpose of God is the eternal predestination of God itself.
Hence note secondly: the word "nam" (for) here gives the cause why for those who love God all things work together for good; and at the same time explains who are "the saints called according to His purpose," namely those whom God foreknew and predestined to be conformed to Christ as to an image, that is, to His exemplar. Note here: the Apostle does not say: "Those whom He foreknew, these He also predestined," but only: "Those whom He foreknew and predestined," so as to imply that the same persons are foreknown and predestined, namely those who love God and are holy, called according to God's purpose and good pleasure. For these who love God and are holy, called according to God's purpose, are foreknown and predestined by God to this, that they may be conformed to the Son.
The sense, therefore, is: To those who love God and are holy, called according to His purpose, all things even the saddest work together for good, because these are those whom God from eternity foreknew and predestined to be conformed to His Son, both in this present love, holiness, patience, and grace, and in the future glory: provided of course that they themselves persevere in love, holiness, grace, and patience. And just as God from eternity foreknew and predestined them to be such by His grace: so also in time He called the same persons to the same by His grace; the called and those obeying their call He justified; the justified, and those constantly remaining in justice in every temptation and persecution, He will glorify. You see therefore how, with God Himself directing, all things work together unto good, namely unto the heavenly and eternal glory, for those who love God.
Hence note thirdly three arguments and incentives to patience, which the Apostle here tacitly suggests and presents to the faithful, namely first, in that he says: "He foreknew and predestined," as if to say: Our sufferings, crosses, and afflictions we ought to ascribe not to the flesh, not to the demon, not to the enemy, but to God. For He from eternity foreknew them, indeed predestined them, and decreed to give to each their own, that through them each might be conformed to Christ suffering and rising. God therefore, who arranged all things in number, weight, and measure, Himself from eternity defined and limited each one's cross for those who love Him, that he might suffer just so much, no less and no more. He decreed by the cross to polish and perfect him in patience, purity, grace, and charity; He determined by the cross to lead him to glory. Who therefore should shrink from or flee the cross decreed and measured to him from eternity by the most loving Father God? The second argument for patience he suggests by "conformed to the Son," as if to say: Through the cross we are conformed to the Son of God and to the crucified Christ: which is an immense dignity and benefit. For as we are here conformed to Christ in tribulation, so we shall be conformed to Him in blessedness. Who therefore would not seek the cross with Christ? The third argument for patience the word "brethren" says, as if to say: Through the cross we become not only conformed to, but also brothers of Christ, and consequently we become sons and heirs of God. Who then would not desire the cross? Who would not embrace and kiss patience, which is the cause of so great a good? Whence the Syriac translates: "and from the beginning He knew them, and sealed them in the likeness of His Son."
TO BE MADE CONFORMABLE TO THE IMAGE OF HIS SON. — St. Thomas and Adam expound these words of the Son insofar as He is God, as if to say: We adopted sons shall imitate the natural Son of God. For God predestined us to be conformed to Him in glory. Whence Origen too explains thus: God predestined us to be conformed to God in wisdom, justice, and truth.
But better do St. Chrysostom, Jerome, Anselm and others everywhere understand by "son" here Christ as He is man, because Christ as man is the firstborn among many brethren. Similar is Philippians 3, last verse, as if Paul said: All the elect will be conformed to Christ as man in grace and glory, and this with this end, namely that Christ Himself may be as the first measure and the first image, that is, the exemplar of the rest.
Whence note further: Origen by "the image of the Son" takes, first, Christ's soul, which by a special reason is called the image of the Son of God, because it integrally receives the Son or Word of God in itself, and most perfectly reflects Him by its wisdom and grace.
Second, Theodoret, Ambrose, and Jerome say: This image is the body, or the glorious humanity, of Christ.
Third, St. Athanasius in his letter to Serapion On the Holy Spirit, and St. Basil, book V Against Eunomius, say: This image is the Holy Spirit, who is the image of the Son, as if to say: God predestined His own to be conformed to the image of the Son, that is, to be conformed to the Holy Spirit Himself, namely that they may be pure and holy, just as the Holy Spirit is most pure and most holy. But these, though ingenious, seem nevertheless more obscure and more foreign to Paul's phrase and mind.
I say then plainly and simply, the image of the Son of God is the exemplar of the Son of God, namely it is the Son of God Himself, who is our exemplar, from whom our grace and glory is, as it were, an image expressed from its exemplar. For Christ, who is the natural Son of God, is to all holy men who are sons of God by adoption the exemplar of holiness, grace, virtues, and consequently of glory and eternal happiness; so that all our holiness, love, patience, grace, and glory is, as it were, an image painted and expressed from Christ's holiness, love, patience, grace, and glory, as from its exemplar. "Image" therefore is here taken metonymically for its exemplar, of which it is the image, as it is also taken in Genesis 1:26, where it says: "Let us make man to our image (that is, exemplar) and likeness." Yet "image" can here be taken properly, as Toletus takes it, so that the Son is here called "image," not in respect to us, but in respect to the eternal Father. For Christ, by the very fact that He is the natural Son of God the Father, is by that very fact the image of God the Father, as if Paul said: God predestined us to be conformed to the Son of God, inasmuch as He is the Son, and consequently the image, of the Father, that we likewise on equal grounds may be likened and conformed to the Father through the Son.
THAT HE HIMSELF (Christ the Son of God) MIGHT BE THE FIRSTBORN AMONG MANY (among all) BRETHREN, — namely the holy faithful, friends, elect, and beloved of God.
Note: Christ is the firstborn of the sons of God, first, because He Himself is the natural Son of God, while the rest are adoptive only; second, because before all others Christ was predestined to this sonship and union with the Word, and consequently to all His grace and glory; third, because Christ was and is the end, scope, and exemplar of all the predestined and elect, as St. Augustine teaches from this and other passages, in the book On the Predestination of the Saints, chapter XV.
Verse 30: Whom He Predestinated, Them He Also Called
30. AND THOSE WHOM HE PREDESTINED (from eternity), THESE HE ALSO CALLED, — in time, by giving them grace and the calling to which He predestined them. He called them, I say, both with an external calling, through examples, scourges, sermons; and most especially with an internal calling, through prevenient and stimulating grace, which responds to the eternal calling and is commensurate with it from God's liberal ordination.
Note: "He called," that is, He calls, has called, or will call. Thus also "He justified," which follows, is the same; that He justifies, has justified, or will justify; and "He glorified" is the same as He glorifies, has glorified, or will glorify. For these past tenses are, in the Hebrew manner, put for any time: but the Apostle uses past rather than future tenses, because these past tenses fittingly, as being in the same tense, correspond to the first verb and past "predestined," from which the Apostle deduces and derives these other past tenses as effects flowing from their most certain cause, so far as concerns God's part.
AND THOSE WHOM HE JUSTIFIED, THESE (persevering in justice unto the end of life) HE ALSO GLORIFIED. — St. Chrysostom, Theophylact, Theodoret, and the Commentaries ascribed to St. Jerome and Ambrose, take "glory" here not as the eternal one, but the glory of the present life, namely that they are sons of God; for this is the immense glory of the saints and the just, namely divine adoption and sonship. Whence the Greek ἐδόξασε, that is, "He glorified," can also be rendered, He has rendered them celebrated, great, glorious, namely by afflictions, temptations, martyrdoms, and other heroic acts and merits of patience and virtue. Origen, however, St. Augustine in On the Predestination of the Saints, Fulgentius to Monimus, chapter XI, and now everywhere theologians take "He glorified" of the glory of eternal blessedness; which sense is plainer, more apt, and more sublime.
Hence the Scholastics posit three effects of predestination, namely calling, justification, glorification; and consequently they conclude that glory and eternal beatitude is an effect of predestination.
Verse 31: If God Be for Us, Who Is against Us?
Paul in all these verses stirs up the faithful to confidence, patience, magnanimity, and love toward God. Whence here he wards off two darts of distrust. The first is the outward persecution of enemies, such as the very many pagans then were, who not infrequently robbed Christians of their goods and lives; lest, then, Christians yield to this and distrust God, St. Paul here opposes to it the divine shield, saying in verse 31: "If God is for us, who is against us?" The other dart of distrust is interior fear and anxiety of conscience over sins formerly committed, lest perhaps they should at some time be required and exacted from us, which here he wards off by saying: "It is God who justifies, who is he that condemns?"
31. WHAT THEN SHALL WE SAY TO THESE THINGS? IF GOD IS FOR US, WHO IS AGAINST US? — Behold here is the impenetrable shield of the patience of the Saints, by which they receive and ward off all the darts of enemies: namely, "If God is for us, who is against us," that is, of demons or men shall rise up to hinder our salvation, when God cares for it by the eternal purpose of His predestination, and through His temporal calling, justification, and glorification? But no one is more powerful than God, supply: if we go on following and obeying God, nor will any hinder our salvation: for God does not wish to save the unwilling and against their will. "If God is for us, who is against us? Who is against us?" says St. Chrysostom. "The whole world is against us, and tyrants, and peoples, and kinsmen, and circuses, etc. But these, even if they stand against us, so far are they from harming us, that even unwillingly they become for us authors of crowns, since God's own wisdom turns their snares into our salvation and glory." See more in the same author.
The Hebrews relate, such as R. Isaac Benhole, Reuchlin in book III of the Cabala; Marcer in the Abbreviations of the Hebrews; Sixtus of Siena in book I of the Library, and Genebrardus in the Chronology, that the Maccabees used a similar emblem for a shield, namely that little verse of the canticle and triumph of the Hebrews after Pharaoh was drowned, Exodus 15:11: "Who is like You among the strong, O Lord?" which they everywhere bore as the insignia of war and victory, and with a small band overthrew the strongest and most numerous enemies: and from that they relate that these were called in Hebrew Machabi, that is, Maccabees, namely from the Hebrew letters which are the initials of the individual words of the just-mentioned little verse, which in Hebrew runs thus: mi kamokha ba'elim YHWH. For if from the first word mi you take the first letter M, from the second the first C, from the third the first B, from the fourth I, and join them together, you will make "Machabi," that is, Maccabee.
Verse 32: He That Spared Not Even His Own Son, but Delivered Him Up for Us All
32. WHO ALSO SPARED NOT HIS OWN SON. — Hence Pope Hadrian, in his letter to the Bishops of Spain, the Council of Frankfurt and the Doctors teach that Christ, insofar as He is man, that is, according to His humanity, is truly and properly the Son of God, namely by reason of the grace of union with the Word, or with the person of the Son of God, because as man He was handed over to death for us, which Paul here asserts of Him.
HOW HAS HE NOT ALSO WITH HIM GIVEN US ALL THINGS? — "All things" namely which pertain to our calling, justification, glorification, and salvation, so that no adversities or prosperities, no enemies, no persecutors can hinder it, if we do not voluntarily yield and succumb to them.
Verse 33: Who Shall Accuse against the Elect of God? It Is God That Justifies
33. WHO SHALL LAY ANYTHING TO THE CHARGE OF GOD'S ELECT? — "Elect" here and elsewhere Paul understands, not those who are efficaciously and immediately elected to heavenly glory, but those who are elected to the faith and grace of Christianity. All true Christians, then, are elect, namely completely to grace, but inchoately to glory, as I said in verse 28 and in Canon 13, whence follows;
33 and 34. IT IS GOD WHO JUSTIFIES; WHO IS HE THAT CONDEMNS? — As if to say: It is God who absolves these elect, namely His faithful and true Christians, from sins and from the intended action of sin and the devil, and pronounces them just. "What devil then," says Anselm, "or man shall pass against them a contrary sentence of damnation?" As if to say: No one, except in vain; or what harm shall the accusations and condemnations of men do them, when God justifies them? Paul alludes to Isaiah 50:8 and 9, where it is said: "He is near who justifies me, who shall contradict me? Behold the Lord God is my helper, who is he that shall condemn me?" For "shall condemn me," the Hebrew is yarshieni, that is, He shall make me unjust or impious, that is, He shall judge and declare me impious; for he opposes these two, hatzdiq and harshia, that is, to justify and to make unjust, or to judge unjust, which is to condemn.
CHRIST JESUS (supply, it is), WHO (for us) DIED, YEA RATHER WHO HAS RISEN, WHO IS AT THE RIGHT HAND OF GOD, WHO ALSO INTERCEDES FOR US. — Repeat from the preceding: "Who then shall accuse against God's elect? Who shall condemn them?" As if to say: Christ: He will so far not accuse them, that He died for them, and rose again for this, that sitting at the right hand of God He should intercede for them. The Apostle had said, in the verse on the Holy Spirit, that He helps our weakness and pleads for us. He had also said of the Father, in verse 32, that He delivered up His own Son for us. The Son Himself remained: of Him here he says, that He died, and that He intercedes for us, as if to say: The whole most Holy Trinity therefore loves us, His faithful, intensely, cherishes us, defends us. What then shall we fear, what accuser shall we dread? When we have such a One, indeed such Ones, as Advocates and Patrons, who diligently care for us and ours; and consequently will bring it about that all things work together for us unto good, and yield to us unto salvation and eternal glory.
Cajetan notes that "for us" is to be referred to all the preceding, namely to "He died," to "He rose again," and to "He sits at the right hand of God." Yet it is more referred to "He intercedes for us." Note here that "yea rather, who has risen" has emphasis and a tacit anticipation: lest anyone should say that Christ indeed died for us, but after His death does no more either to suffer or to act for us, the Apostle meets this by saying: yea, after His death He labors all the more for us, and cares for our affairs and our salvation; for as He died for us, so much more for us did He rise, namely to open for us the way to resurrection and heavenly blessedness, and that after the resurrection He might ascend into heaven and there sitting at the right hand of the Father intercede for us.
WHO ALSO INTERCEDES FOR US. — You will ask: How does Christ in heaven intercede and pray for us?
I answer first: Christ prays with an interpretive prayer, namely by presenting Himself and His scars which He still bears from those received in His Passion, and shows them to the Father; and consequently He prays by alleging His merits, His labors, and His sufferings to the divine sight; and this is what the Apostle says, Hebrews 9:24: "(Christ) entered into heaven itself, that He may now appear before the face of God for us." So St. Thomas teaches there; St. Gregory, book XXII Morals, chapter XVIII; Rupert, book IX On the Divine Offices, chapter III, and others.
Second, properly Christ, as man, in heaven prays for us, just as He prayed on earth. For He is there, just as here, our Advocate, Mediator, and High Priest, whose proper office is to pray for the people. Rupert in the cited place seems to deny this: but other Fathers everywhere assert this very thing, indeed Christ Himself in John 14:13, where speaking of His ascension to the Father in heaven: "I," He says, "am going to the Father, and whatsoever you shall ask in My name, this I will do. If you love Me, keep My commandments; and I will ask the Father, and He will give you another Paraclete." What is "I will ask" but I will request, I will petition, I will beg? Again Paul here signifies the same thing when he says: "He intercedes for us." For what is "intercedes" but pleads, prays, beseeches for us? The same is plain at Hebrews 7:27. Whence Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 4 On Theology: "He intercedes," he says, that is, He supplicates for us by the office of mediation. And St. Gregory in Penitential Psalm 5: "Daily," he says, "Christ prays for the Church, concerning which the Apostle testifies, because sitting at the right hand of the Father He intercedes for us." The same is taught by St. Augustine in Psalm 29, Theodoret, Chrysostom, Theophylact, Bonaventure, the Abulensis, Soto, and others, whom Francisco Suárez cites and follows, Part III, disp. XLV, sect. 2.
Note here: Christ in heaven prays for us with prayer properly so called, not by which He should anew merit or obtain anything, as He did in this life, in which He consummated all His merit, and obtained all that was to be obtained, so that nothing more remains for Him to merit or obtain; but by which He asks, demanding the right due to His merits, and the reward obtained from the Father, namely our grace and salvation, when He demands and requires that these things, as already merited and promised to Him by the Father, be in fact given, dispensed, and applied to us, with that reverence, however, humility, and submission which a man and creature owes to his Creator. In this life therefore Christ prayed to the Father anxious, solicitous, and with tears, but now He prays to the Father most joyful, most free, and most blessed. For all humility, anxiety, and lowliness, unworthy of the glorified Christ, must now be removed from His prayer, say Nazianzen and Augustine in the cited place.
You will object: Christ is now blessed, into whose hands the Father has given all things; therefore there is no need for Him to pray to the Father.
I answer: Although Christ is blessed and has power over all things, yet He is also man, and as man is a creature who is bound to render the due worship of religion to God His Creator and Lord, and to acknowledge, revere, and honor Him, namely by adoring Him, praising Him, giving thanks: why not also by properly interceding and petitioning? For this is the office of an advocate and pontiff, especially since Christ, as man, continually receives all His power, dignity, and glory from God, and entirely depends on God, and all grace and glory must be derived and descend from God to us through the merits and prayers of Christ. Thus then God the Father has given all things into the hands of Christ, because He denies Christ nothing, but grants Him whatever He asks, and thus Christ as man can do all things, not immediately and independently; for this is proper to God; but mediately and dependently on God, as Mediator and Pontiff, whose office is to ask and obtain His own things from God.
You will object secondly: If Christ in heaven prays for us, then it will be lawful to pray in this manner: "O Christ, pray for us."
I answer that it is lawful, if you understand "O Christ" as man; yet the Church does not pray thus, because she attributes to Christ the Redeemer that which He has more dignified and excellent, and prays to Christ not that He may intercede as man, but that He may give as God what is asked.
Verse 35: Who Then Shall Separate Us from the Love of Christ?
35. WHO THEN SHALL SEPARATE US FROM THE LOVE OF CHRIST? — You will ask: What is here called "the love of Christ?" Is it that which is in Christ Himself, and in God, by which God through Christ loves us: or rather that which is in us, by which we love Christ and God? Heretics, and some Catholics like Toletus and Pererius, understand by "charity" not that which is in us, but that which is in Christ Himself and in God, by which God loves us through Christ the Mediator, whom He gave for us unto death, and makes all things work together for good for His beloved, by which He predestines, calls, justifies, and glorifies them: so that the Apostle goes on commending God's love toward those who love Him, and the called according to His purpose, as if to say: Neither sword, nor famine, nor demon, nor angel, nothing in the end will be able to recall God from this love, so that He should cease to love them, govern them, protect them, or allow them to fall away from Him and from salvation. But St. Chrysostom, Origen, Theodoret, Ambrose, Theophylact, Anselm, and elsewhere other Fathers, and more recent commentators, understand here the charity which is not in God, but which is in us, by which we love Christ and God: for the very charity of Christ and of God elicits this, protects, preserves, and enkindles it in us. As if to say: If thus (as I have shown in vers. 29 and following) Christ and God have loved and do love us, how shall we not in turn love Him and continue to love Him? What will there be that can tear us from His friendship and love? That this is the sense is clear, because what follows shows the souls of Paul, and of every saint burning with the love of God. Nor indeed is it rightly said that distress, famine, nakedness, sword should separate from us, or be able to separate, the charity which is in God; but of our own charity it is most rightly said: neither famine nor sword shall separate me from the love of Christ; I shall overcome all these things by the charity of Christ.
Secondly, because if Paul were speaking of Christ's love toward us, he would not say: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" but rather, "Who shall separate Christ from our love?" Thirdly, because regarding this charity which is in us, he immediately adds: "But in all these things we overcome, for the sake of Him who loved us;" and more clearly in the last verse: "I am certain that neither death, nor life, etc., shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ." St. Bernard, in his sermon On the Twofold Baptism and on Forsaking One's Own Will, asks: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?" and answers: Neither death, nor angels, nor anything which is outside of man, but only man's own will can effect this separation. But this is not according to the mind of the Apostle, because the Apostle, with fervent, resolved, and constant will, not doubting it, asserts that no one shall separate himself or those like him from the love of Christ: just as if a friend, most ardently loving his friend and resolved to die for him, were to say: "Who shall separate me from you, that I should not follow you even unto death?" — as Virgil tells of Nisus and Euryalus. The Apostle therefore says, loving Christ as strongly as sweetly: "Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?"
TRIBULATION? — Certainly not, because we glory in tribulations. DISTRESS? — Much less: for though battles press from without and fears within, yet in all things we conquer, on account of Him who loved us. The breadth of Christ's charity devours, indeed swallows up, all distresses; just as the whale gulps down little fish, and the greatest fire scarcely feels it as it draws up drops of water: for many waters cannot extinguish charity, nor shall floods overwhelm it. FAMINE? — By no means: for my food is Christ, with whom I shall always feed, I cannot perish from hunger: indeed famine, serpent, thirst, scorching, sands, are sweet to virtue, sweet to charity. Charity does not flee these things, does not suffer them, but seeks them out and rushes upon them. Seneca writes of himself in epistle 65: "In whatever state of mind I am," he says, "when I read Sextius, I want to challenge every misfortune, I want to exclaim: Why do you delay, Fortune? Engage, I am prepared; I put on the spirit of one who seeks where he may be tried, where he may show his virtue: he longs in his prayers that a foaming boar be given him among the lazy herds, or that a tawny lion descend from the mountain. I want to have something to overcome, by whose endurance I may be exercised." These are the words of a pagan; what shall the Christian say here? what shall Paul say? Surely he will say: When I behold Christ on the cross and read the crimson characters of my love over His whole body, I want to exclaim: Come hunger, come sorrow, come cross, come lions; I court you, that I may show my love for Christ, that I may repay love with love: I rejoice in you, I glory in you, I exult in you.
NAKEDNESS? — By no means; for the charity of Christ clothes me, and I will gladly follow naked Him who, though He was rich and clothed with light as with a garment, deigned for my sake to become poor and naked. DANGER? — Not at all; for I am a veteran soldier of Christ, who do not flee dangers but court them; who against the principalities and powers of these darknesses have undertaken a thousand wars, fought, and conquered; accustomed to so many victories, I cannot fear enemies, nor tremble in dangers. PERSECUTION? — In no way; the Jews, Gentiles, Barbarians, Greeks, princes, magistrates have persecuted me; with stones, rods, and lashes they have struck me: but what of it? They could not take Christ from me. Behold, I live more vigorous and stronger, and am more intimately joined to Christ in love. THE SWORD? — By no means; let it sever my head from my body, so that my soul may fly to Christ, who is my love; for me to live is Christ, and to die is gain. Higher than all these and other troubles and torments is the charity of Christ: the soul fixed in the heavens, in Christ, in eternity, laughs at all things which are under heaven, as worthless and slight; it esteems kings and tyrants no more than fleas; it counts blows and lashings as the bites of fleas, as Chrysostom says; it considers and seeks crosses and deaths as a short, easy, and certain passage and gateway to Christ and blessedness. What wonder, then, if one burning with the love of Christ is not troubled in tribulations, but exults; is not constrained in distresses, but overflows with consolation; in famine does not hunger or thirst, but is full and inebriated with Christ's grace, patience and fortitude; in nakedness is not cold, but warms and glows with charity; in dangers does not fear, but securely sleeps under Christ's protection; in persecution does not flee, but freely and fearlessly offers himself with Christ as an invincible athlete; in sword and death does not grieve, does not perish, but triumphs as a laureled martyr? The same is beautifully and piously sung by Prosper in his book of Epigrams, On the Love of Christ:
And what shall there be (he says) that may separate me from the Lord?
Apply fire, search my entrails with your hand, torturer:
My limbs released escape your penalties.
If I be shut in a dark prison and bound with chains,
Free in the rapture of mind I shall approach God.
If the lictor prepare to cut off my neck with the sword,
Swift death and brief pain shall find me undismayed.
I do not fear exile; the world is one home for all.
I despise hunger; the word of the Lord becomes food for me.
The Gentile Philosophers despised death out of zeal for human virtue or glory. Thus Damindas, turning to those who feared Philip of Macedon, said: "O half-men, what bitter thing can befall us, who despise death?" — Plutarch is the witness.
Another, to a tyrant threatening him with death, said: "There is a half-pint of blood in your power, take it; you have nothing more to threaten me with." Theodorus, to the tyrant Lysimachus threatening him with death and the cross, said: "It makes no difference whether I rot on the ground or aloft." And again: "You have done a splendid thing if you have attained the power of a Spanish-fly." For the cantharis, an insect and most vile little creature, can kill a man with its poison; Cicero is the witness, Tuscul. ch. v. Tertullian has more on Anaxarchus, Empedocles and others in Apologeticum ch. L.
What then will the Christian philosopher and soldier do, with the love of God and the hope of heavenly glory? Hear what the Christian philosophers have done. When St. Basil was being driven into exile by the Emperor Valens for the faith, he was brought before the tribunal of the prefect, and beset with the greatest terrors and threats, that unless he obeyed the prince's commands he should know that destruction hung over him; then he, undaunted, replied to the prefect: "And would that I had something of worthy gift which I could offer to him who should the more quickly release Basil from the knot of this bellows!" And when a respite was given him, he replied again: "I tomorrow shall be the same as I am now; would that you might not change!" So the Ecclesiastical History, book I, ch. IX.
Such and so lofty and lion-like spirits did St. Chrysostom display, when he was driven into exile by Eudoxia and feared every extremity. For writing to Cyriacus, epistle 3, vol. V, he says: "When I was being driven from the city, I cared for none of these things, but I said within myself: If indeed the queen wishes me an exile, let her drive me into exile: the earth is the Lord's, and the fullness thereof. And if she wishes to cut me, let her cut: Isaiah suffered the same, let her subscribe to him. If she wishes to cast me into the sea, I shall remember Jonah. If she wishes to stone me, let her stone me: I have Stephen as my first martyr companion. If she wishes also to take off my head, let her take it: I have John the Baptist as my companion. And if she would take away my substance, let her take it: naked I came forth from my mother's womb, and naked I shall return thither," etc.
Verse 36: For Thy Sake We Are Put to Death All the Day Long
Verse 36. As it is written (Ps. xliii, vers. 22): FOR FOR THY SAKE WE ARE PUT TO DEATH (we are handed over to death and the perils of death, to wounds and afflictions: hence St. Cyprian reads, we are slain) ALL THE DAY LONG, WE ARE COUNTED AS SHEEP FOR THE SLAUGHTER. Note the "for thy sake," as if to say: For the faith, love, confession and worship of Thy name: for these are the words of the Maccabees and of other Jews afflicted by Antiochus Epiphanes, and punished with wounds and death, as Theodoret notes there. Allegorically however these are the words of the Church, the Apostles and the Martyrs, who are vexed by persecutors and tyrants, and given over to prisons, scourges and death. Tertullian reads this verse thus, in Scorpiace ch. xiii: "For thy cause we are put to death all the day, we are counted as cattle of slaughter," that is, as cattle destined for certain and imminent killing, and now about to be slaughtered.
Verse 37: But in All These Things We Overcome, Because of Him That Hath Loved Us
Verse 37. BUT IN ALL THESE THINGS WE OVERCOME (in Greek ὑπερνικῶμεν, that is, we are more than conquerors, we super-conquer, namely, by a remarkable and illustrious victory, says Theophylact and Oecumenius, which we obtain when, not by resisting but by enduring and dying, we overcome all enemies and any adversities, and we glory in them; and this) FOR THE SAKE OF HIM, that is, by the love and example of Christ; or, as the Greeks and the Syriac have it, through Him, that is, through the help of Christ's grace, WHO LOVED US. The Apostle therefore here brings forward a threefold reason for this super-victory. The first is from the ease of conquering; because by mere endurance against our enemies we everywhere erect trophies. The second, because by the very torments and persecutions we conquer: which is a new and wonderful manner of conquering. The third, because of the certainty of victory: for it is more than to conquer, for someone to enter the contest as if he were already the lord of victory. Hence he says: "For I am certain, that neither death, nor life," etc. "This," says Chrysostom in homily 25 on Matthew, "the Apostles attest, who, when the torrent of the whole world rushed equally upon them, namely of tyrants and of peoples, of Jews and of Gentiles, of their own and of strangers, stood more firmly than a rock beaten by the waves." And below: "This is what is most wonderful: for though they suffered very many plots, and especially though tempestuous storms frequently rushed upon them, yet they could in no way shake their souls, nor strike any sorrow into them. The enemy harasses you on all sides, and surrounds you with a thousand afflictions, but he weaves for you a more glorious crown. And what is especially to be wondered at, those who contrive such plots not only do no harm at all, but they even make their victims better by their assault." Then he proves the same point, fittingly comparing them to adamant, to a goad and to fire, saying: "And he who kicks against the goad, without doubt is himself pricked and wounded by his own blows; and he who attacks those holding fast to virtue is himself certainly overthrown, and his malice is rendered the weaker the longer he fights against virtue. And just as one who binds fire in a garment does not extinguish the fire, but burns up the garment: so too those who persecuted those set in virtue, and seized them, and more often bound them, made them by all these things the more illustrious, but destroyed themselves."
Verses 38 and 39. For I am certain, that neither death, NOR LIFE, etc., SHALL BE ABLE TO SEPARATE US FROM THE LOVE OF GOD. — "I am certain;" therefore, the heretics say, the elect by faith believe themselves to be impeccable and chosen unto glory. Some answer that Paul speaks of himself, and that it had been revealed to him that he was predestined and confirmed in grace. Others think that Paul here speaks in the person of the elect, as if to say: The elect cannot finally be separated from charity, or die in sin. But I answer: in place of "I am certain," the Greek has πέπεισμαι, that is, I have certain hope in the Lord, I am persuaded, I trust, as Ambrose, Jerome (in Question IV to Algasia), the Syriac, and indeed Erasmus, Beza, and Vatablus read. For Paul uses τὸ πέπεισμαι in this sense in ch. xv, vers. 14; Hebr. ch. vi, vers. 9, and II Tim. i, 5, and elsewhere. Paul therefore signifies by these words, says St. Augustine in the book On the Manners of the Church, ch. xi and following, the power and efficacy of charity, as if to say: There is no terror which can move a man who burns with charity to offend God; nevertheless, in the same place St. Augustine teaches that charity can be lost, and is to be most diligently preserved. So a soldier, courageous and fired with the ardor of war and victory, would say: I am certain and resolved that neither weapons, nor stones, nor fires shall bar me from the walls but that I shall scale them, as Virgil says of Sinon: "Prepared for either course, either to spin deceits, or to meet certain death."
Add to this that the heretics themselves, who throw this passage at us in support of their special faith, together with other Catholic Doctors, take these words of God's charity, not of ours, as if Paul were saying: The charity by which God loves His beloved, cares for them and directs them unto salvation, is so firm, certain, and immutable, that no creature whatsoever can tear us from it, or bring it about that He should cease to love us, or that His love should be frustrated of its effect, namely grace, justice, our salvation, "which is in Christ," that is, through Christ, who reconciled this charity of God to us by His death. Understand: unless we voluntarily, through sin, tear ourselves away from His love and refuse to be loved and ruled by Him. And this is what St. Bernard says: "No creature can separate us from God's charity, but only one's own will can do this very thing." This certitude therefore on God's part is supreme, and is the certitude of faith: but on our part it is only a moral certitude, such as a man's firm resolve and steadfast purpose brings; and it is more truly of this that the Apostle here speaks, as I have said.
Here St. Chrysostom exclaims: "O soul raging with madness, yet a madness which produces sobriety! transcending all things which are in the heavens, on the earth, under the earth, above the heavens, visible and invisible, on account of the love of Christ, he reckoned nothing of them: this one thing he feared, lest he should fall away from the love of Christ." "Adorned with this charity," the same Chrysostom says in homily 2 On the Praises of Paul, "Paul esteemed tyrants, and even Nero himself, as so many gnats; with this he reckoned death, torments, and a thousand punishments to be a children's game; with this Paul gloried as the prisoner of Jesus Christ, more than if he had been crowned with a diadem: for, hemmed in in prison, he dwelt in heaven; with this he received scourgings and wounds more gladly than others snatch up prizes; with this he loved labors no less than rest, sufferings no less than rewards, triumphal processions and trophies. 'I,' he says, 'in very many labors, in prisons more abundantly, in stripes beyond measure, in deaths,' etc."
Set on fire by this charity, St. Tiburtius the martyr, as his Acts have it, taunting the judge Torquatus and as it were triumphing, said: "Apply the rack, hang up Christians, condemn, strike, burn, in short employ every torture: if you threaten exile, the whole world is for those who philosophize; if death's penalty, we escape the prison of the world; if fires, we conquer greater fires in our concupiscences: decree whatever you wish, every penalty is cheap to us, where conscience is a pure companion." Soon following Tiburtius, the brothers Marcus and Marcellianus, when their feet had been fixed to a stake with sharp nails, sang saying: "Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! Never have we feasted so well, because now we have begun to be fixed in the love of Christ; would, O judge, that you might permit us to be so, as long as we are clothed with the garment of this body!"
Beautifully on this sweet force and violence of charity, by which the whole heart of the lover is snatched into God whom he loves, speaks St. Bernard in sermon 79 on the Canticle, on that passage of ch. III: "Have you seen Him whom my soul loves?" He says: "O love, headlong, vehement, burning, impetuous, who do not allow anything else to be thought of besides yourself, you scorn other things, despise everything besides yourself; content with yourself, you lead reason and intellect captive, wonderfully triumphing over all things. Behold, all that this soul thinks, all that it speaks, sounds of you, smells of you, and of nothing else: so you have claimed for yourself both her heart and her tongue. 'Have you seen Him whom my soul loves?' As though these knew what she herself was thinking, she does not explain the name of her Spouse in words; that you may consider this holy love not to be measured by tongue and word, but by deed and truth. And besides, since just as one not skilled in Greek cannot understand the Greek idiom, so too the lover alone understands the proper terms and names of love: but to others, the one speaking these words will appear a barbarian. But these watchmen, because the idiom of love were skilled in, instruct the beloved. 'I held Him, and will not let Him go.'" Then he illustrates the same point with the example of the Patriarch Jacob: "Jacob said to the angel, with whom he wrestled until morning, who asked him to let him go because he saw the dawn approaching: I will not let you go, unless you bless me; and he blessed him in that very place, and after this let him go. But the Spouse, having also obtained a blessing, when she had found Him whom her soul loves, says: I held Him, and I will not let Him go; she does not wish to let Him go, nor perhaps does He wish to be held less, of whom it is said: My delights are to be with the sons of men. What is stronger than this bond, which has been made one by the so vehement will of both? I held Him, and I will not let Him go, and she is held, according to that: You have held my right hand; she would not hold, unless she were held by the mercy of God."
Nor strength. — So the Roman Bibles read. But the Greek, Syriac and Ambrosian texts delete this; nor does it have a corresponding term, as the others do, which are paired: for each one has its own pair, as is plain when he says: "Neither death, nor life, neither things present (that is, present goods or evils, says Anselm), nor things to come."
Verse 39: Nor Height, nor Depth, nor Any Other Creature, Shall Be Able to Separate Us from the Love of God
Verse 39. Nor height, nor depth. — That is, no prosperity, no adversity, no glorious or humble things, says Oecumenius and after him Toletus. Secondly, D. Thomas and Anselm explain thus: "Nor height," namely of a citadel or rock, from which someone would threaten you with being thrown headlong unless you depart from God's love; "nor depth," namely sea or river, in which in like manner someone would threaten drowning, shall separate us from charity. Thirdly and more effectively, Theodoret: "nor height, nor depth," that is, neither of heaven nor of hell, as if to say: Even if you should promise the heavenly kingdom, even if you should threaten Gehenna to one who loves God, in order to separate him from charity, you will accomplish nothing with him, says St. Chrysostom. It is hyperbole. For it is implied: if indeed anyone could promise this or threaten this on such a condition, as if Paul were saying: This one thing I fear not so much as oppose, abhor, and detest — namely, separation from the charity and love of God, "which is in Christ" (that is, through Christ; by which we are joined and united to God through Christ and Christ's faith, grace and love: see Canon 25); in comparison with this separation I despise all things as trifles, for to be separated from Christ is more horrible to me than Gehenna itself: just as on the contrary, to endure in the charity of Christ is more pleasant to me than any kingdom, says St. Chrysostom.
Beautifully, subtly and forcefully expounding these things one by one, St. Augustine in book I On the Manners of the Church, ch. xi, vol. 1, says: "No one separates us from the love of the Lord by threatening death; for that very thing by which we love God cannot die, since death itself is not to love God. No one separates us from it by promising life: for no one separates from the fountain itself by promising water. An angel does not separate: for there is no angel, when we cling to God, more powerful than our mind. Virtue which has power in this world does not separate: for the mind clinging to God is altogether higher than the whole world." Augustine continues: "Pressing troubles do not separate: for we feel them the lighter, the more closely we cling to Him from whom they strive to separate us. The promise of things to come does not separate: for whatever good is to come, God promises more certainly; and nothing is better than God Himself, who is already present to those who cling well to Him. Height does not separate, nor depth: for what would heaven promise me, that I should be sundered from heaven's Maker? or what would hell terrify me with, that I should desert God? whom if I had never deserted, I should not have known hell. Finally, what place shall tear me from His charity, who would not be everywhere wholly, if He were contained in any place?"
So resolved and made steadfast in the love of Christ above other Saints was St. Agatha, the heroine of virgins, that — being most noble, most rich, most honorable and most beautiful — when Quintianus, the governor of Sicily, taken by love of her, played not so much the judge as the suitor, but in vain, and therefore at length handed her over to Aphrodisia, that she might bend her by her allurements and make her compliant to the governor, and she like a Siren day and night sang to her of pleasures and delights, St. Agatha as if deaf, fixing her mind on God, persisted unmoved: and when Aphrodisia made no end of solicitation, at last the holy virgin answered her: "I take your words, Aphrodisia, and your tongue, not as yours, but as the instrument and tongue of the demon. Be ashamed to propose to me these foul and unworthy things. If you are not ashamed, yet cease: for you waste your effort, you sing to a deaf woman. For I am so founded and confirmed in the love of my Lord Jesus, and so constant in the vow of my virginity which I have made to Him, that by His grace I trust the sun shall sooner fail of its light, fire of its heat, snow of its whiteness, than I shall change my will and purpose. Let Quintianus prepare lions, kindle the pyre, stretch out the racks, open the gates of hell if he can, and stir up against me all the force and torments of demons, I shall gladly receive all things that I may die a Christian and a virgin. I fear no violence of Quintianus, because God, to whom I have consecrated my soul and body, will defend me." Wherefore Aphrodisia, reporting back to Quintianus what she had seen and tested in Agatha, said: "It is easier to make stones soft and tender, or to turn iron into lead, than to lead Agatha's mind from the love of Christ and chastity over to you. For I and my daughters for thirty days, night and day, have done nothing else than to beat upon and pound her soul, now with flatteries, now with threats, now with promises; but she esteems everything which is under heaven for Christ's sake no more than the earth which she treads under her feet; nay, night and day she thinks of nothing else, dreams of nothing else, than that she may die for Christ." Quintianus therefore summoning Agatha, by new methods and with all manner of arts again sounded out her mind, promising her whatever could be desired in this world, if she would comply with him. To him the saint said: "Outside of Christ I wish for and desire neither life, nor safety, nor anything else. Nor is there cause, O Quintianus, why you should think to overthrow me with your threats, savagery, and torments. For know that the wearied and thirsting hind is not such as to desire clear water as I desire and thirst for your torments, that through them I may embrace my Christ and be united to Him. If you wish to draw the sword on me, behold my neck; if scourges, behold my back; if fire, behold my whole body. Behold I offer to you my hands, my feet, all my members, torture them as you please. Burn, cut, bind, tear, stretch, bind, torture, kill: the more cruel you are to me, the greater the favor you confer on me, the more consolation and glory I shall receive from my sweet Spouse. Why do you delay? why do you tarry? to a thirsting soul every delay is long." She spoke, and stood by her word; for having endured with eager and brave spirit the cutting off of her breasts, fires, potsherds and other dread torments, she flew up to heaven as a martyr on the 5th of February.