Exposition of Certain Propositions from the Epistle to the Romans
These are the meanings in the Epistle of the Apostle Paul to the Romans. First of all, that everyone should understand that in this epistle the question being treated concerns the works of the law and grace.
1. [1.] When he says: According to the Spirit of sanctification from the resurrection of the dead , that is, because they received the gift of the Spirit after his resurrection; and he mentions the resurrection of the dead, because in him we were all crucified and rose again.
2. [2.] When he says: That I may impart to you some spiritual grace , namely the love of God and neighbor, so that through the charity of Christ they might not at all envy the Gentiles who were called to the Gospel.
3. [3.] When he said: The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness , and so on, Solomon too says concerning the wise men of the world: For if they were able to know so much that they could estimate the world, how did they not more easily find the Lord and Creator of that very world? But those whom Solomon reproves did not come to know the Creator through the creature; whereas those whom the Apostle reproves did know him, but they did not give thanks, and while saying that they were wise they became fools and fell to worshiping idols. For that the wise men of the nations could find the Creator, the same Apostle clearly showed when he was speaking with the Athenians. For when he had said: For in him we live and move and are , he added: As certain ones among you also have said . But with this intention he first reproves the ungodliness of the Gentiles, that from it he may prove that even those converted can attain to grace. For it is unjust that they should undergo the penalty of ungodliness and not receive the reward of faith.
4. [4.] When he says: Knowing God, they did not glorify him as God or give thanks , this is the head of sin, of which it is said: The beginning of all sin is pride . For had they given thanks to God, who had given this wisdom, they would not have attributed anything to themselves by their own thoughts. Wherefore they were given over by the Lord into the desires of their heart, to do the things that were not fitting.
5. [5.] When he says: He gave them over , it is understood: he dismissed them into the desires of their heart. And he says they received a reciprocal recompense from God, namely to be given over into the desires of their heart.
6. [6.] When at last he says: God gave them over to a reprobate mind , etc., filled , he says, with all iniquity , we are given to understand that these things he now names, that is, crimes, pertain to doing harm to others. But above he was speaking of the corruptions that are called shameful deeds, from which one comes to crimes; for each person, following the pernicious sweetness of shameful deeds, while he tries to remove the persons who hinder him, proceeds to crime. Thus too that passage in the Wisdom of Solomon is distinguished, where, when he had enumerated the shameful deeds above, he says: Let us lie in wait for the poor righteous man, because he is useless to us , etc.
7. [7.-8.] When he says: Not only those who do these things, but also those who consent to those who do them , he means that whatever they did, they did not unwillingly; but, when they consent to evil deeds, they also approve even those things which they did not do; and therefore, of sins now fully accomplished, he says: Therefore you are inexcusable, O every man who judges. And when he says every , he now brings in a further point, to show not only the Gentile but also the Jew, who wished to judge the Gentiles according to the law.
8. [9.] When he says: You are storing up for yourself wrath in the day of wrath , he everywhere uses the wrath of God for vengeance. Therefore he says: Of the just judgment of God . It should be noted, however, that the wrath of God is placed also in the New Testament—which, when men who are opposed to the old law read it in the Old, they think it something to be blamed; whereas God is surely not subject to perturbations as we are, as Solomon says: But you, O Lord of hosts, judge with tranquility . But wrath, as has been said, is used in the signification of vengeance.
9. [10.] When he says: Their conscience bearing witness , he speaks according to that passage of the apostle John, where he says: Beloved, if our heart reproves us, God is greater than our conscience , etc.
10. [11.] When he says: By the spirit, not the letter , this means that the law is to be understood according to the spirit, not according to what the letter contains—which surely happened to those who received circumcision more carnally than spiritually.
11. [12.] When he says: Whose praise is not from men but from God , this fits with what he says: He who is a Jew in secret .
12. [13.-18.] When he says: Because no flesh shall be justified in the law before him; for through the law comes knowledge of sin , and other similar things which some think must be raised as a reproach against the law, these must be read carefully enough, so that neither may the law seem to be disapproved by the Apostle, nor may free will be taken away from man. So let us distinguish these four stages of man: before the law, under the law, under grace, in peace. Before the law we follow the concupiscence of the flesh; under the law we are dragged by it; under grace we neither follow it nor are dragged by it; in peace there is no concupiscence of the flesh. Before the law, then, we do not fight, because we not only lust and sin, but even approve of our sins. Under the law we fight, but we are conquered; for we confess that the things we do are evil, and by confessing them to be evil, we certainly do not wish to do them, but because grace is not yet present, we are overcome. In this stage it is shown to us how we lie prostrate, and while we wish to rise and yet fall, we are more grievously afflicted. Hence it is said here: The law entered in secretly, that sin might abound . Hence too what is now set down: For through the law comes knowledge of sin —for it is not the removal of sin, since sin is removed by grace alone. The law, therefore, is good, because it forbids the things that ought to be forbidden and commands the things that ought to be commanded. But when anyone thinks to fulfill it by his own strength, and not through the grace of his Liberator, this presumption profits him nothing; indeed, it even harms him so much that he is both swept away by a more vehement desire for sin and is found to be a transgressor in his sins as well. For where there is no law, neither is there transgression . So then, lying thus prostrate, when anyone recognizes that he cannot rise by himself, let him implore the help of the Liberator. Grace, therefore, comes, which forgives past sins, and helps him as he strives, and bestows the love of righteousness, and takes away fear. And when this happens, although certain desires of the flesh, while we are in this life, fight against our spirit to lead it into sin, yet the spirit, not consenting to these desires, because it is fixed in the grace and love of God, ceases to sin. For we do not sin in the evil desire itself, but in our consent. To this pertains what the same Apostle says: Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, so as to obey its desires . For by this he shows that there are desires which, by not obeying, we do not allow sin to reign in us. But since these desires arise from the mortality of the flesh, which we draw from the first sin of the first man, from whom we are born carnally, they will not come to an end until, by the resurrection of the body, we attain that transformation which is promised to us, where there will be perfect peace, when we shall be established in the fourth stage. And it will be perfect peace, because nothing will resist us when we do not resist God. This is what the Apostle says: The body indeed is dead because of sin, but the spirit is life because of righteousness. If, then, the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Jesus Christ from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit dwelling in you . Free will, therefore, existed perfectly in the first man; but in us, before grace, there is no free will so that we may not sin, but only so that we may not wish to sin. But grace brings it about that we not only wish to do right but also are able to, not by our own strength but by the help of the Liberator, who will also grant us perfect peace in the resurrection—which perfect peace follows upon good will. For, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will .
13. [19.] When he says: Do we then make the law void through faith? God forbid! Rather we establish the law —that is, we confirm it. But how was the law to be confirmed except through righteousness? And through the righteousness that is by faith, since the very things that could not be fulfilled through the law have been fulfilled through faith.
14. [20.] When he says: For if Abraham was justified by works, he has glory, but not before God , this means that Abraham, being without the law, since he does not gain glory from the works of the law—as if he were fulfilling the law by his own strength, when that law had not yet been given—that glory is God's, not his own. For he was justified not by his own merit as if from works, but by the grace of God, through faith.
15. [21.] When he says: But to him who works, the reward is not reckoned according to grace but according to debt , he spoke of how men render reward to men. For God gave by grace, since he gave to sinners, that they might live justly through faith, that is, might work well. Therefore that we work well, once grace has been received, is to be attributed not to us but to him who justified us by grace. For if he wished to render the wage that was owed, he would render to sinners the penalty that was owed.
16. [22.] When he says: Who justifies the ungodly , this means: he makes the godly out of the ungodly, so that henceforth he may remain in that very godliness and righteousness; for he was justified for this purpose, that he might be righteous, not that he should think it permitted him to sin.
17. [23.] When he says: For the law works wrath , this signifies vengeance and pertains to that stage when a person is under the law .
18. [24.] When he says: Before God, in whom he believed , he indicated that faith is in the inner man, in the sight of God, not in the display before men, such as is the circumcision of the flesh.
19. [25.] When he says of Abraham: Giving glory to God , this is set against those who sought their own glory from the works of the law before men.
20. [26.] When he says: And not only so, but we also glory in tribulations , and the rest, he leads on step by step up to the love of God—which love he says we have through the gift of the Spirit—and he shows that all those things which we might attribute to ourselves are to be attributed to God, who has deigned to give grace through the Holy Spirit.
21. [27.-28.] When he says: For until the law sin was in the world , it must be understood: until grace should come. For it was said against those who suppose that sins could be taken away through the law. For the Apostle says that sins were made manifest through the law, but not taken away, when he says: But sin was not imputed when there was no law. For he does not say: There was no sin, but: it was not imputed . Nor, when the law was given, was it taken away, but it began to be imputed, that is, to appear. Let us not, then, suppose that until the law was said as though there were no sin now under the law; rather it was said thus: until the law , so that you may count the whole time of the law up to the end of the law, which is Christ.
22. [29. 1.] When he says: But death reigned from Adam to Moses, even in those who did not sin after the likeness of Adam's transgression , this may be distinguished in two ways: either, Death reigned after the likeness of Adam's transgression , because even those who did not sin died from the origin of Adam's mortality; or else, Death reigned even in those who did not sin after the likeness of Adam's transgression , but sinned before the law—so that those are understood to have sinned after the likeness of Adam's transgression who received the law, since Adam too sinned once the law of the commandment had been received. Certainly, too, what is said, until Moses , is to be understood as the whole time of the law. And Adam is called the figure of the one to come , but by contrast; so that as through him came death, so through our Lord came life.
23. [29. 2.] When he says: But the gift is not as the offense , the gift excels in two ways: either because grace much more abounds—since through it one lives forever, whereas through Adam's death, death reigned only temporally; or because by the condemnation of one offense the death of many came about through Adam, whereas through our Lord Jesus Christ grace was given, by the free gift covering many offenses, unto eternal life. But he explains another difference thus, saying: And the gift is not as it was through the one who sinned. For the judgment indeed was from one unto condemnation, but grace is from many offenses unto justification. When, therefore, it says from one , offense is to be understood, since there follows: but grace from many offenses . This, then, is the difference: that in Adam one offense was condemned, but by the Lord many were forgiven. What follows, therefore, contains both these differences, so that it is explained thus: For if by one man's offense death reigned through one, much more shall those who receive the abundance of grace and of righteousness reign in life through one, Jesus Christ. What he said, then— much more shall they reign —pertains to eternal life; but what he said— they receive the abundance of grace —pertains to the forgiveness of many offenses. After these differences have been explained, he returns to the figure from which he had begun, whose sequence he had suspended, when he said: For as through one man sin entered into this world, and through sin, death . To which he now returns, when he says: Therefore, as through one man's offense it came upon all men unto condemnation, so also through one man's righteous act it comes upon all men unto justification of life. For as through the disobedience of one man many were made sinners, so also through the obedience of one many shall be made righteous. This is the figure of the coming Adam, of which he had begun to speak above, and, interposing certain of its differences, he had deferred the sequence, to which he now, returning, brought his conclusion, saying: Therefore, as through one man's offense it came upon all men , etc.