While almost all of the works in this vault use Victorian translations, due to the English translations of this commentary being in copyright, it was machine-translated (by Claude, 2026) from the public-domain Latin. It has not been checked by a human translator.
Commentary on Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, long printed among the works of Ambrose. Its author, whom Erasmus first called “Ambrosiaster”, wrote at Rome while Damasus was bishop there (366–384). Chapter 15 of the Epistle; the verse numbers are the Benedictine editors’.
(Verse 1.) We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak. He rightly says we ought: for teachers must strengthen the weak and instruct the unskilled with gentleness; lest, being provoked — since they wish to contend, so as not to seem humbled — they go on to worse.
(Verses 1–2.) And not to please ourselves: that is, not to claim what profits and pleases ourselves, but also what profits our brother; for we ought to care for one another. Let every one of us please his neighbour for his good to edification. Now he has set his own person apart; for he admonishes these, that, being zealous for charity, they should please their neighbours in what is profitable. This is edification, as he says elsewhere: I, he says, please all men in all things (1 Corinthians 10:33).
(Verse 3.) For even Christ pleased not himself; but, as it is written, The reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me. He says that the Saviour did not please Himself, but God the Father; for He says: For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me, the Father (John 6:38). And since, when He said these things, He was killed as a sinner, the Jews gainsaying Him, the Psalmist speaks words in His person to God the Father, saying: The reproaches of them that reproached thee fell on me (Psalm 69:9); that is: “When I was doing your will, they had said that I was sinning against you — they who, by not receiving me, whom you sent, reproached you.” For the Jews, when they sinned against God by not receiving Christ whom He sent, went further and killed Him as one sinning against God. Hence the sins of those who sinned against God fell upon Christ; for the innocent one is killed by sinners as a blasphemer, as is written in the Gospel (Mark 15:29).
(Verses 4–6.) For whatsoever things were written aforetime were written for our learning, that we through patience and comfort of the scriptures might have hope. It is plain that whatever things were written were written for our instruction; so that from that very exhortation we may advance to hope, not distrusting the promises if they are slow in coming. Now the God of patience and consolation grant you to be likeminded one toward another according to Christ Jesus: that ye may with one mind and one mouth glorify God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. As one sent for their salvation, the Apostle follows the people with a good prayer, wishing that God may give them one mind of wisdom according to Jesus Christ, so that they may be wise according to the teaching of Christ. For then they will be able to keep love, after the example of the Lord, who says: Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends and brothers (John 15:13); and so, with one mouth and one confession, to praise God the Father in Christ, if they have exhorted one another according to the mind of Christ; so that all things may praise God without ceasing — all things which He made through Christ, and which, having fallen after their straying, He deigned to raise up and re-form again through the same, giving a double benefit, mercy and knowledge.
(Verse 7.) Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God (Isaiah 53:4). We were taken up by Christ in this way, when He took our infirmities and bore our sicknesses; so that by this example we may strengthen one another’s infirmities through patience, that the name of God’s honour, which has been taken upon us, may not be emptied; for we are called sons of God through the grace of Christ.
(Verse 8.) Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers. He commends the origin of the Jews: for by “the circumcision” he means the sons of Abraham, to whom Christ was sent and ministered the grace promised to the fathers. Hence the Saviour says: For I am among you (Luke 22:27), not to be ministered unto, but to minister; so that the truth in the promise made to the fathers might be proved. For the circumcision of the flesh was given to Abraham as a figure of the circumcision of the heart, which the prophet afterwards signified was to come, saying: Circumcise the hardness of your heart (Jeremiah 4:4). Of this circumcision, promised in his words, Christ is the minister, that is, the preacher. Then, so that the apostles might minister the circumcision of the heart to those circumcised in the flesh, He says thus: As thou hast sent me into this world, even so have I also sent them into this world (John 17:18). And the circumcision of the heart is this: that, the mist of error being taken away, one should acknowledge God the Father as Creator, and His Son Christ, through whom He created all things; so that the truth of God might be fulfilled. For He had promised that He would give mercy, and He had promised it to the fathers of the Jews; for He had said to Abraham: In thy seed shall all nations be blessed (Genesis 22:18). And to David He said: Of the fruit of thy body will I set upon thy throne (Psalm 132:11); and, There shall come a Star out of Jacob (Numbers 24:17).