[10]. Sin
Sin is taken in a twofold sense in the Gospel teachings: First, for that disease which we contract from the author of our race, in consequence of which we are given over to love of ourselves. Of this I spoke to the best of my ability when considering man. It is this disease that Paul has in mind when he says, Rom. 7:20: “It is no more I that do it, but sin which dwelleth in me.” This sin, therefore, i. e., this defect, is the
[legis: Vulgate, praecepti; Greek, τῷ, xapayyeMas 1Cf. Zwingli’s On original sin, in vol. 2 of this series, pp. 1-32.]
disease native to us in consequence of which we shun things hard and burdensome and pursue things pleasant and agreeable. In the second place, sin is taken for that which is contrary to the Law, as through the Law comes knowledge of sin, Rom. 7:7. Any course of action, therefore, which is contrary to the Law is called sin. Let us see, then, how they are related to each other, the sin that is disease and the sin that is transgression of the Law. The disease does not know that it is disease, and thinks it has a right to do whatever it likes. God does not think so, but when the disease tries to get everything for itself and thinks all things bound to serve it and to minister to its greed, He prunes this luxuriant growth with the sickle of the Law. For the Law “was added because of transgressions,” Gal. 3:19. For the Searcher of hearts is aware that the nature of all is the same, and that Thersites has just as much selflove as Agamemnon. Now if all were alike given loose reins, the only consequence would be that every man would subject everything to himself, according to the measure of his strength; whence a harvest of robbery, plundering, murder, parricide, and all that kind of enemy to human association would spring up. He therefore confines this far-reaching greed within fixed limits, and commands us not to do to others what we do not want done to us, and, conversely, to do to others what we want done to ourselves [Mt. 7:12]. And that we may do it more readily and recognize the wisdom of God, He sweetens this law of nature, as it is called, with the seasoning of love, saying: “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself” [Mt. 22:39]. Love is a sweet thing, but it takes even the most bitter things cheerfully, for nothing is hard to him that loveth. Therefore, though it seems a great and difficult thing to do to your neighbor what you want done to you, it becomes pleasant and very easy if you love. But here the old man, the disease, the flesh, Adam, sin, rebels—for these are the names by which the teaching of the Apostles calls this vice of φιλαυτία; [self-love]. The flesh, or the old Adam, I say, rebels, scorning everything but itself; for it would rather that all things should serve its own lust to their own destruction than put any limit to its greed and its passion
[Thersites vias the meanest, as Agamemnon was the highest, of the]
[Greeks before Troy.]
for glory and pleasure. Hence anger against the Law and the Lawgiver, hatred and machinations—hatred, because it cannot avoid or escape the Law or the Lawgiver, for if it ascendeth into heaven, He is there, if it descendeth into hell, He is there [cf. Ps. 139: 8]; machinations, because it struggles with all its might to deceive Him who yet cannot be deceived; it ponders, devises, schemes, hustles about, and after many attempts comes to this conclusion: “He is a tyrant who demands these things, for how is it possible for anyone to love another as much as himself? Nevertheless, since He makes such severe demands, His vengeance must be guarded against. You will do, therefore, as crafty slaves are wont to do with good and ἀδόλοις [guileless] masters—think up some clever dodge to blind Him so that He will not see your design.” Hence the usurer endows a priesthood or some sacred office, the whoremonger keeps a season of thoroughgoing fasting in honor of the Virgin, the betrayer puts up trembling and desperate prayers. By this more than silly cajolery they hope, forsooth, to overwhelm their unsuspecting Lord, or to throw dust in His eyes, so that they can indulge with impunity in adultery, usury, and betrayal. Thus was the Law no more listened to, nor men’s ways modeled upon it, nor the things that cause dishonor put away, but man became a god unto himself; for though the Law might slay, yet man none the less made himself alive in his wiles and hopes. Hence impiety gradually increased to such an extent that it said in its heart: “There is no God” [Ps. 14:1]; though by disguising its face it was openly posing as piety itself. I have spoken thus at rather great length that we might see how the sin that is transgression is born of the sin that is disease.
The next thing is to show how we have been made free from the Law and from sin.
We have not been made free from the Law in the sense of not being bound to do what the Law bids; for the Law is the unchangeable will of God. For not one tittle of the Law shall fail, Luke 16:17. How then are we through Christ dead to the Law, so that we are subject to something other than the Law, as Paul taught by the analogy of the wife in Rom. 7:1-4? This is the way we have been made free: He that loves does
all things freely, even the hardest. God, therefore, has put into our hearts a fire by which to kindle love of Him in place of love of ourselves; and He desires this fire to burn, Luke 12:49. The Baptist had promised this fire, and so had Christ Himself as He was going to heaven, Acts 1:5; which fire is love, and God is love [I John 4:8]. If this burn in us, we shall do all things no longer from compulsion, but freely and cheerfully. For love is the completion of the law [Rom. 13: 10]. For the Law was performed with repugnance and feigning, when the fire of love was not yet burning; but now that that is kindled, the Law is not regarded, so far are we from fearing it; but love draws us in all things and to all things. And as we say of those who are bound by their passions that they are earried away, so those that are on fire with divine love are carried away by the spirit that burns in them. We have, therefore, one kind of freedom from the Law, that through which J we do for love that which we know will please God. For Paul teaches in Rom. 12: 2 that this is acceptable to God. A second kind of freedom from the Law is that the Law cannot condemn any more, which yet before wrought the wrath and indignation and just vengeance of God, Rom. 4:15 and Gal. 3:10; and Deut. 27: 26, where divine justice sternly thunders: “Cursed is everyone who continueth not in all things that are written in the book of the law, to do them.”
Christ, therefore, “redeemed us from this curse of the law, being made a curse for us,” that is, being nailed to the cross for us, Gal. 3: 13 and Rom. 6:10. We are no longer under the Law but under grace; and if under grace, the Law cannot condemn us, for if the Law still has the power to condemn, we are not under grace. It is, therefore, Christ who has broken the wrath of the Law (that is, who has appeased God’s justice, which would have caused Him deservedly to rage against us), and who by bearing the cruelty of the cross for us has so softened it that He has chosen to make us not only free instead of slaves, but even sons. And if we are sons, as we surely are, Rom. 8: 14 and Gal. 4:6, we are above the Law. “For if the Son hath mace us free, we are free indeed and free-born,” John 8:36. We are, therefore, freed from the Law, now that love has been substituted for the fear of the Law. For since
God so loved us that He gave His Son for us, has He not above all kindled a responsive love? For one might, perhaps, undergo death for a righteous friend; but God, when we were His enemies, sent His Son to free us and to make us joint heirs with Him [ecf. Rom. 5: 7-10]. Again, we are freed from the vengeance of the Law; for Christ has paid by His suffering that penalty which we owed for our sins. Indeed, we have been so completely freed from sin, as far as it is a disease, that it is no longer able to harm us if we trust in Christ. For “there is no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus, who walk not after the flesh” [Rom. 8:1]. And in so far as it is transgression, we have been freed from harm from it in the same way as from the wrath of the Law, Rom. 8: 2: “For the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus made me free from the law of sin and of death.” For when we say, “The Law condemns,” we are simply saying, “The sin which is done contrary to the will of the Law condemns.” Hence I said, we must determine about freedom from sin in the same way in which we have determined about freedom from the condemnation of the Law. When after all this we find in our own case that the disease is still so potent that we are constantly sinning, and have said that those have absolutely no hope of salvation who have not been made new men, we are, of course, driven into the old despair. Therefore, having made the needful preparations for, removing this difficulty, I will now show how we are new men, even when we still are full of the old man; that is, to speak plainly, how it happens that those who are in Christ, even though they sin, yet are not condemned.
In order to do this more easily and fitly, I will treat the words of Paul in Romans 7. Paul was forced to ventilate this question when he was settling the controversy about justification by faith and justification by works. One party raised the objection, Rom. 6: 1, “Shall we then continue in sin, that grace may abound?” His answer to this objection he does not set forth until the eighth chapter, and I refer the diligent reader to that chapter. I shall begin with the words that seem best adapted to clearing up our problem. Paul ass, then, Rom. 7:7-8: “What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Howbeit, I had not known sin, except through the law: for I
had not known that coveting is sin” (to speak for the moment in paraphrase) “except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. But sin, finding occasion, through the commandment,” as with a sun-dial or a plumb line (for there is personification here), “measured out in me all manner of coveting.” That is, when the Law came into sin’s hands, she wanted to measure and weigh everything, and finally brought it about that I learned that all manner of human coveting is sin. For all teem with it in consequence of the disease. And that this is the meaning is shown by what immediately follows: “For apart from the law sin is dead.” I, Paul, will take myself as an illustration for you. I was alive apart from the law once,” still ignorant because of my age of even the name of law; “but when the commandment came, sin revived.” There was the disease of φιλαυτία [self-love] and coveting in me, but I did not know that these were sin, thinking allowable what love of self persuaded to. But when the law, Thou shalt not covet, was promulgated, sin revived; not that any new change took place in me, but what I had not before known to be wicked I perceived through the Law was wicked. And as soon as I saw this, “I died.” For all that I saw in me was the lust of the flesh, of the eyes, the hands, the belly, and a sort of vast pride of life. Hence nothing but despair of life could arise within me. But I must not omit to state that no one should from this death of mine accuse the Law of poisoning, so to speak, as if if killed me. The Law displayed itself to me to show me that I was dead before, but to my undoing did not understand what death or what life is; and it tried to restore me to life and innocence. But this resulted for me in death, through the fault not of the Law but of myself. For sin, being a curious but stupid evil (note the personification!), having got hold of the Law as a standard, began to measure everything. And the Law deceived me; for in great part at least I thought myself righteous, but I was mightily mistaken. Indeed, everything so teemed with sin, was so polluted and impure, that, as I said, I straightway died. For, to speak frankly, no blame for this death of mine ought to be imputed to the Law. “The law is holy, and the commandment holy, and righteous and good” [Rom. 7:12]. If you
[dimensum est: Vulgate, operatum est; Greek, κατειργάσατο]
think I am now saying these things in order to defame that which is good, as if it were the cause of death unto me, you are wrong. For the Law did not kill me, but at the Law’s so showing I found myself dead. For [Rom. 7:13] “sin” (personification for the third time), “that it might be shown to be what it is, through the law, which is good, rendered me dead; that through the law sin” (personification again) “might make itself the greatest of sinners.” That is, sin, seized with admiration of the Law, wanted to try all things by it, but only established the fact that it is itself a sinner beyond measure.
This is the first part, in which we learn that we are nothing but corruption.
The second part contains the battle of the flesh and the spirit. There follows, therefore [cf. Rom. 7: 14-25]: “For we know that the law is spiritual: but I,” to come back to myself, whom I had begun to set before you as an illustration, “am carnal, sold under sin,” like some Κὰρ ὅλος;?. €., poor, mean slave, who, like the enslaved Cappadocians, knows how to be nothing but a slave. For, that you may understand my bondage, now that I have turned to Christ I see so much of the old disease still remaining that when I begin to do anything faults immediately so assail me on all sides that there comes out a work contrary to what I desire through faith. And so it happens that “that which I do, I know not,” nor approve. For what I had determined upon according to the counsel of faith, “that I do not; but, on the contrary, I rather do that which I hate.” Now notice whether I accuse the Law at any point. When, as I have said, “I do that which I would not, I silently consent unto the law, and bear witness to it that it is good.” For I had myself determined to do what the Law bids, for the reason that it seemed to me good. When, therefore, I determine one thing according to the teachings of faith, but do a widely different thing, “it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me,” that is, the disease to which we are all subject. “For I know that in me, that is, in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing.” And think not that I mean here the flesh that we have in common with the cattle (for who does not know that there is no good thing in that?). Or what of importance would he have said who proclaimed that no good is in it? That
would be too frivolous a remark for apostolic seriousness. I am speaking of the whole man, who is nothing but flesh if left to himself (as God Himself said in Genesis 6:3), and neither meditates nor determines aught that is not evil. Yet if th& Spirit of God comes to him to illumine him, so that man knows himself and God, the man pulls in his direction, promising nothing but pleasures, and the Spirit pulls in its direction, promising troubles but finally eternal bliss. Hence a contest arises. While I give ear to the Spirit, I excite the soul to pious living; again, when I listen to the flesh, that is sluggish and refuses to follow. Thus it happens that the will is present with me, but when I am to carry out the thing all my members are so slothful that I do nothing. “For the good that I would, I do not: but the evil which I would not, that I do” [Rom. 7: 19]. When, therefore, what I would not (in so far as I obey the Spirit), that I yet do, it is no more I that do it, but that violent disease of sin which dwelleth in me. 1 find, then, a law, that, when I would do good, evil at the same time clings very tightly to me. For I feel no little delight in the inward man—that is, the man that gives ear to the Spirit—when I hear the law of God and begin to regulate myself by it; but at once I see another law in my members, warring against the law of my mind when that would obey the Spirit, and bringing me, whether it be law or force, into captivity to the law of sin which is in my members. I am speaking to you of deep and serious matters, but in simple language, though I do my best to season itso that it will slip down successfully. I mean just this, that when with the inward man, taught by God, I consent to the law of God and begin to fashion myself according to it, the force of the old man suddenly springs up and drags me in another direction, so that I abandon my determination and desert to the camp of the flesh. I am so torn asunder, so fluctu- ating, so neither crow nor dove, that I am beyond measure disgusted with myself. For when my heart is given to God and I would only cling to Him and do what is pleasing to Him, Straightway the violence of the flesh seizes me, like a fierce whirlwind, and throws me captive into the fetters of sin. Then do I utter without ceasing such groanings as these: “O wretched man that I am, who through the grace of God recognize what
is true and right, but when I try to follow it am dragged elsewhere by this unclean way, or rather impotence and death, of the flesh! What God will grant me deliverance from this body, which should more properly be called death than body?”
Thus far, dear brethren, I have been showing the discordance between the Law and the old man, and, rising from the Law and the old man to the old man and the new, I have made of one man two, the inward who obeys the Spirit and the old who never varies from his own law, that is, from self-love and self-estem. Between these you will ever find war. “For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh” [Gal.5:17]. Hence continual battles. Sometimes the flesh wins: and though it does not rout all the forces of the Spirit, it yet ν _brings it about that we do not what we would. As a result, though nothing may happen to him from external things, the life of a Christian is yet a continual battle. And this so often saddens and troubles me and disturbs my pious vows, that, as I have just said, I frequently ery out in impatience and on the brink of despair: “O wretched me! who will free me from this misery?” But now, in the third place, that you may have the whole matter, I will show you what conclusion comforts me in such straits. Know, therefore, that when 1 have battled and sweated long and much within myself in this fashion, nothing inspires me with a more grateful sense of relief than the remembrance of Christ. Laying hold on Him, I, who was very near shipwreck, joyously make land. For I say to myself: “The God who gave His Son for you can refuse nothing, and knows your weakness [cf. Rom. 8:32]. Since, when you were once much farther away from Him, in fact His enemy, He took you back into favor, much more will He save you now that His Son has come to life again,” Rom. 5:21. Then my fevers and fears begin to abate, and my soul to be at rest and my whole being to revive. And when this takes place 1 gird myself for the thanksgiving I would make to God, my Father, through Christ Jesus our Lord [cf. Rom. 7:25]. But there are further battles—and this I mention that you may not in security and carelessness after one or two battles fall unawares into danger—
[viam: the reading of the first and second editions and of the Egli-]
[Finsler text, which Schuler and Schultess silently change to vim, “power.”]
and after these still others, so that the life of a Christian seems to me just like a ship that is tossed hither and thither by a great storm, which the sailors now steer for a little with the rudder, and now are compelled to let run before the fierce gale. And this I, if any man, have experienced in myself; for, in spite of what I am, I find myself serving sometimes God and sometimes the flesh. My heart persists in meditating upon those deeds which the Law of God commands; it loves God, trusts in His mercy, is eager to please Him in all things. And the flesh persists, nor changes its nature any more than does a fox or a wolf. It at last makes me sin against my will, though my heart be unwaveringly fixed upon God in unchanging hope. And I doubt not that, as what can happen to anyone can happen to everyone, your experience is the same as mine. For as no one is exempt from this disease, so, of course, none is exempt from the battle. In this matter, therefore, the sacred anchor, as it were, to which we must hold fast is in spite of everything by no means to let ourselves fall from the hope and glory of the sons and heirs of God.
If we hold fast firmly to this [cf. Rom. 8: 1-11]—to put the finishing touch to this problem—no condemnation can touch us; but only on condition that we walk after the Spirif and not after the flesh. But, that you may understand what ἣν is to walk after the Spirit, as far as that is granted to us while we sojourn in this world, note this: The Spirit of life in Christ, which by contrast may be called the law of the Spirit if one pleases, through which I feel in my inmost heart that I am free “through Him from the just vengeance of God and made His co-heir, that Spirit, I say, has made me free from the lawi. e., from the power and necessity of sin and of death. For when on account of the weakness of the flesh we could not be saved through the works of the Law, God sent His Son, clothed in flesh like unto our diseased flesh in every respect except the disease; and He condemned the disease which daily called out so many sins in us; and He condemned it with His own flesh, that is, by Himself enduring death for us according to human weakness, that the righteousness of the law, which no man could fulfil, might through His help be fulfilled in us. For all that He did or bore He bore for us. Hence, also, His
righteousness is our righteousness, if only we walk not after the “Hesh, but after the Spirit. For they that are fleshly do mind, meditate, pursue, fleshly things; but they that are spiritual meditate and pursue the things of the Spirit; though faults often intervene, so that our life does not come out as we had fashioned it in the inward man. The citadel must be stoutly defended, that we may not surrender ourselves wholly to the desires of the flesh. Even though we understand that, against the will of the Spirit, we are frequently drawn by it into sinning, yet we must ever deny its sway, and ever open our eyes again, even though we have been blinded by the mists of the. flesh seven times in the day, and ever look afresh to the Law, i. e., the will of God, and struggle anew for blamelessness. We must, therefore, be on our guard vigorously against scorning the desires of the Spirit and following the flesh; for the desires and counsel of the flesh bring speedy death, whereas the counsel of the Spirit brings forth life and peace. The desires and thoughts of the flesh are enmity against God; for it in no wise obeys the law of God, nor can it be made to obey. Hence you can easily see what it is to live carnally and what spiritually. To live carnally is to be wholly given over to the sway of the flesh and to be averse to the Spirit; to live spiritually is to obey the Spirit, never to abandon faith, even though the flesh sometimes is not free from the infection of sin. “They, then, that «816 in the flesh cannot please God. But ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. And it dwells in you if you trust in the Son of God, although for the time being you are enveloped in the flesh. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. But when Christ is in you (to speak with perfect clearness), the body is dead because of the disorder of sin; but the Spirit is life because of righteousness, not yours but His who has been made your righteousness. Such is the Christian that with respect to the body he is ever dead; but when his heart clings to God, with respect to the Spirit he is ever living.
By these words of the Apostle I think the very perplexing problem with which we are struggling is cleared up, namely, how it happens that a blamelessness is demanded which we cannot possibly offer, and yet Christ is the effieient guarantee
for the sins of all; because the two propositions cannot stand together, that salvation must be won by blamelessness, and that all things are condoned to the righteousness of Christ for the very reason that we cannot attain salvation of our own effort. And although I have overcome the objection which I mentioned above, yet, that certain uneducated persons may feel entirely satisfied, I will answer it again. It was objected that this magnifying of grace through Christ makes those who are called Christians frivolous and dissipated. I answer, therefore: Those who trust in Christ become new men. How? Do they lay aside their original body and take on a new body? By no means; the original body remains. Does, therefore, the disease that we have inherited also remain? Yes. What is it, then, that is renewed in us? The heart. How? In this way: Beforetime it knew not God, and where there is no knowledge of God, there is nothing but flesh, sin, self-esteem; but after God is known, man sees himself within to the core, and repudiates himself thus known. As a result, he sees that all his works, even those which he had always thought were good, are of no value. When, therefore, through the enlightenment of heavenly grace the heart comes to know God, the man is made new. For he who before trusted in his own wisdom, in works or resources or strength, now puts his hope in God alone. He who before turned all his thoughts towards securing his own interests without regard to virtue or God now devotes himself only to retaining nothing of his original habit, and to so fashioning himself according to God’s will as never to offend Him. And as the body is ever bringing forth dead works, our new man is also ever bewailing this unhappy and disastrous condition: Alas! kind God, what am I but an inexhaustible sink of iniquity? I sin again and again and make no end. When wilt Thou set my wretched self free from this mire in which I am caught? See in passing whether the Christian life is continual repentance or not. And this despair, what is it but death? Yet when in these circumstances the heart through the Spirit of God refuses to give up hope, does not the conscious self, which had just before collapsed, now revive? This, then, is the Christian life: when the hope in God through Christ never wavers, even — though man through the weakness of the flesh is not without
sin, yet comes out victorious because he does not surrender himself to it, but as often as he falls always rises again, sure that He who said to Peter that one must be forgiven seventy times seven times [Mt. 18:22] will Himself grant the full measure of pardon that He taught. We see, to use an illustration, that something not unlike this occurs in the grafting of trees. The husbandman digs up a wild pear, and transplants it to rich, cultivated ground. As soon as the stranger tree has taken root in the new soil, its top is cut off, and shoots of cultivated trees are grafted upon it, which then grow along with the trunk. But see what different fruit they put forth! The superior graftings bud, and render the farmer branches loaded with pears in due season. But the trunk arms itself with thorns and with rough shoots, which if not pruned away venture to produce fruit of their own; and the more you suffer them to grow, the more strength is taken from the true cultivated graft. We men are wild pears (for I do not wish, after the fashion of Paul, Rom. 11: 17-24, to talk of the olive, a tree unknown to the Germans and nearly so to the French), and when we are imbued with the heavenly teachings we are planted in new earth. For he that would follow Christ must deny himself [ef. Lk. 9: 23] and listen only to what He orders or suggests. And what is this but being transferred from the forest to the rich soil of a garden, transplanted from the earth to heaven? But see what great and hard things must be done here, or we essay this planting in vain. ‘The top must be cut off, i. e., our desires, wisdom, thoughts, designs, and in their place must be grafted heavenly shoots, i. e., the knowledge and hope of things divine. We are, therefore, grafted from on high; and as the trunk grows along with the grafts, so our body retains its own nature, even though the heart be changed through the heavenly Spirit. Then does the spiritual heart bring forth the fruits that Paul describes in Gal. 5:22. And the flesh puts forth its vicious growths, just as the trunk does shoots and thorns. Yet, just as these are constantly cut away, so also must the faults that spring forth from the trunk of the flesh be continually and assiduously pruned off, that they may not grow to such dimensions as to be able to smother the cultivated fruit or to dwarf it by drawing away the sap. Now, the
thorns are sometimes allowed to flourish on the stem that they may keep off the destructive goat until the tree grows high enough to avoid his harmful tooth. So, too, in us, when the heart is pious the sins that spring up perform some service; for “we know that to them that love God all things work together for good,” Rom. 8:28. But they do not render such service that they ought to be tolerated permanently, but only till the accomplishment of the purpose which the Lord wishés effected through them. David [II Sam. 24: 10] had committed as shameless a sin as was ever done among the Jews, but the Lord made use of his recklessness to keep him all his life from being puffed up. So also pious men who in their hearts cling to the Lord learn through the frequent springing up of thorns, i. e., through the flood of their sins, to recognize their own weakness and to be humble, lest, puffed up with their own fancied blamelessness, they fall into the snares of the Devil. Christ weaves this idea beautifully into an allegory in John 13: 10, when He teaches Peter thus: “He that is bathed needeth not save to wash his feet, but is clean every whit.” But, most wise Master, how is he clean or bathed who has such dirty feet that they have need of washing? Are not the feet a part of the body? How then is he clean every whit whose feet are still unclean? Christ adds, therefore: “And ye are clean, but not all.” “For he knew,” says the evangelist, “him that should betray him.” “They were all clean save one, because they had remained steadfast in faith. Christ bears witness to this in Luke 22: 28: “Ye are they that have continued with me in my temptations.” But Judas was unclean; for he had already covenanted with the Jews to betray Him. The rest of the Apostles still had defects, but these could not harm them as long as the citadel of faith was held. When, therefore, the Apostles are pronounced clean, because they had not fallen away from their faith, even if some dust had clung to them from walking in this high road of corruption, it is quite evident that if faith in God is safe and its power unimpaired nothing that can happen can destroy. It is all washed away by that constant repentance of which I have spoken and by faith in Christ. Paul deals with the same idea in Rom. 8:10. For after having said that “the body is dead because of sin; but the
Spirit is life because of righteousness” found in Christ, he adds, to prove his point: “But if the Spirit of him that raised up Jesus from the dead dwell in you, he that raised up Christ shall quicken also your mortal bodies through his Spirit that dwelleth in you.” But He will only so quicken that the body be forever dead. For thus he speaks afterwards [Rom. 8: 20-23]: “For the creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but by reason of him who subjected it in hope, because it is itself delivered from the bondage of corruption and restored “Into the liberty of the glory of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation,” ὁ. e., all men (for thus Christ also calls all men in Mark 16:15: “Preach the gospel to the whole creation”) “alike groan and are in pain as long as they are now, 4. e., in this present time, living. Even ourselves, who are the chief apostles (because we were the first to receive the Holy Spirit) [cf. Rom. 8:23], no one ought to except from this groaning and pain, for on account of the rebelliousness of the flesh we groan just as much as the rest, desiring to be released and to be with Christ.” And a little later he explains the groaning and anguish more clearly [Rom. 8:26]: “Likewise the Spirit also aids our weaknesses.” By “Spirit” here he means the spiritual man, who is so raised to God through the Spirit of God that he looks up to Him alone. This Spirit of ours, then, which is nothing else than faith in and through God, constantly grieves for our weaknesses. For we see not what we should pray for. For it often happens that we pray to be saved from poverty, illness, humiliation. Then the Spirit, that is, the faithful heart, maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered. For what great pain, think you, is begotten in the heart consecrated to God when it sees the flesh—4. e., man, hopelessly subject as he is to the flesh, ὁ. e., to self-love—forever praying for those things only which it selfishly desires—vengeance, or the favor of man, or wealth? Groanings, therefore, spring up in the heart from this constant folly of the flesh, groanings which only he knows who is caught in these straits. That this is the true meaning of this passage of Paul is proved by what follows: “For he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the counsel or meditation of the Spirit” [Rom. 8:27]. That Holy Spirit through which we all breathe
← 42. Commentary on True and False Religion · Contents · 44. Commentary on True and False Religion →