Commentary on the Epistle to the Romans John Calvin (continued)
Commentary on Romans might have adopted the neuter gender and said — "What shall separate us?" etc., he preferred ascribing personality to things without life, and for this end, — that he might send forth with us into the contest as many champions as there are of temptations to try our faith.
But these three things have this difference: tribulation includes every kind of trouble or evil; distress is an inward feeling, when difficulties reduce us to such an extremity, so that we know not what course to pursue. Such was the anxiety of Abraham and of Lot, when one was constrained to expose his wife to the danger of prostitution, and the other, his daughters; for being brought to straits and being perplexed, they found no way of escape. Persecution properly denotes the tyrannical violence by which the children of God were undeservedly harassed by the ungodly. Now though Paul denies in 2 Corinthians 4:8, that the children of God are reduced to straits, {στενοχωρεῖσθαι}, he does not yet disagree with himself; for he does not simply make them to be exempt from anxious solicitude, but he means that they are delivered from it, as also the examples of Abraham and Lot testify.
36. As it is written, etc. This testimony adds no small weight to the subject; for he intimates, that the dread of death is so far from being a reason to us for falling away, that it has been almost ever the lot of God's servants to have death as it were present before their eyes. It is indeed probable, that in that Psalm the miserable oppression of the people under the tyranny of Antiochus is described; for it is expressly said, that the worshippers of God were cruelly treated, for no other reason but through hatred to true religion. There is also added a remarkable protestation, that they had not departed from the covenant of God; which Paul, I think, had especially in view. It is no objection that the saints there complain of a calamity which then unusually pressed on them; for since they show, that they were oppressed with so many evils, having before testified their innocence, an argument is hence fitly drawn, that it is no new thing for the Lord to permit his saints to be undeservedly exposed to the cruelty of the ungodly. But this is not done except for their good; for the Scripture teaches us, that it is alien to the righteousness of God to destroy the just with the wicked, (Genesis 18:23); but that, on the contrary, it is meet for him to requite affliction to those who afflict, and rest to those who are afflicted. (2 Thessalonians 1:6, 9.) And then they affirm that they suffer for the Lord; and Christ pronounces them blessed who suffer for the sake of righteousness. (Matthew 5:10.) By saying that they died daily, they intimated that death was so suspended over them, that their life differed but little from death.
37. We do more than conquer, etc.; that is, we always struggle and emerge. I have retained the word used by Paul, 276 though not commonly used by the
276"Supervincimus" — {ὑπερνικῶμεν}; Beza's version is, amplius quam victores sumus;" Macknight's, "we do more than overcome;" Schleusner gives this as one of his explanations, "plenissime vincimus — we most fully overcome." Paul commonly uses {ὑπὲρ} in an enhansive sense; so the version may be, "we abundantly overcome," as though he said, "We have strength given us which far exceeds the power of evils." Some say that the faithful abundantly overcome, because they sustain no real loss, but like silver in the furnace, they lose only their dross; and not only so, but they also carry, as it were from the field of battle, chapter spoils — the fruits of holiness and righteousness. Hebrews 12:10,11. It is further said, that the victory will be this, —