ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God.
The apostle is about to teach a Christian ethic.1 From here to *In the marginal gloss, Luther writes (WA 56, n6£., 21 ff.): "In the preceding chapters, the apostle laid 'the true foundation which is Christ' (I Cor.
3:11), or 'the first rock/ upon which the wise man builds (Matt. 7:24), and he destroyed the false foundation, namely, man's self-righteousness and merits, which are as 'the sand' upon which the foolish man builds (Matt.
7:26). Here now he proceeds to 'build upon this foundation gold, silver, and precious stones.' (I Cor. 3:12). Good works, which are the building, must above all have a sure and dependable foundation on which the heart can purpose to stand and to rely forever, so that, even in case it may not yet have built upon it, the site is ready for it to do so. The moralists
['iustitiarii'] do the opposite of this with their good works. They seek to put their trust in their conscience and, when they have performed many good works, they think they have done enough for themselves, so that they can feel secure. This is nothing else than to build on sand and to reject
Christ. The apostle tries hard to prevent this; this is the purpose of all his letters. To say, as is commonly done [cf. the Gl. ord. and Lyra], that 'sand' means the riches of the world is a superficial and weak exegesis. For Christ speaks here of people who build (i.e., who do good) and not of misers and worldlings, who rather destroy themselves than build up anything.
"Hence, it is good works that he calls sand. And it is upon this foundation that these people try to build their righteousness in order to obtain a dwelling place for their conscience and peace of mind. But, as a matter of fact, only Christ is this foundation—and before all good works. For even before we think of doing enough or building up ['praeveniens omne nostrum satisfacere vel aedificare'], he has given us the foundation as a free gift, namely, a quiet conscience and a trusting heart. Has there ever been a builder stupid enough to lay also the foundation? Do not the builders look for the foundation that is already laid in the earth or do they not accept what is offered to them? So then, just as the earth offers us a foundation without our effort, so Christ offers himself without us as our rightROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE g21 the end of the letter his chief concern is, therefore, the uprooting of man's own prudence and self-will. And so he deals with this pest right at the start. It is the most noxious of all because, under the artful disguise of bringing forth goods, it alone causes the birth in the Spirit to be undone again; indeed, it gradually brings it to fall by its own good works. He does this not only in this letter but also in all the others, and with greatest care, because he knows that good works are nothing apart from unity, peace, and humility, to all of which this prudence brings instantaneous death.
Hence, he says in Phil. 2:1 ff.: ''If there are any bowels of commiseration, make full my joy that you be of one mind, having the same love, being of one accord, agreeing in feeling. Let nothing be done through contention, neither by vainglory; but in lowliness of mind let each esteem others better than himself, each one not considering the things that are his own but those that belong to others. Have this mind in you/' etc. In the same vein he writes in II Cor. 6:1: "Helping you, we exhort you that you do not receive the grace of God in vain." So he says also here: "I beseech you by the mercy of God," i.e., which you have been given; see to it that you do not receive it in vain but, rather, "present your bodies as a sacrifice." Moreover, what it means to "present a sacrifice" he explains by saying in II Cor. 6:4 ff.: "in much patience, in much fasting, in watchings, in labors," etc.
And be not conformed to this world, but be reformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (Rom. 12:2.)
The apostle speaks of progress, for he addresses people who have already begun to be Christians, whose life is not static2 but in movement3 from good to better, just as a sick man moves from sickness into health, as our Lord shows in the half-dead man whom eousness, peace, and security of conscience in order that from then on we can continually build upon him in doing good.
"So far the apostle has spoken about what it means to become a new man, and he has described the new birth which bestows the new being
['dat novum esse'] (John 3:3 ff.). But now he speaks about the works of the new birth; one who has not yet become a new man presumes that he is doing them—but in vain. For being comes before doing, but being-actedupon comes even before being ['Prim est enim esse quam operari, prius autem pati quam esse*]. Hence becoming, being, acting, follow one another." (Note by ed.: This is the Aristotelian "progressio a non esse ad esse.")
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS the good Samaritan took care of (Luke 10:34). In the same way, in Gen. 1:2, the Spirit of God did not rest but "moved upon the face of the waters/' And in Deut. 32:11 it says: "As the eagle enticing her young to fly and hovering over them" and, in Ps. 18:10:
"He ascended and flew; he flew upon the wings of the winds."3a This is why Blessed Bernard writes: "As soon as you do no longer want to become better, you cease to be good."4 It is of no use for a tree to grow green and to blossom if the blossoms do not turn into fruit. Hence, many perish when they are in blossom.
For just as there are five stages of natural growth, according to Aristotle: not-being, becoming, being, action, and being acted upon, i.e., privation, matter, form, operation, and passion,5 so it is also with the Spirit: not-being is something without a name and man in sins; becoming is justification; being is righteousness; acting is to act and live righteously; to be acted upon is to be made perfect and complete. These five are somehow always in motion in man. In whatever way the nature of man may be explained— and leaving out of account the first "not-being" and the last "being," for in between these two: "not-being" and "being acted upon," the other three, namely, "becoming," "being," and "acting" are always in motion—by the new birth he passes from sin to righteousness and thus from "not-being" through "becoming" to "being." Thereupon he acts righteously. But from this "new being" which is really a "not being," he proceeds and passes into another "new being" through "being acted upon," i.e., through becoming new, he passes into being better and from there again into being new. For it is really so that man is always in privation, always in becoming or in the state of potency and matter, and always in action. In this way, Aristotle philosophizes about these matters and he does it well, but he is not well understood.
Man is always in not-being, in becoming, in being; always in privation, in potency, in act; always in sin, in justification, in righteousness, i.e., always a sinner, always penitent, always righteous.
For by repenting he becomes righteous from being unrighteous.
Repentance is, therefore, the medium between unrighteousness and righteousness. And thus he is in sin as the terminus a quo and in righteousness as the terminus ad quern. If, therefore, we are always repenting, we are always sinners, and precisely thereby we
3a One must remember that Luther read these words with the understanding that they speak of Christ.
4 Cf. Bernard of Clairvaux, Ep. 91 (cf. Luther's exposition of Rom. 3:11).
5 All these terms are derived from Aristotle, though they cannot all be found in one specific passage of his writings. Luther depended upon the medieval handbooks of physics. Cf. Ockham, Summule in lib. physicorum, c. IX; c. XXV f. (Ficker, p. 441, n. 23.)
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE are righteous and being made righteous; we are partly sinners and partly righteous, i.e., nothing but penitents.
Just so, by contrast, the ungodly who deviate from righteousness hold the middle between sin and righteousness, but they move in the opposite direction. This life, therefore, is a road to heaven and to hell. None is so good that he cannot become better, and none is so bad that he cannot become worse, until at last we become what we are to be.6
The apostle treats this with great sensitiveness. He does not say: be reformed to the renewal but: "in the renewal" or "through the renewal," or better yet, as in the Greek: "Be reformed by the renewing of your mind." He adds "by the renewing" in order that one should see that, in connection with this transformation, he does not teach an instability of mind (or a renewal of the external cultus) but, rather, a renewing of the mind, day by day, that is to become greater and greater, in accordance with the words of II Cor. 4:16: "The inward man is renewed day by day," and of Eph.
4:23: "Be renewed in the spirit of your mind," and of Col. 3:10:
"Put on the new man, which is renewed."
Present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. (Rom. 12:1.) The true sacrifice to God is not outside us or outside what belongs to us, nor is it a matter of time confined to a certain hour of the day, but we ourselves are this sacrifice (forever, according to the word of Ps. 110:4: "You are a priest forever" and hence,
Christ has the eternal priesthood [Heb. 7:17]), as it says in Prov.
23:26: "My son, give me your heart." It says a "living" sacrifice, in contrast to the sacrifices of animals which in former times were offered up dead (as Lyra7 says and as also Blessed Gregory8 explains). But it is better to interpret the term in relation to the spiritual life in so far as it is to bring forth good, "in order," as it is said above in ch. 6:6 of this letter, "that the body of sin may be done away." For before God the "body of sin" is dead. But good works which are done by the morally defiled are worth nothing.
Hence, there follows the phrase "Holy." Lyra translates it to mean "firm" and "persevering." This is a proper but not a suitable translation. For, in the Scriptures, "holy" does not mean
"something firmly established" or "inviolable," nor is it something that is "without earth," something quasi "ageos," as the 6 "Usque dum ad extremam formam perveniamus"
7 Luther seems to refer not to Lyra, but to the Additio I of Paul of Burgos, where something of this sort is said.
8 Cf. Gregory, Horn, in Ezech., II, 10, 9.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS term goes that has been derived from the Greek.9 But this is pure imagination. The "holy" is something separate and set apart, something kept away from the profane, something that is detached from other use and is attached only to sacred use worthy of God, something sacred that is dedicated, as in Ex. 19:10: "Sanctify the people today and tomorrow and let them wash their garments," etc. and in Josh. 3:5: "Sanctify yourselves, for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you"; and I Sam. 21:4 ff.: "If the young men be clean, especially from women, they shall eat. And David answered:
Truly, as to what concerns women, the vessels of the young men are holy," i.e., clean and chaste. Then the text goes on to say: "Now this way is defiled, but it shall also be sanctified this day. And the priest gave them hallowed bread."
"Holy" is then obviously the same as "clean," "chaste," "separate"; it signifies mainly that purity which we owe to God. Blessed Gregory says in the Homily on Ezechiel:10 "A living sacrifice is the body, in so far as it under affliction for the Lord's sake. It is called a living sacrifice because it is alive in virtues and dead to vices; it is a sacrifice because it is already dead to this world and does no wrong; it is living because all its actions are good."
The apostle, then, understands "holy" as "chaste" in the sense that our bodies must not be defiled by dissipation, as he says in ch. 6:19 of this letter: "Present your members to serve righteousness, unto sanctification," and I Cor. 7:34: "that she may be holy both in body and in spirit." Briefly, then, "holy" is the same as "sacred," "pure and clean before God." It is something else than the cleanness or neatness observed in human relations. Nevertheless, there prevails a strange confusion about the distinction between "holy" and "sacred," "sanctify" and "sanctification." It is right, therefore, that, in German, we say heilig rather than rein.
Now, doing good and living cleanly are not worth anything if one takes pride therein. Hence, the apostle goes on to say: acceptable unto God. He says this by way of criticizing the vainglory and pride that commonly undermine the good. For just as envy doggedly pursues somebody else's happiness, so pride and vainglory dog one's own. Thus people become foolish virgins (Matt. 25:3):
9 This derivation, which was attributed to Beda, is mentioned by Lyra in connection with Luke 1:49 ("Because he that is mighty has done great things to me, and holy is his name"). In the Catholicon of John Balbus de
Janua, Hugh of St. Victor is named as the originator of the etymological suggestion. In his Vocabularius brevil., Reuchlin states (in dependence on the Catholicon): Agios graece, i.e., sanctus latine et dicitur ab a quod est sine, et ge, quod est terra (the Greek word hagios [holy], which in Latin is sanctus, means a [=z without] ge [= earth], without earth).
10 Gregory, Horn, in Ezech., II, 110, 19.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE they have lamps, i.e., they live holy lives, but they have no oil, because they seek to be acceptable to men. Now, to be acceptable only to God is something greater than to be holy. For people who have something, such as sanctity, wherewith they feel they must become acceptable, find it most difficult to be displeased with themselves and to be unconcerned for the criticism of others.
Which is your reasonable service. Lyra interprets this to mean a "discreet and moderate" service, lest man destroy his whole body instead of keeping it only under control with respect to its desires.
Though this is good and very wholesome advice, it is not handed down to us in this passage by the apostle. Indeed, in the Greek, he separates this particular phrase from the foregoing by using the article, for he says: "ten logiken latreian hymon/' as if he wanted to give a reason why, as he had just been saying, their bodies should be offered as a sacrifice; in other words, he means to say: I tell you this because I want to point out that, in terms of the new law, you owe God a reasonable sacrifice and not one of beasts. Logikos means "reasonable" as alogos means "unreasonable." And "service" or "latreian" means the sacrifice as such or the actual presentation of this living sacrifice. In short, he wants to say: Present your reasonable service, namely, your bodies as a living sacrifice.
That you may prove what is the good and acceptable and perfect will of God. (Rom. 12:2.) Some interpreters11 relate good to the beginners, acceptable to the advanced, and perfect to the perfect. This application of the text is not unreasonable. One can relate it also to the three aforementioned terms "living, holy, acceptable to God." For it is the "good" will of God that one should do good; and to live cleanly and to be abstinent is his "acceptable" will; and wanting to be acceptable only to him is his "perfect" will.
However, by saying that the proving of this threefold will of God comes from being transformed to a new mind, the apostle hints at something that is deeper than written words can convey, something that one can come to know only by experience. This is why those "who are led by the Spirit of God" (Rom. 8:14) are flexible in mind and thought. "The right hand of God leads them wonderfully" (Ps. 45:4) whither they neither want12 nor think to go, and beyond all understanding. As they are thus led, the will of God seems to go against them; it is harsh and displeasing and utterly hopeless. But they yield to such a leading in humble resigLUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS nation and are patient in faith. Only when they have been most severely tried, they understand how good this will was, though they did not, indeed could not, know this while it was in process of being done.
But unbelievers "do not wait for the counsel of God" (Ps. 107:
11). They act and want to see action done according to their own set mind and they refuse to give up their own thinking; neither do they want to have it changed. Hence, they do not "prove what is the good will of God," but they are "conformed to this world" because they rely only on their own feelings and experience. It cannot be otherwise, for only faith transforms the mind and leads it to the recognition of the will of God. The apostle expresses a similar thought in Eph. 3:18, where he says: "That you may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth that you may be filled unto all the fullness of God." And then he goes on to say: "Now to him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we think," etc.
Whenever God gives us a new degree of grace, he gives it in such a way that it conflicts with all our understanding and our planning. A man, therefore, who then does not yield and is not willing to change his mind and to wait but is scornful and becomes impatient can never obtain this grace. Hence, this transformation of our mind is the most useful of all knowledge for Christ's believers. And the clinging to our own mind is the most hurtful resistance to the Holy Spirit. For example: when Abraham received the command to go out from his own country (Gen. 12:1 ff.), not knowing whither he went, this was against his own mind. Likewise, when he was ordered to sacrifice his own son (Gen. 22:2 ff.), this was an exceedingly great transformation of his mind, as Rom. ch. 4, proves,13 and the will of God concerning Isaac seemed harsh and unacceptable to him to the point of despair; and yet it was afterward proved to have been very good, very acceptable, and perfect in every way. Similarly, one could point to David14 and the Virgin Mary15 as other examples. But everyone needs to have here his own experience, and he must carefully observe the visitation that comes upon him.
Certainly self-will is here a very great hindrance, especially because it leads to differences with others. Moreover, it causes one to have his own mind in opposition to his superiors and those by whose words or action God wants to demonstrate his will. Hence,
13 Luther probably thinks of Heb. 11:17 and James 2:21 ff., where Gen. 15:6
(which Paul quotes in Rom. 4:3) is related to the sacrifice of Isaac.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE the apostle goes on to say: "For I say. . . to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think." (Rom. 12:3.) For in the church, God does nothing else than transform men's minds. But people who are self-complacent resist being so transformed; they disturb everything and cause schisms and heresies. They are "men corrupted in mind," as he calls them elsewhere (II Tim. 3:8).
Therefore, just as the wisdom of God is hidden under the disguise of foolishness and truth under the form of a lie, so also the word of God comes, whenever it comes, in a form that is contrary to our own thinking in so far as it pretends to have the truth by and from itself. Hence, when the word goes against us, our mind condemns it as a lie and this corresponds to the fact that Christ called his word our adversary: Matt. 5:25:^ "Agree with your adversary," and Hos. 5:14: "For I will be like a lioness to Ephraim and a lion's whelp to the house of Judah/1 i.e., I will be an adversary.
So it is also with the will of God. In its nature, it is really "good, acceptable, and perfect." But it is so hidden under the disguise of evil, unacceptableness, and hopelessness that it seems to our will and so-called good intention17 to be nothing but a very bad and desperate will and in no way the will of God but rather that of the devil, except in case man abandons his own will and good intention and undergoes a total denial of his preconceived notions of righteousness, goodness, and truth. If he does this, all that previously was very bad for him, greatly displeased him, and seemed lost to him will taste very sweet to him, and it will be most acceptable to him, and he will recognize it as perfect in every way.
Thus the Lord says to Peter: "When you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you would. But when you are old, another shall gird you and lead you whither you would not."
(John 21:18.) How amazing! Peter is led whither he will not, and yet unless he wills this, he will not glorify God but fall into sin.
At the same time, therefore, he wills and wills not. In the same way, Christ in the agony of his death perfected his not-willing (if I may say so) by a most fervent willingness.18 Thus God acts in all his saints: he makes them do very willingly what they do not want to do at all. This contrariety astounds the philosophers, and men do not understand it.
This is why I said that unless one becomes acquainted with it 16 The Gloss interprets adversarius to mean sermo divinus.
17 Cf. Gabriel Biel, II Sent., d. 40, q. un., n. 2.
18 "Sic Christus in agone suo voluntatem suam (ut sic dixerim) ferventissima voluntate per fecit."
LUTHER! LECTURES ON ROMANS through practical experience, he will never understand it. And certainly, if practical experience is necessary in law which teaches a shadowy righteousness, how much more necessary it is in theology. Every Christian, therefore, should rejoice most, precisely when something is done against his will and intention, and he should be very apprehensive when he has his own way. I say this not only with respect to the desires of the flesh, but also with respect to our greatest achievements of righteousness.
This is why, nowadays, the lawyers give very dangerous counsel when they advise without hesitation that what, according to their knowledge of the law, is just must be carried out. In this way, they advised Pope Julius, and people called him blessed. In this manner, they counseled Duke George. Indeed, almost the entire world is carried away by this error—cardinals, bishops, and princes, just as the Jews once were when they opposed the king of Babylon (II Kings 24:20; 25:1 ff.)
All of them insist on their particular rights; therefore they do not settle anything but get ruined. For God rules the world by a universal right19 by which what ought to be is done in all and by all and through all. But they are so blind and foolish as to proceed according to a particular right. In this matter no lawyer is of any use. They are all alike: they are so utterly foolish that they are not ashamed to make proposals so silly that not even peasants would dare to advance them. For example, they say: This man here is right, even before God, but that man there is not right, either according to divine or human law; then they proceed with greatest assurance along the lines of their "good intention" and of their great concern for justice.
Meanwhile, it occurs to none of them that one may be right in one single part but perhaps wrong before God in all other, or at least in several other, parts. Then God must be ready to help him as if he were righteous, and all the while God is expected to ignore all his wrong acts and prefer this single point of his being right to the whole mass of his wickedness.
For example (and I say this in order to give a practical exposition of what the Scripture means so that in similar cases you can form a similar judgment): when Duke George was advised to insist upon his right in Frisia,20 there was none that dared say to him:
Good prince, your merits and those of your entire people are not such that God should not rightly punish you by chastening you through this rebellious and unrighteous fellow. Therefore, calm
19 "Iustitia universali."
2 0 Luther here refers to the feuds between Duke George of Saxony and Count Edzard of East Frisia. George invaded Frisia in 1514.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE down and recognize in this wicked act the gracious will of God.
You had better submit to his will!
Just so, someone should have advised Pope Julius by saying to him: Holy Father, the Roman Church of today is not so holy that it would not deserve something much worse than this injury the Venetians now inflict upon it. Be still, this is the will of God. But he was the sort of person who would say: No, no, we must get justice.
In the same way, some one should counsel our own bishop of Brandenburg21 and say to him: Reverend Father, you, too, have often sinned universally. Please tolerate this particular case of injustice. And you, Prince Frederick, you have so far been protected by a good angel. If you would only acknowledge this! How often have you been provoked by wrongs and how often would you have gone to war for just causes! But you have quietly endured it all. Yet I do not know whether you did so from a sincere confession of sin or from fear that you might sustain a loss.
This is why (if I may speak of myself) I detest this word "justice." To hear it pains me more than if someone were to rob me.
And yet, the lawyers have it constantly on their lips. No group of people on this earth are more unteachable in this matter than the lawyers and the folk who harp upon their "good intention"22 or consider themselves to be of superior intelligence. For I have often had the experience with myself and many others that when we were right God laughed at us in our rightness. And yet I know people who dared say: I know that right is on my side. But God does not pay any attention to this. And it is really so, right is on his side but with respect to a particular case. But God does not care how right it may be.
The universal right or justice is then humility. It subjects everyone to everyone else and thereby gives everyone everything, as Christ said to John the Baptist: "So it becomes us to fulfill all justice."
Thus, in Dan. 3:27 (Vg.), Azarias confesses it to be altogether right that he and those with him should suffer, even though wrong is being inflicted upon them, namely, by the wicked king. For even though one who inflicts wrong is in the wrong, he does not do wrong to him who must suffer it, for he suffers justly. By what right does the devil take possession of men? Or by what right does an evil hangman hang a thief? Certainly not by his own right, but by that of the judge. Thus men who boast of their own rightness
21 This seems to be a reference to Jerome Scultetus (Schultz), who was chancellor of the Elector of Brandenburg.
22 "Boneintentionarii."
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS refuse to direct their attention to the supreme Judge but they mind only their own judgment. And so they take themselves to be innocent in all respects, when in fact they are innocent only in relation to him who did them wrong.
Inasmuch, therefore, as there is none righteous before God, no injustice can be done to anyone by any creature, even though right may be on his side. Hence, all men are rid of the cause of contention.
Therefore, whenever you are being wronged and evil befalls you while you are doing good, turn your eyes away from this evil and consider how much evil you have yourself done in other ways.
Then you will see how good the will of God is in this evil that befalls you. This is what it means to be changed by the renewing of your mind and to be concerned for what belongs to God.
We can then be sure that Peter would not have glorified God if he had girded himself and gone whither he himself would, even though he were not to walk on evil paths but on the very best road to righteousness. Indeed, our Lord put a damper on him when he wanted to demonstrate his great righteousness. And when, thereupon, he went whither he would not but whither another led him, he did glorify God.
Thus we, too, cannot glorify God unless we do what we do not want to do, even if we think we are right, indeed, most of all if we think we are right in what we plan and in the good we do. So then:
"to take up your cross" and "to become Christ's disciple" (Luke 14:27) and "to be transformed by the renewing of your mind," etc., is the same as to hate yourself, to will against your own will, to mind what transcends your comprehension,23 to concede over against the objection of your own righteousness that you are sinful, and to give an ear to foolishness against the objection of your own wisdom.
Hence, we must note that the terms "good," "acceptable," "perfect" do not refer to the will of God as such but as it is in relation to its object.24 For it is not our proving that makes the will of God good, acceptable, and perfect, but in our proving we recognize that 23 "Sapere contra suum sapere"
24 "Non formaliter, sed obiective/'
Cf. Luther's interlinear gloss on Rom. 11:8
(WA 56, 108, 3ff.): "God has given them through the word of the gospel that was received by others the spirit of compunction, because of their unbelief and their presumptuous pride in their own righteousness."
In the marginal gloss, he comments as follows (WA 56, 108, 9 ff.): "God gives them this spirit in order to make them indignant by doing what they do not want him to do and by completely undoing what they want. Thus he gives them in fact ('obiective') the spirit of envy, but not because it is his purpose to make them envious or because he is envious in himself
(fnon effective seu formalitef).
If one understands that God gives them this ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE it is so; it becomes "good" to us means, therefore, that it is being recognized as good; and it is acceptable because it proves to be highly acceptable, and "perfect" because it perfects everything, i.e., it becomes "good, acceptable, and perfect" to us.
These words overflow with consolation. For precisely when evils befall us we must be of good courage, for therein God shows his good will. We should be best pleased when something happens to us that is most unpleasant to us, for there is in it most certainly the acceptable will of God, i.e., a very gentle and pleasing will. And we should be most confident when something desperate and hopeless befalls us, for the perfect will of God is in it, perfecting everything and bringing full salvation.
For it is the nature of the divine will, according to I Sam. 2:6, that "it kills and makes alive, that it brings down to hell and brings back again." This means: it does good by doing us harm, it is most acceptable when it causes our displeasure, and it perfects while it destroys. We must, then, not become foolish and "be conformed to this world" which judges according to its sense and understanding (and it understands only what it experiences here and now), but we must be more and more renewed. For this is what it means to prove the will of God: not to form our judgments on the basis of what we feel and experience but to walk in darkness.
Now those who do not want to be transformed will find out what is the evil and unacceptable and destructive, wrathful will of God. It is evil, because it inflicts injury and harm; it is unacceptable, because it causes men to resent this affliction and renders them incapable of bearing it patiently; and it is destructive, because it causes the impatient and resentful to fall into obstinacy and damnation where they live or rather die uttering blasphemies and curses.
However, the will of God is "good," because it brings forth good from evil; it is acceptable, because it causes men to love this good cheerfully and to find good and real pleasure in it, and not only in it but also in the evil we spoke of before. It is perfect, because it brings those who rejoice in it to completion, perfecting what has here been begun.
Yet all this is addressed only to those who have the power to spirit incidentally, so to speak, or by his permission, he has the correct understanding. Not that God does not want them to be of this mind, for he wants them to realize that they are being punished, but he acts as he does, according to Ps. 112:10, 'in order that the sinner shall see and be angry, that he shall gnash his teeth and pine away' and that 'the desire of the wicked shall perish/ By giving others something good, he thus gives them an evil that they hate and must pursue."
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS act and who are responsible for themselves. But the matter is different in the case of those who are set over others, for they are not their own agents but the agents of God. Hence, it is their responsibility to rule their subjects with justice and not to permit them to inflict wrong upon one another. They are not empowered to tolerate everything, and patience is out of place for them. For God expects of them, not humility and patience and submission, but readiness to pass judgment, to exercise power, and to impose punishment. They are his representatives. Yet if it is possible for any one of them to make concessions without violating his trust, he must do so, as we have said before, even if this entails harm and trouble for him.
For I say, through the grace that was given me, to every man that is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but so to think as to think soberly, according as God has divided to each man the measure of faith. (Rom.
"Measure of faith" can be understood, first, as the measure or mode according to which faith is given, in distinction from all other gifts. But here it cannot be taken in this sense, because the apostle plainly states that different gifts are given according to this measure.
The term "measure of faith" must, therefore, be taken to mean, secondly, the measure of the gifts of faith. In other words: there are many gifts in faith, and though believers live by one and the same faith, they have a different measure of gifts. Now the apostle calls this a measure of faith, because those who act without faith do not have these gifts and this measure. It is certainly true that there is one faith, one baptism, one church, one Lord, one Spirit, one God (Eph. 4:4 ff.). Nevertheless, there are diverse gifts in this one faith, in this one church, in this one Lordship, etc. It is just like saying: Everyone is entitled to the measure of the town or the measure of the house that the prince has assigned to him, i.e., the measure that prevails in a given house or town.
Or better still: faith is all of this, for faith is nothing else than the obedience of the spirit. But there are different degrees of the obedience of the spirit. For one of us exercises his obedience and faith here and another there, yet we are all of one faith. Just so there prevails in a town one obedience to the prince, yet there are diverse ways of practicing this obedience; nobody can presume to adopt someone else's way and neglect his own responsibility, for then confusion, sedition, and rebellion would develop in the commonwealth.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE For as we have many members in one body, but all the members have not the same office, so we who are many are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another. And having gifts differing according to the grace that is given us, either prophecy, to be used according to the rule of faith, or . . . (Rom. 12:4-6.)
So far the apostle has shown how we must behave toward God, namely, by the renewing of our mind and the sanctification of our body so that we may prove what is the will of God. But from here on to the end of the letter, he teaches us how we must behave toward our neighbor and he explains the commandment of the love of the neighbor in great detail. It is strange, indeed, that there is not more concern among us for such an important teaching of so great an apostle, a teaching which is manifestly that of the Holy Spirit. Instead, we occupy ourselves with matters that are trifling by comparison: we build churches; we expand ecclesiastical property; we accumulate money; we provide the church with more and more ornaments and vessels of gold and silver; we install organs and other ostentatious pieces of display. We practice all our piety in activities of this kind and are not a whit concerned about what the apostle here commands. And I have not even mentioned the monstrous display of pride, ostentation, greed, dissipation, and ambition that is connected with all these enterprises!
So then, he turns first against the false prophets. For prophecy must be practiced "according to the rule of faith." And this is violated by those who prophesy on the basis of human thought or according to conjectures of probability derived from actions and signs of the creature, as, for example, by people who foretell God's plan by the stars or some other guess of probability that they may have. But God-given prophecy comes in such a way that it goes against all human sense just as though it proclaimed something impossible. Hence, it provokes most people to unbelief, inasmuch as everything pertaining to the truth of this kind of prophecy appears to be beyond hope, leading one to expect its opposite. Such was the prophecy of Jeremiah (Jer. 32:15). During the siege of Jerusalem, when everything was quite hopeless, he prophesied saying: "Thus says the Lord: Houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land." Yet all was already laid waste, and the people of the city were already moving away. This is why
Jeremiah exclaims then and there: "The Lord is great in counsel and incomprehensible in thought." However, when he prophesied the destruction of the city and the exile of its people, one did not believe him, inasmuch as there were no signs pointing to such an eventuality. Everything spoke against it: fortifications; armed strength; auxiliary power, so that the destruction of Jerusalem
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS seemed to be impossible—so much so that, on the basis of these indications, Ananias dared to prophesy the opposite (Jer. 28:1 ff.), and he, too, was a prophet. For it was not only the false prophets who prophesied wrongly; also true prophets became false precisely when they forgot to prophesy "according to the rule of faith."
Thus Nathan certainly erred when he advised David to build the Temple (II Sam. 7:3 ff.). And, according to Num. 22:21 ff., Balaam erred and became a false prophet despite the fact that he foretold such extraordinary things. Thus (at the end of the book of I Kings) also Micah prophesied contrary to the common feeling that Ahab would perish, although everywhere there were only the strongest indications that certain victory was at hand. This was the reason why Zedekiah, who relied on these indications, prophesied against him.
A prophecy, therefore, is not true because it is based on experience or human proof. Hence, it says, in the passage before us,
"according to the rule of" or "by comparison with" faith. For some interpreters25 take the Greek word "analogia" to mean
"rule," "comparison," "proportion," or "similarity." The apostle is then saying: If you want to prophesy, prophesy in such a way that you do not exceed faith, so that your prophesying can be in harmony with the peculiarity of faith. In German we say: Es ellicht ym. Es sihet ym gleich,26 i.e., "it has the same characteristics," "it resembles it," "it is like it."
For example, if you see a monastery that resembles a castle, you can say that it is analogous to a castle, i.e., it has the proportion, peculiar character, and location that a castle would have. In the same way, the apostle wants to say here that prophecy must be in harmony with faith: It must be concerned with "things that are not seen" (Heb. 11:1), lest it become a wisdom of the world which, with respect to its cause as well as its effect, is part of the things that are apparent. And this word is noteworthy.
So then, an analogy is an assimilation, not one that is produced by the intellect, but one that is contained in the matter itself, or, rather, it is neither of the two, but that in virtue of which one thing agrees with another in its peculiar characteristics and becomes like it. To be sure, one may prophesy something new but, in doing so, one must not transcend the characteristic nature of faith. In other words: what one prophesies must not be provable by experience; it must only be a token of things that are in no way apparent either by signs or other indications. Otherwise, faith
25 Cf. Faber and Erasmus.
26 A Middle High German expression, meaning: Es dhnelt ihm; es sieht ihm gleich.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE will be destroyed by prophecy and become a plain kind of wisdom that any knowledgeable man can understand and comprehend and by which he can construe a similar prophecy. In such a case, prophecy is no longer prophecy but a factual demonstration and an evidence of experience.264
Ministry, in ministering. (Rom. 12:7.) In Greek, these words read "diakonian" and "in diakonia" i.e., "in ministering." Ministers are all those who serve in ecclesiastical offices, such as a priest, a deacon, a subdeacon and whosoever has to do with sacred things, with the exception of the administration of the word of God, and also those who assist a teacher, just as the apostle often speaks of his helpers.
This rule is being violated, first of all, by ambitious men who, because they dislike their office, want to teach, though they are not only untrained, which is something that could be tolerated, but also lack the gift of teaching. For it is not enough to be learned and intelligent, but the gift of grace, too, is required in order that one be chosen by God for teaching. But today all of us rush forward eagerly in order to teach the whole world, even if we ourselves do not understand what we teach, and even if, in case we have this understanding, we lack the gift of grace or the mandate of God who must send us. In this sense he says: You have no right to send, because you are servants and not masters. 'Tray ye, therefore, the Lord of the harvest that he send forth laborers into his vineyard." (Matt. 9:38.) For this reason, let him be content with his ministry who does not know how to preach or is not yet called to preach, even though he may know how to do so. (Matthew 25:14:
"He called his own servants and delivered unto them his goods/' but first he called them.) It is certainly strange to see to what an extent the "good intention" is at work here: It imagines that by preaching it can produce heavens knows how much fruit, though, in the first place, it may be untrained, and, secondly, trained but not called, and, thirdly, trained but not provided with the gift of grace. For when
God extends this call to preach, he either calls men who already have this gift, or he grants the gift with the call.27 And if someone preaches without a call, "he beats the air" (I Cor. 9:26) or the fruit he boasts of exists only in his foolish imagination.
I refrain from saying anything about the utterly stupid and incompetent persons whom bishops and abbots nowadays promote everywhere to the pulpit. We really cannot say that they are
27Lit., "Nam vocatio velinvenitgratiam velconcert earn'9
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS called and sent, even if we wanted to, because in this case incompetent and unworthy men are given the call. This is the work of God's wrath, for it is he who withdraws his word from us on account of our sins and he increases the number of vacuous talkers and verbose babblers.
Or he that teaches, in doctrine. (Rom. 12:7.) Many have the gift of teaching, though they do not possess great learning. Others have both, and they are the best teachers, as, for example, Saints Augustine, Ambrose, and Jerome. A man, therefore, who does not use this gift but gets involved in other matters, sins against this mandate of the apostle, indeed, against the mandate of God. This concerns especially those who have been called and put into teaching positions, even though they may not yet be called by the title of teachers. For "tender ears do not want to listen to a truth that bites/'28 But the apostle deals chiefly with those who have been called. In his letters, he therefore always emphasizes his own call, because without the divine call neither the office of the ministry nor teaching can prosper. Hence, it is due to the instigation of the devil that as ministers arrogate the teaching office to themselves so, by contrast, teachers flee the teaching office, with the result that thus the work of God is hindered in both ways. To be sure, in this passage as well as in I Cor. 12:28, the apostle puts the order of the teachers in the third place.
He that exhorts, in exhortation. (Rom. 12:8.) Teaching and exhortation differ from each other in this, that teaching is directed to the ignorant but exhortation to those who have knowledge. The teacher lays the foundation and the exhorter builds upon it. The teacher transmits knowledge; the exhorter stimulates and sees to it that the transmitted knowledge bears fruit. The one plants and the other waters. As the apostle says in I Cor. 3:6: "I have planted, Apollos watered," and also farther on (I Cor. 3:10): "As a wise master builder, I have laid the foundation, and another builds thereon." In our age, almost all preachers find themselves in this situation: they are watering a faith that is already planted unless they are preaching where there has not been any preaching before. Therefore those who possess this gift and are called should not take time for other things. Yet today, this gets to be a common practice—in the same way in which the heathen Horace was acquainted with it: "The lazy ox desires the saddle, while the horse yearns for the plow,"29 and "Nobody is con28 Cf. Persius, Satira, I, 108.
29 Horace, Ep. I, 14, 43: "Optat Ephippia bos piger, optat arare Caballus"
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE tent with his lot but he praises those who follow strange trails."80
And Terence says:81 "Most of us are of such a mind that we are not satisfied with what we have." Those who are fit to do a certain piece of work detest it, and the incompetent pant for it.
He that gives, with simplicity. (Rom. 12:8.) Just as everybody else is tempted in his state of grace by his particular devil, so that he cannot purely and faithfully cultivate his divine gift for his God, so also he that gives does not lack his special devil. This means that this commandment is here broken in two ways.
First, when one gives on condition and not freely, i.e., with the expectation that he will get his gift back with interest. Today, one can often find this way of behavior among Christians, and a common proverb describes it as follows: "Nowadays people are wont to give a piece of bread to one who has plenty to eat/'32 In German we say: Geschenk unnd eer?z Thus those of lower rank give to those of higher rank, i.e., to the princes, prelates, bishops, and to the rich and powerful. But these would not get anything given to them if everyone gave with simplicity, i.e., without the expectation of getting something in return. Strangely enough, this evil is today widely spread. Here the saying of Luke 14:12 ff. is relevant: "When you make a dinner or a supper, call not your friends nor your brethren, nor your kinsmen, nor rich neighbors, lest perhaps they bid you again and a recompense be made you. But when you make a feast, bid the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you shall be blessed, because they have not wherewith to recompense you; for you shall be recompensed in the resurrection of the righteous." If only this were observed, how many monstrous evils would the church then be spared today! Would the lawyers then get such large gratuities and tips? This practice of buying favors is widely current in all ranks of society. To be sure, this kind of payment can sometimes give great joy, but getting it repaid is always a much greater joy. This applies particularly to subordinates in relation to their superiors.
The commandment of the apostle is broken, secondly, when those who belong to the upper ranks give to those who are below them or when persons of equal rank give to each other. This
30 A free rendering of Horace* first satire.
31 Terence, Phormio, I, 3, 20.
32 "Mos nunc est genti, quod pants praebetur habentu"
33 I.e., "Geschenk und Ehre!* These words are probably pointers to German proverbs, corresponding to the Latin ones quoted in the text, which Luther intended to cite in his lectures.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS gives much greater delight, because it is the occasion for boasting and vainglorying. Here, indeed, "it is more blessed to give than to receive*' (Acts 20:35)! In their pride, they think they are like God himselfl
(This exposition does not seem right to me. For the apostle speaks of the tribute to which the teachers of the word and the leaders of the churches are entitled. As he says in Gal. 6:6: "Let him that is instructed in the word communicate to him that instructs him in all good things." To be sure, this must be done in the spirit of simplicity and not in that of hypocrisy, just as the Children of Israel were commanded "to take heed not to forsake the Levites" [Deut. 12:19]. Hence, he goes on to say in Gal. 6:7:
"Be not deceived; God is not mocked." It is this gift, I think, which he has in mind in I Cor. 12:28. There he speaks of "gifts of healings" or "subsidies"34 that are due to the leaders and teachers who devote themselves to the word and to prayer. For "the Lord is their portion" [Num. 18:20; Ps. 73:26] and thus "the laborer is worthy of his reward" [I Tim. 5:18; Matt. 10:10].)
The common people call this eyn gnade adder fruntschafft?5
I do not know whether I should number among them the foundations and anniversary endowments36 that have become so common in our age. For the people who contribute to them seem to be chiefly concerned in obtaining honor and glory, indeed, not only glory but also temporal as well as eternal repayments—I mean, when they press certain burdens upon those who are obligated to them. Then there are those who give for the sake of future glory.
They believe that they give simply and they are really more sincere than the ones just named. (For they do not appear to give temporal goods in order to obtain eternal ones. But they make arrangements for the singing of choirs in a certain way as if they did not get their due when the singing is arranged in a way different from that which they had determined or when there is less of it than they had anticipated. Formerly, however, the choirs were not established in the name of certain persons, as one can see in the practices of the collegiate churches.37) But they, too, make their contribution, not simply for the sake of the glory of God, but for 3 4 This is the translation of Erasmus.
3 5 "Eine Gnade oder Freundschaft"
("a gracious gift or friendly act").
3 6 Luther may think here of the endowments which the Elector Frederick the Wise gave to the Chapter of All Saints in Wittenberg.
3 7 Luther here apparently refers to the practice, which, at the end of the fifteenth century, became more and more common in Germany, to provide for the singing (by choirs) of a certain number and kind of hymns in the church services. Donors established foundations or provided funds for this purpose. Luther may have thought of the institution of such choirs at the Church of All Saints in Wittenberg or of the establishment of the "eternal
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE the sake of their own future advantages in heaven, and they would not make a gift if they did not hope to gain advantage. But this is a vain hope, because they are not free from duplicity. However, they give no thought to this but go securely along as if they could count with certainty on a remuneration, and they are unmindful of the fact that they have received their reward (Matt. 6:2; 5:16).
To be sure, I can hardly believe that they do this for the glory of God, inasmuch as they would then prefer to cultivate old foundations or restore such as are already sufficiently endowed but have been permitted to break down. But the worship and the service of God have become a market place.
He that rules, with diligence. (Rom. 12:8.) But today it is like this: he that rules, whether in a spiritual or secular office, does so with luxury and ease, riches and pleasure, glory and honor, power and terror. (Of such, Ezek. 34:2 ff. says:
"Woe to the shepherds of Israel that fed themselves. You ate the milk and you clothed yourselves with the wool, and you killed that which was fat; the weak you have not strengthened and that which was sick you have not healed and that which was driven away you have not brought again, neither have you sought out that which was lost. But you ruled over them with cruelty and a high hand." Should these words not cause one to tremble, and make one's hair stand on end?) It is fellows of this sort that violate this commandment. They do not ascend in order to descend as the angels did on Jacob's ladder (Gen. 28:12). For to ascend means to rule, and to descend means to be diligent. They do not rule in order to serve, although everyone who is exalted is exalted in order that he seek nothing for himself nor live for himself, but in order that he should recognize that he was made the servant of his servants.
The clear and distinct norm of every rulership is diligence, as the apostle here states. Moreover, only he can be diligent in relation to others who is not concerned for himself and his own. For diligence makes one unconcerned, the wrong kind of diligence in the wrong way and the right kind in the right way. Therefore, then, let him who rules do so with diligence, i.e., with no concern for himself.
He that shows mercy, with cheerfulness. (Rom. 12:8.) Second Corinthians 9:7: "not grudgingly or of necessity: foi choir" in the cathedral of Meissen in Saxony. The singing of this choir was conceived by its founders as a perpetual memorial commemorating their ancestors.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS God loves a cheerful giver." This is different from what he said before: "He that gives, let him do so with simplicity." For in that case one gives to those from whom one can expect to be repaid, but here one gives to the poor and needy.
Now I think that one can safely ignore the question about which Lyra is so much concerned, namely, why the good works of this list are ranked in a certain order. For we may lose the true understanding of the whole text if we base it on an imagined construction of its parts. This happens to Lyra whenever, as he likes to do, he divides the Scripture into parts, as he brings his great learning to bear upon it in the belief that he is expounding it most excellently.
A man who feels obliged to help the needy because he feels ashamed or senses some kind of danger does not show mercy with cheerfulness. Thus, today, many contribute to collections of alms, but they do not earn any merits thereby, because they do so against their will and without joy. The same is true of those who give alms lest they be regarded as miserly, heartless, or merciless.
Let love be without dissimulation. (Rom. 12:9.) The connection between these two terms is a necessary and most significant one. For just as there is nothing that must be purer and freer from dissimulation than love, so there is nothing more easily defiled by dissimulation. Nothing abhors dissimulation so much as love does and nothing must suffer so much dissimulation as love must bear. This is why there is on everybody's lips the proverb: "You cannot trust anyone/'38 and also the saying of the Preacher:39 "Who can find a faithful man?" Everything is covered with rouge and concealed under the disguise of friendship.
Indeed, there are two kinds of simulated love. First, there is that kind which outside displays itself as love but hides a veritable hatred inside. (This kind is characteristic of the relation of subordinates to their superiors and of the relation between equals.)
Here we must make a twofold distinction: There are some who, like Joab over against Abner (II Sam. 3:27), do this knowingly.
Here belong also the detractors, the deceivers, the scandalmongers, and the double-tongued traitors. But this is such a crass kind of simulation that I cannot believe that it is what the apostle here speaks of. Today, however, this vice is spread everywhere, overflowing everything with its dirt.40
38 "Nnsquam tuta fides/'
39 Luther writes "Ecclesiastis" but the quotation is from Prov. 20:6.
40 "Quamquam toto gurgite hoc vitium grassatur hodie"
Ficker thinks that this terra "whirlpool" (gurges) was part of the apocalyptical speech of ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE Then there are others who do this unknowingly. They are not aware that they love falsely until trial and adversity befall the one they love. As Ovid says: "When you are happy, you will have many friends, but in times of trouble, you will find yourself alone/*41
Even the apostles were of this sort at the time of Christ's Passion, and so also were many other saints. This dissimulation is so deep that there is hardly anyone who recognizes it in himself. Indeed,
I dare say, even though many do not think so, that nobody is free from this dissimulation. Who would be more perfect than the apostles who were made strong by the fact that they lived together with Christ?
Secondly, there is the kind that does not conceal a wrong love or shows itself as true hatred. (This kind is characteristic of the relation of superiors to their subordinates and of the relation between equals.)
This love, too, is of two kinds. There are some who see with their own eyes that their neighbor commits a mistake or a sin, i.e., that he does himself great harm, but though they have the power to do so, they do not reprove or admonish or correct him. But also this kind of simulated love is so crude and gross that it is unbelievable that the apostle had it in mind when he wrote this passage of his letter. However, there are many who practice this dissimulation even if it goes against their conscience.
Others show this kind of simulated love unknowingly: they admire and praise the vices of others as if they were virtues. They have achieved a high degree of humility and are therefore all the more ready to interpret an apparent evil as a good. They are quick to praise but slow to reprove, even if they happen to encounter a very great vice, if only it is covered by a thin disguise of good so that, even though one cannot actually see any evidence of good, one can nevertheless find something to appreciate. In this case, one does not test all things in order to hold fast that which is good (I Thess. 5:21), but one is satisfied with a superficial impression and is quick to pronounce things good and to make friends.
So then, people of the first kind do not do the good, and those of the second kind do not do the evil, which love requires them to do. But the former do evil and the latter good, each going against love.
In between these two, the neutralists42 have their way. Like Luther's day. He quotes an expression that refers to Rome as "quasi gurges flatitiorum."
41 Ovid, Tristia, I, 9, 5.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS Absalom (II Sam. 13:22), they speak or do neither good nor evil.
Such are the theologians of today. They stand firm and secure in their "elicited acts"42a and never come through with an effective deed. They think that they have done more than enough when they wish their neighbor well and hope the best for him and when they reject, detest, and deprecate the evil of their fellow man, and all this they do by "elicited acts." Otherwise, they do nothing or they behave like the aforementioned simulators. (Furthermore, I do not hesitate to say that it is simulated love to say that to love means to wish someone well by an "elicited act.*') As if to expose the deceitfulness of such a dissimulation, he therefore goes on to say:
Hating that which is evil, cleaving to that which is good. (Rom.
There is not one man who would say that he loves that which is evil and that he hates that which is good. Nevertheless, the apostle gives this commandment and certainly not in vain, for man is inclined toward that which is evil and he is reluctant to do good. Dissimulation, therefore, finds its defense in the ignorance of good and evil, in view of the fact that everyone calls good what pleases him and evil what displeases him. What he means to say, therefore, by his commandment that "we test all things and hold fast to that which is good" (I Thess. 5:21) is only that we should beware of taking hold of the good through its immediate outward appearance.
For here he understands the good to be that of the new man and evil also that of the new man. Now this good is something twofold, and so also is this evil. The one is invisible, and man can keep it only by faith: it is God. The other is visible: it is all that which is bad for sensuality and opposes the old man in us, for example: the chastisement of the old man in us and the exercise of good works. Just so, by contrast, the visible evil is all that is good for the old man in us and agreeable to him, as, for example, the license of the flesh and the neglect of the spirit.
Both are twofold in so far as they are related, on the one hand, to one's own person, and, on the other hand, to the neighbor. It is of the latter that the apostle speaks here, for in order that our
"love be without dissimulation," we must hate in our fellow man whatever is evil, without fear or favor,43 and cleave to that in him which is good, without fear or favor.43a
42a "/n actibus elicitis"
43 "Sine adulatione et timore."
43a "Sine simulatione et favore"
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE (By using the expression "hating" that which is evil, he means to say that there will always be evil and that not every evil is in your power. Therefore, hate the evil you are trying to avoid and do not side with the evil of someone else, but align yourself with the good of someone else. Cherish and favor, promote and preach, the good, but hate and hinder evil where you can. But often one can do nothing else but hate that which is evil and love that which is good, as in the case of heretics and other unteachable persons who rage against the people of the church who keep the peace.)43b
(If there were such men, i.e., who hate evil, at the courts of the higher clergy and of the princes, the church would be fortunate. But just the opposite is the case today. Hence, the church is in a miserable state, not so much because they themselves are evil, but because they do not hate the evil that can be found in the church.)
Yet hatred or good will directed toward an individual person overthrows this judgment entirely, as one can see today, for example, in the case of John Reuchlin and the theologians of Cologne.430 When we give our love to a person with unreserved assurance and devotion, we are ready and eager to cherish and defend whatever he may happen to think, but we do not ask ourselves how we can recognize what is good or evil in him, because we do not want to make it appear that this kind of person has good or evil in him. Hence, it is the nature of simulated love that it hates what is good and cleaves to what is evil. Indeed, a characteristic of every kind of love is that it makes blind. Who, then, is not blind? For who is without love—without sensual love, I mean, except one who is not alive?
Loving one another with brotherly love. (Rom. 12:10.) One Greek version of the text reads "brotherly love": 'Philadelphia") hence, "philadelphos" means "lover of the brethren" or "one who loves his brother." Thereby the apostle means to say that, among Christians, love must be of a special kind and more perfect than the love one shows to strangers and enemies. Thus he says in another passage (Gal. 6:10): "Whilst we have time, let us do good unto all men, but especially unto them who are of the household of faith." And where, in our translation, we have "loving" (diligentes), we read in the Greek text ("philostorgoi"; philos — amor).44 Now storge means "affection" or "sympathy" as we say in common speech. Philostorgos, therefore, is one who is
43b "ut in haereticis et obstinatis contra catholicos et mites furentibus."
4 3 c Cf. Luther's comment on Rom. 11:22.
44 The translation of philos into amor was common in the Middle Ages.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS tenderly affectioned toward someone else whom he is to love with Philadelphia. The apostle speaks, then, with great emphasis, by quasi superfluously putting together these two words that mean love, saying (tPhiladelphia estote philostorgoi/' i.e., "in brotherly love be tenderly affectioned one to another."
With honor preferring one another. (Rom. 12:10.) In Phil. 2:3 he says: "in humility each counting the other better than himself." And our Lord says in Luke 14:10: "When you are invited, go, sit down in the lowest place/' He speaks here of that inward honor which is represented by a high regard and esteem for one's fellow men. For outward honor is, in most cases, simulated and mercenary. One bestows it in order to receive a higher one in return. And if it is not returned, one becomes indignant and ceases to bestow honors. This is what he means by "counting the other better than himself." He does not say: "each placing himself higher than the other."
However, you cannot bestow this honor upon someone else without self-denial. Moreover, you must judge yourself worthy to be put to shame, but must regard others as worthy to be honored in preference to yourself. In other words: only a humble man can prefer another in honor.
Pride, too, bestows honors, but it follows after others in bestowing its honor, just as humility precedes them in doing so. Pride expects that one goes before it, but humility does not even wish the others to come after it, believing that its only duty is to go before others. What a great service it is to yield honor to someone else! It is easier to give and do service with one's body than to make nothing of oneself and to think highly of all others.
Some are prompt in returning an honor or, in the way of a mercenary, in bestowing honors with the expectation of being honored in return. But this also the Gentiles do; the Roman
Domitius45 said, for instance: "Why should I recognize you as a prince if you do not recognize me as a senator?" This is not a Christian but a heathen saying. For we must give honor to one another without asking who comes first or last in honor.
In diligence not slothful. (Rom. 12:11.) I.e., in Greek: "in diligence," "in zeal," "in service," "in application."
Notice how love does not keep anything for itself but how it is concerned only for that which belongs to others. In the preceding,
45 This story goes back to Cicero (De orat., 3, 4). It is reported by Jerome, on whom Luther probably depends (d. Ep. ad Nepot., 52, 7 [PL 22, 533 f.]).
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE the apostle taught us how we must direct our substance and faculties to others by giving them gifts and by showing them mercy and diligence, etc., and, then, how we must give them the honor and esteem we have for ourselves. Now he teaches us that we must also give ourselves, and he says that the helping action of one's own person, so to speak, on behalf of those in need is the help, service, and succor we must give to them. The Absalomites do the opposite, i.e., "the fathers of peace"46 and those who do not want to be disturbed by serving others. Yet if they do help someone, they do so unwillingly and sullenly, as, for instance, in court cases, legal actions, and similar undertakings.
Fervent in spirit. (Rom. 12:11.) This commandment is broken by those who are asleep and lazy and without interest in anything they do. Whatever work they undertake proves to be wasted. Proverbs 18:9: "He that is loose and slack in his work is the brother of him that wastes his own works/* People of this sort are irksome also to men, to say nothing of God. So it is nowadays a common experience that the artisans one has hired do their work as if they were asleep. It is an actual fact that monks and priests are fast asleep during prayers, even physically. I shall not say anything about their mental laziness.
Whatever they do, they do slothfully.
It is this capital sin of sloth or boredom in the performance of good works that the apostle criticizes in this passage. The Greek work akedia or acedia means being "bored" or "morose" or "indifferent."
This evil is so widespread that scarcely anyone deems it worthwhile to exert himself. Now, if one does not want to be fervent in spirit, one cannot help being fervent in the flesh. For one of the two must burn with passion, either the spirit or the flesh. And when the one glows fervently, the fervor of the other cools and becomes dead, except in times of temptation, when God lets the spirit continue to be fervent in the midst of physical ardor. A man, therefore, who performs his tasks without ardor cannot help being fervent in the flesh; hence, he will necessarily "waste the work" he does, namely, by the fervor of the flesh. For example: a lazy cook who is about to get a meal ready proceeds in such a way that the food gets cold while it is being served. Who would not detest him, and rightly so?
46 The interpretation of Absalomites as "fathers of peace" is of an etymological character (cf. Augustine, Enarr. in Ps., 3, 7). Cf. also Luther's reference to Absalom in his comment on Rom. 12:8. There he has in mind II Sam.
13:22: "Absalom spake unto Amnon neither good nor bad, for Absalom hated Amnon."
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS Serving the Lord. (Rom. 12:11.) This is directed not only against those who serve avarice, or the world, or their own belly, but also, and emphatically so, against those who stubbornly persist in doing a good work when obedience calls them to some other task. They are like the people of the Gospel who have an ass under yoke and do not want to let him loose in order that it may serve the Lord (Matt. 21:2 ff.;
Mark 11:2 ff.; Luke 19:30 ff.); i.e., they wear themselves out in their own pursuits and do not let themselves be called to something else by any religious task or even by a divine cause. Hence, they serve themselves rather than the Lord. For they are not ready to do whatever God wills unless they can choose what it shall be.
They excuse themselves and say: It would not be right that I leave what I am doing now in order to work somewhere else. I doubt whether I am wrong in saying that among people of this kind there must also be numbered the princes who are constantly in church and the higher clergy who cannot absent themselves from court.
This applies also to our Duke Frederick47 and his officials.
When one asks for them, they are unavailable. God called them away and they say: Ah, I must pray and serve God! What fools they are I For the sake of serving God they decline to serve God. They do not know that to serve God means to be indifferent about whereto the Lord may have called one and not stubbornly to stay put in one place.
Rejoicing in hope. (Rom. 12:12.) This means: do not rejoice in present experience and knowledge. For joy is of two kinds. First, there is the joy in visible things, i.e., what we have somehow come to know inwardly or outwardly.
But this is a vain joy because it is transitory. Then, there is the joy in invisible things, i.e., in that which we cannot know but can only believe. And this is true, eternal, and abiding joy. Yet without hope this joy cannot be real. For who can rejoice in something that he despairs of or doubts he can ever obtain? The apostle means to say, therefore, that Christians should always be joyful, but not with respect to any specific thing. For "blessed are they that mourn" (Matt. 5:4), about something specific, here and now, for they rejoice in hope. But we can have hope and therefore also joy through hope only if we renounce everything and have nothing to desire, to rely on, and to delight in. Moreover, we are beset by so much trouble that we cannot rejoice in any earthly good. If we bear all this willingly, we shall obtain hope and through hope, joy. Therefore he goes on to say:
47 I.e., Luther's prince, Frederick the Wise, Duke of Ernestine Saxony.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE Patience in tribulation. (Rom. 12:12.) Romans 5:3 ff.: "Tribulation works patience, and patience trial, and trial hope, and hope does not confound," i.e., it rejoices and is cheerful and confident. But our theologians, subtle as they are, have limited hope to "elicited acts/*48 This is why none of them has any understanding of what hope is, although the word is on everybody's lips. They say that we can induce an act of hope, even though everything about us on which we depend and rely is in good order. But by such an "induced act" we shall never get even a taste of hope. For hope strips a man, at least in his inner being, of all the goods he relies on and it surrounds him with all sorts of evil. Then "patience is necessary," and it works hope.
Instant in prayer. (Rom. 12:12.) This is directed against those who merely read off the psalms during prayer and who do not have their heart in what they read.
And indeed, I am afraid, that today the prayers in church are more a hindrance than a help. First, because we offend God all the more when we read them off and our heart is not in what we read, for he says himself: "This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me" (Matt. 15:8; Isa. 29:13). And, secondly, because, letting ourselves be deceived by this pretense, we feel safe and at peace, as if we had really prayed. And thus we never gird ourselves for the effort of true prayer, but having said our prayers in this superficial way, we think we have really prayed and are no longer troubled about anything. This exposes us to a terrible danger. And in return for this, we then consume at leisure and in safety the taxes, pensions, and subsidies of the people!
This is why the word "instant" is a call to order and vigilance that everyone but especially the clergy must hear and fear. For it means that praying must be a constant effort. Nor is this a useless call, for as the ancient fathers said: "No labor is so hard as prayer."49 One who wants to enter the priesthood should first consider, therefore, that he must perform a labor that is harder than every other labor, namely, prayer. For it requires a subdued and broken mind and a high and triumphant spirit. But at this point the legalists50 introduce a nice explanation: they say that it is not prescribed that they pray the hours51 but that they "read" or "say" them. Thus they weigh every word of the canon so that they can doze in safety.
48 Cf. Ockham, III Sent., q. 8, H ad tertiam; Pierre d'Ailly, III Sent, d. 26, q. un., Gabriel Biel, III Sent., d. 26, q. un., 0. 2, concl. 3.
** Cf. Vitae Patrum V, Verba Seniorum XII, 2 (PL 73, 941).
6i "Orationes horarias."
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS However, quite apart from the canonical hours, we must say something else about prayer.
Prayer is of two kinds: it is vocal or mental.52
It is now customary to say that for "vocal prayer" a "virtual intention"58 is sufficient. A nice cover for laziness and indolence!
For one takes this to mean that one must first wrest from himself the good intention of praying, and that, in reliance on this, one can then give up any further effort.
The attentiveness practiced in vocal prayer is threefold: There is the material (or sensual) attentiveness. Here one pays attention only to the words. Monks54 pray in this way, but also others such as simple lay people who do not understand even the Lord's
Prayer. This is prayer no more than "matter" is the real thing, i.e., as to its nature, it is not praying strictly so-called, but it is prayer only in an extrinsic sense, in terms of which every other good work can also be called a prayer. To pray in this way is nothing else than to perform an act of obedience. And this obedience is supposed to make it acceptable in God's sight.
Such a prayer is not to be despised, for, apart from the fact that it constitutes an act of obedience, it is good in many respects.
First: it drives the devil away if only it is spoken aloud in the spirit of simplicity (i.e., if it is "sung in the Spirit1' (I Cor. 14:15), thus procuring the presence of the Holy Spirit. (This is symbolized by David playing the harp before Saul.) For, as we can learn from many examples, the devil cannot bear it that the word of God is spoken aloud (I Cor. 14:2: "For he that speaks in a tongue speaks to God"). Secondly: the divine word affects the soul (this is its nature) even if one does not understand it. For it is a word of grace, according to Ps. 45:2: "Grace is poured upon your lips" and "Your lips are like a dropping honeycomb" (S. of Sol. 4:11).
Thirdly: it offers the intellect and the feeling an occasion they would not have otherwise (this is symbolized in Elisha's playing).55
Fourthly: even though people who pray in this way do not comprehend the feeling-tone56 characteristic of the words they recite,
6 2 The Scholastics distinguished between oratio vocalis and oratio mentalis.
6 3 Cf. Garcia, Lex. scholast, 6 5 Cf. II Kings 3:15. If Luther meant to refer to this passage, he probably had in mind Lyra's comment on it. Lyra explains that the spirit of prophecy did not always touch the heart of the prophets. This, he says, could be brought about only by the lifting up of the heart in devotion. This devotion, again, could be induced by certain prescribed melodies as they were played on various instruments to the praise of God. Elisha asked for such a playing of music. Cf. Ficker, p. 467, n. 13.
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE many have, nevertheless, a general impression of it, and this means that their spirits are lifted up to God.
There is also the intellectual attentiveness. Here the attention is directed to the meaning and significance of the words spoken in prayer. All educated and intelligent people are obliged to practice this. For everyone must return his talent to God (Matt. 25:14 ff.).
Then there is the spiritual or affectional attentiveness. Here one directs his attention to the feeling-tone or spirit of the words used in prayer, sighing with those that sigh; rejoicing with those that rejoice; shouting for joy with those that exult, adapting himself to every movement of the words. This is true prayer.
Of these two the apostle says in I Cor. 14:15: "I will sing with the spirit; I will sing also with the understanding." He calls "singing with the spirit*' that sensual attentiveness which does not achieve understanding but is not without emotional alertness; devout nuns and unlearned folk practice it. "Singing with the understanding" means intellectual attentiveness. It can be achieved without as well as with the spirit.
Mental prayer is the ascent of the mind,57 or rather of the spirit, to God.
This, then, is the prayer with respect to which the apostle says here: "Instant in prayer." He means to say by this that Christians must practice prayer frequently and with diligence. For "to be instant" does not only mean "to be constantly engaged in something" but it means also "to press on," "to quicken one's pace,"
"to demand earnestly." So then, as there is nothing that Christians must do more frequently than praying, so there is also nothing that requires more labor and effort and, for this reason, is more effective and more fruitful. Here "the Kingdom of God suffers violence, and the violent bear it away" (Matt. 11:12). In my judgment, prayer is indeed a continuous violent action of the spirit as it is lifted up to God. This action is comparable to that of a ship going against the stream. This is why it is said in praise of Blessed
Martin that he had an invincible spirit, for he never relaxed from prayer.58
To be sure, this violent action becomes milder and even ceases whenever it happens that the Spirit draws and carries our hearts
57 This definition of prayer was common in the Middle Ages. It was derived from John of Damascus.
58 In the Responsorium on the Feast of St. Martin, the following words were said: "Oculis ac manibus in caelum semper intentus. Invictum ab oratione spiritum non relaxabat"
("With eyes and hands he was always intent upon heaven. He never relaxed his invincible spirit from prayer.") Cf. Ficker, p. 468, n. 8.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS upward through grace or, in any case, when a pressing and growing anxiety forces us to seek refuge in prayer. Without these two, prayer is a very difficult and most wearisome thing. But its effect is tremendous. For true prayer is omnipotent, as our Lord says:
"Everyone who asks, receives," etc. (Matt. 7:8). Everyone, therefore, must do violence, out of the awareness that he that prays fights against the devil and the flesh.
Now with respect to the prayer of hours, the question is raised, In what way is it prescribed? The answer is as follows: The church requires only sensual attentiveness (i.e., the individual words must be spoken aloud) but not intellectual or affectional attentiveness
•—at any rate, not a personal involvement. For the church requires and presupposes a common disposition. And it is not in its power to command that one should have an understanding and a personal experience of prayer, but by its prescription it only provides the occasion therefor.
For this reason, it is nothing but foolishness if nowadays people make endowments for canonical hours. They do this in the superstitious belief that they do not need to be concerned about what is being prayed but only that there should be much of it, inasmuch as they want to have the prayers said for themselves. Moreover, they themselves prescribe the prayer as if it were in their power to buy prayer. How much better it would be if they gave their gifts without any condition, so that prayers would be said for them when the one who does the praying would be able to do sol
But they think that they must imitate the old foundations.
But I say: No, this is impossible, for our ancestors sought to glorify God with them; they did not merely try to gain an advantage from prayer.
Thus also the documents by which our foundation here was established state specifically that this was done "for the salvation of our souls."59 Could God not have known for what purpose the gift was made? Or could he not have given you sufficient recompense if you had given your gift purely for his sake, and if you had not prescribed to him for what purpose you wanted to make your gift, and if you had not blown your own horn in the presence of your fellow men? What if you deceive yourself? What if you are not at all concerned about the glory of God? Would God that I turn out to be a false prophet, but I fear that this monastery will yet bring great misery upon its unfortunate founder and likewise upon the Church of All Saints.60
59 This formula appears frequently in the documents relating to the endowments of the Wittenberg Chapter of All Saints.
60 Luther probably is thinking of the new buildings which, in 1513-1514, the ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE Communicating to the necessities of the saints. (Rom. 12:13.)
Today we understand the "saints" to be the blessed ones who have been glorified; the apostle, however, and, indeed, the whole
Scripture, call "saints" all who believe in Christ. This is perhaps the reason why nowadays one does not readily communicate to the saints; one believes that there are no longer any. Why, then, does the apostle say in Rom. 1:7: "to all that are . . . called to be saints" and in I Cor. 7:14: "The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife" and in I Peter 1:16: "You shall be holy, for I am holy," the Lord, your God?
He speaks here of the feeling of compassion, urging Christians to make the needs of the saints a common concern of theirs through compassion, according to Heb. 10:33 f.: "On the one hand, by reproaches and tribulations, you were made a gazing stock; and on the other, became companions of them that were used in such sort. For you had compassion on them that were in bands," etc. This is disregarded by people who blush when they see the needs of the saints and are ashamed of them.
However, one can understand this passage also in the sense that it refers to the effect that is produced by helpfulness. Then it means something else than the commandment with which we have dealt before, namely: "He that shows mercy, with cheerfulness"
(Rom. 12:8). For there, the apostle spoke generally of the miserable and needy whether they were saints or not. But here he speaks of those who are being persecuted, who are being deprived of their possessions and to whom one can give nothing except sympathy, as Saint Anastasia and Saint Natalie did in their time when they visited the prisons and encouraged the martyrs.60a If it was possible that one could contribute something to them, it was not so much because they lacked anything but because they suffered need for the sake of righteousness, for they were needy only because they were victims of persecution.
But today, the saints live in obscurity and their needs are therefore unknown. Yet people who are oppressed by want but keep it secret and who are ashamed to beg or to disclose their poverty in public can be thought of as taking the place of the martyrs of old.
But all this relates to temporal necessities.
Others are in spiritual straits: They find themselves in great trials of temptation which are inflicted upon them either by a fellow man or by the devil. We must defend and console them, for they too suffer harm. This word here therefore says something else Elector Frederick ordered to be built both for the Chapter and the Augustinian monastery in Wittenberg.
60a Cf. Ficker, p. 470, n. 11.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS than what is enjoined in the saying: "He that shows mercy . . ."
For there the apostle speaks of needy folk who are spared suffering, but here he is concerned about those who must suffer quite apart from poverty.
Pursuing hospitality. (Rom. 12:13.) In the letters to Titus and Timothy, the apostle commends this duty specifically to the bishops (Titus 1:8; I Tim. 3:2), but here he enjoins it generally to everybody. Hebrews 13:2: "Do not forget hospitality, for by this some have been pleased to entertain angels," or, according to another version: 'Tor thereby some have entertained angels unawares/*61 i.e., they were not aware that they had entertained angels; for example, Abraham and Lot (Gen. 18:2 ff.;
19:2 ff.). Thus it can happen also today that we give or refuse hospitality to saints without being aware of it. Furthermore, the apostle has here in mind a "hospitality" that is freely extended and not one for which one must pay an innkeeper; hence it is called in Greek philoxenia, which means "love of strangers" or "loving to take care of strangers," as philoxenos means "one who loves strangers." So then the apostle commends here those who extend hospitality from the free love of their heart and not those who are hospitable for mercenary reasons. For this also the heathen do. Nevertheless, it is no "evil work"; properly done, it too is meritorious.
Bless them that persecute you; bless and curse not. Rejoice with them that rejoice; weep with them that weep. Being of one mind one toward another. Not minding high things, but consenting to the humble. (Rom. 12:14-16.)
The apostle speaks of "high" and "humble" things and not of "high" and "humble" persons. So he does also in I Cor. 1:27 and 25: "God chose the weak things of the world that he might confound the strong" and "the foolishness of God is wiser than men."
What he wants to say is this: Do not set your minds on high things, i.e., do not find satisfaction in any relation with those who hold high positions in the world and do not be displeased to have dealings with them that are despised, but have a cordial interest in the humble and take satisfaction in relating yourselves to them. Do this in accordance with the rule of Blessed Augustine: "Do not glory in the high rank of wealthy parents but in the company you keep with your poor brethren."62
61 Faber preferred the version: "Per hanc enim quidam latuerunt angelis hospicio receptis"
Erasmus rejected this and read placuerunt instead of latuerunt.
Luther agreed with him.
62 Cf. Regula Augustini, c. 5 (PL 33, 1379).
ROMANS, CHAP1TR TWELVE We must take note of the fact that our translation uses the word "humile" ("humble") indiscriminately, while in Greek it is one thing to say tapeinosis and another tapeinophrosyne. Tapeinosis means "humility" and tapeinos "humble" or "low," so that "tapeinosis" must be translated by "lowliness" if one wants to pay close attention to the sense of the Latin where humilis means the opposite of "high" or "noble." Tapeinophrosyne is derived from tapeinos and phronein; it means "to be mindful of humble things."63 It signifies humility or the readiness to accommodate oneself to that which is inferior or not to despise that which is lowly, i.e., it is characteristic of one who has a concern for what is base and exposed to contempt and who avoids all that is highly regarded. A man who is of this disposition has humility or, as we say, the virtue of humility. So we read, on the one hand: "because he has regarded the humility" (in Greek: "tapeinosin") "of his handmaiden" (Luke 1:48), and, on the other hand, in Phil. 2:3:
"In humility let each esteem others better than himself" (here the Greek word is "tapeinophrosyne") and in Eph. 4:2: "with humility and mildness" (in Greek: "tapeinophrosynes").
One can also interpret the words "alta" ("high things") and "humilia" ("humble things") in such a way that they are strictly taken as things (in terms of the neuter and not the masculine gender). Then the meaning of the passage would be: one should not strive after something high in order to attract attention and to be regarded as someone important but, rather, after something lowly so that one can remain unnoticed and even despised. Thus interpreted, the saying would be directed against ambitious men who want to make an impression by their involvement in high affairs.
It is superfluous to allude here to the disagreements and animosities that prevail now in the kingdoms, duchies, and towns in their relations with one another, to a greater degree, it would seem, than among the heathen. I refer to the Venetians, the Italians, the French, and the Germans. The Germans give preference to German poets, and the French to French ones. And all this is regarded as being highly virtuous, and one has almost forgotten that we are Christians. Thus the word of Christ is being fulfilled:
"Nation shall rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom"
Be not wise in your own conceits. (Rom. 12:16.) This is directed against opinionated, hardheaded, stiff-necked 63 All these grammatical distinctions seem to be derived from Erasmus' Anno* tationes.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS folk whom, in common speech, we call "standpatters/*64 but the Scripture calls them "stiff-necked" and "unbelieving" (Ex. 32:9;
Deut. 9:13). We all have a strange proneness and propensity toward this fault; and a man who does not have it is very rare indeed. In German, we say "Steifsynnig."65 People of this sort refuse to change their minds, even if they have been refuted by every kind of reasonable argument. Even if one uses the opposite method,65* they stand absolutely pat and wait for the chance to laugh at their opponents when their scheme breaks down. These people cause contention; they upset and disturb the peace; and they destroy spiritual unity. It is this which the apostle has in mind when he says in Eph. 4:3: "Be careful to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace" and, in Phil. 2:2: "being of one accord and of one mind."
To no man rendering evil for evil. (Rom. 12:17.) In Ps. 37:27,65b we read: "Depart from evil." In I Peter 3:9, Blessed Peter explains this to mean that one should not only do no evil but also not return evil for evil. In like manner, we must understand the injunction "Do good" (Ps. 37:27) to mean not only that we should render good for good but also that we should take the initiative in doing good. Also, Christ rebuked his disciples when they wanted to call down fire from heaven, saying, "Do you not know of what spirit you are?" (Luke 9:55). So we, too, are not born "to destroy souls but to save them" (Luke 9:56).
Providing good things, not only in the sight of God, but also in the sight of all men. // it be possible, as much as is in you, have peace with all men. Revenge not yourselves, my dearly beloved, but give place unto wrath, for it is written: Revenge is mine, I will repay, says the Lord. But if your enemy be hungry, give him to eat; if he thirst, give him to drink. (Rom. 12:17-19.)
In I Peter 2:12, we read as follows: "Having your conversation good among the Gentiles, that whereas they speak against you as evildoers, they may, by the good works which they shall behold in you, glorify God." And in I Tim. 5:14: "Give no occasion to the adversary to speak evil." And in Titus 3:1-2: "To be ready to every good work, showing all mildness toward all men." And in I Cor. 10:32 f.: "Be without offense to the Jews, and to the Gen- (perhaps to be translated, "blockheads").
= of an unbending mind.
6 5 a I.e., unreasonableness.
6 5 b Luther writes: Ps. 33 (Vg.).
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE tiles, and to the church of God. As I also in all things please all men," etc., i.e., seek to please all men as far as I can.
From this saying stems the following famous word of Blessed Augustine's:6C "A man who is not concerned to have a good reputation is lacking in good feeling. For you personally a good conscience is sufficient, but for your neighbor your good reputation is a necessity." It is strange to see how often this word is misused:
People quote it in order to cover up their impatience, their contentiousness, and their pride. They understand Blessed Augustine to say that they must not take any insult and that they must not let anyone who disparages them go unpunished. But Blessed
Augustine wants to express exactly what the apostle says here, namely, that one must not do anything that may cause offense by what to all appearances is evil, even though one has a good conscience about it.
At all events, if one has sustained an insult, one should excuse himself, speaking quietly and not angrily, and one should not fight back or get angry or acknowledge the insult as if it were justified. Just so that woman who was beaten seven times bore the wrong that was inflicted on her, but she did not acknowledge any guilt and she did not hurt her reputation, for she did not speak up, though inwardly in her conscience she knew herself to be innocent.67
In contrast to this, there is abroad today the shocking notion68 not only of the liberty of conscience but, what is worse, of the liberty of intention or of the feigned conscience. Everywhere the higher clergy grant dispensations according to their liking. Merely on the evidence of the so-called "good intention," the lower clergy obtain the license to transfer, to exchange, or to combine ecclesiastical benefices and, under cleverly designed strange pretexts, to engage in fraudulent financial transactions.
For, doing this, you shall heap coals of fire upon his head. (Rom.
Blessed Augustine writes:69 "We must understand this saying in the following way: we should induce a man who has done us harm to repent of what he did, and, in this way, we shall do him good.
For such "coals," i.e., benefits, have the power to burn his spirit, i.e., to distress him. This is what is meant by the words of the 6 6 Cf. Augustine, Sermo 355, 1,1.
6 7 T h e reference is to the unjust sentence imposed upon a woman during a persecution in Vercelli: T h e story is told by Jerome in Ep. 1.
6 9 Cf. Augustine, Propos. ex ep. ad Rom., 71.
LUTHER: LECTURES ON ROMANS Psalter: "The sharp arrows of the mighty, with coals that lay waste" (Ps. 120:4). Thus also God converts those whom he converts by showing them his goodness. And this is the only way to convert anyone: to show him love and kindness. For a man who is converted by threats or fear is never truly converted as long as he retains this character of his conversion, for fear will cause him to hate the one who converted him. But a man who is converted by love is ablaze with self-criticism and is angrier with himself than anyone else could possibly be with him, and he is greatly displeased with himself. Moreover, it is not necessary to forbid him anything or to watch him or to demand satisfaction from him, for love will teach him all he needs to do; as soon as he comes under its influence, he will go to seek out the one he offended.
So then, it is the benefactions one has performed for his adversaries that are the "coals of fire." But benefactions for friends are something else. For a friend does not feel about a good deed as an enemy does: he thinks that he is entitled to receive benefits and he is never satisfied by nor astonished at the good will70 of his benefactor. But an enemy feels differently. He is conscious of his own unworthiness and is therefore drawn in his whole being toward his benefactor.
Thus God gave his only-begotten Son for us, his enemies, in order to kindle in us a great love for him and in order to arouse in us a deep hatred for ourselves. Christ is a furnace full of fire,71 according to Isa. 31:9: "The Lord has said it, whose fire is in Zion and his furnace in Jerusalem." We heap "coals of fire" upon the head of our adversary, but God heaps the very fire upon it.
Be not overcome by evil but overcome evil by good. (Rom.
This means: see to it that he who hurts you does not cause you to become like him, namely, a wicked person, nor let his wickedness defeat your goodness. For a man who changes another man by causing him to become like him, while he himself remains unchanged, is a victor over that man. No, by doing good to him, you must make him into a good person who resembles you. Thus your goodness will overcome his wickedness and change him into you.
Now, to be sure, men commonly regard as the victor the one who has the last word and can deal the last blow, whereas, as a matter of fact, he who is the last to inflict pain is the one who is
7 1 "Caminus totus cst Christus." Ficker (p. 474, n. 26) observes that this interpretation cannot be found in the Gi. ord. and in Lyra. It seems to be
ROMANS, CHAPTER TWELVE worse off, for the evil remains with him while the other is done with it. In this sense, Blessed Gregory says: "It is more glorious to escape from anger by keeping silent than to overcome it by replying in kind.1'72 Proverbs 26:4-5: "Answer not a fool according to his folly, lest you be made like him. But answer a fool according to his folly, lest he imagine himself to be wise."
Disregarding the truth we have just been trying to state, some wrongly use this word in order to cover up their own fury. They say it means that a wise man is allowed to answer a fool with foolishness and to render him evil for evil. And also many learned men allege with great erudition that in their judgment this appears to be the meaning of the word. He, therefore, that lets himself "be overcome by evil" and does not correct the fool but even falls victim to the same violent feeling answers the fool according to his folly and thus becomes like him. But one who "overcomes evil with good" answers the fool in such a way that he does not imagine himself to be wise, with the result that he recognizes his folly and detests and bewails it. For if you answer folly with folly, you will never cause the fool to see himself as he is, but your reply in kind will only make him still more of a fool.
But what does it mean "to answer and not to answer according to folly"? I believe that "according to"73 is written here in place of "to"74 or "against."75 When one thing is put "against" another thing, we say: they are "put next to each other."76 And to say
"when opposites are put next to each other, each becomes more distinct" is the same as to measure them against each other or to relate them to each other. So also this expression "according to his folly" does not mean that one should answer a fool with the same folly, but that one should put something else next to it, by comparison with which one can recognize how abominable it is; and this must not be something which by its likeness to folly only enhances it, so that one knows even less how hideous it actually is. For as long as folly sees something like itself, it does not become dissatisfied with itself, but it becomes dissatisfied with itself only if it sees something that has no resemblance to it at all.
?2 This quotation cannot be located in the writings of Gregory I.
™ "luxta" can mean both "according to" and "next to.'* ROMANS, CHAPTER THIRTEEN1 Let every soul be subject to higher powers, for there is no power but from God, and those that are, are ordained of God.2
1 Luther writes in the marginal gloss (WA 56, 123 f., 16 ff.): "Here the apostle instructs the people of Christ how they should conduct themselves toward the higher powers that are without. And in contrast to the Jewish conception, he teaches that they must submit also to evil and unbelieving rulers.
As it is also written in I Peter 2:13 ff., 'Be subject to every human creature, whether it be to the king, as excelling, or to the governors, as sent by him, for so is the will of God/ Even though the rulers are evil and unbelieving, the order of government and their power to rule are nevertheless good and from God. Just as our Lord said to Pilate, to whom he was willing to surrender in order to give us all an example, 'You could have no power against me, unless it were given you from above' (John 19:11). Christians should not refuse, under the pretext of religion, to obey men, especially evil ones.
The Jews thought they should, according to John 8:23: 'We are Abraham's and have never been in bondage to anyone/ He commands them, therefore, that they should honor the higher power and not make the liberty of grace a cloak for their malice. As Peter says, 'As free, and not making liberty a cloak for malice.' (I Peter 2:16.)
"In the preceding chapter, he taught that one must not disturb the order of the church; in this chapter, he teaches that also the secular order must be maintained. For both are of God: it is the purpose of the former to give guidance and peace to the inner man and what concerns him, and it is the purpose of the latter to give guidance to the outer man in his concerns. For, in this life, the inner man cannot be without the outer one."
2 In the marginal gloss, Luther writes as follows (WA 56, 124, 17 ff.): "The Greek text reads as follows: 'The powers that are are ordained by God/
Now this saying is being interpreted in different ways. Stapulensis reads it as follows: 'The powers that are of God are ordered' [Comm. ad Rom.].
Then he makes the comment that power is twofold, namely, ordered and disordered. But I do not like this comment. No power is disordered, but one aspires to it in a disorderly way and handles it in a disorderly way, just as all other goods do not lose' their goodness through evil use; otherwise, money would become evil through theft. Hence the following is a better