Chapter 13 [XI.]—Meaning of the Apostle’s Phrase “The Reign of Death.”

“Nevertheless,” says he, “death reigned from Adam even unto Moses,”44    Rom. v. 14.—that is to say, from the first man even to the very law which was promulged by the divine authority, because even it was unable to abolish the reign of death. Now death must be understood “to reign,” whenever the guilt of sin45    Reatus peccati. so dominates in men that it prevents their attainment of that eternal life which is the only true life, and drags them down even to the second death which is penally eternal. This reign of death is only destroyed in any man by the Saviour’s grace, which wrought even in the saints of the olden time, all of whom, though previous to the coming of Christ in the flesh, yet lived in relation to His assisting grace, not to the letter of the law, which only knew how to command, but not to help them. In the Old Testament, indeed, that was hidden (conformably to the perfectly just dispensation of the times) which is now revealed in the New Testament. Therefore “death reigned from Adam unto Moses,” in all who were not assisted by the grace of Christ, that in them the kingdom of death might be destroyed, “even in those who had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression,”46    Rom. v. 14. that is, who had not yet sinned of their own individual will, as Adam did, but had drawn from him original sin, “who is the figure of him that was to come,”47    Rom. v. 14. because in him was constituted the form of condemnation to his future progeny, who should spring from him by natural descent; so that from one all men were born to a condemnation, from which there is no deliverance but in the Saviour’s grace. I am quite aware, indeed, that several Latin copies of the Scriptures read the passage thus: “Death reigned from Adam to Moses over them who have sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression;”48    Comp. Epist. 157, n. 19. [Some few Greek copies have come down to us (e.g. 67**) which omit the “not,” but no Latin copy (unless d* be an exception), although other Latin writers (e.g. Ambrosiaster) testify to their former existence.—W.] but even this version is referred by those who so read it to the very same purport, for they understood those who have sinned in him to have sinned after the similitude of Adam’s transgression; so that they are created in his likeness, not only as men born of a man, but as sinners born of a sinner, dying ones of a dying one, and condemned ones to a condemned one. However, the Greek copies from which the Latin version was made, have all, without exception or nearly so, the reading which I first adduced.

CAPUT XI.

13. Regnum mortis quid apud Apostolum.---Sed regnavit, inquit, mors ab Adam usque ad Moysen: id est, a primo homine usque ad ipsam etiam legem quae divinitus promulgata est, quia nec ipsa potuit regnum mortis auferre. Regnum enim mortis vult intelligi, quando ita dominatur in hominibus reatus peccati, ut eos ad vitam aeternam, quae vera vita est, venire non sinat, sed ad secundam etiam, quae poenaliter aeterna est, mortem trahat. Hoc regnum mortis sola in quolibet homine gratia destruit Salvatoris, quae operata est etiam in antiquis sanctis, quicumque antequam in carne Christus veniret, ad ejus tamen adjuvantem gratiam, non ad legis litteram, quae jubere tantum, non adjuvare poterat, pertinebant. Hoc namque occultabatur in vetere Testamento pro temporum dispensatione justissima, quod nunc revelatur in novo. Ergo in omnibus regnavit mors ab Adam usque ad Moysen, qui Christi gratia non adjuti sunt, ut in eis regnum mortis destrueretur: etiam in eis qui non peccaverunt in similitudinem praevaricationis Adae; id est, qui nondum sua et propria voluntate sicut ille peccaverunt, sed ab illo peccatum originale traxerunt: qui est forma futuri; quia in illo constituta est forma condemnationis futuris posteris, qui ejus propagine crearentur, ut ex uno omnes in condemnationem nascerentur, ex qua non liberat nisi gratia Salvatoris. Scio quidem plerosque latinos codices sic habere : Regnavit mors ab Adam usque ad Moysen in eos qui peccaverunt in similitudinem praevaricationis Adae, quod etiam ipsum, qui ita legunt, ad eumdem referunt intellectum; ut in similitudinem praevaricationis Adae peccasse accipiant, qui in illo 0117 peccaverunt, ut ei similes crearentur, sicut ex homine homines, ita ex peccatore peccatores, ex morituro morituri, damnatoque damnati . Graeci autem codices, unde in latinam linguam interpretatio facta est, aut omnes aut pene omnes, id quod a me primo positum est, habent.