1

Fragments on the epistle to the Romans Rom 7

By doing good works, the divine apostle became a spotless image for those being discipled, for which reason he also cried out: Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ. Therefore, what he said is not literally his own: But I know that in my flesh dwells no good thing, nor indeed the saying, Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? But these things and whatever is of such a kind, he says, acting in an assumed persona for the refutation of those who love sin. And just as the divine scripture knows to call men from their own deeds carnal, psychical, spiritual, and by countless other names, so also it knows to call the devil not only Satan and adversary and devil and serpent and lion and Beliar, but also flesh and law and sin and death; for to these we were enslaved through disobedience and not to Christ. For which reason he says: when we were in the flesh, showing that now they are no longer in the flesh, although they are in the flesh, thus not slandering the flesh which we wear, but the flesh homonymously so-called, from which we have also been freed through our having died in Christ, through being buried with him through baptism. Truly from this flesh we were freed; for he adds, saying: But now we have been released from the law of sin, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in newness of spirit and not in oldness of letter. Then thus he began again the hypothetical personification, beginning from What then shall we say? Is the law sin? By no means! until Wretched man that I am, who will deliver me from this body of death? having set forth in the preface his own defense as an unshakable foundation, saying thus: What then? Is the law sin? By no means!, and that the 2 law is holy, and the commandment is holy and just and good. Here he speaks of the law, not the one warring against the law of our mind, but the one that exhorts beforehand, the one that punishes sinners. For which reason he also agreed with it as holy and just and good. Then thus he began again to explain, in accordance with what he said before, prefacing it with a word of thanksgiving thus: I thank God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Then for the condemnation of those who start from such premises and malign the flesh which we wear, he says interrogatively, So then, I myself with my mind serve the law of God, but with my flesh the law of sin? Am I, Paul, divided, in one part serving the law of God, in another part the law of sin? Do I have Christ and Beliar in myself at the same time and in the same way? Am I, the one who says, "It is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me," having lied, do I have sin living in me? I, who addressed others: Do you not know that your bodies are a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, and glorify God in your members, I myself having nothing good in the body? But he is not such, he is not; by no means! For he was formerly a child of wrath and a vessel of wrath, and having changed his manner of life, not his nature, he became a precious chosen vessel. Since, therefore, the personified words are fitting neither for the divine Paul, nor indeed for everyone who has been buried with Christ through baptism, because they have been freed from the so-called flesh; for such will no longer be condemned because of the disobedience of Adam, sin no longer reigns over them, nor the death that is through sin; for they have been buried with the life of Christ who through obedience did away with disobedience, and who by his own voluntary death drove out the death that befell us from it; for he willingly became under the law of disobedience, so that us

1

Fragmenta in epistulam ad Romanos Rom 7

Ἀγαθοεργῶν ὁ θεῖος ἀπόστολος εἰκὼν ἀκηλίδωτος ἐγίνετο τῶν μαθητευομένων, ὅτου χάριν καὶ ἐκέκραξεν· μιμηταί μου γίνεσθε, καθὼς καὶ ἐγὼ Χριστοῦ. τοιγαροῦν οὐκ αὐτοῦ ἐστι κατὰ κυριολεξίαν ὃ ἔφη· οἶδα δὲ ὅτι οὐκ οἰκεῖ ἐν τῇ σαρκί μου τὸ ἀγαθόν, ἀλλ' οὐδὲ τὸ ταλαίπωρος ἐγὼ ἄνθρωπος, τίς με ῥύσεται ἐκ τοῦ σώματος τοῦ θανάτου τούτου; ἀλλὰ ταῦτα καὶ ὅσα τοιαῦτα ἐν παρενθέτῳ προσώπῳ ὑποκρινόμενος λέγει πρὸς ἔλεγχον τῶν φιλαμαρτημόνων. ὥσπερ δὲ τοὺς ἀνθρώπους ἀπὸ τῶν σφῶν πράξεων σαρκικούς, ψυχικούς, πνευματικοὺς καὶ ἑτέροις μυρίοις ὀνόμασι καλεῖν οἶδεν ἡ θεία γραφή, οὕτω δὴ καὶ τὸν διάβολον οὐ μόνον σατανᾶν καὶ ἀντικείμενον καὶ διάβολον καὶ ὄφιν καὶ λέοντα καλεῖν οἶδεν καὶ Βελίαρ, ἀλλὰ γὰρ καὶ σάρκα καὶ νόμον καὶ ἁμαρτίαν καὶ θάνατον· τούτοις γὰρ ἐδουλεύσαμεν διὰ τῆς παρακοῆς καὶ οὐ τῷ Χριστῷ. ὅτου χάριν λέγει· ὅτε ἦμεν ἐν τῇ σαρκί, δηλῶν ὡς νυνὶ οὐκέτι ὄντων αὐτῶν ἐν σαρκί, καίπερ ὄντων ἐν σαρκί, ὡς οὐκ ἄρα τὴν σάρκα ἣν περικείμεθα διαβάλλων, ἀλλὰ τὴν ὁμωνύμως αὐτῇ λεγομένην σάρκα, ἧς καὶ ἀπηλλάγημεν διὰ τὸ ἀποθανεῖν ἡμᾶς ἐν Χριστῷ διὰ τοῦ συνταφῆναι αὐτῷ διὰ τοῦ βαπτίσματος. ὄντως ταύτης ἠλευθερώθημεν τῆς σαρκός· ἐπιφέρει γὰρ λέγων· νυνὶ δὲ κατηργήθημεν ἀπὸ τοῦ νόμου τῆς ἁμαρτίας, ἀποθανόντες ἐν ᾧ κατειχόμεθα, ὥστε δουλεύειν ἡμᾶς ἐν καινότητι πνεύματος καὶ οὐ παλαιότητι γράμματος. εἰθ' οὕτως ἤρξατο πάλιν τῆς καθ' ὑπόθεσιν προσωποποιΐας, ἀρξάμενος ἀπὸ τοῦ τί οὖν ἐροῦμεν; ὁ νόμος ἁμαρτία; μὴ γένοιτο· ἕως τοῦ ταλαίπωρος ἐγὼ ἄνθρωπος, τίς με ῥύσεται ἐκ τοῦ σώματος τοῦ θανάτου τούτου; ἄσειστον θεμέλιον προθέμενος ἐν προλόγῳ τὴν ἑαυτοῦ ἀπολογίαν οὕτω λέγων· τί οὖν; ὁ νόμος ἁμαρτία; μὴ γένοιτο, καὶ ὅτι ὁ μὲν 2 νόμος ἅγιος, καὶ ἡ ἐντολὴ ἁγία καὶ δικαία καὶ ἀγαθή. ἐνταῦθα νόμον λέγει οὐ τὸν ἀντιστρατευόμενον τῷ νόμῳ τοῦ νοὸς ἡμῶν, ἀλλὰ τὸν προπαραινετικόν, τὸν τοὺς ἁμαρτάνοντας κολάζοντα. ὅτου χάριν καὶ συνεψηφίσατο αὐτῷ ὡς ὁσίῳ καὶ δικαίῳ καὶ ἀγαθῷ. εἰθ' οὕτως ἤρξατο πάλιν ἐπιλύειν ἀκολούθως οἷς ἀνωτέρω προεῖπεν, λόγον εὐχάριστον προοιμιασάμενος οὕτως· εὐχαριστῶ τῷ θεῷ διὰ Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τοῦ κυρίου ἡμῶν. εἶτα πρὸς κατάκρισιν τῶν τοιάδε ἀφορμαζομένων καὶ κακιζόντων ἃς περικείμεθα σάρκας, λέγει ἐπερωτηματικῶς ἆρα οὖν αὐτὸς ἐγὼ τῷ μὲν νοῒ δουλεύω νόμῳ θεοῦ, τῇ δὲ σαρκὶ νόμῳ ἁμαρτίας; ἆρα κἀγὼ Παῦλος μεμέρισμαι, πῆ μὲν δουλεύων νόμῳ θεοῦ, πῆ δὲ νόμῳ ἁμαρτίας; ἆρα τὸν Χριστὸν καὶ τὸν Βελίαρ ἅμα καὶ κατὰ τὸ αὐτὸ ἔχω ἐν ἐμαυτῷ; ἆρα ἐγὼ ὁ λέγων· ζῶ δὲ οὐκέτι ἐγώ, ζῇ δὲ ἐν ἐμοὶ Χριστός, ψευσάμενος τὴν ἁμαρτίαν ζῶσαν ἔχω ἐν ἐμαυτῷ; ὁ ἄλλοις προσφωνήσας· οὐκ οἴδατε ὅτι τὰ σώματα ὑμῶν ναὸς τοῦ ἐν ὑμῖν ἁγίου πνεύματός ἐστιν, καὶ δοξάσατε τὸν θεὸν ἐν τοῖς μέλεσιν ὑμῶν, αὐτὸς ἐγὼ ἐν τῷ σώματι οὐδὲν ἔχων ἀγαθόν; ἀλλ' οὐκ ἔστι τοιοῦτος, οὐκ ἔστιν· μὴ γένοιτο· τέκνον γὰρ ὀργῆς καὶ σκεῦος ὀργῆς πρίν, μεταβαλὼν τὸν τρόπον οὐ τὴν φύσιν, ἐγένετο τίμιον ἐκλογῆς σκεῦος. ἐπεὶ οὖν τὰ προσωποποιηθέντα ῥήματα οὔτε τῷ θεσπεσίῳ Παύλῳ ἁρμόζει, οὔτε μὴν παντὶ τῷ συνταφέντι Χριστῷ διὰ τοῦ βαπτίσματος, διότι τῆς ὀνομαζομένης σαρκὸς ἠλευθερώθησαν· οὐ γὰρ ἔτι κατακριθήσονται οἱ τοιοῦτοι διὰ τὴν τοῦ Ἀδὰμ παρακοήν, οὐκέτι βασιλεύει αὐτῶν ἡ ἁμαρτία, οὐχ ὁ θάνατος ὁ διὰ τῆς ἁμαρτίας· συνετάφησαν γὰρ τῇ ζωῇ τοῦ Χριστοῦ διὰ τῆς ὑπακοῆς τὴν παρακοὴν ἐξαφανίσαντος, καὶ τῷ ἑκουσίῳ ἑαυτοῦ θανάτῳ τὸν ἐξ αὐτῆς ἐπισυμβάντα ἡμῖν θάνατον ἐκκρουσαμένῳ· γέγονε γὰρ ἑκὼν ὑπὸ νόμον τὸν τῆς παρακοῆς, ἵνα ἡμᾶς