ACC ~ Romans 10 v1 - 11

OVERVIEW:

Paul does everything he can to find something good to say about the Jews, but in the end he is forced to admit that even their good qualities have been distorted because of their unbelief. Christ brings the law to an end, but this is recognized and realized only in those who believe in him. Those who reject him and cling to the law are destroyed along with the law they trust in. The Fathers were unwilling to accept the idea that a person could be saved by keeping the law. They therefore interpreted Romans 10:5 to mean that the law would keep people safe in this life but would not grant them safe passage into eternity.

Those who know Christ by faith understand that he is everywhere but above all that he is present in our hearts and on our lips. There is no need to go in search of him but only to do what he commands. A Christian is saved by confessing Christ—a notion that came to be understood as confessing the creed from the heart at baptism. Those who believe in Christ will be rewarded on the day of judgment, when others will be punished. Jews and Gentiles will be treated alike, for it is those who call on the name of the Lord who will be saved.

10:1 | Praying That the Jews Will Be Saved

NO HATRED FOR JUDAISM. AMBROSIASTER: Since Paul wants to liberate the Jews from the law, which is a veil over their faces, but does not want to appear to desire this out of any hatred for Judaism, he shows his love for them and says many good things about the law. But he teaches that the time for obeying the law has come to an end and by doing this bears witness that he is concerned for them, if only they will listen to him and not assume that he is their enemy. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

MY HEART’S DESIRE AND PRAYER. CHRYSOSTOM: Paul continues to demonstrate his deep-seated good will toward the Jews. … He even does his best to find excuses for them, but in the end he is overcome by the nature of the facts and cannot do so. HOMILIES ON ROMANS 17.

AUGUSTINE: Here Paul begins to speak of his hope for the Jews, lest the Gentiles in their turn become condescending toward them. For just as the pride of the Jews had to be countered because they gloried in their works, so also with the Gentiles, lest they become proud at having been preferred over the Jews. AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 66.

PELAGIUS: Here Paul shows that he prays for his enemies not only with the tongue but also with the heart. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

10:2 | A Zeal for God

ZEAL FOR GOD BUT NOT ACCORDING TO KNOWLEDGE. ORIGEN: If someone has a love for God but does not know that love must be patient, kind, not envious, not acting wrongly, not puffed up, not ambitious, not seeking its own and so on; if he does not have these things in his love but only loves God in his emotions, then it may rightly be said of him that he has a love for God but not according to knowledge. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

AMBROSE: I know that you [Emperor Theodo-sius I] are God-fearing, merciful, gentle and calm, that you have the faith and fear of God in your heart, but often some things escape our notice. Some people have a zeal for God but not according to knowledge. Care must be taken … lest this condition steal upon pious souls. LETTER 2.

CHRYSOSTOM: Should not the Jews be excused if they have erred because of some misguided zeal? Notice how Paul goes on to remove this excuse from them. HOMILIES ON ROMANS 17.

PELAGIUS: The Jews are zealous in pursuing the law, but they do not understand that Christ came according to the law and that they cannot be justified by the law. Indeed, it is risky to do something without knowledge, because it often turns out contrary to what was expected. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

PRAISE WITH A HOOK. THEODORET OF CYR: Paul adds criticism to his praise, just as food sometimes contains a hook, so that they might derive some benefit from what he had to say. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS.

GENNADIUS OF CONSTANTINOPLE: Having once been one of them himself, Paul understood and bore witness that the Jews fought against the gospel out of zeal for God, yet it was a zeal uninformed by true knowledge. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

10:3 | Ignorance of Righteousness from God

WHETHER THEIR IGNORANCE WAS DUE TO MALICE. AMBROSIASTER: Paul says that the Jews did not accept Christ because they were mistaken, not because there was any malice on their part. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

CHRYSOSTOM: Once again, ignorance would seem to be an excuse for pardoning them. But it turns out to lead only to a stronger accusation. … It was from small-mindedness and a desire for power that they erred rather than from ignorance, and even their own righteousness was not based on keeping the law. HOMILIES ON ROMANS 17.

SEEKING TO ESTABLISH THEIR OWN RIGHTEOUSNESS. AUGUSTINE: Paul said this about the Jews who because of their self-confidence rejected grace and as a result did not believe in Christ. The Jews, he says, seek to establish a righteousness of their own that comes from the law, not that the law was established by them but rather that they had placed their righteousness in the law which comes from God by supposing that they were able to fulfill this law by themselves. For they were ignorant of the righteousness of God, not that righteousness whereby God is righteous but the one which comes to man from God. GRACE AND FREE WILL 12.24.

[PSEUDO-]CONSTANTIUS: By “their own righteousness” Paul means the law of the Pharisees. For the sacrifices of the law and the other things which were a shadow of the truth, which were to be fulfilled in Christ, ceased to operate once he had come. But this they did not want to believe. The apostle was right to talk of their own righteousness, because it was not of God but of themselves. THE HOLY LETTER OF ST. PAUL TO THE ROMANS.

THEY DID NOT SUBMIT. PELAGIUS: Because the Jews did not know that God justifies by faith alone and because they thought they were righteous by the works of a law they did not keep, they refused to submit themselves to the forgiveness of sins, to prevent the appearance of having been sinners, as it is written: “But the Pharisees, rejecting God’s purpose for themselves, refused to be baptized with John’s baptism.” PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

THEODORET OF CYR: When Paul talks about the Jews’ own righteousness he means their inappropriate way of keeping the law. For they were trying to keep something which was already out of date. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS.

10:4 | Christ Is the End of the Law

THE INTENT OF THE LAW. CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA: The Jews did not understand the intention of the law and so failed to practice it. They made up their own version and thought that that was what the law intended. They had no faith in the prophetic power of the law. They followed the bare letter, not the inner meaning—fear, not faith. STROMATA 2.9.42.5.

THE END OF THE LAW. IRENAEUS: How is Christ the end of the law if he is not also the cause of it? For he who has brought in the end also created the beginning. AGAINST HERESIES 4.12.3.

ORIGEN: Christ is the end of the law, but only for those who believe. Those who do not believe and who do not have Christ do not have the end of the law and therefore cannot come to justification. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

NOVATIAN: There was indeed a time long ago when attention was to be paid to these shadows and figures prescribing abstinence from foods pronounced good in their creation but forbidden by the law. When Christ, “the end of the law,” came, he cleared up all the ambiguities of the law and all those things which antiquity had shrouded in mystery. JEWISH FOODS 5.1-2.

APOLLINARIS OF LAODICEA: Christ furnishes believers with holy righteousness, because he is “the end of the law,” and the law prepared the way for Christ by showing that he was the fulfillment of it, the salvation of mankind. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

EVERYONE WHO HAS FAITH MAY BE JUSTIFIED. CHRYSOSTOM: There is only one righteousness, which finds its fulfillment in Christ. … Even someone who has failed to keep the law properly will be righteous if he has Christ … but the man who does not have Christ is a stranger to the law as well. HOMILIES ON ROMANS 17.

PELAGIUS: On the day that one believes in Christ it is as if one has fulfilled the whole law. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

SEVERIAN: This does not mean that Christ is a part of the law but rather that he is the beginning of a new life. The law has come to an end; it has ceased. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

GENNADIUS OF CONSTANTINOPLE: Christ fulfilled the law’s purpose by granting the righteousness which comes by faith in him to all those who accepted him. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

10:5 | Righteousness Based on Law

SHALL LIVE BY IT IN THIS LIFE. ORIGEN: Moses did not say that the man who practices the righteousness of the law will live forever but only that he will live by it in this life. For Christ is the end of the law, as the apostle says, and without Christ it is impossible to fulfill the righteousness of the law. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

JEROME: Scripture says not that he will find life through the law, in the sense that through it he will live in heaven but that he will find life through it to the extent that what he will reap what he deserves in this world. SERMONS ON THE GOSPEL OF MARK 76.

THE ONE WHO PRACTICES THE LAW’S RIGHTEOUSNESS. AMBROSIASTER: Paul says this because the righteousness of the law of Moses did not make people guilty as long as they kept it. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

DIODORE: Paul says that the man who fulfilled the law would enjoy the good things promised by it, that is to say, “a land flowing with milk and honey.” PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

CHRYSOSTOM: In fact this has proved to be impossible, and therefore the law’s righteousness has failed those who tried to keep it. HOMILIES ON ROMANS 17.

NO ONE KEEPS THE LAW PERFECTLY WITHOUT CHRIST. PELAGIUS: Moses distinguished between two kinds of righteousness, the righteousness of faith and the righteousness of works. The latter justifies the suppliant by deeds, but the former justifies by belief alone. … In this age no one keeps the law perfectly without Christ. Believing in him is also implied in the law. On account of this passage some think that the Jews have earned only this present life by the works of the law, but the words of the Lord show that this is not true. When he was asked about eternal life the Lord stipulated the commandments of the law: “If you would enter life, keep the commandments.” From this we understand that one who kept the law at that time had everlasting life. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

ALL COMMANDMENTS REQUIRED. GENNADIUS OF CONSTANTINOPLE: Comparing the law with the glory of grace, Paul says that even Moses could not have been justified by the law unless he fulfilled all the commandments of the law. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

10:6 | Righteousness Based on Faith

CONTRASTING TWO KINDS OF RIGHTEOUSNESS. [PSEUDO-]CONSTANTIUS: Wanting to demonstrate the difference between the righteousness of the law and the righteousness of faith, the apostle calls Moses as his witness. Moses said of the righteousness of the law that the man who practiced it would live by it. But concerning the righteousness of faith, he says: “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’ ” which means: Do not doubt but believe the command which Christ will announce in the future, when he will come to give you righteousness by faith. THE HOLY LETTER OF ST. PAUL TO THE ROMANS.

MOSES AS GOD’S MOUTHPIECE. THEODORET OF CYR: These are the words not of Moses but of the God of all things, who was using Moses as his mouthpiece. INTERPRETATION OF THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS.

10:7 | No Limitations on Christ

CHRIST NOT LIMITED TO A PARTICULAR PLACE. ORIGEN: We are not to think that Christ is in heaven in such a way as to be absent from the depths. … Furthermore, if someone should go down into the depths in his mind and thought, thinking that Christ is contained there and that he can somehow be called back from the dead … let him realize that he ought to think of Christ as he thinks of the Word, the truth and the righteousness of God. These things are not limited to a particular place but are present everywhere, nor can they be called up from the lower depths, but they can be grasped only by the mind and the intellect. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

WITHOUT DOUBT. AMBROSIASTER: The quotation is from Deuteronomy [30:12], but the last phrase is the apostle’s own addition. He says that someone who does not doubt about the hope which is in Christ has the righteousness of faith. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

DESCENT AND ASCENT. DIODORE: The Word of God leaves believers in no doubt either about the descent of the Lord from heaven for our sake or about the resurrection from the dead and the ascent into heaven. PAULINE COMMENTARY FROM THE GREEK CHURCH.

10:8 | The Word of Faith Is Near Us

THE WORD IS NEAR YOU. ORIGEN: Here we have to bear in mind the important distinction between what is possible in theory and what is realized in practice. … Christ, who is the Word of God, is potentially near us and near everyone, but this is only realized in practice when I confess with my mouth that Christ is Lord and when I believe in my heart that God has raised him from the dead. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

ORIGEN: By this Paul indicates that Christ is in the heart of all men by virtue of his being the Word or reason [logos] embedded in all things by sharing in which all men are rational. ON FIRST PRINCIPLES 1.3.6.

FAITH NOT FOREIGN TO OUR NATURE. AMBROSIASTER: This is said in Deuteronomy [30:14] in order to show that belief [in Christ] is not all that foreign to our mind or to our nature. Even though we cannot see him with our eyes, what we believe is not out of harmony with the nature of our minds and our way of speaking. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

PELAGIUS: Historically speaking, Moses said this about the law, but the apostle applies it to Christ, because the law was neither in heaven nor in the abyss. Or it may mean that Paul is ordering them to meditate constantly on the lawso that they may find Christ in it. The “word of faith which we preach” is the New Testament. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

10:9 | Confessing Jesus Is Lord

AUGUSTINE: The creed builds up in you what you ought to believe and confess in order to be saved. SERMONS FOR THE RECENT CONVERTS, HOMILY 214.1.

PELAGIUS: The testimony of the heart is the confession of the mouth. “You will be saved” from past transgressions, not from future ones. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

10:10 | Belief and Confession

CONSISTENCY NEEDED. IGNATIUS: It is better for a man to be silent and be a Christian than to talk and not be one. … Men believe with the heart and confess with the mouth, the one unto righteousness, the other unto salvation. It is good to teach, if the teacher also does what he says. EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS 15.

HEART AND MOUTH. AMBROSE: With these twin trumpets of heart and mouth we arrive at that holy land, viz., the grace of resurrection. So let them always sound together in harmony for us, that we may always hear the voice of God. Let the utterances of the angels and prophets arouse us and move us to hasten to higher things. ON THE DEATH OF HIS BROTHER SATYRUS 2.112.

THE RULE OF FAITH. AMBROSIASTER: What Paul previously spoke about he now makes clear. The rule of faith is to believe that Jesus is Lord and not to be ashamed to confess that God raised him from the dead and has taken him up to heaven with his body, whence he will come again. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

CHRYSOSTOM: The understanding must be strongly fixed in pious faith, and the tongue must herald forth by its confession the solid resolution of the mind. BAPTISMAL INSTRUCTIONS 1.19.

THE SIMPLICITY OF CONFESSION. AUGUSTINE: The innumerable and multiple rites by which the Jewish people had been oppressed have been taken away, so that in the mercy of God we might attain salvation by the simplicity of a confession of faith. AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 67.

A CONSISTENT PROFESSION. AUGUSTINE: Did not almost all those who disowned Christ in the presence of their persecutors keep in their hearts what they believed about him? Yet, for not making with their mouth profession of faith unto salvation they perished, except those who repented and lived again. AGAINST LYING 6.13.

BAPTISMAL PROFESSION. AUGUSTINE: This condition is fulfilled at the time of baptism, when faith and profession of faith are all that is demanded for one to be baptized. THE CHRISTIAN LIFE 13.

AUGUSTINE: This profession of faith is the creed which you will be going over in your thoughts and repeating from memory. THE CREED 1.

AUGUSTINE: We who expect to reign in everlasting righteousness can only be saved from this wicked world if while for our neighbor’s salvation we profess with our lips the faith which we carry about in our heart, we exercise a pious and careful vigilance to see that this faith in us is not sullied in any point of belief by the deceitful snares of heretics. FAITH AND THE CREED 1.1.

PELAGIUS: If faith avails for righteousness and confession for salvation, there is no distinction between the Jew who believes and the Gentile who believes. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

10:11 | No Shame for Believers

ADAM HID HIMSELF. ORIGEN: If no one who believes in him will be put to shame, it is clear that those who sin will be, just as Adam sinned and was ashamed and hid himself. So whoever incurs the shame of sin obviously does not believe. COMMENTARY ON THE EPISTLE TO THE ROMANS.

THE DAY OF JUDGMENT. AMBROSIASTER: On the day of judgment, when everything will be examined and all false opinions and teachings will be overthrown, then those who believe in Christ will rejoice, seeing it revealed to all that what they believed is true and what was thought to be foolish was wise. For they will look at others and see that they alone are glorified and wise, when they had been considered contemptible and crazy. This will be the real test, when rewards and condemnation are decreed. COMMENTARY ON PAUL’S EPISTLES.

THE PENITENT THIEF. [PSEUDO-]CONSTANTIUS: Take for instance that thief who was crucified next to Christ and who confessed Christ with his heart and his mouth (the two parts of him which were free) and thus deserved to hear the reply: “Today you will be with me in Paradise.” THE HOLY LETTER OF ST. PAUL TO THE ROMANS.

BELIEVERS NOT PUT TO SHAME. PELAGIUS: This applies not only to the Jews but to everyone. Do not put believers to shame, therefore, on account of their former actions, since the Scripture says that they cannot be put to shame. PELAGIUS’S COMMENTARY ON ROMANS.

CYRIL OF ALEXANDRIA: Israel ought not to suppose that salvation by faith is a blessing peculiar to it. For Scripture says that everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved, whether Jew or Gentile, whether slave or free. The universal God saves everyone without distinction, because all things belong to him. Thus we say that all things are recapitulated in Christ. EXPLANATION OF THE LETTER TO THE ROMANS.