For I know that many empty heretics have boasted much that is impious and foolish. 'For by hope we are saved.' By hope, he says, salvation is hoped for, not yet in the reality itself; just as it is said to the Corinthians: 'We walk by faith, not by sight.' We believe that we shall be what we are not yet. 'But hope that is seen is not hope. For what a man sees, why does he hope for?' What is seen is not hoped for, because it is already held. 'But if we hope for that which we see not,' therefore patience through faith has a great reward, because it hopes for what it does not see; and thus we are secure, as though we had already received what we have not yet received. 'By patience we wait for it.' Hope cannot exist without patience. 'And in like manner the Spirit also helpeth.'
According to this same waiting, the Spirit helps the weakness of our prayer, so that we may pray for the things which are God's, and, on account of hope, may ask for the things which are pleasing to God. 'Our weakness.' Our prayer is weak, unless it be not only helped by the Holy Spirit but even inspired by Him. For what should we pray? Often the things we think prosperous are harmful; therefore they are not granted, since God provides better, just as Paul three times besought the Lord. 'We know not what we should pray for as we ought.' Because now we see through a glass, as he says to the Corinthians: 'If any man think that he knoweth anything, he hath not yet known as he ought to know.' 'But the Spirit himself asketh for us.' How does He tempt us, that He may know—that is, that He may make us to know—as it is said:
'He built the house at whose command it is made,' so also the Holy Spirit intercedes, that is, He pours forth in us the asking for the things which are God's, by inspiring, or bestowing, or working in us. 'With unspeakable groanings.' He makes us groan with other, mute groanings: because as much as we cannot ask with the mouth, so much we implore with groanings. 'But he who searcheth the hearts knoweth what the Spirit desireth.' Here he has named the grace of the Spirit the Holy Spirit, just as there: 'If I pray in a tongue, my spirit prayeth,' where the kind of tongue or of speech is understood. 'Because it is according to God.' Because He desires heavenly and divine things. 'He asketh for the saints.' For holy things, not human, nor earthly. 'And we know that to them that love God all things work together unto good.'
Whatever we shall have done, or shall have suffered for love's sake, all things run together for us unto reward: whether they 'work together,' that is, increase; or by God's help are turned against adversity into prosperity, according to that word: 'Whatsoever thou shalt do shall prosper.' 'To them that according to' His purpose. Just as He also calls us elect before the foundation of the world. 'According to His purpose they are called saints.' It is God's purpose that, without the works of the law, or any other merits, He should justify the ungodly by faith alone—which faith is not from nature, but is the gift of God: among the rest, the fruit of the Spirit is also faith. For not all who are called are called according to His purpose; since 'many are called, but few are chosen.'
These, therefore, are called according to His purpose, who are also chosen before the foundation of the world. 'For whom He foreknew He also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of His Son.' He predestinated, so that he who by His gift was conformed to Him in life should be conformed also in glory: He 'who transformed the body of our lowliness, conformable to the body of His glory.' Whence also John: 'We shall be like Him.' 'That He might be the firstborn among many brethren.' The firstborn from the dead, because He has many before Himself. 'And whom He predestinated.' Here predestination is understood as belonging to times, not to the men of this particular time: that is, both before the law, under the law, and under grace. But whosoever were then saved, were saved by the grace of God, as the Apostle says:
'Having the same spirit of faith.' 'These He also called.' He called men in this time unto faith, because with Him, before the world existed, they had already been called. They are called through the inspiration of faith, and through exhortation, and by divine working; they are justified through baptism, glorified through the reward, whether in the present through virtue; but all these are gifts of God: for he says elsewhere, 'That He would count you worthy of your calling'; and that other saying, 'Who called you in the grace of God,' being 'justified freely,' who 'worketh all in all': because He Himself rescued us from the power of darkness and translated us into the kingdom of His love—not His own, but that of the Son. 'And whom He called, them He also justified; and whom He justified, them He also magnified.'
'It is a great thing for thee to be called my servant': those whom, after the resurrection, He will glorify. All those things have already been done—He foreknew, predestinated, called, and justified. Since all have already been foreknown and predestinated, and many have already been called and justified. But as to what he says, 'Them He also glorified,' that glory is here to be understood of which the same one speaks: 'When Christ, your life, shall appear, then shall you also appear with Him in glory.' 'What then shall we say to these things? If God be for us, who is against us?' If God helps us, who shall harm us? If God wishes to justify us freely, who says: It cannot be done?
He wishes to show that what we have received is a great thing, and that no one prevails to hinder the will of God, who does what He wills. 'He who spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all: how hath He not also, with Him, given us all things?' He spared Him not, by permitting Him to be delivered up, so that freedom of choice unto sinning might remain even to those who delivered Him, and that He might show us an example of patience. For what has Christ dearer that He would deny us, who for us spared not His own Son? Moreover, He was delivered up not only by the Father, but by Himself, as he says elsewhere: 'Who delivered Himself an offering and a sacrifice to God for an odour of sweetness.' 'Who shall accuse the elect of God?' Who shall accuse those whom God has chosen, and has made to believe in Him?
God proves by signs and mighty works that they are already just, against those who say: There are none just except those whom the law has justified—when at that time all things were shut up under sin. If you were to pronounce it as though affirming, how great a perversity would arise? Thus therefore it must be pronounced, as if it were said: 'Is it God who justifieth anything?'—so that it may be understood: Surely it is not God who justifies? Understanding: Is it not God who through them does signs and wonders, who has justified them freely? 'Who is he that condemneth?' As if he asks: Who is he that condemns? or that dismisses? It must be understood: Surely not Christ? And he answers: Does He who died for us Himself condemn us? God forbid. Nay rather, He who also rose again, and is in the blessedness of the Father.
He who, as in the form of a servant, entreats the Father for us, and also, together with the Father, hears us—will He Himself accuse or condemn us? 'Christ Jesus who died'—nay, rather who rose again. He loved us so greatly that He even died for us. 'Who is at the right hand of God.' Where He is, thither we too shall come; he treats of Him according to the manhood, according to which He died, and was made 'the firstborn from the dead.' 'Who also maketh intercession for us.' The Arians are wont to say: He who intercedes is the lesser. It must be answered that the Lord suffers no forgetfulness, so that He is ever mindful on behalf of those whom He Himself has justified.
But He is said to intercede in this, that He ever shows and offers to the Father the man, whom He has taken up and glorified, as it were our pledge, as the true and eternal Priest. Through which manhood He is also called the lesser: just as soul and body, of diverse substance, are one man, so God and man, of diverse substance, are one Christ. And by this, since He Himself is one of diverse substance, He in a certain manner petitions Himself, He in a certain manner hears for us. 'Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or famine, or persecution, or nakedness, or peril, or the sword?' as it is written. The Jews wished to separate them from Christ, wishing to recall them to the keeping of the law.
After benefits and promises so great and so illustrious, who will give or promise us any such thing, that we should with reason depart from Christ, who even laid down His own soul for us? 'For thy sake we are put to death all the day long; we are counted as sheep for the slaughter.' 'Blessed are ye when they persecute you for my sake.' And, for thy sake, he says, not for any crime, are we afflicted with death; and for thy sake we endure death, when we could render like for like. In us most of all is this testimony fulfilled, to whom it is not even permitted to resist, following the example of our Master and Lord, who was 'led as a sheep to the slaughter.' But 'in all these things we overcome, because of Him that loved us.'
We reduce all these tribulations to nothing on account of Him who so greatly loved us, that He died for us: and when we die for His name, then most of all do we triumph. 'For I am sure that neither death, nor life.' I am sure: because neither if anyone threaten me with death, nor if he promise me eternal life. 'Nor angels.' Not even if he say himself an angel sent from God: as he himself says to the Galatians. 'Nor principalities, nor things present.' Not even if he confer honour in the present. 'Nor things to come.' Nor if he promise present goods, and in the future glory. 'Nor might.' Not even if he work mighty deeds. 'Nor height.' Of the kingdom of heaven or of wisdom. 'Nor depth.' Nor the depth of knowledge, or hell.
'Nor any other creature shall be able to separate us.' He named almost every creature, and was not content with these, and added: Even if there be any other creature, it shall not be able to separate us from the love of Christ. Whence it must be considered with what faith one has believed in Christ. 'From the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.' The love of Christ does not consist in this alone, if one says that he loves Him, but also in that whatever is done to His saints, He Himself testifies is done to Himself, saying: 'He that receiveth you, receiveth me,' etc. And John says: 'If thou lovest not thy brother whom thou seest, how canst thou love the Lord whom thou seest not?' Nay, He willed that the love of God be shown in the brethren. 'For God,' he says, 'is love,' and the rest. And the Lord:
'In this,' He says, 'shall it be known that you are my disciples, if you love one another.' 'If you love me, keep my commandments.' And: 'He who heareth my words and doeth them, he it is that loveth me.' CHAPTER IX. 'I speak the truth.' Some say that, being about to say an incredible thing—namely, that he would wish to be anathema from Christ for Israel's sake—he first satisfies them with a certain attestation. He satisfies the Jews that he does not hate them, but is exceedingly grieved on their account, because they refuse to believe in Christ, who had been promised to them. 'In Christ I lie not.' Whoever therefore has been baptized, whether he speaks truth or falsehood, whatever he does, he does it in Christ, of whom he is a member. And whoever sins in baptism, sins in Christ, as he says:
'Thus sinning against the brethren, and wounding their weak consciences, you sin against Christ.' 'My conscience bearing me witness.' He speaks truly whose conscience bears witness, and does not convict him of a lie. 'In the Holy Spirit.' Not feignedly. 'That I have great sadness, and continual sorrow in my heart.' Because I have seen them not believing in God. 'For I myself wished to be anathema from Christ for my brethren, who are my kinsmen according to the flesh.' I wished it once, not now would I wish it. For I knew that all things were theirs; but when I came to know the truth, I was converted—I who was so faithless—and they are not converted.
'Who are Israelites, to whom belongeth the adoption of sons, and the glory, and the covenants, and the giving of the law, and the service, and the promises.' He recounts also what he has renounced, that you may know how great a power that was which could separate him from them. 'Whose are the fathers': Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. 'And of whom is Christ according to the flesh, who is over all things, God.' Against the Arian, the Manichaean, and the Photinian, but also against Nestorius, who denies the Lord Christ according to the flesh. 'Blessed for ever. Amen.' And Thomas said, 'My God and my Lord,' which He confirms, saying: 'Because thou hast seen, therefore thou hast believed.' 'But not as though the word of God had failed.'
Because he had said above that he grieved that the race of Israel was excluded from the kingdom by its own fault—the race to whom all these things had belonged—here he shows that those who do not believe are not the sons of Abraham, lest he be thought to preach to all the Jews, and lest it be said: Then has God lied to Abraham? God forbid. Hence he begins to reason why, by the high and just judgment of God, the Jews being rejected, the Gentiles were let in. 'For all are not Israelites that are of Israel; neither are they all children who are the seed of Abraham.' If not all, yet some, who were chosen from thence, and made believers; if not all who are of Israel are Israel, then, on the contrary, many who are not of Israel are Israel. The Saviour says: 'Behold a true Israelite, in whom there is no guile.'
In whom therefore there is guile, he is not a true Israelite. 'But in Isaac shall thy seed be called.' In Isaac then were also called the sons of Abraham, not in Ishmael, though he too was his seed. 'That is, they that are the children of the flesh are not the children of God; but they that are the children of the promise are counted for the seed'—for this is the word of promise. For Ishmael indeed was born according to the ordinary way, from a bondwoman; but Isaac had more than nature gave, since he was born of aged parents by promise. So also now the promise makes Christians the sons of Abraham—not the flesh—and the imitation of his faith, by which he was justified, and merited that in his seed all the tribes of the earth should be blessed—not circumcision.
'At this time I will come, and Sarah shall have a son.' Not Hagar the bondwoman's—so as to show that the later people is of the promise, thus also in Isaac. 'And not only she, but Rebecca also.' Not only Ishmael and Isaac, who, though from the one Abraham, yet were born of different mothers, and were not one before the Lord; but also Jacob and Esau, who from one conjugal act were born of Rebecca, before they were born, by God's foreknowledge were separated from one another before God—so that the purpose of God might remain in His foreknowledge, by which He was about to reject the unbelieving Jews, and to grant mercy to the Gentiles without any merits.
He does all this to show that with God the prerogative of race avails nothing, nor does He accept any man's person; which he wishes to confirm by these examples, which they could have turned into a calumny—about to show from these very things that God does what He wills, and no one can contradict Him, if He willed to give something specially to their race, and now to choose whomsoever He willed. 'Isaac our father, of one conjugal act.' 'For when they were not yet born, nor had done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand.' Of one, two—she who is understood first to have brought forth twins—in that, as though something new had happened to her, being terrified, she inquires of the Lord. 'Not of works, but of Him that calleth, it was said to her: The elder shall serve the younger.'
It was fulfilled not in Jacob and Esau, but was said figuratively of the Christian people, which was preferred to the older people of the Jews, just as Ephraim and Manasseh also prefigured the younger people, that is, the Christian, who were blessed with hands crossed. As it is written: 'Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.' This was said in Genesis. This the Prophet relates as fulfilled not of themselves, but of their sons; which testimony the Apostle takes up, and represses curiosity and calumny, asserting that there is no iniquity with God, but whatever He does, He does either mercifully or judicially. 'What shall we say then? Is there injustice with God? God forbid.'
He reasons still further, and sets before himself, as it were, the person of one contradicting, and overcomes him by testimonies—that no one can go against the will of the Lord, Moses himself saying: 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy'; that is: If I am good, why is thy eye evil? Do I take away from thee what I give to another? In My foreknowledge I have decreed to graft the wild olive into the olive tree; what is that to thee? For He says to Moses: 'I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will show mercy to whom I will be merciful.' For on whom God has mercy, He calls him and inspires him to believe; and to whom He is merciful that he may believe, He grants mercy—that is, He makes him merciful, that he may also do good works. Whence it evidently stands that all good things are from God Himself, who is 'the Saviour of all, especially of the faithful.'
But someone says: Why this one thus, and another not thus, and why not all equally? Is God then a respecter of persons? Respect of persons is rightly said to exist where he who judges, abandoning the merit of the cause about which he judges, favours one against another, because he finds something in the person which is worthy of honour or of mercy. But if anyone have two debtors, and wish to remit the debt to the one and to exact it from the other, he gives to whom he wills, but defrauds no one, nor is it to be called respect of persons, when there is no iniquity.
Otherwise, to those who understand little, respect of persons might seem to exist, where the lord of the vineyard gave to the workmen who had done one hour's work of his as much as to those who had borne the burden of the day and the heat, making them equal in wages, whose distance in labour had been so great. But what did he answer to those who murmured at this as though it were respect of persons? 'Friend, I do thee no wrong,' etc. Surely here is complete justice: this I wish to render, to this one I gave freely, nor did I take anything from thee, or diminish, or deny what I owed. 'Is it not lawful for me to do what I will?' etc. As therefore here there is no respect of persons, because one is thus freely honoured, so that another is not defrauded of his due:
so, when according to the purpose of God one is called and another is not called, to the one who is called a gratuitous good is given—of which good the calling itself is the beginning; to the one who is not called, the due evil is rendered, since all are guilty through the one through whom sin entered into the world. 'Therefore it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.' He concludes the disputation, and brings forward testimonies about Pharaoh, that we may tremble at God's judgments rather than discuss them, because for the most part they are hidden, yet never are they unjust; for it is true that He Himself directs the course of those who run, and that without His grace no one's running obtains its own effect, as Ecclesiastes says: 'The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong'; and David:
'Unless the Lord build the house, they labour in vain that build it.' His help therefore must be implored, who 'worketh all in all.' The Christian ought therefore to run, and never to presume upon his own strength; he ought to run and to fulfil God's precepts, but ought to arrogate nothing to himself, according to that word: 'He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord.' This is against those who presumed upon their own merits and strength. For he himself was running, when he wished to go into Bithynia, as we read in the Acts of the Apostles. I believe that his course there was going to be in vain, but he was directed thither by the Holy Spirit, where his preaching would profit. For David also cried out to the Lord: 'Direct my steps according to thy word.'
Without doubt our running is in vain, unless our steps be directed by the Lord. For a horse too can run, but if it have no rider, unbridled and headlong it dashes forward, and does not walk the right path. So too are we without God and His grace. But what man has power to touch his mind with such vision that his will may be moved to faith? And who embraces that in which he takes no delight? Or who has it in his power that either that which can delight him should meet him, or that it should delight him when it has met him? When therefore those things delight us by which we make progress, this is inspired by God, and this grace of God is bestowed—not by our nod, or industry, or the merits of works is it obtained; because in order that there be movement
of the will, that there be industry of zeal, that there be works fervent with charity—He bestows it, He grants it freely. For we are commanded to ask, that we may receive, and to seek, that we may find, to knock, that it may be opened to us. Is not our very prayer sometimes so lukewarm, or rather cold, and almost nothing—nay, sometimes altogether so utterly nothing—that we do not even notice this in ourselves with grief? for if we even grieve at this, we are already praying. What else is shown to us, except that both to ask, and to seek, and to knock, He grants, who commands that we do these things? 'Therefore it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy.' Since we can neither will nor run, unless He move and rouse us. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh:
'For this very purpose have I raised thee up, that I may show in thee my power, and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth.' Each one is punished according to the measure and end of his sins being completed. Sometimes even in the present, as the Sodomites and the men of Gomorrah. Pharaoh therefore had already exceeded the measure, and because he was worthy of destruction, God willed by his example to strike fear into all, and that His people, who were about to go out of Egypt, might acknowledge His power and justice, lest they should sin likewise, or fear their adversaries; He willed by such retribution not only to free them from the imminent peril, but also to fortify them beforehand, by the terror of His power, against committing iniquity in time to come.
Concerning Pharaoh it can also be understood thus, that he is said to have been hardened through God's mercy, since when the plague ceased at Moses' prayer, he was hardened; and although He knew him to be so hardened that he could not be converted, yet He showed His goodness. For as to what He said, 'I have raised up,' that is, 'I have brought forth,' not 'I have made': just as if someone should carry two full vessels, one with balsam and the other with dung, he brings forth the fragrance or the stench, he does not generate it. 'Therefore on whom He wills He has mercy, and whom He wills He hardens.' He has mercy of His great goodness, and He hardens by no iniquity: He has mercy by bestowing good, He hardens by rendering what is deserved—as though He said:
'If then you understand it thus, that He has mercy on whom He wills, and hardens whom He wills, your understanding follows, so that you say: Why then does He yet find fault? For what He wills, that we do.' The Apostle perceived what would move their carnal understanding, and set against himself the words of one contradicting, which he might restrain by apostolic authority. For he says: 'You will say therefore to me: Why then does He still complain?' [Below in the same passage it is read 'find fault.'] 'For who resists His will?' And he answered to the one saying these things: 'O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Does the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus?' Then, having pursued so great and hidden a secret, he judged how much of it ought to be opened to men, and opened it, saying:
'But if God, willing to show His wrath and to make known His power, endured with much patience the vessels of wrath, which are fitted for destruction, that He might show the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy.' This is not only the aid of God's grace, but even its proof. The aid, namely, in the vessels of mercy; but in the vessels of wrath, the proof. For in them He shows His wrath and makes known His power, because His goodness is so powerful that it uses well even evil things, and in them makes known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy: since what the justice of the One punishing exacts from the vessels of wrath, this the grace of the One delivering remits to the vessels of mercy:
nor would the benefit which is freely bestowed on some appear, unless God, others of the same mass being likewise condemned as guilty by just judgment, showed what was due to both. Hear also the entire interpretation of this passage by the most blessed Father Augustine; for concerning Pharaoh it is thus answered: By his former merits, whereby he afflicted the strangers in his kingdom, he was worthy—fitted for one whose heart should be hardened, so that he would not believe even the most manifest signs of God commanding: from the same mass, therefore, that is, of sinners, He brought forth both the vessels of mercy, whom He would succour when the children of Israel entreated Him, and the vessels of wrath, by whose punishment He would instruct them, that is, Pharaoh and his people:
because although both were sinners, and on that account belonged to one mass, yet they were to be treated differently—those who had groaned to the one God, that He might succour them; differently those under whose unjust burdens they had groaned. He endured therefore 'with much patience the vessels of wrath, which are fitted for destruction.' And by the very fact that he says 'with much patience,' he sufficiently signified that He then avenged their former sins, in which He endured them: since from their vengeance there was to be succour for those who were being delivered: 'that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He hath prepared unto glory.' Here perhaps, disturbed, you have returned to that question: If He has mercy on whom He wills, and hardens whom He wills, why does He yet complain?
'Who resists His will?' Assuredly it is so: whether you will or will not, He has mercy on whom He wills, and hardens whom He wills. But what impious man would call the will of God unjust—to whom Pharaoh himself cries out: 'God is just: but I and my people are unjust,' because this will of God cannot be unjust. For it comes of the most hidden merits, which distinguish the sinners themselves. For although, on account of the general sin, they made up one mass, yet there is not no diversity among them; because there are many sinners naturally living with moderation, whereby, although they are not yet justified, they nevertheless are made worthy of justification:
and it does not precede in other sinners that by their own vice they should be worthy of the hardening—we having the same Apostle saying elsewhere: 'Because they did not approve to have God in their knowledge, God delivered them up to a reprobate sense.' This is what hardened Pharaoh's heart. But that they did not approve to have God in their knowledge—this is what made them worthy to be given up to a reprobate sense: yet it is true that it is 'not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy'; because if for that reason anyone shall have been, by lighter sins, or certainly by graver and many sins, yet with great groaning and grief of repenting, made worthy of God's mercy, it is not of himself—who, if he were forsaken, would perish—but of the merciful God, who succours his prayers and griefs.