For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity, that they may be without excuse. Because knowing God, they didn’t glorify him as God, and didn’t give thanks, but became vain in their reasoning, and their senseless heart was darkened.
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and traded the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, four-footed animals, and creeping things. Therefore God also gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to uncleanness, that their bodies should be dishonored among themselves; who exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
For this reason, God gave them up to vile passions. For their women changed the natural function into that which is against nature. Likewise also the men, leaving the natural function of the woman, burned in their lust toward one another, men doing what is inappropriate with men, and receiving in themselves the due penalty of their error. Even as they refused to have God in their knowledge, God gave them up to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not fitting; being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, malice; full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil habits, secret slanderers, backbiters, hateful to God, insolent, arrogant, boastful, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant breakers, without natural affection, unforgiving, unmerciful; who, knowing the ordinance of God, that those who practice such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but also approve of those who practice them.
John Calvin 1540 · Public Domain On vv20–32 20. Since his invisible things, etc. God is in…
20. Since his invisible things, etc. God is in himself invisible; but as his majesty shines forth in his works and in his creatures everywhere, men ought in these to acknowledge him, for they clearly set forth their Maker: and for this reason the Apostle in his Epistle to the Hebrews says, that this world is a mirror, or the representation of invisible things. He does not mention all the particulars which may be thought to belong to God; but he states, that we can arrive at the knowledge of his eternal power and divinity; for he who is the framer of all things, must necessarily be without beginning and from himself. When we arrive at this point, the divinity becomes known to us, which cannot exist except accompanied with all the attributes of a God, since they are all included under that idea.
So that they are inexcusable. It hence clearly appears what the consequence is of having this evidence — that men cannot allege any thing before God’s tribunal for the purpose of showing that they are not justly condemned. Yet let this difference be remembered, that the manifestation of God, by which he makes his glory known in his creation, is, with regard to the light itself, sufficiently clear; but that on account of our blindness, it is not found to be sufficient. We are not however so blind, that we can plead our ignorance as an excuse for our perverseness. We conceive that there is a Deity; and then we conclude, that whoever he may be, he ought to be worshipped: but our reason here fails, because it cannot ascertain who or what sort of being God is. Hence the Apostle in Hebrews 11:3, ascribes to faith the light by which man can gain real knowledge from the work of creation, and not without reason; for we are prevented by our blindness, so that we reach not to the end in view; we yet see so far, that we cannot pretend any excuse. Both these things are strikingly set forth by Paul in Acts 14:16-17, when he says, that the Lord in past times left the nations in their ignorance, and yet that he left them not without witness (amarturon,) since he gave them rain and fertility from heaven. But this knowledge of God, which avails only to take away excuse, differs greatly from that which brings salvation, which Christ mentions in John 17:3, and in which we are to glory, as Jeremiah teaches us, Jeremiah 9:24
John Calvin's Commentaries (1540-1563) — public domain. Text from the Calvin Translation Society English edition (1840s-50s) via the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (ccel.org). Calvin's coverage is partial (roughly two-thirds of the Bible); uncommented books and verses are honest gaps, never fabricated. The 19th-century editor's footnotes and remarks are omitted so the notes are faithfully Calvin's own voice.
Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 27, 28, 30, 31 Thou seest not God, and yet thou acknowledgest him…
Thou seest not God, and yet thou acknowledgest him as God by his works, Cicero.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain On vv20–32 20 For the invisible things of him from the…
20 For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:
Ver. 20. Are clearly seen] Pervidentur. As in a mirror, or as on a theatre. Ut solem in aquis, sic Deum in operibus contemplamur. God (saith one) is best seen in his works, as the sun in the west. {a}
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{a} Saeculum est speculum, quo Deum intueamur.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain On vv20–32 Because it might be further objected in behalf of…
Because it might be further objected in behalf of the Gentiles, that the notions of God imprinted in their nature are so weak, that they may be well excused; therefore the apostle adds, that the certainty of them is further confirmed by the book of the creatures, which was written before them in capital letters, so that he that runs may read.
The invisible things of him: the apostle tells us afterwards himself what he means by the invisible things of God, viz. his being and his attributes, particularly his eternity and almighty power; to which we might add, his wisdom, goodness, &c. These, though invisible in themselves, yet are discernible by his works, and that ever since the creation of the world. By what they see created, they may easily collect or understand, that there is an eternal and almighty Creator; they may argue from the effects to the cause.
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So that they are without excuse: some render it, that they may be without excuse; but it is better rendered in our translation: the meaning is not, that God gave them that knowledge for this end and purpose, that they might be inexcusable, for they might catch even at that for an excuse; but the plain sense is this, that God hath given all men such means of knowledge as sufficeth to leave them without excuse, there can be no pretence of ignorance.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
William Burkitt 1703 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 29, 32 The apostle here proceeds in acquainting us with that…
The apostle here proceeds in acquainting us with that knowledge of God which the Heathens had by the light of nature, which was in their hearts, and augmented and increased by what of God they saw in the book of the creatures; namely, in the works of creation and providence: The invisible things of God from the creation of the world are clearly seen, &c. The sense, I conceive, is this, That the wise and wonderful frame of the world, which cannot reasonably be ascribed to any other cause but God, is a sensible demonstration to all mankind, of an eternal and powerful Being, that was the author and contriver of it. The strokes of the Creator’s hand are engraven in all parts of the universe; the heavens, the earth, and the capacious sea, with all things contained in them, are evident testimonies of the excellency of their original cause: And therefore such of the Heathens of old as shut their eyes, and such of the Atheists at this day as wink hard, and will not see the footsteps of a Deity in the works of creation and providence, are, and will be, everlastingly left without excuse.
Learn hence, 1. That much of the being and essential perfections of God may be known by the light of nature, if attended to; and much more may be understood by the book of the creatures, if attentively looked into. The invisible things of God are clearly seen from the creation; that is, the creation of the world is a plain demonstration to men of the being and power of God.
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Learn, 2. That all such persons will be left forever without excuse before God, who either extinguish the light of nature, and smother the natural notices which they have of God, or do not improve them by a due consideration of the works of God. Without opening the eye of reasons, the book of creation is of no more use to us than to the brute beasts: They see the creatures as well as we, but many of us consider the creatures, and see God in the creation no more then they: And this will leave us without excuse.
Learn, 3. How endearing are our obligations to almighty God, for the favour and benefit of divine revelation; that, together with the light of nature, we have the superadded light of scripture; the law to convince us of our sin, the gospel to discover a Saviour. The Heathens had only those natural apostles, of sun, moon, and stars, to guide them to the wisdom of the Father, the incarnate Son of God, and his inspired apostles and ministers to lead us into all truth, and his Holy Spirit to excite and quicken us in our obedience to him.
Therefore, eternally magnified be Omnipotent Love, for the light of scripture, for the benefit of divine revelation. For though there be a natural theology, there is not a natural Christology; there is a natural divinity, but not a natural gospel, a knowledge of God by the light of nature, but no knowledge of Jesus the Mediator, without the light of scripture.
All thanks, eternal thanks be to God for his unspeakable gift! Lord, how will all such as contemn it be left without excuse!
William Burkitt's Expository Notes on the New Testament (1700–1703) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain On vv20–32 For the invisible things of him,.... Not the angels,…
For the invisible things of him,.... Not the angels, the invisible inhabitants of heaven: nor the unseen glories of another world; nor the decrees of God; nor the persons in the Godhead; but the perfections of God, or his "properties", as the Arabic version reads it; and which are explained by "his eternal power and Godhead": these,
from the creation of the world are clearly seen; this is no new discovery, but what men have had, and might, by the light of nature, have enjoyed ever since the world was created; these
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being understood, in an intellectual way, by the discursive faculty of the understanding,
by the things that are made; the various works of creation; all which proclaim the being, unity, and perfections of God their Creator,
so that they are without excuse; the very Heathens, who have only the light of nature, and are destitute of a revelation, have no colour or pretext for their idolatrous practices, and vicious lives; nor have they, nor will they have anything to object to God's righteous judgment against them, or why they should not be condemned.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 For those things of him which are invisible, are…
For those things of him which are invisible, are seen - By the eye of the mind. Being understood - They are seen by them, and them only, who use their understanding
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain On vv20–32 Verse 20. The invisible things of him] His invisible…
Verse 20. The invisible things of him] His invisible perfections are manifested by his visible works, and may be apprehended by what he has made; their immensity showing his omnipotence, their vast variety and contrivance, his omniscience; and their adaptation to the most beneficent purposes, his infinite goodness and philanthropy.
His eternal power] αιδιος αυτου δυναμις, That all-powerful energy that ever was, and ever will exist; so that, ever since there was a creation to be surveyed, there have been intelligent beings to make that survey.
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And Godhead] θειοτης, His acting as God in the government and support of the universe. His works prove his being; the government and support of these works prove it equally. Creation and providence form a twofold demonstration of God,
1st. in the perfections of his nature; and,
2dly. in the exercise of those perfections.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain On vv21, 24, 26, 28, 32 Rom 1:21-23. “Because that when they knew God —…
Rom 1:21-23. “Because that when they knew God — The writings of Plato, Xenophon, Plutarch, Cicero, and other philosophers, which still remain, together with the quotations made by Just. Martyr and Clem. Alexandrinus from those which are lost, prove that the learned heathen, though ignorant of the way of salvation, were not entirely unacquainted with the unity and spirituality of God, and had pretty just notions of his perfections, of the creation and government of the world, and of the duties which men owe to God and to one another. Their sin, therefore, in worshipping idols, and in concealing the true God from the vulgar, did not proceed so much from ignorance as from corruption of heart.” They glorified him not as God — Did not esteem him, pay homage to him, or worship and serve him in a manner worthy of him, and consistent with those apprehensions they had, or might have had, of him; neither were thankful — Grateful for his benefits. As the true God was not the object of the popular religion, no public thanksgivings were offered to him in any heathen country; and with respect to the private conduct of individuals, though there are still extant hymns in honour of the heathen gods, written by Orpheus, Homer, Pindar, and Horace, who were themselves philosophers as well as poets, we have never heard of any psalm or hymn composed by any heathen poet or philosopher in honour of the true God. It is observable, that thankfulness to God for his mercies, is here represented as a principal branch of religion, and undoubtedly no principle can be nobler, nor can any have a greater or more extensive influence. But became vain in their imaginations — Absurd, stupid, and ridiculous in their reasonings, concerning God’s nature and worship; entangling themselves with a thousand unprofitable subtleties, which only tended to alienate their minds more and more from every truly religious sentiment and disposition. And their foolish, ασυνετος, their undiscerning, unintelligent, imprudent heart was darkened — Instead of being enlightened by these sophistries, it was more and more involved in ignorance and error, and rendered impenetrable to the simplicity of the most important truths. What a terrible instance have we of this in the writings of Lucretius! What vain reasonings, yet how dark a heart, amid pompous professions of wisdom! Professing themselves to be wise — Greek, φασκοντες ειναι σοφοι, saying that they were wise; “cum se dicerent, aut se dici sinerent sapientes:” when they called, or suffered themselves to be called, wise men. — Grotius. It evidently refers to their assuming the philosophic character, and to the pride they took in the title of wise men, or lovers of wisdom. They became fools — Degrading, in the lowest and most infamous manner, the reason which they so arrogantly pretended to improve, and almost to engross. Thus the apostle finely ridicules that ostentation of wisdom which the Greek philosophers made, by taking to themselves the name of wise men. And his irony was the more pungent, in that it was put into a writing addressed to the Romans, who were great admirers of the Greeks. And changed, &c. — As if he had said, As their folly and wickedness were evident in a variety of other vices, in which these heathen philosophers joined with the vulgar, so particularly in the early and almost universal prevalence of idolatry among them; for they changed the glory — The unutterable glory, of the incorruptible and immortal God — (the word αφθαρτος means both) all the majestic splendours, in which he shines forth through earth and heaven, into an image, made by their own hands, like to corruptible and mortal man — Which, how elegantly soever it might be formed, was an abominable and insufferable degradation of the infinitely perfect and eternal Godhead, had their folly proceeded no further. But, not content with this, they set up as emblems of Deity and objects of worship, brute creatures and their images: birds, four-footed beasts, and creeping things — Even such vile reptiles as beetles, and various kinds of serpents, which creep on the dust. The learned Egyptians in particular, as is well known, worshipped dogs, snakes, nay, and even vegetables. We may observe here, 1st, That the word corruptible, applied to man, signifies not only his being liable to dissolution, but to moral pollution; and the term incorruptible, applied to God, signifies that he is not liable to either. 2d, “The great evil of the heathen idolatry consisted in their setting up the images of men and beasts in their temples as representations of the Deity, by which the vulgar were led to believe that God was of the same form, nature, and qualities with the animals represented by these images. And the persons who thus changed the glory of God were not the common people among the Greeks, but the legislators, magistrates, priests, and philosophers; for they were the persons who framed the public religion in all the heathen countries; who established it by their laws, and recommended it by their example.” — Macknight.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain On vv20–32 For the invisible things of him - The expression…
For the invisible things of him - The expression “his invisible things” refers to those things which cannot be perceived by the senses. It does not imply that there are any things pertaining to the divine character which may be seen by the eye; but that there are things which may be known of him, though not discoverable by the eye. We judge of the objects around us by the senses, the sight, the touch, the ear, etc. Paul affirms, that though we cannot judge thus of God, yet there is a way by which we may come to the knowledge of him. What he means by the invisible things of God he specifies at the close of the verse, “his eternal power and Godhead.” The affirmation extends only to that; and the argument implies that that was enough to leave them without any excuse for their sins.
From the creation of the world - The word “creation” may either mean the “act” of creating, or more commonly it means “the thing created,” the world, the universe. In this sense it is commonly used in the New Testament; compare Mar 10:6; Mar 13:19; Mar 16:5; Rom 1:25; 2Co 5:17; Gal 6:15; Col 1:15, Col 1:23; Heb 4:13; Heb 9:11; 1Pe 2:13; 2Pe 3:4; Rev 3:14. The word “from” may mean “since,” or it may denote “by means of.” And the expression here may denote that, as an historical fact, God “has been” “known” since the act of creation; or it may denote that he is known “by means of” the material universe which he has formed. The latter is doubtless the true meaning. For,
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This is the common meaning of the word “creation;” and, This accords with the design of the argument.
It is not to state an historical fact, but to show that they had the means of knowing their duty within their reach, and were without excuse. Those means were in the wisdom, power, and glory of the universe, by which they were surrounded.
Are clearly seen - Are made manifest; or may be perceived. The word used here does not occur elsewhere in the New Testament.
Being understood - His perfections may be investigated, and comprehended by means of his works. They are the evidences submitted to our intellects, by which we may arrive at the true knowledge of God.
Things that are made - By his works; compare Heb 11:3. This means, not by the original “act” of creation, but by the continual operations of God in his Providence, by his doings, ποιήμασιν poiēmasin, by what he is continually producing and accomplishing in the displays of his power and goodness in the heavens and the earth. What they were capable of understanding, he immediately adds, and shows that he did not intend to affirm that everything could be known of God by his works; but so much as to free them from excuse for their sins.
His eternal power - Here are two things implied.
(1)That the universe contains an exhibition of his power, or a display of that attribute which we call “omnipotence;” and,
That this power has existed from eternity, and of course implies an eternal existence in God.
It does not mean that this power has been exerted or put forth from eternity, for the very idea of creation supposes that it had not, but that there is proof, in the works of creation, of power which must have existed from eternity, or have belonged to an eternal being. The proof of this was clear, even to the pagan, with their imperfect views of creation and of astronomy; compare Psa 19:1-14. The majesty and grandeur of the heavens would strike their eye, and be full demonstration that they were the work of an infinitely great and glorious God. But to us, under the full blaze of modern science, with our knowledge of the magnitude, and distances, and revolutions of the heavenly bodies, the proof of this power is much more grand and impressive. We may apply the remark of the apostle to the present state of the science, and his language will cover all the ground, and the proof to human view is continually rising of the amazing power of God, by every new discovery in science, and especially in astronomy. Those who wish to see this object presented in a most impressive view, may find it done in Chalmer’s Astronomical Discourses, and in Dick’s Christian Philosopher. Equally clear is the proof that this power must have been eternal. If it had not always existed, it could in no way have been produced. But it is not to be supposed that it was always exerted, any more than it is that God now puts forth all the power that he can, or than that we constantly put forth all the power which we possess. God’s power was called forth at the creation. He showed his omnipotence; and gave, by that one great act, eternal demonstration that he was almighty; and we may survey the proof of that, as clearly as if we had seen the operation of his hand there. The proof is not weakened because we do not see the process of creation constantly going on. It is rather augmented by the fact that he sustains all things, and controls continually the vast masses of matter in the material worlds.
Godhead - His deity; divinity; divine nature, or essence. The word is not used elsewhere in the New Testament. Its meaning cannot therefore be fixed by any parallel passages. It proves the truth that the supremacy, or supreme divinity of God, was exhibited in the works of creation, or that he was exalted above all creatures and things. It would not be proper, however, to press this word as implying that all that we know of God by revelation was known to the pagan; but that so much was known as to show his supremacy; his right to their homage; and of course the folly and wickedness of idolatry. This is all that the argument of the apostle demands, and, of course, on this principle the expression is to be interpreted.
So that they are without excuse - God has given them so clear evidence of his existence and claims, that they have no excuse for their idolatry, and for hindering the truth by their iniquity. It is implied here that in order that people should be responsible, they should have the means of knowledge; and that he does not judge them when their ignorance is involuntary, and the means of knowing the truth have not been communicated. But where people have these means within their reach, and will not avail themselves of them, all excuse is taken away. This was the case with the Gentile world. They had the means of knowing so much of God, as to show the folly of worshipping dumb idols; compare Isa 44:8-10. They had also traditions respecting his perfections; and they could not plead for their crimes and folly that they had no means of knowing him. If this was true of the pagan world then, how much more is it true of the world now?
And especially how true and fearful is this, respecting that great multitude in Christian lands who have the Bible, and who never read it; who are within the reach of the sanctuary, and never enter it; who are admonished by friends, and by the providences of God, and who regard it not; and who look upon the heavens, and even yet see no proof of the eternal power and Godhead of him who made them all! Nay, there are those who are apprized of the discoveries of modern astronomy, and who yet do not seem to reflect that all these glories are proof of the existence of an eternal God; and who live in ignorance of religion as really as the pagan, and in crimes as decided and malignant as disgraced the darkest ages of the world. For such there is no excuse, or shadow of excuse, to be offered in the day of doom. And there is no fact more melancholy in our history, and no one thing that more proves the stupidity of people, than this sad forgetfulness of Him that made the heavens, even amid all the wonders and glories that have come fresh from the hand of God, and that everywhere speak his praise.
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain On vv20, 24, 26, 27, 29, 30, 31, 32 St. John Chrysostom, hom. ii. p. 20. Greek: tes…
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[BIBLIOGRAPHY]
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St. John Chrysostom, hom. ii. p. 20. Greek: tes panton armonias salpiggos, lamproteron booses.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown 1871 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 30, 32 For the invisible things of him from--or "since"
For the invisible things of him from--or "since"
the creation of the world are clearly seen--the mind brightly beholding what the eye cannot discern.
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being understood by the things that are made--Thus, the outward creation is not the parent but the interpreter of our faith in God. That faith has its primary sources within our own breast (Rom 1:19); but it becomes an intelligible and articulate conviction only through what we observe around us ("by the things which are made," Rom 1:20). And thus are the inner and the outer revelation of God the complement of each other, making up between them one universal and immovable conviction that God is. (With this striking apostolic statement agree the latest conclusions of the most profound speculative students of Theism).
even his eternal power and Godhead--both that there is an Eternal Power, and that this is not a mere blind force, or pantheistic "spirit of nature," but the power of a living Godhead.
so that they are without excuse--all their degeneracy being a voluntary departure from truth thus brightly revealed to the unsophisticated spirit.
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 29, 30, 31, 32 20. Invisible things—God’s attributes, unseen by bodily eyes, are…
20. Invisible things—God’s attributes, unseen by bodily eyes, are revealed to the understanding by things that are made. That is, from evidences of design and power seen in natural constructions the reason of man is able and is bound to infer God. From the time of the creation of the world, including the primitive ages, until now, those standing evidences of God have left man without excuse for not recognising his eternal power and Godhead. The syllable head in Godhead is the same as hood in manhood, so that the word signifies divinity.
The plain meaning of the apostle is, that the argument from external design (so conclusively stated by Paley) is so clear that men are excuseless from not knowing nature’s God. This is more noteworthy, as some at the present day, even claiming to be Christian philosophers, slight the design evidence as of no value, and rest the whole proof of God’s existence upon an intuitive and direct perception of God himself. That there are intuitions by which God is recognised we need not deny; but holy Scripture largely bases the assurance of the Divine existence upon the proofs derived from “the things that are made.”
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 20. from the creation of the world] i.e. “since…
20. from the creation of the world] i.e. “since the world was created.” The Gr. scarcely allows the interpretation “from the framework, or constitution, of the world.”—He means that ever since there was a universe to observe, and man to observe it, the being and will of a Divine Artificer have been discernible.
are clearly seen] The Gr. verb hardly gives the emphatic “clearly,” though it distinctly states that they “are under observation,” “in view.”
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eternal] The Gr. word here (aïdios) is only found besides in N. T. in Judges 6. By derivation and usage it is connected with the Greek equivalent for “ever” or “always.” The point of the word here is that creation condemns the guilty vagaries of Idolatry by witnessing to a God everlastingly One and the Same.
Godhead] Lit. Divinity; character or capacity worthy of God.
so that they are without excuse] Better perhaps, (comparing similar constructions in this Epistle) so that they may, or might, be without excuse; to remove all cause of inevitable ignorance, and to throw the whole blame of declension from primeval truth on the perverted Will.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 (20) For, though there were parts of God’s being…
(20) For, though there were parts of God’s being into which the eye could not penetrate, still they were easily to be inferred from the character of His visible creation, which bore throughout the stamp of Omnipotence and Divinity.
The invisible things of him.—His invisible attributes, afterwards explained as “His eternal power and Godhead.”
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Are clearly seen . . . by the things that are made.—There is something of a play upon words here. “The unseen is seen—discerned by the eye of the mind—being inferred or perceived by the help of that which is made,” i.e., as we should say, by the phenomena of external nature.
Even His eternal power and Godhead.—A summary expression for those attributes which, apart from revelation, were embodied in the idea of God. Of these “power” is the most obvious. St. Paul does not go into the questions that have been raised in recent times as to the other qualities which are to be inferred as existing in the Author of nature; but he sums them up under a name that might be used as well by a Pagan philosopher as by a Christian—the attributes included in the one term “Godhead.” Divinity would be, perhaps, a more correct translation of the expression. What is meant is “divine nature,” rather than “divine personality.”
So that they are without excuse.—They could not plead ignorance.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 32 For the invisible things of him from (i.e. since,…
For the invisible things of him from (i.e. since, apo) the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Divinity (yeiothv , not yeothv); so that they are without excuse. The concluding clause is rendered in the Revised Version, "that they may be without excuse;" and it is true that eiv to ainai autou does not express the fact that they now are so, but the subjective result of the manifestation, if disregarded. "Paulus directe excusationem adimit, non solum de eventu aliquo loquitur" (Bengel). It is, however, a question of importance, which has been much discussed, whether (as the rendering of the Revised Version might be taken to imply) the idea of Divine purpose, and not result only, is involved in eiv to einai . The difference between the two conceptions is apparent from the Vulgate, ira at sint inexcusabiles, compared with Calvin"s in hoc ut. The bearing of the distinction on the doctrine of predestination is obvious, and it was consequently a subject of contention between the Lutherans and Calvinists. Meyer among moderns contends strongly that "the view which takes it of the purpose is required by the prevailing use of eiv with the infinitive," referring in this Epistle to Rom_1:11 Rom_3:26 Rom_4:11, Rom_4:16, 18 6:12 7:4, 5 8:29 11:11 12:2, 3 15:8, 13, 16. A comparison, however, of these passages does not seem to bear out his contention, it being apparently dependent on the context in each case, rather than the phrase eiv to , whether the idea of purpose comes in. Chrysostom among the ancients expressly opposed this view, saying, Kaitoige ou dia touto tauta epoihsen, o Yeo touto exebh. Ou gaav aposterhsh didaskalian tosauthn eiv meson prouyhken all ina auto. So that they should be may be suggested as an adequate rendering, so as to avoid the idea of God"s manifestation of himself to men hating been from the first delusive, having condemnation, and not enlightenment, for its purpose.
These two verses, 19 and 20, carry out the thought of thyeian katecontwn in ver. 18, their purport being to show that the asebeia and adikia of men have been in spite of knowledge, and therefore involve them all in sin. For sin implies knowledge of good and evil; it is not imputed to the brute beasts, who but follow their natural instincts, having no perception of God or a Divine law. Now, to man, even without any special revelation, God manifests himself in two ways outwardly in nature, and inwardly in conscience. In these verses the outward manifestation is spoken of, the other being more especially noted in Rom_2:14, etc. But here, too, an inward manifestation is implied by the word nooumena , as before by en autoiv . To the animals below us the phenomena of nature may be but a spectacle before their eyes, making no appeal to a mind within. But to man they have a language they awake wonder, awe, admiration, a sense of infinite mysterious power, and, to the receptive of such impressions, of ideal beauty indefinable. To the psalmists of old they spoke irresistibly of God; of one infinite and eternal Being, above and beyond all; and their consciences, owning the supremacy of good in the moral sphere, concurred with their sense of the evidences of beneficence in nature, so as to convince them also of the righteousness of God. All men (the apostle would say) were originally endowed with a like capacity of knowing God; and their failure in this regard, shown in the various forms of idolatry prevalent throughout the world, he views as the first stage in the development of human sin. The next stage is general moral degradation, regarded as the judicial consequence of the dishonour done to God. It is, indeed, a necessary consequence; for low and unworthy conceptions of Deity bring with them moral deterioration; when man"s Divine ideal becomes degraded, with it he becomes degraded too. Witness, for instance, the debauches and cruelties that so commonly accompanied idolatrous worship. Lastly, the final stage of this moral degradation is represented in an unveiled picture of the utter wickedness, and even unnatural vice, at that time prevalent and condoned in the heart of the boasted civilization of the heathen world. Such is the drift of the remainder of this first chapter. The argument suggests the following thoughts.
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(1) There is no mention here of Adam s transgression as the origin of human sin. The reason is that the apostle is arguing from a philosophical rather than a theological point of view, having Gentile as well as Jewish thinkers in his view as readers. His appeal in this chapter is not to the Old Testament at all, but to facts by all acknowledged. He is offering the world a philosophy of human history to account for the present perplexing state of things for the undoubted discord between conscience and performance, between ideal and practice, his purpose being to show universal guilt on the part of man. But his position here is quite consistent with what he says elsewhere (as in Ro 5) of Adam"s original transgression. For his whole argument in this chapter involves the doctrine of the fall of man, who is conceived to have been originally endowed with Divine instincts, and to have forfeited his prerogative through sin; and this is the essential meaning of the picture given us in Ge 3 of the original transgression.
(2) The entire drift of the chapter is against the view of the condemnation of mankind being due simply to the sin of the progenitor being imputed to the race. For all men are represented as guilty, in that all have sinned against light which they might have followed. This view does not, indeed, preclude that of an inherited infection of nature predisposing all to sin; nay, it rather necessitates it; for why should the sin have been so universal but for such predisposing cause? Still, the distinction between the two views is important in regard to our conception of the Divine justice.
(3) It may, however, be said that the distinction is without a real difference in this regard; for that, if the inherited infection is such that sin becomes inevitable (as seems to be implied by its alleged universality), it may appear as inconsistent with the Divine justice to condemn men for it, as it would be to impute to them their progenitor"s transgression. In reply to this difficulty, it may be said that Scripture nowhere says that men are finally condemned for it. On the contrary, the gospel reveals to us the atonement, preordained from the first, for the avoidance of such final condemnation; and this retrospective as well as prospective in its effects, (Rom_3:25, Rom_3:26) and as far-reaching as was the original transgression. (Rom_4:12, etc.) And our apostle (Rom_2:7, Rom_2:14, Rom_2:15, Rom_2:16) expressly asserts the salvation of all who, according to their light, have done what they could. The fact is, that in the argument before us (as in other passages of similar purport) it is only the principle, or the ground, of man"s possible justification before God that is under review. The intention is to show that this cannot be man"s own "works or deservings," as of debt, but is another which the gospel reveals. Be it observed, lastly, that a clear view of this position is important, not only for our apprehension of the truth of things and of the meaning of the gospel, but also for our right moral tone of mind and attitude before God. For not to be convinced of sin is to belie the true ideal of our conscience, and implies acquiescence in a moral standard below that of the Divine righteousness to which we are able to aspire.
The revelation of God in nature.
To come into contact with the fearless writing of the Apostle Paul is like inhaling a breath of mountain air. He was not alarmed at the presence of any inquirer, though ancient as a Jew, learned as a Greek, or imperious as a Roman. He held up the gospel as a lamp whose rays, shining in all directions, search every system, refusing to allow error to pass for truth, vice for righteousness, or imperfection for completeness. He implied that what the Law did for the Jews, convincing them of sin, was effected for the Gentiles by the glories of creation, taking away all excuse for ungodly immorality, and thus shutting all up equally to the sense of the need of such a righteousness, through faith unto salvation as the gospel of Christ proclaims.
I A PARADOX INVISIBLE THINGS CLEARLY SEEN. The possibility of such a seeming contradiction is allowed, when we distinguish between the outer vision of the body and the inner perception of the mind. Properly speaking, it is only the mind that ever sees. The mind arranges and digests what is carried to it by the optic nerve. Like a chemist, the brain has its laboratory, into which the senses convey the colours, sounds, impressions, facts, and figures of the world around us; and there in private it analyzes, synthetizes, manipulates, the products till they seem invested with new attributes. Think of our abstract conceptions, such as those of beauty, of time, of character; these have no sensible existence they are qualities superadded by the mind which gazes. They may arise necessarily upon certain objects being presented to our view; they affect us powerfully, and, though unseen by the bodily eyes, become clear to the eyes of the soul.
II THE PARADOX APPLIED TO THEOLOGY.
1. The works of nature manifest a mighty Power. This world, so wonderfully framed, exhibiting such unity in diversity, furnishes to the attentive mind abundant traces of a Force which has been at work other than ourselves. The declarations of past investigators, such as Buddha, Plato, Cicero, are amply confirmed by scientists to-day, who confess themselves in the presence of a glorious, awful Force, whose laws are to be ascertained and obeyed. The attempt is made to resolve demonstrably all phenomena into manifestations of the one indivisible force. Such thinkers we may claim as buttressing the declaration of the text that the invisible power of God is clearly seen, being understood through his works. Those regularities they call "laws" are his habits; those numerous analogies indicate the one mind influencing similarly all realms. Note especially that epic of natural theology, the Book of Job.
2. This Power discerned to be everlasting. There is the proper word in the text to denote "endless duration that which is always existent. The Power which originated the universe is needed to sustain it. Evolution is perpetual creation, whereby "things that are seen were not made of things that do appear." Man has from of old contrasted his brief life with the everlasting mountains, the perpetual hills. Astronomy is making us familiar with the countless millenniums of God"s lifetime, and geology reveals the measureless ages through which his power has been working. The doctrine of the conservation of force, which Tyndall calls "the gift of science to the nineteenth century," echoes the same truth, that though the animals die, and even the hills crumble and decay, yet the Power which made them continues; they assume other shapes and do other work. Herbert Spencer writes of the "infinite and eternal energy whence all things proceed and by which they are sustained.
3. Such power reveals Divinity. The "Divinity" of the Revised Version is preferable, since here the apostle is speaking, not of the incommunicable essence of God, as in Col_2:9, but of his nature as distinguished from our mortal humanity. The works of God show that he can originate life; man can only propagate it. And reflection proves that this power of God acts in favour of righteousness and in punishment of wickedness. He stands forth as the Holy One. We do not forget the dark problems of life nor the abysses of creation, but we must beware lest we underrate the clearness with which he has written his autograph on the laws of nature, and on his chief product man. Froude says, "This is the one lesson of history the moral law is written on the tablets of eternity... Justice and truth alone endure and live. Injustice and falsehood may be long-lived, but doomsday comes at last to them.
III THE INEVITABLE CONCLUSION, THAT, MEN"S IRRELIGIOUS, SINFUL PRACTICES BEING INEXCUSABLE, THEY NEED JUST SUCH A GOSPEL AS CHRISTIANITY PROCLAIMS. Such a revelation ought to have prevented all ungodliness. A chief sin is to ignore God, as the greatest civil crime is treason against the ruler of the state. Not to worship and thank him is fiat rebellion at court. How clearly the apostle implies that darkened views of the Creator, degrading his attributes, lead men first to base ingratitude, and then to indulge, unchecked and unashamed, the worst fleshly desires! And these flames of ungodly passion, no longer subdued by the rains of heavenly pity, leap up into a fierce conflagration, by which the doomed are destroyed. Yet he who formed the world and placed man upon it, has remembered man"s frailty has provided an Advocate for the defenceless criminal, a city of refuge for the despairing murderer. It cannot be an escape through our own merits, or justification by works; but by a transcendent exhibition of Divine power in its noblest garb of love, stooping to bear our sins, and to make his righteousness ours, through our contrite, humble, joyful acceptance of his mercy and help. S.R.A.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Biblical Illustrator 1887 · Public Domain On vv22, 23, 24, 26, 28, 29, 32 Professing themselves to be wise they became fools.
Rom_1:22-23
Professing themselves to be wise they became fools.
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The follies of the wise
Futility of thought has reached the character of folly. What, in fact, is polytheism, except a sort of permanent hallucination, a collective delirium, a possession on a great scale? And this mental disorder rose to a kind of perfection among the very peoples who, more than others, laid claim to the glory of wisdom. When he says, professing to be wise, Paul does not mean to stigmatise ancient philosophy absolutely; he only means that all that labour of the sages did not prevent, the most civilised nations--Egypt, Greece, and Rome--from being at the same time the most idolatrous of antiquity. The popular imagination, agreeably served by priests and poets, did not allow the efforts of the wise to dissipate this delirium. (Prof. Godet.)
Boasting of wisdom
In every department of knowledge, but especially in religion, boasting of wisdom is alike the proof and parent of folly.
I. It leads a man to go beyond the limits of his own powers, and to meddle with matters too high for him, or else to refuse to believe in anything which he cannot understand or grasp.
1. In either case this ends in folly. For the wisest and the most ignorant are on a par when they speculate upon subjects which transcend human thought, or over which God has been pleased to place an impenetrable veil.
2. He who believes in truth taught by nature and revelation is wiser than the so-called philosopher, who declines to receive anything but what his human intellect and finite powers can explain or fully grasp.
II. It leads a man to dispense with the help to be derived from the labours, remarks, or suggestions of others, as well as to advance the most absurd opinions, and to maintain them with the most inveterate obstinacy for the sake of notoriety.
III. It makes a man too willing to accept his own conclusions without sufficient and searching examinations.
IV. It ignores Gods law that the temple of Divine knowledge must be entered only by the gate of humility. (Biblical Museum.)
And changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image.
Degradation of Gods glory
The glory of God is the splendour which His manifested perfections cast into the heart of His intelligent creatures; hence a bright image which is to man the ideal of all that is good. This image had been produced within them. What did they make of it? The sequel tells. While holding the Divine person, they wrapped it up, as it were in the likeness of its opposite; it would have been almost better to leave it in silence--it would not have been so great an affront. The preposition ἐν exactly describes this imprisonment of the Divine glory in a form ignoble and grotesque. The epithet incorruptible is, as it were, a protest beforehand against this degradation. (Prof. Godet.)
Idolatry a retrogression, not an advance in religious though
Idolatry according to Paul is not a progressive stage reached in the religious thought of mankind starting from primeval fetishism. Far from being a first step towards the goal of Monotheism. Polytheism is, on the contrary, the result of degeneracy, an apostasy from the original Monotheism, a darkening of the understanding and heart which has terminated in the grossest fetishism. The history of religions, thoroughly studied nowadays, fully justifies Pauls view. It shows that the present heathen peoples of India and Africa, far from rising of themselves to a higher religious state, have only sunk, age after age, and become more and more degraded. It proves that at the root of all pagan religions and mythologies there lies an original Monotheism, which is the historical starting point in religion for all mankind. (Prof. Godet.)
The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Expositor's Bible 1887 · Public Domain On v24 Chapter 5
Chapter 5
MAN GIVEN UP TO HIS OWN WAY: THE HEATHEN
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Rom_1:24-32
WHEREFORE God gave them up, in the desires of their hearts, to uncleanness, so as to dishonour their bodies among themselves.
There is a dark sequence in the logic of facts, between unworthy thoughts of God and the development of the basest forms of human wrong. "The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God:-they are corrupt and have done abominable works". {Psa_14:1} And the folly which does not indeed deny God, but degrades His Idea, always gives its sure contribution to such corruption. It is so in the nature of the case. The individual atheist, or polytheist, may conceivably be a virtuous person, on the human standard; but if he is so it is not because of his creed. Let his creed become a real formative power in human society, and it will tend inevitably to moral disease and death. Is man indeed a moral personality, made in the image of a holy and almighty Maker? Then the vital air of his moral life must be fidelity, correspondence, to his God. Let man think of Him as less than All, and he will think of himself less worthily; not less proudly perhaps, but less worthily, because not in his true and wonderful relation to the Eternal Good. Wrong in himself will tend surely to seem less awful, and right less necessary and great. And nothing, literally nothing, from any region higher than himself-himself already lowered in his own thought from his true idea-can ever come in to supply the blank where God should be, but is not. Man may worship himself, or may despise himself, when he has ceased to "glorify God and thank Him"; but he cannot for one hour be what he was made to be, the son of God in the universe of God. To know God indeed is to be secured from self-worship, and to be taught self-reverence; and it is the only way to those two secrets in their pure fulness.
"God gave them up." So the Scripture says elsewhere. "So I gave them up unto their own hearts lusts"; {Psa_81:12} "God turned, and gave them up to worship the host of heaven"; {Act_7:42} "God gave them up to passions of degradation"; "God gave them over to an abandoned mind"; (Rom_1:26; Rom_1:28). It is a dire thought; but the inmost conscience, once awake, affirms the righteousness of the thing. From one point of view it is just the working out of a natural process, in which sin is at once exposed and punished by its proper results, without the slightest injection, so to speak, of any force beyond its own terrible gravitation towards the sinners misery. But from another point it is the personally allotted, and personally inflicted, retribution of Him who hates iniquity with the antagonism of infinite Personality. He has so constituted natural process that wrong gravitates to wretchedness; and He is in that process, and above it, always and forever.
So He "gave them up, in their desires of their hearts"; He left them there where they had placed themselves," in "the fatal region of self-will, self-indulgence; "unto uncleanness," described now with terrible explicitness in its full outcome, "to dishonour their bodies," the intended temples of the Creators presence, "among themselves," or "in themselves"; for the possible dishonour might be done either in a foul solitude, or in a fouler society and mutuality: Seeing that they perverted the truth of God, the eternal fact of His glory and claim, in their lie, so that it was travestied, misrepresented, lost, "in" the falsehood of polytheism and idols; and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen. He casts this strong Doxology into the thick air of false worship and foul life, as if to clear it with its holy reverberation. For he is writing no mere discussion, no lecture on the genesis and evolution of paganism. It is the story of a vast rebellion, told by one who, once himself a rebel, is now altogether and forever the absolute vassal of the King whom he has "seen in His beauty" and whom it is his joy to bless, and to claim blessing for Him from His whole world forever.
As if animated by the word of benediction, he returns to denounce "the abominable thing which God hateth" with still more terrible explicitness. For this reason, because of their preference of the worse to the infinite Good, God gave them up to passions of degradation; He handed them over, self-bound, to the helpless slavery of lust; to "passions," eloquent word, which indicates how the man who will have his own way is all the while a "sufferer," though by his own fault: the victim of a mastery which he has conjured from the deep of sin.
Shall we shun to read, to render, the words which follow? We will not comment and expound. May the presence of God in our hearts, hearts otherwise as vulnerable as those of the old pagan sinners, sweep from the springs of thought and will all horrible curiosity. But if it does so it will leave us the more able, in humility, in tears, in fear, to hear the facts of this stern indictment. It will bid us listen as those who are not sitting in judgment on paganism, but standing beside the accused and sentenced, to confess that we too share the fall, and stand, if we stand, by grace alone. Aye, and we shall remember that if an Apostle thus tore the rags from the spots of the Black Death of ancient morals, he would have been even less merciful, if possible, over the like symptoms lurking still in modern Christendom, and found sometimes upon its surface.
Terrible, indeed, is the prosaic coolness with which vices now called unnameable are named and narrated in classical literature; and we ask in vain for one of even the noblest of the pagan moralists who has spoken of such sins with anything like adequate horror. Such speech, and such silence, have been almost impossible since the Gospel was felt in civilisation. "Paganism," says Dr. F.W. Farrar, in a powerful passage, with this paragraph of Romans in his view, "is protected from complete exposure by the enormity of its own vices. To show the divine reformation wrought by Christianity it must suffice that once for all the Apostle of the Gentiles seized heathenism by the hair, and branded indelibly on her forehead the stigma of her shame." Yet the vices of the old time are not altogether an antiquarians wonder. Now as truly as then man is awfully accessible to the worst solicitations the moment he trusts himself away from God. And this needs indeed to be remembered in a stage of thought and of society whose cynicism, and whose materialism, show gloomy signs of likeness to those last days of the old degenerate world in which St. Paul looked round him, and spoke out the things he saw.
For their females perverted the natural use to the unnatural. So too the males, leaving the natural use of the female, burst out aflame in their craving towards one another, males in males working out their unseemliness-and duly getting in themselves that recompense of their error which was owed them.
And as they did not approve of keeping God in their moral knowledge, God gave them up to an abandoned mind, "a reprobate, God-rejected mind"; meeting their disapprobation with His just and fatal reprobation. That mind, taking the false premisses of the Tempter, and reasoning from them to establish the autocracy of self, led with terrible certainty and success through evil thinking to evil doing; to do the deeds which are not becoming, to expose the being made for God, in a naked and foul unseemliness, to its friends and its foes; filled full of all unrighteousness, wickedness, viciousness, greed; brimming with envy, murder, guile, illnature; whisperers, defamers, repulsive to God, outragers, prideful, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, senseless, faithless, loveless, truceless, pitiless; people who morally aware of Gods ordinance, that they who practise such things are worthy of death, not only do them, but assent and consent with those who practise them.
Here is a terrible accusation of human life, and of the human heart; the more terrible because it is plainly meant to be, in a certain sense, inclusive, universal. We are not indeed compelled to think that the Apostle charges every human being with sins against nature, as if the whole earth were actually one vast City of the Plain. We need not take him to mean that every descendant of Adam is actually an undutiful child, or actually untrustworthy in a compact, or even actually a boaster, an άλαζν, a pretentious claimant of praise or credit which he knows he does not deserve. We may be sure that on the whole, in this lurid passage, charged less with condemnation than with "lamentation, and mourning, and woe," he is thinking mainly of the then state of heathen society in its worst developments. Yet we shall see, as the Epistle goes on, that all the while he is thinking not only of the sins of some men, but of the sin of man. He describes with this tremendous particularity the variegated symptoms of one disease-the corruption of mans heart; a disease everywhere present, everywhere deadly; limited in its manifestations by many circumstances and conditions, outward or within the man, but in itself quite unlimited in its dreadful possibilities. What man is, as fallen, corrupted, gone from God, is shown, in the teaching of St. Paul, by what bad men are.
Do we rebel against the inference? Quite possibly we do. Almost for certain, at one time or another, we have done so. We look round us on one estimable life and another, which we cannot reasonably think of as regenerate, if we take the strict Scriptural tests of regeneration into account, yet which asks and wins our respect, our confidence, it may be even our admiration; and we say, openly and tacitly, consciously or unconsciously, that that life stands clear outside this first chapter of Romans. Well, be it so in our thoughts; and let nothing-no, nothing-make us otherwise than ready to recognise and honour right doing wherever we see it, alike in the saints of God and in those who deny His very Being. But just now let us withdraw from all such looks outward, and calmly and in a silent hour look in. Do we, do you, do I, stand outside this chapter? Are we definitely prepared to say that the heart which we carry in our breast, whatever our friends heart may be, is such that under no change of circumstances could it, being what it is, conceivably develop the forms of evil branded in this passage? Ah, who, that knows himself, does not know that there lies in him indefinitely more than he can know of possible evil? "Who can understand his errors?" Who has so encountered temptation in all its typical forms that he can say, with even approximate truth, that he knows his own strength, and his own weakness, exactly as they are?
It was not for nothing that the question was discussed of old, whether there was any man who would always be virtuous if he were given the ring of Gyges, and the power to be invisible to all eyes. Nor was it lightly, or as a piece of pious rhetoric, that the saintliest of the chiefs of our Reformation, seeing a murderer carried off to die, exclaimed that there went John Bradford but for the grace of God. It is just when a man is nearest God for himself that he sees what, but for God, he would be; what, taken apart from God, he is, potentially, if not in act. And it is in just such a mood that, reading this paragraph of the great Epistle, he will smite upon his breast, and say, "God, be merciful to me the sinner". {Luk_18:13}
So doing he will be meeting the very purpose of the Writer of this passage. St. Paul is full of the message of peace, holiness, and the Spirit. He is intent and eager to bring his reader into sight and possession of the fulness of the eternal mercy, revealed and secured in the Lord Jesus Christ, our Sacrifice and Life. But for this very purpose he labours first to expose man to himself; to awaken him to the fact that he is before everything else a sinner; to reverse the Tempters spell, and to let him see the fact of his guilt with open eyes.
"The Gospel," someone has said, "can never be proved except to a bad conscience." If "bad" means "awakened," the saying is profoundly true. With a conscience sound asleep we may discuss Christianity, whether to condemn it, or to applaud. We may see in it an elevating programme for the race. We may affirm, a thousand times, that from the creed that God became flesh there result boundless possibilities for Humanity. But the Gospel. "the power of God unto salvation," will hardly be seen in its own prevailing self-evidence, as it is presented in this wonderful Epistle, till the student is first and with all else a penitent. The man must know for himself something of sin as condemnable guilt, and something of self as a thing in helpless yet responsible bondage, before he can so see Christ given for us, and risen for us, and seated at the right hand of God for us, as to say, "There is now no condemnation; Who shall separate us from the love of God? I know whom I have believed."
To the full sight of Christ there needs a true sight of self, that is to say, of sin.
William Robertson Nicoll, ed., The Expositor's Bible (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1887–1910) — public domain. 65 of 66 books (1 Corinthians is not separately keyed, as that volume carries no machine-parseable verse references); section-level commentary keyed to the opening verse. Introductory and overview sections not keyed to a specific passage are excluded.
B. W. Johnson 1891 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 20. The invisible things of God. God's attributes. Are…
20. The invisible things of God. God's attributes. Are clearly seen. Are manifested by his works. Nature speaks of nature's God. His eternal power and divinity. The attributes are especially shown in his works. The earth and the heavenly bodies are effects which must be due to eternal power and divinity. So that they are without excuse. No excuse is left for worshiping helpless idols.
B. W. Johnson's The People's New Testament with Notes (1889–1891) — public domain. Electronic text from the Christian Classics Ethereal Library (CCEL) ThML edition.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary 1892 · Public Domain On v22 Rom_1:22-23.—Here begins a dark picture of heathenism, but fully…
CRITICAL NOTES
Rom_1:22-23.—Here begins a dark picture of heathenism, but fully verified from the writings of what has been called the most brilliant age of the most intellectual nations of the world. St. Paul traces man’s downward progress. Evolution, but in the wrong direction. According to the Jewish rabbis, one sin made to follow as the punishment of another. τὴν δόξαν, spoken of God, refers to the divine majesty and glory.
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Rom_1:25. Who is blessed for ever.—These doxologies common in Paul’s writings. Jewish rabbis use them. Mohammedans have honoured the custom. Tholuck mentions one Arabic manuscript in the Berlin Library where the expression “God be exalted” is often used.
Rom_1:28.—The apostle here states that the heathen voluntarily rejected the knowledge of the true God, which they must have gathered from the book of nature (Olshausen).
Rom_1:29.—Inveteracy of all evil and pernicious habits. Finding pleasure in causing and seeing suffering.
Rom_1:30. Backbiters, haters of God.—ὑβριστάς, ὑπερηφάνους, ἀλαζόνας. Insolent and injurious in acts, proud in thoughts, and boastful in words. Evil speakers in general. Planning more sins.
Rom_1:31.—ἁσυνθέτους. Covenant breakers, treacherous. Impious as neglecting the true wisdom, and continuing in sin, heathenism (Robinson).
Rom_1:32.—Sentence of God immutably written on the conscience. Approval of and delight in sin in ourselves and others, the highest pitch of wickedness.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.—Rom_1:22-32
Polytheism and atheism.—In these concluding verses we have a dark but true record of the deplorable results of polytheism. The most degrading vices that can afflict and ruin humanity run rife in the polytheistic world. The rejection of the true God, the rejection of all true good, of every preservative influence—the rejection of God is not only the rejection of every preservative influence, but the stirring up against the rejecters of every destructive force. God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things which are not convenient. This is alike the teaching both of nature and of revelation. The rejection of good is the provocation of evil. The downward course is easy. Beware of first steps in sin, the provocation of evil, because by the rejection of the good evil is incited, as it were, to do us further harm and bring upon us destruction. Death is the final penalty of those who take pleasure in polytheistic and atheistic theories. Polytheism is scarcely the danger of civilised societies. The only idols we are likely to worship are idols of the mind. Our pantheons are the temples of mammon, the halls of philosophy falsely so called, the shrines of fashion, the haunts of refined but insidious and harmful pleasures. Our danger is practical atheism, and it is creeping into our places of religious worship. What is it but practical atheism which limits God to the church or chapel? What is it but practical atheism which allows men to do in secret that which they would not do before the sight of their fellow-men? Polytheism and atheism are nearly allied. They both conspire to rob God of His glory. The former substitutes images of corruptible men, birds, four-footed beasts, and creeping things for the glory of the incorruptible God; the latter substitutes, rather leaves, an awful void for the repose which those enjoy who recognise, worship, and serve the Creator: the former, as we here see, generates deplorable vices, and would soon make the world both a moral and a material ruin; the latter, likewise, would leave nations without any true safeguard. In speaking of atheistic tendencies we are not to consider the refined and moral advocates of atheism only, who may be influenced by the Christian forces about them; but we must follow them in their tortuous windings until we come to the dire and dark ocean where humanity would be finally immersed. In the endeavour to make our paraphrase on these gloomy verses of the epistle practical and suitable to our times, let us offer a few reflections on atheism in general. We here make no blind attack upon particular men, and do not forget that men are sometimes better than their creeds; for atheists, theists, and scientists all have their creeds, though they do not recite them in churches. Even the agnostic, who denies that we can know the absolute and infinite God, may have a creed, which may be professing himself to be wise.
I. Atheism suits the depraved wishes.—The head is not convinced; but the heart, the seat of affections, is set upon this declaration, that there is no God. It is well known that the wish is the father of the thought; and the fool has the strong wish that there may be after all no God. It would be a great relief if he could be firmly persuaded that there were no moral governor, and that man were an irreponsible creature. Responsibility is a heavy burden on the back of him who is sinful and foolish in conduct. Man finds himself trammelled not only by outward laws, but by an inward feeling that he ought to be subject to and obey those laws, and he cannot rid himself of this feeling, he cannot shake himself free from the trammels. The words “ought” and “ought not” are as fearful phantoms that torture his soul. He longs to be free, and yet cannot attain freedom. His wishes go out towards a goal which he can never reach. He keeps saying in his heart there is no God, and yet he gets no nearer to the establishment of this desired atheistic doctrine in his nature.
II. Atheism accords with false doctrine.—It is both the cause and the effect of false doctrine. Action and reaction work here as in other realms, only that reaction is a great productive power in this sphere. Atheism is the result of false doctrine; and when the creed, the “no God” creed, is received, it works powerfully to the production of still greater falseness and more debasing views of life and of morals. There can be no guarantee for morals if the idea of a moral governor be banished, if indeed it can be completely banished, from the world of thought. Theism is the foundation of right religion, and right religion cannot be divorced from a correct moral code. Ethical systems are but a rope of sand if they do not begin in the idea of a moral governor. Atheism is the cause and effect of false doctrine in the heart. These produce both the professed and the practical atheist. And this in turn fosters erroneous opinions; they grow to greater potency, and become tyrannical.
III. Atheism agrees with and fosters corrupt practice.—We are far from charging all atheists with being corrupt in practice as well as erroneous in doctrine. It may be that some atheists are as pure in life as some theists. Certainly it will not do to denounce a creed because of the immorality of its adherents. It is an old and a favourite method to damage the cause by vilifying the persons. Still, when atheism has been tried, if it can ever be tried, to a large extent like the Christian religion, then will be the time to speak of its practical results. The nearest approach to such a trial was in France, when God was dethroned and reason was worshipped. This monarch soon had the sceptre of authority wrested from its grasp. Reason soon became unreason. The vilest passions were let loose. Judgment was taken away from the line. Righteousness was no longer the guide of the reins. Misrule was the confusing, disturbing, and wasting order of the day. Practical atheism had been tried, and was found wanting. When atheists live pure lives, it follows either from the unconscious influence of Christianity, or from the force of an enlightened public opinion, or from remaining respect for virtue which atheism has not destroyed. Men are naturally depraved, and practise the evil while they approve of the good. It seems ridiculous to extol the goodness of human nature in the light of history, and of that history which is being enacted daily before our eyes, and which is being recorded in our daily papers. Let atheism prevail, and the floodgates of iniquity would be thrown open, and the pestilential waters would flow with destructive and ominous sweep over our planet. Our blessings brighten as they fly and disappear. We tell the force of an element or of a principle by withdrawing it from its proper connection. Tom Paine’s Age of Reason was printed in America, and before publishing the book he submitted the manuscript to Benjamin Franklin, who said, “Burn it; do not loose a tiger: if men are so wicked with religion, what would they be without it?” The withdrawal of religion would be the withdrawal of a great restraining force from society, and human nature would lose one important check to the outlet of its depravity. A belief in a God is a blessing which we do not fully appreciate. If it were withdrawn from the world, we should find out how great a preservative and conservative force it has been amongst mankind. Virtue, as its own reward, would not lead men to follow virtue for its own sake. The greatest happiness of the greatest number would mean the greatest happiness of the greatest number one; for selfishness would override a spirit of universal philanthropy. Utilitarianism would mean, How can I make others useful to the promotion of my individual interests? Materialism would swallow up moralism, and, like Pharaoh’s lean kine, would not be bettered by the process. Moral restraints would be not only loosened, but destroyed. Passions of the vilest kind would be let loose, like so many fierce and hungry wolves. Debasing lusts would speedily quench the fires of divinity still shining in human nature. The question of existence would become a question of physical power; the weakest physically considered would have to go to the wall. The time would soon come when only Samson and the Philistines were left, and he would make a last effort by which he and his oppressors would be involved in one common and hideous ruin. And our planet would soon be destitute of intelligent inhabitants. Before this sad event the race would be indeed properly described by the graphic words, “They are corrupt: they have done abominable works; there is none that doeth good.”
IV. Atheism is an endeavour to delude conscience.—Strange are the tricks which men play with their own nature. They endeavour to deceive their own selves, and too often succeed for a time in the art of self-deception. They strive to delude conscience by saying that there is no Creator, and therefore no moral governor. Then the voice of conscience is to be regarded as uttering a meaningless sound. In Paris they drink a mixture which they call “absinthe,” which brings the mind into a delightful state. Under its influence the soul appears to rise above the clouds, and is filled with pleasant visions. But by-and-by this pleasant effect passes away, convulsions and fearful headache follow, the hair falls from the head, and the deluded victim of over-indulgence is brought either to the madhouse or to an early grave. These short-lived visions of pleasure are bought at a fearful price. Thus the atheistic fool may for a time delude conscience. Pleasant visions of freedom from moral bondage may delight; but alas! too soon the pleasant effect will vanish. The atheistic absinthe will lose its power to charm and to delude, even if it does delude for the time being—a question which may very well be asked as we consider the constituents of conscience. Let us seek then:
1. To retain the idea of the true God in our knowledge;
2. To cling to the theistic truth as taught by right reason, by nature, and by Revelation 3. To worship and serve the Creator with heart and with head—in fact, with all our powers;
4. So to work, live, and pray that neither we nor our descendants may be reduced to the lowest depth of evil. “Without understanding, covenant-breakers; without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful.” Christianity develops the understanding, teaches men to feel themselves bound by their contracts, nurtures the natural affections, ameliorates and ultimately removes the implacable nature, and informs the poet to raise the song in praise of mercy. Shakespeare’s “quality of mercy” is one of the sublimest strains ever chanted by mortal tongue, and it received its inspiration from the lips of the Great Teacher.
Lie.—
I. An idol a lie.—
1. As professing to be what it is not;
2. As deceiving him who trusts in it.
II. Everything opposed to God a lie.
III. Everything a lie which—
1. Disappoints man’s hopes;
2. Fails to satisfy the cravings of his immortal soul.
IV. That life a lie which is not—
1. According to God’s will;
2. Directed to His glory;
3. The realisation of His enjoyment.—Rev. T. Robinson.
Man’s forgetfulness.—God has well remembered man—remembers him every day. God might easily forget man; he is so insignificant, worthless, unlovable. But He does not. God desires to be remembered by man. He has taken unspeakable pains to keep Himself before His creatures, so as to make forgetfulness on their part the greatest of all impossibilities. In everything that God has set before our eyes or ears He says, Remember Me. In every star, every flower, every mountain, every stream—in every joy, every comfort, every blessing of daily life—God says, Remember Me. It is not, however, merely a “deity,” a divine being, that is to be remembered. It is the one living and true God. Every departure from this is idolatry and dishonour. This true God wishes to be remembered.
1. Reverently. He is great and glorious, to be had in reverence of all creaturehood.
2. Confidingly. His character is such that He deserves to be trusted.
3. Joyfully. Not by constraint, or through terror or hope of profit, but with the full and happy heart.
4. Lovingly. We love Him because He first loved us.
5. Steadfastly. Not by fits and starts, at certain “devotional seasons,” but always. This God, whose name is Jehovah, is worthy to be remembered, He is so infinitely glorious, and good, and great, and lovable. The wonder is, how One so great should ever for a moment be forgotten. Yet man forgets God! He hears of Him, and then forgets Him. He sees His works, and then forgets Him. He acknowledges deliverances, and then forgets Him.
Israel is frequently charged with such things as these:
1. They forgot His words.
2. They forgat His works. Miracle on miracle of the most stupendous kind did He for Israel in Egypt and in the desert. They sang His praise, and then forgat His works.
3. They forgat Himself. Yes, Himself—their God, their Redeemer, their Rock, their Strength! They thrust Him out of their thoughts and memories. God lays great stress upon remembering Him and His works. Often did He use that word to Israel, “Remember.” “Remember the way that the Lord led thee.” “Remember the commandments of the Lord.” “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.” “Remember thy Creator.” In the New Testament the words of the Lord Himself must occur to every one, “This do in remembrance of Me”; and the response of the Church, “We will remember Thy love more than wine.” Forget not, O man, the God that made thee. He has given thee no cause to forget Him.—H. Bonar.
SUGGESTIVE COMMENTS ON Rom_1:23-32
Paul includes all transgressors.—Though the apostle begins his delineation of the ungodliness and unrighteousness against which wrath is revealed by specifying the grievous misconduct of the philosophers and legislators among the heathen, it must not be supposed that he means to limit his description to those who possessed extensive knowledge and high intellectual attainments. He plainly includes all who transgressed any known duty. His allusion to the wise and eminent seems intended to suggest this important consideration, that if the wrath of God be revealed against the transgressions even of these high and honoured characters, how much more must it fall on the great body of offenders who have no such shining qualities to counterbalance their sins? Nor must it be supposed,—because the first thing specified in this dark catalogue of transgressions is the concealment of what was known concerning God, and transferring the glory which belongs only to the incorruptible God to imaginary objects of worship, that is the only or even the chief offence against which wrath is revealed. This is the only fruitful source from which the gross practical wickedness of the heathen arose, and by which it was encouraged. But according to the principle before laid down, wrath is revealed, not only against this particular sin, but against every transgression whatever.—Ritchie.
Nature leaves without excuse.—“Not as God,” etc. The revelation in nature of God’s greatness and bounty ought to have produced in their hearts admiration and gratitude. It produced neither. But it left them without excuse. And for this end it was given—i.e., to make them conscious of the guilt of their ungodliness and ingratitude. Notice that their first fault was negative. All else was the result of not using the light which God gave. “But they became vain,” etc. Result of not giving honour and thanks to God. Their minds were at work, but to no purpose. Their reasonings were in vain. The facts of idolatry here asserted need, unfortunately, no confirmation. The writings and relics of antiquity prove the charge. Statues of men were worshipped by the Greeks; and the mummies of birds and reptiles from the temples of Egypt fill our museums. And, as far as I know, when Paul wrote this epistle, no serious voice had been raised in heathendom against this folly. Paul’s view of natural theology. With him creation plays a part in the moral training of the Gentiles similar to that of the law in the training of the Jews. A striking coincidence is found in the only two recorded discourses addressed by Paul to heathens, each of which he begins by appealing to the works of creation. With the Jews he begins by quoting the Old Testament. In each case he appeals to an earlier revelation given to prepare the way for the gospel, and thus seeks to call forth that consciousness of guilt without which the need of the gospel is not felt. God’s revelation of Himself in nature would probably bear its chief fruit in those Gentiles who heard the gospel. While listening to it they would condemn themselves, not for rejecting Christ, of whom they had never heard, but for disregarding a revelation which had been before their eyes from childhood. And just as the law retains its value even for those who have accepted the gospel, so the worth of the nature-revelation remains to those who behold the glory of God in the face of Jesus. That God reveals Himself in nature, raises natural science to a sacred study, and gives to it its noblest aim. We learn that, by the just judgment of God, godlessness, folly, and shame go together. Are not those men guilty of incredible folly who prefer to direct their highest thought and effort to the perishing objects around, rather than to those which will never pass away? Human nature is the same. The principles here asserted attest themselves before our eyes and in our hearts. The inevitable connection of godlessness, folly, and sin proclaims in words we cannot misunderstand that God is angry with those who forget Him. Heathens have observed this. Socrates, in Xenophon’s Memoir, says that the fact that certain sins produce their own punishment proves that the law which forbids them is from God. The true nature of sin. It is not a mere act, but is an adverse power against which man, unaided by God, is powerless. It has allies in our own hearts. The deep shame of the heathen is with Paul fully accounted for by the fact that God gave them up to sin. Of this all else is the necessary result.—Beet.
Conscience the best argument.—Our conscience is the best argument in the world to prove there is a God, for conscience is God’s deputy; and the inferior must suppose a superior, and God and our conscience are alike relative terms, it not being imaginable why some persons in some cases should be amazed and troubled in their minds for their having done a secret turpitude or cruelty, but that conscience is present with a message from God, and the men feel inward causes of fear when they are secure from without—that is, they are forced to fear God when they are safe from men. And it is impossible that any man should be an atheist if he have any conscience; and for this reason it is there have been so few atheists in the world, because it is so hard for men to lose their conscience wholly.—Ductor Dubitantium.
Corruption of the heathen.—Greater folly than this exchange of the living and glorious God for the mere image of birds, beasts, and reptiles the world has never seen. That the heathen really worshipped such objects is well known. Philo says that the whole land of Egypt was covered with temples and groves dedicated to dogs, wolves, lions, land and water animals, crocodiles, birds, etc. With regard to the vast majority of the people, the homage terminated on the animal or the idol; and the case was little better with the pantheistical refiners and defenders of this system, who professed to worship the great and universal divine principle in these particular manifestations. Why should the higher manifestation of God in the human soul do homage to the lower development of the universal principle in a reptile? We never find the sacred writers making any account of this common subterfuge and apology for idolatry. All who bowed down to a stock or stone they denounced as worshipping gods which their own hands had made, which had eyes but saw not, ears but heard not, and hands that could not save. This corruption of morals was confined to no one class or sex. Paul first refers to the degradation of females among the heathen, because they are always the last to be affected in the decay of morals; and therefore when they are abandoned the very fountains of purity are corrupted. It is unnecessary to say more than that virtue has lost its hold on the female sex, in any community, to produce the conviction that it has already reached the lowest point of degradation.—Hodge.
God not the author of sin.—God may make one sin the punishment of another, though it still is to be remembered that it is one thing for God to give a man over to sin, and quite another to cause him to sin: the former importing it in no more than God’s providential ordering of a man’s circumstances, so that he shall find no check or hindrance in the course of his sin; but the latter implying also a positive efficiency toward the commission or production of a sinful act; which God never does, nor can do; but the other He both may and in a judicial way very often does.… In all which God is not at all the author of sin, but only pursues the great work and righteous ends of His providence in disposing of things or objects, in themselves good or indifferent, toward the compassing of the same. Howbeit, through the poison of men’s vicious affections, they are turned into the opportunities and fuel of sin, and made the occasion of their final destruction.—Dr. South.
Holy voice of nature.—Cast your eyes over all the nations of the world. Amid so many inhuman and absurd superstitions, amid that prodigious diversity of manners and characters, you will find everywhere the same principles and distinctions of moral good and evil. The paganism of the ancient world produced indeed abominable gods, who on earth would have been shunned or punished as monsters, and who offered as a picture of supreme happiness only crimes to commit and passions to satiate. But vice armed with this sacred authority descended in vain from the eternal abode; she found in the heart of man a moral instinct to repel her. The continence of Xenocrates was admired by those who celebrated the debaucheries of Jupiter. The chaste Lucretia adored the unchaste Venus. The most intrepid Roman sacrificed to fear. He invoked the god who dethroned his father, and he died without a murmur by the hand of his own. The most contemptible divinities were served by the greatest men. The holy voice of nature, stronger than that of the gods, made itself heard and respected and obeyed on earth, and seemed to banish as it were to the confinement of heaven guilt and the guilty.—Rousseau.
[We are not to forget that Rousseau’s holy voice of nature is infidelity, and that it is folly to talk of vice descending from an eternal abode and finding a repelling force in the heart of man. We give the extract as a graphic confirmation of St. Paul’s description.]
Infidelity barren of good results.—The system of infidelity is a soil as barren of great and sublime virtues as it is prolific in crimes. By great and sublime virtues are meant those which are called into action on great and trying occasions, which demand the sacrifice of the dearest interests and prospects of human life, and sometimes of life itself—the virtues, in a word, which by their rarity and splendour draw admiration, and have rendered illustrious the character of patriots, martyrs, and confessors. It requires but little reflection to perceive that whatever veils a future world and contracts the limits of existence within the present life must tend in a proportionable degree to diminish the grandeur and narrow the sphere of human agency. As well might you expect exalted sentiments of justice from a professed gamester, as look for noble principles in the man whose hopes and fears are all suspended on the present moment, and who stakes the whole happiness of his being on the events of this vain and fleeting life. If he be ever impelled to the performance of great achievements in a good cause, it must be solely by the hope of fame: a motive which, besides that it makes virtue the servant of opinion, usually grows weaker at the approach of death; and which, however it may surmount the love of existence in the heat of battle or in the moment of public observation, can seldom be expected to operate with much force on the retired duties of a private station. In affirming that infidelity is unfavourable to the higher class of virtues, we are supported as well by facts as by reasoning. We should be sorry to load our adversaries with unmerited reproach; but to what history, to what record, will they appeal for the traits of moral greatness exhibited by their disciples? Where shall we look for the trophies of infidel magnanimity or atheistical virtue? Not that we mean to accuse them of inactivity: they have recently filled the world with the fame of their exploits—exploits of a different kind indeed, but of imperishable memory and disastrous lustre. The exclusion of a supreme Being and of a superintending Providence tends directly to the destruction of moral taste. It robs the universe of all finished and consummate excellence, even in idea. The admiration of perfect wisdom and goodness for which we are formed, and which kindles such unspeakable raptures in the soul, finding in the regions of scepticism nothing to which it corresponds, droops and languishes. In a world which presents a fair spectacle of order and beauty, of a vast family nourished and supported by an almighty Parent—in a world which leads the devout mind, step by step, to the contemplation of the first fair and the first good, the sceptic is encompassed with nothing but obscurity, meanness, and disorder. Modern infidelity not only tends to corrupt the moral taste, it also promotes the growth of those vices which are the most hostile to social happiness. Of all the vices incident to human nature, the most destructive to society are vanity, ferocity, and unbridled sensuality; and these are precisely the vices which infidelity is calculated to cherish.—Robert Hall.
Origin of idolatry.—Here then—in the alienation of the heart from God, the unsuitableness of His character to the depraved propensities of fallen creatures, and the consequent desire to have a God “who will approve their sin”—is the origin of idolatry. This view of the case accords well with the character of the “gods many and lords many of the heathen world,” and with the nature of the worship with which they were, and still are, honoured. Where, among all the objects of their worship, shall we find one whose attributes indicate the operation, in the mind that has imagined it, of anything like a principle either of holiness or of love? Where one whom its worshippers have invested with the qualities either of purity or of mercy? All their deities appear to be the product of a strange and an affecting combination of depraved passions and guilty fears. The principal gods of the Pantheon are raised above human kind chiefly by the superior enormity of their crimes, their greater power only enabling them to be the greater adepts both in folly and in wickedness. They are the patrons and the examples of all that is vile and of all that is cruel—of intemperance, and lust, and knavery, and jealousy, and revenge. Thus men love to sin; and they make their gods sinners, that they may practise evil under their sanction and patronage. The worship of their gods is such as might be anticipated from their characters. Well are their superstitions denominated “abominable idolatries.” They consist, not merely of the most senseless fooleries and extravagances, but of the most disgusting impurities, the most licentious acts of intemperance, and the most iron-hearted cruelties. It may be remarked that the very same tendency of human nature to depart from Jehovah and follow after idols evinced itself when a fresh experiment was tried in the case of the Jews. They alone of all nations were put in possession of the knowledge of the true God; and they showed a constant inclination, for many ages of their history, to change—to go astray from Jehovah, and to serve “strange gods, the gods of the heathen that were round about them,” Is it not most wonderful that the only people who were in the right discovered so strong a, propensity to change the right for the, wrong, while those who were in the wrong adhered pertinaciously to their errors and were obstinately averse to; embrace what was right? How spirited the expostulation of Jehovah by the I prophet Jeremiah!—“Pass over the isles of Chittim, and see; and send unto Kedar, and consider diligently, and see if there be such a thing. Hath a nation changed their gods, which are yet no gods? but My people hath: changed their glory for that which doth not profit. Be astonished O ye, heavens, at this, and be horribly afraid; be ye very desolate, saith the Lord.”—Wardlaw.
ILLUSTRATIONS TO CHAPTER 1
Rom_1:22. The fate of a boaster.—Simon Tournay affords a memorable and affecting proof of the truth of that scripture. “Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools.” In 1201, after he had excelled all Oxford in learning, and had become so eminent at Paris as to be made chief doctor of the Sorbonne, he was so puffed up with foolish pride as to hold Aristotle superior to Moses and Christ, and yet but equal to himself. In his latter days, however, he grew such an idiot as not to know one letter in a book, or to remember one thing he had ever done.
Rom_1:24. The Goddess of Reason.—In the Paris papers of August 1st, 1817, we find among the obituaries the following announcement: “Died, within these few days, in the hospital of pauper lunatics of Salpêtrière, where she had lived unpitied and unknown for many years, the famous Theroigne de Mericourt (the Goddess of Reason), the most remarkable of the heroines of the Revolution.” This female (nearly in a state of nudity) was seated on a throne by Fouché and Carnot in the Champ de Mars, and hailed alternately as the Goddess of Reason and Liberty. There was something remarkable in the history of the latter days of this poor creature, and her life is not without its moral. She who was taught publicly to blaspheme her Creator and dishonour her sex was for the last twenty years of her miserable life subject to the greatest of human calamities—the deprivation of her reason. She repented severely of her horrible crimes, and her few lucid intervals were filled up by the most heartrending lamentations. She died at the age of fifty-seven.
The Preacher's Complete Homiletical Commentary (gen. ed. Joseph S. Exell; Funk & Wagnalls, c. 1892) — public domain (pre-1929). A full-Bible homiletical/sermon-outline anthology covering 65 of 66 books (2 John is absent from the source module). Text from a community e-Sword module.
William B. Godbey 1900 · Public Domain On vv20, 21, 22, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32 20. “For the invisible things of Him from the…
20. “For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being known by the things which are made, both His eternal power and divinity, so that they are left without excuse.” God-head in E. V. is wrong, the Greek being theiotees, which means divinity, instead of theotees, which means God-head; the words being so much alike, transcribers and translators mistook the one for the other. The truth of the matter is, while God is revealed to all the heathens by the light of nature, conscience and the universally present Holy Spirit, it is a matter of fact that the different Persons of the Trinity are not thus revealed. Hence, though the heathens can know God and be saved without the revealed Word, in the absence of the latter, they never would be able to recognize three Persons of the Trinity. You see Paul positively affirms the gracious possibility of universal salvation, otherwise they would not all be left “without excuse.” Hence you see from this positive statement that no one in the judgment day can give an apology for his disqualification to meet the Lord and enter heaven. The untutored savage in his primeval wilds sees God in the clouds and hears him in the winds:
“Whose soul proud science never taught to stray, Far as the solar walk, the milky way.”
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Captain John Smith, a cultured Episcopalian, during his captivity with the Indians, after the old chief had adopted him as his son and successor, was left in charge of him and his old wife and little grandson, while all the balance went off to war. During a terrible wintry storm, when a great sleet everywhere covered the deep snow, the loud roar of whose breaking beneath the feet entirely disqualified him to get in gunshot of the wild animals on which they were all dependent for their daily food, day after day the young Englishman returns at nightfall from a laborious all-day walk over the ice fields, crushing beneath his feet and letting him down into the deep snow, weary and forlorn, faint with hunger and fatigue. Every evening the venerable chief lying flat on his back on his bear-skin, prostrate with rheumatism, delivers his adopted son a profitable exhortation on the patience and humiliation requisite to qualify a soul at life’s end to ascend above the snow clouds, and dwell in the glorified presence of the Great Spirit forever. Finally John concludes that they are all going to starve to death in a pile. Consequently, with much regret in his own heart to leave those people to die alone, he set out apparently as usual on a hunting excursion, but with his mind made up to escape and make his way back to Jamestown. While thus trudging along, seeing a herd of buffaloes at a great distance, taking position in concealment, he prays God to send them within gun-shot, as he had had nothing to eat for a week but some broth made from the bones of a wild-cat, which the vultures had picked, and they had recovered from beneath the snow. Sure enough, his prayer is answered and the herd comes roaring along near by. He fires away and downs a fat heifer. Running, he cuts out some meat and satisfies his awful hunger by eating it blood-raw. Then supplying himself with some of the food to eat on his journey, his heart turns back with incorrigible sympathy for those poor people he had left to die. Consequently, loading himself with the meat, he wends his way back to the wigwam, arriving at nightfall, and saluted by the venerable chief, lying on his back, “O, my son, I knew you would bring it today. Oeneah (the name of his God) told me so.” Smith wanted to hand him some of it raw to eat at once. “O, no, my son, I am not in a hurry.” “Well,” says Smith, “I will broil you some on the coals.” “O, no, I prefer it stewed. While it is cooking I want you to sit down that I may talk to you about the great spirit, Oeneah, who always takes good care of his children.” Smith felt himself a missionary among them, and had been teaching them the Christian religion the best he could from the Bible. Now he finds, to his surprise, that the old Indian, who had spent his life in savagedom, knew much more about the Lord, and his salvation, than he did. I mention this to demonstrate a case of a heathen who was intelligently saved, walking with God and bearing the fruits of the Spirit. A multitude of Scriptures intelligently corroborates this great truth, that all the people in the world can be saved if they will, having nothing to do but walk in the light which God gives them, as in that case, in the glorious ultimatum, the “blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth them from all sin” (1Jn 1:7). This is true of all the people in the world, whether heathen, Moslem, Papist or Protestant (Joh 1:9 and Tit 2:11). Then why send the heathens the gospel if they can be saved without it?
(a) Because God has commanded us to go and preach the gospel to every creature. We must obey or fall under condemnation.
(b) Because the more light they have, the greater the probability that they will walk in it and be saved. For the same reason we keep on preaching to people in gospel lands, not because they can not be saved without it, but because they will not. In all cases it is a question of will and probability rather than privilege and possibility.
William B. Godbey, Commentary on the New Testament (1896–1900) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
J. W. McGarvey 1914 · Public Domain On vv20–32 For the invisible things of him since the creation…
For the invisible things of him since the creation of the world are clearly seen, being perceived through the things that are made, even his everlasting power and divinity; that they may be without excuse [and God reveals his wrath against them, because that which is known of God, i. e., the general truths as to his nature and attributes, is manifested unto them; for God himself so manifested it, causing his invisible attributes, even his power, divinity, etc., to be constantly and clearly revealed in the providential working of nature from the hour of creation's beginning, until now, that they may be without excuse for sin, and so justly punishable]:
J. W. McGarvey (with Philip Y. Pendleton), Commentaries on the New Testament (The Fourfold Gospel, 1914; Acts; and the epistles) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
C. I. Scofield 1917 · Public Domain On v28 did not like
did not like
refused to have. Lit. did not approve God.
The Scofield Reference Bible (1917 edition), notes by C. I. Scofield — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Paul E. Kretzmann 1924 · Public Domain On vv22, 26 The result of deliberate folly:
The result of deliberate folly:
v. 22. Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools,
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v. 23. and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God in to an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things.
v. 24. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts to dishonor their own bodies between themselves;
v. 25. who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshiped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
Here the result of ignoring God and of deliberately setting aside the guidance of the natural knowledge of God is shown. When men claimed, asserted, boasted their own wisdom, 1Co 1:22, they became fools, they were stultified in intellect. The true wisdom, which comes down from above, is ever humble, but where the divine truth is missing, human philosophy with its boastful attitude makes its appearance. And so the final result of the vanity of their mind, of the darkness and foolishness of their intellect, was that men have exchanged the glory of the immortal God for the semblance of the picture of mortal man. The semblance which was chosen in the place of God was the picture of some man or of some animals, either birds or four-footed beasts or reptiles. Such an idol was to be a representation of the Godhead, Isa 44:12-19; Psa 115:4-8; Psa 135:15-18. History gives many examples; for the idols of the Greeks and Romans, also of the ancient Germans were statues in the form of men; the eagle of Jupiter and the ibis and hawk of the Egyptians were sacred birds; the white ox of the Egyptians, the golden calf of the Israelites, goats and monkeys in other nations, were four-footed idols; and among the reptiles were the crocodile and various serpents, all of which were given divine honor. Such were and are the manifestations of the false religions of men when they turn from the true God. In the foolishness of their unnatural idolatry they pervert the original order of God. "Man, made in the image of God, now makes God in his own image; and the master of the animal kingdom has so far forgotten his dignity as to worship the pictures of animals which should be subject to him."
The result of this idolatry is a loss of all true morality as well, a fact which God permitted as a well-deserved punishment. Therefore, because of their godlessness and idolatry, God has delivered the idolaters into uncleanness. It is a divine punishment and destiny; God punishes sin with sin. In the lusts of their hearts, in the condition in which they were in consequence of their godless, irreligious conduct, which they delighted in, God has given them over to uncleanness. The sinful lusts and desires of the heart were the people’s own doing, and the dishonoring practices which followed were God’s punishment. When a person refuses to heed the warnings of God in nature and conscience, then these warnings are finally withdrawn, the unrighteous person is abandoned to the gratification of his desires and lusts, to every form of uncleanness and immorality, just as a physician may finally leave an untractable patient to his own devices. And so the uncleanness of the idolaters results in gross transgressions of the Sixth Commandment, that their bodies are dishonored in themselves. Through all immoral vices the bodies of men are shamefully treated; uncleanness takes away all the honor which the body of man possesses as a creature of God, 1Co 6:18.
The apostle now emphasizes once more that the motive which prompted God to this punishment lay in the transgressors themselves. It is carried out in the case of all those that changed the truth of God, the true worship of God, the true God Himself, into a lie, into idolatry and idolatrous practices. Men have exchanged the true living God for idols, to whom they falsely attach the name gods. And the creature they have thus honored and served in place of the Creator, in preference to the true God, to whom alone all blessing and honor is due, as Paul emphasizes by the conclusion with the Hebrew Amen. This same emphatic belief and confession must live in the Christians of all times: there is only one true God, He who has revealed Himself in His Word for the salvation of mankind.
Paul E. Kretzmann, Popular Commentary of the Bible (1921–1924) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
unfoldingWord translationNotes 2017 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv20, 22, 24, 26, 28, 29, 32 For his invisible qualities ... have been clearly seen
For his invisible qualities ... have been clearly seen
Paul speaks of people understanding God's invisible qualities as if people have seen those qualities. This can be translated in active form. AT: "For people have clearly understood God's invisible qualities, namely his eternal power and divine nature" (See: Metaphor and Active or Passive)
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divine nature
"all the qualities and characteristics of God" or "the things about God that make him God"
world
This refers to the heavens and the earth, as well as everything in them.
in the things that have been made
This can be translated in active form. AT: "because of the things that God has made" or "because people have seen the things that God has made" (See: Active or Passive)
they are without excuse
"these people can never say that they did not know"
became foolish in their thoughts
You can translate this in an active form. AT: "began to think foolish things" (See: Active or Passive)
their senseless hearts were darkened
Here "darkness" is a metaphor that represents the people's lack of understanding. Here "hearts" is a metonym for a person's mind or inner being. AT: "they became unable to understand what God wanted them to know" (See: Metaphor and Metonymy)
translationWords
create
world
eternity
power
divine
glory
fool
heart
darkness
unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.
Tyndale Open Study Notes 2022 · CC BY-SA 4.0 On vv21, 24, 26, 27, 28, 29, 32 1:21 To know God in Scripture usually means to…
1:21 To know God in Scripture usually means to have an intimate, saving relationship with him (see 2 Cor 5:16; Gal 4:9; Phil 3:8, 10). Here, however, they knew God means that people knew about God. All people have some understanding of God through creation, yet they do not do what is right based on that knowledge. Rather than learn more about God, they worship gods of their own making.
Tyndale Open Study Notes — © Tyndale Open Resources, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Text via the HelloAO Bible API.