Romans 14:23

ὁ δὲ διακρινόμενος ἐὰν φάγῃ κατακέκριται : such, on the other hand, is the unhappy situation of the weak a new motive for charity. For διακριν. cf. Romans 4:20; James 1:6; Mark 11:23. The weak Christian cannot be clear in his own mind that it is permissible to do as the strong does; it may be, he thinks one moment, and the next, it may not be; and if he follows the strong and eats in this state of mind, κατακέκριται he is condemned. The condemnation is absolute: it is not only that his own conscience pronounces clearly against him after the act, but that such action incurs the condemnation of God. It is inconsistent with that conscientiousness through which alone man can be trained in goodness; the moral life would become chaotic and irredeemable if conscience were always to be treated so. ὅτι οὐκ ἐκ πίστεως, sc., ἔφαγεν. The man is condemned because he did not eat ἐκ πίστεως : and this is generalised in the last clause πᾶν δὲ ὃ οὐκ ἐκ πίστεως ἁμαρτία ἐστίν. All that is not of faith is sin; and therefore this eating, as not of faith, is sin. It is impossible to give πίστις here a narrower sense than Christianity: see Romans 14:1. Everything a Christian man does that cannot justify itself to him on the ground of his relation to Christ is sin. It is too indefinite to render omne quod non est ex fide as Thomas Aquinas does by omne quod est contra conscientiam : it would need to be contra Christianam conscientiam. All a man cannot do remembering that he is Christ's all he cannot do with the judgment-seat (Romans 14:10) and the Cross (Romans 14:15) and all their restraints and inspirations present to his mind is sin. Of course this is addressed to Christians, and there is no rule in it for judging the character or conduct of those who do not know Christ. To argue from it that works done before justification are sin, or that the virtues of the heathen are glittering vices, is to misapply it altogether.