Romans 1:32

“ Who, knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but applaud those who do them. ”

The relation of this verse to what precedes has been very generally misunderstood, hence probably the corrections of the text attempted in some MSS.

The most serious misunderstanding is that of Ritschl. This theologian regards the men to whom this verse and the four following (Romans 2:1-4) refer as forming a class by themselves, and wholly different from the sinners described from Romans 1:19 onward. The men who repress the truth, Romans 1:18, are according to him divided into two classes: “those who through heathenism have quenched the feeling of divine revelation (Romans 1:19-31),” and “those who, while judging the immoralities produced by paganism, nevertheless take part in them by their conduct (Romans 1:32 to Romans 2:4).” But it is easy to see that this construction is devised solely with the view of finding the development of the idea of divine wrath, Romans 1:18, in the passage Romans 2:5 et seq., and not in the παραδιδόναι, giving over, of Romans 1:24; Romans 1:26; Romans 1:28 (see p. 168). This construction, proposed by Ritschl, is impossible.

1. Because judging with a view to approve, Romans 1:32, is not the same thing as judging to condemn, Romans 2:1-2.

2. On account of the obvious relation between the terms of Romans 1:32: though knowing the judgment of God, and those of Romans 1:28: they did not keep God in their knowledge.

3. The uniform sense of the pronoun οἵτινες, as people who, forces us to seek in the description of Romans 1:32 the justification of the judgment described from Romans 1:28.

Far, then, from indicating a change of persons, this pronoun expresses the moral qualification by which the individuals just described have drawn on them so severe a punishment. It is an exact parallel to the οἵτινες of Romans 1:25. The latter justified the judgment of idolaters by recalling to mind the greatness of their offence. The former in the same way justifies the punishment which has overtaken the resistance of man to the revelation of moral good (Romans 1:28 a): “They had well deserved to be given over to this deluge of iniquities, they who had acted thus toward God when He revealed his will to them.” The terms which follow and explain the pronoun they who, set forth this radical iniquity through which men quenched the sentiment of moral truth revealed in them; comp. Romans 1:28 a Τὸ δικαίωμα, strictly, what God establishes as just; here: His just sentence; ἐπιγνόντες denotes the clear discernment which men had of it. The word recalls the γνόντες τὸν Θεόν, knowing God, of Romans 1:21: moral light was produced in them as well as religious light. The words following indicate the contents of that sentence which God had taken care to engrave on their heart. What appeals to God's justice do we not find in the writings of Gentile historians and philosophers! What a description in their poets of the punishment inflicted on malefactors in Tartarus! The phrase worthy of death has been applied by some, and recently again by Hofmann, to the punishment of death as executed by human judges. But this penalty would suit only one term in the whole preceding enumeration, viz., φόνος, murder; and the τὰ τοιαῦτα, such things, does not allow so restricted an application. Death therefore here denotes death as God only can inflict it, the pains of Hades, which the Gentiles also recognized, and which Paul, designating things from his own point of view, calls death. The second part of the verse leads from the offence to the punishment. It is the mind deprived of discernment, to which God has given up men, in its most monstrous manifestation; not only doing evil, but applauding those who do it! This is true to fact. Had not the Caligulas and Neros found advocates, admirers, multitudes always ready to offer them incense? The not only, but even, rightly assumes that there is more guilt in approving in cold blood of the evil committed by others, than in committing it oneself under the force and blindness of passion. Such a mode of acting is therefore the last stage in the corruption of the moral sense.

The reading of the Cantab. would signify: “They who, knowing the sentence of God, did not understand that those who do such things are worthy of death; for not only do they do them, etc.”...This meaning would be admissible, but the contents of the sentence of God would remain absolutely unexplained, which is far from natural. The reading of the Vatic. would give the following translation: “They who, knowing the sentence of God, that those who do such things are worthy of death, not only doing those things, but approving those who do them.” The construction in this case demands the doubling of the verb εἰσίν, are (first, as verb of the proposition ὅτι, that those who; then as verb of the proposition οἵτινες, they who). This construction is very forced; it is very probable, as has been supposed, that the reading of B is only an importation into the apostolic text of a form of quotation found in the Epistle of Clemens Romanus. This Father, quoting our passage, says: “They who practice these things are abominable in the sight of God; and not only they who do them (οἱ πράσσοντες), but those also who approve them (οἱ συνευδοκοῦντες).” The “ did not understand,” and the for added by the Cantab., appear to be mere attempts to correct the reading of the Vaticanus. In the whole of this chapter the apostle evidently distinguishes two degrees in the sin of the Gentile world; the one active and internal, the other passive and external; the one a natural result of depraved instinct, the other having the character of unnatural monstrosity. The first is chargeable on man, it is his guilt; the second is sin as a punishment, the manifest sign of God's wrath. This great historical fact is developed in two aspects. First, from the religious point of view: man quenches his intuition of the Divine Being, and clothes God in the form of an idol; his punishment in this connection is self-degradation by monstrous impurities. Then in the moral point of view: man quenches the light of conscience, and as a punishment his moral discernment is so perverted that he puts the seal of his approbation on all the iniquities which he should have condemned and prevented. This is the worst of corruptions, that of the conscience. Thus is fully justified the great thought of Romans 1:18: The wrath of God displayed on the Gentile world to punish the voluntary darkening of the religious sense (ungodliness) and of the moral sense (unrighteousness), which had been awakened in man by the primeval revelation of God.