Augustine of Hippo — Commentary on Scripture

Romans 5:5

Who can hurt such a man? Who can subdue him? In prosperity he makes moral progress, and in adversity he learns to know the progress he has made. When he has an abundance of mutable goods he does not put his trust in them, and when they are taken away he gets to know whether or not they have taken him captive.

OF TRUE RELIGION 92

Romans 5:12

As infants cannot help being descended from Adam, so they cannot help being touched by the same sin, unless they are set free from its guilt by the baptism of Christ.

LETTER 157

Romans 5:12

If the souls of all men are derived from that one which was breathed into the first man … either the soul of Christ was not derived from that one, since he had no sin of any kind … or, if his soul was derived from that first one, he purified it in taking it for himself, so that he might be born of the virgin and might come to us without any trace of sin, either committed or transmitted.

LETTER 164

Romans 5:12

Everyone, even little children, have broken God’s covenant, not indeed in virtue of any personal action but in virtue of mankind’s common origin in that single ancestor in whom all have sinned.

City of God 16.27

Romans 5:12

When a man is born, he is already born with death, because he contracts sin from Adam.

TRACTATES ON THE GOSPEL OF JOHN 49.12.2

Romans 5:12

All men for whom Christ died died in the sin of the first Adam, and all who are baptized into Christ die to sin.

AGAINST JULIAN 6.7.21

Romans 5:12

These words clearly teach that original sin is common to all men, regardless of the personal sins of each one.

AGAINST JULIAN 6.20.63

Romans 5:13

Paul said this in opposition to those who thought that sin could be taken away through the law. He says that sins were made apparent by the law, not abolished. He says not that there was no sin but only that it was not counted. Once the law was given, sin was not taken away, but it began to be counted.

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 27-28

Romans 5:14

This can be understood in two ways: either “in the likeness of Adam’s transgression, death reigned,” or (as surely it must be read) “death reigned over even those who did not sin in the likeness of Adam’s transgression but sinned before the law was given.” Thus those who received the law may be understood to have sinned in the likeness of Adam’s transgression, because Adam also sinned after having received a law to obey…. Adam is the type of the one who was to come but in reverse, for as death came through Adam, so life came through our Lord.

Romans 5:14

Adam is the type of Christ but in reverse, because the good done by Christ to the regenerated is greater than the harm done by Adam to his descendants.

LETTER 157

Romans 5:15

The gift excels in two ways: first, because grace abounds much more in that it bestows eternal life even though death reigns in the temporal sphere because of the death of Adam, and second, because by the condemnation of one sin the death of many came about through Adam, whereas by the forgiveness of many sins through our Lord Jesus Christ grace has been given for eternal life.

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 29

Romans 5:16

This is the difference: in Adam one sin was condemned, but by the Lord many sins have been forgiven.

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 29

Romans 5:17

“Much more will those reign” pertains to eternal life; “those who receive the abundance of grace” pertains to the forgiveness of many sins.

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 29

Romans 5:18

No one is born without the intervention of carnal concupiscence, which is inherited from the first man, who is Adam, and no one is reborn without the intervention of spiritual grace, which is given by the second man, who is Christ.

LETTER 187.31

Romans 5:18

God wants all those to whom grace comes through the righteousness of the One unto justification of life to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.

AGAINST JULIAN 4.8.42

Romans 5:18

Here Paul returns to his original argument, interrupted [from verse 12].

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 29

Romans 5:19

This is the figure of the future Adam.

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 29

Romans 5:20

Prohibition increased lust. It made it unconquered so that transgression might be added, which did not exist without the law, although there was sin.

On Continence 3.7

Romans 5:20

By this Paul has clearly indicated that the Jews did not know by what dispensation the law had been given. It was not given in order to bring life, for grace brings life through faith, but the law was given to show with what great and tight chains those who thought they could fulfill all righteousness in their own strength were bound. So sin abounded, both because desire grew more ardent in the light of the prohibition and because the crime of trespass affected those who sinned against the law. Whoever considers the second of the four states of man will understand this.

AUGUSTINE ON ROMANS 30

Romans 5:20

Grace means that good works are now performed by those who had earlier done evil; it does not make them continue in evil in the belief that good will be given to them in return.

GRACE AND FREE WILL 22.44