Just as they did not judge it fitting to have God in their cognitive purview, God delivered them over to a mind that was unfit, so they would do things that should not be done.
—Romans 1:28
In the first chapter of Romans, Paul addresses the corrupted mind of the Gentile world; he will address the more knowledgeable Jewish mind in Romans 7:7–25. Ancient thinkers regularly opposed reason to the passions: the wise would overcome passions through truth. In Romans 1:18–32 Paul paints a more complicated picture of reason and passions, one that fits Jewish condemnations of paganism.1
In this passage Paul argues that humanity irrationally distorted God’s image through idolatry and that God in turn expressed his wrath against this idolatry by handing them over to their own irrational desires. Unreasonable thinking led to humanity’s subjection to passion. People’s unfit ways of thinking are the consequence of their rejection of God’s truth.2
The Pagan World’s Corrupted Mind
To establish that all humanity needs Christ, Paul first establishes what was probably not actually in dispute among believers in Jesus: that the Gentile world (i.e., unconverted non-Jews) did not know God (cf. Gal. 4:8; 1 Thess. 4:5). This premise will prepare for Paul’s argument that the possession of the Torah, a revelation far superior to what the Gentiles possessed, does not guarantee that Paul’s own Jewish people know God adequately either (cf. Rom. 2:1–29). Indeed, it merely makes them more culpable, so that all humanity stands under sin (Rom. 3:9–20).
Summary of Paul’s Likely Argument
Paul’s argument in Romans 1:18–32, in summary, appears to run as follows: God judges humanity for their wicked action of suppressing and perverting the truth about him through idolatry (1:18, 23). Humanity is culpable for their false images of God because in creation—especially in humans, created in God’s image—God has revealed what he is like (1:19–20). God therefore judges humanity by handing them over to their own corrupted thinking (1:24, 26, 28). This wrong thinking probably includes distorting the image of God in themselves (1:24–27). As they have dishonored God (1:21), God has allowed them to dishonor each other (1:24) with what Paul calls “dishonorable” and “shameful” passions (1:26–27). In the end they have committed all kinds of sins, even though they ultimately know better (1:28–32).
Although worded in various ways, the language of reason, knowledge, and truth pervades this passage, explaining that pagans’ current irrationally immoral “mind” or “way of thinking” (1:28) stems from humanity’s own sinful choices. Such language includes the following elements: Humanity originally had enough knowledge about God to honor him (1:19–21); by finding imaginative ways around that truth, they willfully distorted it (1:21, 25). Their reasoning became void and empty, like the idols they made; their hearts, now lacking understanding, were darkened (1:21). They became foolish—even while claiming to be wise (1:21–22; cf. 1:14). They no longer approved true knowledge about God, so God gave them disapproved minds so they would do what was improper (1:28). Just as humanity initially knew enough that they should have honored God, they also knew enough to understand that their wicked treatment of God and others—who, like themselves, were all created in God’s image—merited judgment (1:32). Nevertheless, they chose to justify rather than to reject such behavior (1:32).3 Thus they rejected truth, and God punished them by allowing them to become incapable of discerning truth, not only theologically but morally as well.4
Paul’s depiction of the culpable Gentile world under sin fits one line of Jewish thought about Gentiles5 and prepares for his larger argument about all of humanity being under sin (2:1–3:31).6 Gentiles lack the fuller moral truth of God’s Torah; Paul will argue in chapter 7 that even that knowledge cannot transform fully. My focus in this chapter, however, is more specifically on Paul’s depiction of Gentile thinking ruled by, and sometimes justifying, passion.
An Early Jewish Analogy
The intellectual elements of Paul’s argument should have been intelligible to a Diaspora Jewish audience and therefore probably to an early Christian audience, whether Jewish, Gentile, or mixed, many of whose inherited beliefs had been formed in a Diaspora Jewish milieu. Most scholars acknowledge that Paul develops existing Hellenistic Jewish arguments in this section.7
Paul’s argument follows most closely the popular Wisdom of Solomon.8 Wisdom declares that truth about God is evident in creation (Wis. 13:1–9); people, however, have failed to infer that truth from the good things that are visible (13:1). Thus, they ended up reducing God’s rightful glory by worshiping images of humans or beasts (13:13–14), images of created things (13:10–14:1; 14:8, 11).9 Once introduced, idolatry grew increasingly worse (14:15–16), and it has led to other vices (14:22–24). These moral consequences include sexual sin (14:12, 24) and have climaxed in a number of vices (14:25–26).
Like Paul, the author of Wisdom of Solomon notes the intellectual element in humanity’s folly. Idols deceived the ignorant (Wis. 14:18), and idolatry led people astray from the knowledge of God (14:22).10 Such images, or idols, revealed that people harbored wrong thinking about God (14:30). Paul, however, condemns Gentiles even more harshly than Wisdom of Solomon does, by emphasizing that Gentiles knew the truth and were not simply ignorant (Rom. 1:20–21, 32).11 Paul’s argument may presuppose an element of corporate guilt in that some earlier Gentiles made truth less accessible to later generations; while Paul might expect his ideal audience to share his knowledge of this element of the biblical narrative, however, he does not address such explanations. He is establishing a premise for his following argument in Romans 2, not writing a complete essay on salvation history.
God’s Wrath against Idolaters
In Romans 1:18–23 God is angry (1:18) with those who suppress the obvious truth about him and substitute false and inferior conceptions of deity in place of the truth (1:19–23).12 Paul views this deliberate ignorance in both moral and intellectual terms.
Although it becomes most explicit in 1:23, Paul is probably challenging idolatry throughout 1:18–23. In principle, Paul’s language of “ungodliness” or “impiety” (ἀσέβεια, 1:18) could refer to any action hostile toward a deity,13 and some thinkers viewed ignorance—especially about the right way to serve the gods—as impiety.14 Paul is not thinking in merely general terms, however. The climactic sin in this paragraph is idolatry (1:23).15 In this context the truth that people have suppressed unjustly (1:18) is the truth about God (1:19–21), and they especially suppressed this truth by worshiping created things rather than the creator (1:23, 25).16
Some Greek philosophers rejected the notion of divine wrath,17 but other Gentiles thought differently.18 Jewish sources certainly acknowledge God’s wrath,19 including in response to idolatry.20 In the context of Romans 1:24–32, God expresses this wrath in the present (1:18) by handing humanity over to their own moral insanity (see discussion below).
Information about God in Creation
Paul treats faith as accepting divine truth, and the rebellion of sin as the result of deliberately rejecting divine truth (Rom. 1:16–18). Thus, as God’s righteousness is revealed for salvation in the good news about Jesus (1:16–17), it apparently is also revealed in just wrath against those who suppress the truth (1:18).21 This observation contrasts not only salvation with wrath but also faith (1:16–17) with suppression of the truth (1:18), suggesting that what Paul means by “faith” is, in contrast to some applications of the English term in recent centuries, simply embracing the divine truth.22
Excursus: Knowledge of God in Ancient Mediterranean Thought
Greek thought highly valued the knowledge of deity.23 Although this interest was not limited to philosophers, it particularly predominates there.24 For example, a Cynic writer believes that the true knowledge of God includes right understanding of God’s character, as revealed by creation rather than mortals’ rituals.25 The Stoic Seneca contends that knowing what God is like would deliver mortals from superstition.26 A later Neoplatonist emphasizes correct understanding about God that leads to correctly approaching him and to one’s mind being conformed to his character.27 To a Pythagorean writer, knowledge of God leads to quietness,28 which perhaps reflects the understanding of one’s proper station that correct self-knowledge was thought to produce. Yet most philosophers held that knowledge of God was quite rare.29 Many writers echoed Plato’s view concerning knowledge of God: “To discover the Maker and Father of this universe is a task, and after discovering him it is impossible to tell of him” to others.30
The Alexandrian Jewish philosopher Philo insists on proper knowledge about God;31 he even replaces manna with heavenly knowledge32 and indicates that the Logos dwells in knowledge.33 Those with true knowledge of God are aptly entitled God’s children.34 Nature attests God’s reality, but God himself remains essentially unknowable by natural means.35 Wisdom also leads to the knowledge of God,36 but even philosophic reflection on what is proper does not necessarily lead beyond human thoughts; the mind must value God above all else, do everything it does on account of God, and ascend into knowledge of God.37 Philo combines revelation with intuition;38 as important as reason is, the highest mysteries are available only through direct experience with God.39
Judean sources also valued divine knowledge. In Scripture, knowing God often has an ethical component (e.g., Jer. 22:16).40 “Knowledge of God” in the Hebrew Bible usually indicates a right relationship with him, one predicated on proper knowledge about him and expressed in genuine piety.41 Knowing God also can express intimacy with God42 and can indicate the covenant relationship (cf. Hosea 2:20).43 In Scripture God often acts in a self-revealing way so that people “might know that I am YHWH.”44
The Dead Sea Scrolls heavily emphasize knowledge of God.45 Thus, the author of one Qumran document extols God as the source of knowledge who enlightens the writer to understand God’s mysteries.46 For the Qumran sect, knowledge was a gift from the Spirit.47 Knowledge was salvific, and its focus was on understanding the Torah, which God had given to the Teacher of Righteousness and those who followed him.48 In the Scrolls,49 as in the Old Testament,50 knowledge will be complete in the eschatological time.
For pre-Christian sages, knowledge of God included the recognition that he alone is the true God.51 The wicked were those who did not know him52 or his law53 and might mock the righteous for claiming to have the knowledge of God.54 In the late second century Rabbi Meir interpreted “know the Lord” in Hosea 2:22 (2:20 ET) as referring to those sharing the qualities listed in Hosea 2:21–22 (2:19–20 ET) knowing God’s will.55 The rabbis, who emphasized knowledge specifically of the law,56 taught that one would know God through learning57 and obeying58 his law; some rabbis believed that one would come to know God truly even through studying haggadah.59 In Jewish thought only Israel possessed the law, and therefore only Israel knew God.60
Because many Gentile thinkers highly valued the knowledge of God, they would have agreed that suppressing the truth about God is a serious act of impiety. Some ancient thinkers insisted that nature gave human minds a longing for truth;61 thus, knowingly suppressing it by denying the existence of the gods is not merely ignorance but evil.62 For some, as for Paul here, belief in a deity could be a basic element of reason, “one of those norms of which reason consists.”63 Some Gentiles believed that the earliest people had true knowledge that became enshrined in religion.64 Many Gentiles also believed that humanity had declined morally from the earlier era.65
One basic conviction about deity that was widely shared was that the existence of deity was self-evident. As in Paul’s perspective, exemplified in Romans 1, most ancient thinkers believed that they recognized divine design in nature.66 Epicureans, who denied divine design in nature, were deemed idiosyncratic.67 Socrates, for example, thought that nature revealed divine benevolence and thus invited praise.68 Stoics also inferred God’s existence from order in nature.69 They could thus claim that Zeus was manifest in his works in creation.70 The Jewish philosopher Philo also believed that creation provided understanding about its designer.71 Some other Jews conversant with Greek thought affirmed that Moses declared that God was revealed by his works.72 Later rabbis even developed the tradition that Abraham reasoned back to a first cause.73
Ancient thinkers would also understand Paul’s language about some knowledge of God being obvious within humans (Rom. 1:19).74 Many regarded knowledge about God as innate within people.75 Early humans could not remain ignorant, some thinkers opined, because Zeus had given them “intelligence and the capacity for reason,” and nature’s splendors testified about him.76 That all peoples had some conception of deities, they reasoned, showed that this truth was innate or implanted in everyone.77 Similarly, divine design is evident within the human body78 and especially in human reason.79
Some thinkers connected human reason with the divine Reason that designed the universe.80 Like many other Middle Platonists,81 Philo believed that God used the world of intellect as a pattern for the material world.82 He argues that God formed the universe through his logos, or reason.83 In Philo logos is not only divine Reason structuring matter but, as in some other Middle Platonic thought, a pattern that is God’s image.84 Philo connects the creative logos with the wisdom of Reason by which God draws the ideal wise person to himself.85 The human mind is allied to this divine Reason, or logos, because it is a copy of it.86
Some early Christian thinkers also developed this conventional notion that truth about God could be inferred from creation,87 although they differed as to the extent to which this potential proved effective.88 Contrary to what is argued by some of Paul’s interpreters, Paul apparently does believe that people can infer some truth about God from nature, although in a limited way.89 What this belief means is debated; some distinguish between natural theology and general revelation, or between knowledge about God that humans can infer from nature on their own and God revealing himself to them in nature.90 In any case, Paul is not trying to demonstrate God’s existence but is insisting that Gentiles already know of him.91 The revelation was sufficient to bring just condemnation, but not salvation, which is revealed only in the good news about Jesus (Rom. 1:16–17).92
Corrupted Minds Resist Rational Evidence from Creation
Paul complains that God had revealed rationally perceptible truth in creation, but people created alternative and inferior frameworks of thought to evade God’s truth. Because they refused the truth they had, they became incapable of discerning truth. In Romans 1:20–21 Paul argues that God’s revelation, including his “invisible characteristics” (ἀόρατα), is “seen” (καθορᾶται, 1:20) and that the resistant heart has been “darkened” (ἐσκοτίσθη, 1:21), playing on the widespread ancient use of vision as an analogy for knowing.93 Many thinkers emphasized the vision of the mind, often of the divine,94 especially in the Platonic tradition.95 This emphasis is frequent in Philo, a Jewish eclectic Middle Platonist thinker;96 for example, he condemns blindness of soul97 and emphasizes that, given the transcendence of God,98 divine inspiration in the soul is the best way to envision him.99
Humanity refused to act on true knowledge about the creator by honoring him or being grateful (Rom. 1:21). Paul probably viewed this expression of resisting true knowledge as not merely negligent but also defiant. Ingratitude was considered an abominable offense;100 Seneca deemed it a more fundamental vice than adultery, murder, or tyranny, allowing that these other vices might spring from it.101 Ingratitude toward deities, however, was easily recognizable as the worst expression of ingratitude.102 Failure to act in accordance with truth about God ultimately deprived mortals of truth.
Paul emphasizes the corruption of Gentile minds in Romans 1:21–22 and 28, often echoing biblical phraseology. Thus in 1:21, for example, “they became worthless” (ἐματαιώθησαν, from ματαιόω) in their “reasonings” (διαλογισμοῖς) echoes the language of Psalm 93:11 (LXX; 94:11 ET), where merely human reasonings are worthless (διαλογισμοὺς . . . μάταιοι).103 Paul may choose this wording for another reason, since “worthless” was also a common Jewish designation for, or was often associated with, idols.104
That sinners’ hearts, lacking understanding, were darkened probably also echoes biblical language105 and would have been widely intelligible. Ignorance could be viewed as darkness,106 the realm that impaired vision. Similarly, Stoics viewed the ignorant masses as “blind,”107 and many depicted ignorance as blindness,108 particularly in moral or divine matters.109 Gentile thinkers recognized that vices blinded people.110 Jewish authors agreed that sin blinded people;111 they also recognized that, as here, God could punish deliberate ignorance with further spiritual blindness.112
In the very process of boasting of their self-made wisdom, mortals became more foolish (Rom. 1:22). That professed wisdom could be folly was recognized by all who criticized some other, often rival, philosophic schools.113 That a Jewish writer would view idolatrous Gentiles as ignorant is even less surprising.114
Paul, like most other Jewish critics of idolatry, expects his audience to understand that idolatry is foolish.115 This is not to say that most unconverted Gentiles would have agreed. Polytheism was the dominant worldview of antiquity and exerted considerable social pressure, not unlike the force of popular worldviews today.116 Even many Gentiles, however, would have scorned some of the image veneration described here in Romans 1.
Egyptians were known for worshiping animal images.117 Greeks and Romans, however, usually despised Egyptian use of animal images,118 though even Greeks and Romans themselves traditionally thought there were spirits in nature—for example, in trees.119 Hellenistic and Greco-Roman culture propagated the use of human images for deities,120 which they viewed as much superior, since people were more like the gods.121 It is on such human images, however, that Paul will begin his list of idols in Romans 1:23.
Paul already has in mind his explicit argument, in the next section, that all people are sinners. Jewish practices were well known in Rome,122 and everyone knew that Jews abhorred deity images (Rom. 2:22).123 Jewish tradition deemed idolatry the worst of all sins124 and emphasized that it invited judgment.125 Jewish people told stories of Abraham rejecting idolatry,126 sometimes (as already noted) by reasoning back to a first cause.
Nevertheless, Paul’s language here implicitly prepares for his denunciation of Jewish sins in Romans 2; Israel had never forgotten its own past idolatry.127 When Paul speaks of “exchanging” God’s “glory” for an animal image, his wording clearly evokes Israel’s sin with the golden calf in Psalm 106:20 (105:20 LXX).128 Changing their glory—accepting other deities—may also recall Jeremiah 2:11.129 Paul’s listing of classes of animals in Romans 1:23 could recall the warning to Israel in Deuteronomy 4:16–18, which specifically denounces idolatry,130 though the ultimate source of Deuteronomy’s list could be Genesis 1:20–25.131
Paul emphasizes the intellectual emptiness of the same action (“changing” God’s glory, from ἀλλάσσω, Rom. 1:23) when he describes it as exchanging (from μεταλλάσσω) truth about God for a lie (i.e., idolatry) in Romans 1:25, behavior that in turn leads to the moral consequence of exchanging (from μεταλλάσσω) what accords with nature for what does not (1:26).132
Paul need not elaborate the connection between idolatry (1:23) and immorality (1:24–27) for the topics’ conjunction to evoke themes that had often provoked Jewish polemic. Gentile myths abounded with accounts of their deities’ immoral behavior.133 Even Gentile intellectuals found these stories of divine immorality to be problematic and sometimes criticized134 or ridiculed135 Greek myth, though Jews and Christians ridiculed the stories far more.136 Gentile thinkers sometimes tried to reinterpret tales of divine immorality137—an approach that some Jews and Christians viewed as a flimsy apologetic.138 Josephus charged that Gentiles created stories of divine immorality to justify their own irrational desires.139 Indeed, mortals could occasionally appeal even directly to the gods’ example for their behavior.140 If gods could not resist lust, some reasoned, how could mortals?141 “When myths are not discredited,” one pagan intellectual warned, “they may be the counsellors of evil deeds.”142
Paul is using polemical generalization here, not trying to offer a nuanced description of image veneration.143 Many Gentile intellectuals protested treating images as if they were the deities themselves,144 although they often affirmed the value of these images in pointing beyond themselves to the divine.145 Still, even Gentiles who criticized abuses in polytheism or worship of images sometimes warned against being too critical of image veneration, as they thought Jews and Christians were.146
The Madness of Sin as Its Own Punishment
After charging Gentiles with moral and intellectual rebellion in their worship of idols, Paul revisits his mention in Romans 1:18 of heavenly wrath. Although God’s wrath would be expressed more explicitly in the future (2:5, 8–9), God expresses his wrath in the present (1:18) by handing humanity over to their own moral madness. Both ancient147 and modern148 interpreters of Romans have often recognized this connection here. Humanity sought autonomy from God (1:21–23), and God punished them accordingly by permitting them to become increasingly debased.
Handed Over to Irrational Desires
Three times Paul repeats his refrain that “God gave [humans] over” (παραδίδωμι) to sins (Rom. 1:24, 26, 28),149 an idea that his audience probably would have understood. Jewish people recognized that God could punish sin by handing people over to the power of the sin150 or by blinding their minds.151 When God’s people abandoned him, he often abandoned them to their folly or to the course of human activity without his help.152
Ancient hearers who were not Jewish could also understand the concept of false beliefs reaping their own consequences.153 Plato opined that the greatest punishment for evildoers was their becoming more evil.154 Cretans allegedly cursed their enemies by praying that they would “delight in their evil courses,” so the enemies would choose for themselves what “borders on destruction.”155 A second-century orator warns that someone seduced by pleasure is finally “swept away into ignorance and then into hedonism.”156
Jewish tradition often spoke of God punishing people in ways fitting their sins;157 Paul depicts the punishment here as fitting the crime. Having by idolatry failed to honor God (Rom. 1:21), human beings now by immorality have dishonored their own bodies (1:24).158 Likewise, in 1:26 they indulged in “dishonorable” passion,159 and in 1:27 they committed “disgraceful acts.”
Exploitation of the body for sin did not reflect any inherent deficiency in the original creation but distorted the body’s purpose and design. Rather, the mind that lacked the Spirit became warped without its role in the larger purpose. Too “futile” to recognize God in creation, ungrateful minds distorted creation by idolatry (Rom. 1:19–23), and hence ultimately their own sacred sexuality based on God’s image as male and female (1:24–27; 5:1–2). Thus creation was subjected to “futility”160 until the glorification of God’s children, when the original divine image will be restored (8:20–23, 29).161 For Paul, however, believers with the first fruits of the Spirit are not bound by the same “futility” of the fleshly mind that is blinded by the world’s idolatry.
Thoughts Corrupted by Passions
Most ancient thinkers believed that passions corrupted rational thinking and that reason should control passions; Jewish apologists, however, often chided Gentiles for being ruled by passion and sometimes offered Jewish law as a way to achieve genuine mastery over passion.162 In Romans 1:24–27, in keeping with Jewish polemic against idolatry,163 humanity’s corrupted thinking subjects people to irrational passions (1:24, 26).
In ordinary conversation people might use the language of “passions” or “desires” positively.164 Nevertheless, many intellectuals considered desire a fundamental evil; thus one philosophically informed second-century orator opines, “The greatest human evil is desire.”165 Many therefore warned against passions and desires;166 such cravings were insatiable, they felt.167 Many thinkers spoke of slavery to passions and sought freedom from their tyranny.168 Overcoming desire was thus praiseworthy,169 and some philosophers were said to have worked to rid the world of passion.170 The ideal Stoic sage was supposed to lack passions, at least in the form of negative emotions;171 Stoics valued this objective because passion was a kind of impulse not subject to reason.172 Later Platonists warned that passions defiled the soul.173 Even Epicureans affirmed that controlling the passions leads to happiness.174
Stoics counted pleasure (ἡδονή) a fundamental form of passion.175 Although ordinary people often must have viewed pleasure positively,176 Stoics treated it as negative or at least not to be valued.177 Many other thinkers also viewed it as negative, especially when embraced in excess.178 Epicureans demurred, valuing pleasure, but this was partly because Epicurus defined it differently from others; Stoics and others often criticized Epicurean views of pleasure.179
A major emphasis in ancient philosophy was how to overcome one’s passions.180 Aristotle’s followers, the Peripatetics, merely wanted to moderate passions, but many others, including Stoics, wanted to eradicate them.181 Philosophers in the Platonist tradition felt that thinking about virtue or the divine, which was pure intellect, would free one from passions.182 Thus, one later Platonist emphasized that philosophy should cast passion from the soul, as medicine drives sickness from the body.183
Despite differences among particular schools, most intellectuals agreed that one must use reason, guided by virtue, to control the passions.184 Passions could challenge and overpower reason if the latter were not sufficiently strong.185 Stoics and Platonists alike agreed that one must distinguish real happiness from transient pleasures and that one learns this discernment by “repeated, deliberate choice, a lifelong struggle for rational mastery.”186 Thus, one rhetorical historian concludes that philosophy “drives away every unseemly and useless emotion,” making reason “more powerful than fear and pain.”187
For Stoics, the process was purely cognitive: genuinely understanding what was true would eradicate the emotions that were tied to false assumptions about what really mattered.188 Although the Stoic approach offered some positive insights that can be used even today in cognitive psychology,189 in practice it also severely underestimated (for all the Stoic emphasis on living according to nature!) the physiological connections between natural bodily instincts and emotion, as well as connections between emotion and reason.190 Modern research has shown that powerful stimuli can alert the brain’s amygdala, generating emergency physical responses, before the signals are even processed by the cortex. Only at that point can stimuli be rationally evaluated and, when needed, deescalated rationally.191
Stoics were nevertheless sensitive to experiences they inevitably encountered when seeking to subject emotion to reason. Recognizing that humans experience physical reactions that precede cognitive judgments, Seneca counted these reactions “first movements,” a sort of pre-emotion that could be nipped in the bud by rational decisions once one had the opportunity to consider them.192 Because Origen misconstrued “first movements” themselves as cognitive, Christians later imagined “many intermediate degrees of sin,” provoking new questions, such as “Did you let it linger? Did you enjoy it?”193 Although such exercises stimulated and developed self-discipline, they probably also often bred the very sort of fixation on sin that Romans 7 parodies.
Although details varied among ancient thinkers, most viewed reason and passion as mutually opposed. In Romans 1, however, those who fancied themselves wise (1:22) have become slaves of passion (1:24–27; cf. 6:12, 16; 16:18). In 1:27 Paul not only speaks of intense desire (ὄρεξις) but uses the image of “burning” (ἐξεκαύθησαν, from ἐκκαίω), an image (not always the same term) to which he appeals more explicitly in depicting intense emotion (2 Cor. 11:29),194 including, as often elsewhere, consuming sexual passion (1 Cor. 7:9).195
Changing God’s Image (Rom. 1:23–27)
Having exchanged God’s image or glory for other images, humanity eventually corrupted God’s image in themselves. Whereas people once knew the true creator, in whose image they were created, now they worshiped even animals, debasing God’s image.196 Some ancient listeners would hear irony here. Passions were thought to make people irrational, like beasts,197 and thinkers often compared to beasts those ruled by passions rather than by intellect or virtue.198
The beginning of Paul’s list of false images in Romans 1:23, however, is that of people themselves. Instead of recognizing that they should bear the image of the true God, they debased God’s image into something they made, exchanging the creator’s image with which they had been entrusted for images of creation. In so doing, they obscured God’s image in themselves, an image renewed in Christ (8:29). Because Paul does not repeat “image” in 1:24–27, the inference of God’s image here is the least textually certain of the major proposals I offer in this chapter, yet the clues seem sufficient to make it more probable than not.
Many have argued that the progressive fall of humanity in Romans 1:21–23 echoes the fall of Adam, offering a prelude to 5:12–21.199 Certainly, as a Jew Paul does presuppose Adam’s sin, a premise that becomes explicit in 5:12–21.200 Further, if there is reason to see an allusion to Adam (see discussion below), the list of false images beginning with images of humans could evoke the sin of the primeval humans in Genesis 3: rejecting the obvious truth about their creator, they accepted the lies that they would not die and that their knowledge would make them like God (Gen. 3:4–5).201
As others point out, however, many of the allusions to Adam’s fall proposed for Romans 1:21–23 are too general to prove compelling by themselves.202 Thus, for example, in the Wisdom of Solomon, idolatry introduced other sins, including sexual immorality (Wis. 14:12, 22–27, esp. 27), without immediate reference to Adam (cf. 10:1–2). Josephus depicts humanity gradually abandoning the practice of honoring God and sinking into depravity only several generations after Adam (Ant. 1.72). Likewise, Jewish tradition spoke of Gentiles continuing to disobey even after God enlightened Gentiles further through Noah.203 Paul’s plurals and present-tense verbs here (e.g., in Rom. 1:18–19) might also militate against envisioning Adam’s fall in this passage.204
Paul presumably presupposes biblical creation accounts even where he does not explicitly address them. This need not mean, however, that he is directly evoking them for his audience; such a conclusion must rest on clues in the text. Paul must treat humanity’s failure here as theologically coherent with the backstory of humanity’s fall that he later recounts in Romans 5:12–21, but just as Genesis can use different stories to recount a coherent theology of creation, so can Paul. This story will be coherent with Paul’s story of Adam, but Paul is not emphasizing the particular story of Genesis 2–3 here as clearly as some interpreters have argued. The connection might not even occur to a first-time listener at this point in the letter, though of course Paul would hope that Romans would be heard more than once.205
But whereas there is at most limited reason to think that Paul emphasizes Genesis 2–3 here, there are some stronger possible echoes of Genesis 1.206 Although in the Septuagint “image” (εἰκών) most often means “idol,” in Paul it evokes either Wisdom or the first human.207 In view of Paul’s usage elsewhere (1 Cor. 11:7; 2 Cor. 3:18; cf. 4:4), God’s “glory” here (Rom. 1:23) probably implies his image; later in Romans, those conformed to the image of the new Adam are “glorified” (8:29–30).208
In the beginning of Paul’s Bible, humans were formed in God’s image, male and female (Gen. 1:26–27; 5:1–2). Here, however, humans degraded the divine to the image of themselves and even lower animals (Rom. 1:23, 25). In so doing, they distorted God’s true image in their own creation as male and female (Rom. 1:24; Gen. 1:27; 5:1–2). The terms that Paul uses in Romans 1:26–27 for male and female (ἄρσην and θῆλυς) are not his usual ones; he employs these elsewhere only at Galatians 3:28. Of the passages where they occur together in the Septuagint, easily the most relevant and fundamental is the creation narrative (Gen. 1:27; 5:2; cf. Mark 10:6).209
When Paul speaks of the reversal of sexual gender roles in terms of “nature” (φύσις, 1:26–27), he employs a common argument esteemed among Stoics and also some Jewish thinkers.210 At the same time, for Paul as a Jew, a claim about nature is also (as with other Jewish thinkers) an appeal to creation, to the way Paul believes that God originally designed nature. This interest in the beginning is explicit in the preceding context at 1:20: Paul talks about distortion of what was clear from creation.211 When Paul thinks of “image” later in Romans, he has new creation in mind (Rom. 8:29); perhaps even the mention of sonship there might evoke the restoration of Genesis (Gen. 5:1–3). In any case, Paul presents as the consequence of failed reasoning behavior that Jewish audiences (whom he will address directly in Rom. 2) and presumably Christian converts deemed moral madness.
Unfit Minds (Rom. 1:28)
In Romans 1:28 the final mention of handing over continues Paul’s concern with knowledge and truth. Just as humans did not think fitting, or approve of (using δοκιμάζω), continuing to hold true knowledge of God in their reasoning (cf. 1:21), God gave them up to an unfit, or disapproved, mind (ἀδόκιμον νοῦν) to do things that were unfitting.212
The adjective ἀδόκιμος can refer to something tested and found unfit or, by extension, to what is worthless and disqualified.213 This failed mind contrasts with the renewed mind that Paul will mention later, which will test or evaluate (δοκιμάζω) matters to ascertain what is good and thus belongs to God’s will (12:2).214 In other words, those who did not rightly discern God became morally incapable of discerning right from wrong, whereas those whose minds are renewed in Christ experience this discernment.
Paul follows this general declaration with a rhetorically designed vice list, concluding in 1:32 that people “know” (from ἐπιγινώσκω) that such deeds are deathworthy yet practice them anyway.215 Thus, Paul concludes his depiction of pagans in 1:18–32 by suggesting that they have sufficient innate or natural knowledge to be condemned by their own consciences (cf. 2:15). Rejection of divine truth leads to corrupted minds; the opposite of the corrupt mind is faith (1:16–17), that is, accepting divine truth.
Stoics believed that genuine rational understanding would eradicate passion.216 Yet as Robert Jewett observes, “In contrast to the Greek outlook, the flaw in the human race does not lie in ignorance that can be excused or modulated through education but rather in a direct and multifaceted campaign to disparage God and replace him/her with a human face or institution.”217 Even if the philosophers were right that reason alone could defeat the passions, the pagan world had relinquished true reason and true knowledge of God, and God had surrendered them to the rule of their passions, clouding their intellects. That is why, Paul argues, they have neither worshiped the true God nor lived by basic standards of morality.218
Some scholars think that Paul goes on to address, separate from the pagan world in general in Romans 1:18–32, Gentile intellectuals, starting in 2:1–3,219 before explicitly addressing a Jewish interlocutor in 2:17–29. A larger number of scholars, including myself, apply all of chapter 2 to a Jewish audience or at least to a hyperbolically depicted, hypothetical Jewish critic.220 In any case, all agree that in 1:18–2:29 Paul addresses the sinfulness of both Jews and Gentiles (cf. also 1:16; 3:9, 19, 23, 29), both those with and those without biblical law. Because Paul’s depiction of Gentiles in 1:18–32 fits a common early Jewish stereotype of pagans, it suits his purpose well enough in setting the stage for his challenge to Jewish hearers who depend on the law (explicit in 2:17–29; cf. already 2:9–10). For Paul, ultimately neither the pagan mind, which has abandoned natural revelation, nor the Jewish mind, which has not fully obeyed special revelation in the law, can truly overcome passion.221
Conclusion
The corrupted mind of Romans 1:18–32 is the pagan mind, corrupting the evidence for God with a false worldview and thus misconstruing the rest of reality, including humans’ own identity and purpose. These Gentiles had only divine revelation in nature; but what of those who have more detailed revelation in the written Torah? Idolatry (1:19–23, esp. 1:23) and sexual immorality (1:24–27), especially in its homosexual forms (1:26–27), were viewed as distinctly Gentile sins. Yet Paul applies the same principles to sins more widely acknowledged as universal (1:28–32), preparing for Paul’s challenge to those with the written Torah in 2:12–29.
Jewish teachers expected the Torah to enlighten reason to provide power to overcome passions. Yet whereas Paul will grant the value of reason and Torah in identifying sin, he will show that such sins merely become more transgressive once identified. The mind equipped with the law without the Spirit remains the mind of the flesh (Rom. 7:5–6, 22–25; 8:3–9)—the subject of chapter 3 of this book.
1. I use “pagan” not to designate a set of religious views but to communicate the essential perspective that most early Jews and Christians held concerning most non-Jews, especially polytheists.
2. Cf. also minds alienated from God in Eph. 2:3; 4:18; Col. 1:21.
3. As Keck (Romans, 73) notes, not only does theology affect morality, but morality affects theology and how people think, “largely because we rationalize our behavior.”
4. The distortion presumably increases with greater proximity to direct discussion of divine matters, and the level of distortion might be greater in some cultures than others. Paul, however, is offering a graphic depiction of human responsibility that will ultimately encompass even Israel (Rom. 2:1–3:20), not intending a nuanced and systematic anthropology.
5. For the range of ancient Jewish views about Gentiles, see especially Donaldson, Paul and Gentiles.
6. Paul’s starting place may seem unpleasant, but some other ancient thinkers also recognized that knowledge of one’s faults must precede transformation (e.g., Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 28.9–10).
7. E.g., Jeremias, “Zu Rm 1 22–32”; Schulz, “Anklage,” 173.
8. Sanday and Headlam, Romans, 52; Stuhlmacher, Romans, 35; deSilva, “Wisdom,” 1274; Dunn, Theology, 91; see esp. schematically Talbert, Romans, 63; cf. Lucas, “Unearthing”; arguing for deliberate allusion but by way of contrast, Linebaugh, “Announcing.” Although some now date the work later, the traditional first-century BCE date (e.g., Rost, Judaism, 59) better explains the many allusions to it in Paul (e.g., Keener, Corinthians, 38, 170, 174).
9. See Poniży, “Recognition”; here and elsewhere, cf. Dafni, “Theologie.” But this work may not be representative of Diaspora Judaism here; see Collins, “Natural Theology.”
10. For idolatry as foolish, see also Jub. 36:5; Wis. 11:15; 14:11; condemning the “wisdom” of idolatry, see Let. Aris. 137.
11. Hooker, “Adam,” 299; Talbert, Romans, 62–63; Bryan, Preface, 78; Keck, Romans, 62; Matera, Romans, 44, 49; viewing this difference as a source of later patristic intolerance, cf. Gaca, “Declaration,” 3–6.
12. The meaning of Paul’s euphemistic circumlocution “from heaven” was likely obvious enough to ancient hearers; see, e.g., Dan. 4:26; 1 En. 6:2; 1 Macc. 3:18–19, 50, 60; 3 Macc. 4:21; Luke 15:18; m. Ab. 1:3; Sipra Behuq. pq. 6.267.2.1. On periphrasis, see, e.g., Rhet. Her. 4.32.43; Hermog. Method 8 (esp. 8.421–23); Rowe, “Style,” 127; Anderson, Glossary, 102. For euphemism, cf. Hermog. Inv. 4.11.200–201; Pesiq. Rab Kah. 4:2; Anderson, Glossary, 60; Tal, “Euphemisms.” For avoiding anthropomorphisms already in the LXX, see Gard, Method, esp. 32–46. For divine wrath from heaven, see, e.g., 1 En. 83:9; 91:7; Sib. Or. 1.165.
13. E.g., Dio Chrys. Or. 32.80; Arius Did. 2.7.11k, p. 84.4–6, 11–12, 21–22.
14. Esp. Stoics, e.g., Arius Did. 2.7.5b12, p. 26.12–15; 2.7.11k, p. 84.24, 29; though cf. 2.7.5b, p. 12.2–12; cf. Diog. Laert. 2.93; Marc. Aur. 9.1.2. Others besides Stoics associated ignorance with evil, e.g., Porph. Marc. 13.225.
15. Diaspora Jews could associate impiety with idolatry (e.g., Sib. Or. 3.36; cf. connection with homosexual acts in Sib. Or. 3.184–86 and with judgment in 3.568).
16. Note the interpretations (in Bray, Romans, 34–35) of Origen Comm. Rom. on 1:18 (CER 1:134, 140); Ambrosiaster Comm. (CSEL 81:39); Apollinaris of Laodicea, catena on Rom. 1:18 (PGK 15:59). For idolatry as turning from truth, see, e.g., T. Mos. 5:2–4 (Israel); cf. even the later Neoplatonist concern with some images distorting divine truth (Iambl. Letter 18.1–3, in Stob. Anth. 3.11.35).
17. See, e.g., Epict. Diatr. 2.19.26 (though contrast 2.8.14); Max. Tyre Or. 9.2; Porph. Marc. 18.302–4; more moderately, Iambl. Myst. 1.13.
18. See, e.g., Val. Max. 1.1.16–21; 1.1.ext.1–1.1.ext.9; Philost. Hrk. 53.17; especially in the ancient Near East, see Kratz and Spieckermann, Wrath.
19. E.g., 1 Esd. 8:21; 1 Macc. 3:8; Jdt. 9:9; Bar. 2:13, 20; Jub. 15:34; CD 8.3; Sib. Or. 1.179.
20. E.g., Sib. Or. 3.763, 766; 5.75–76 (in view of 5.77–85); Sipre Deut. 96.2.1.
21. See, e.g., Reicke, “Natürliche Theologie”; Stagg, “Plight.” This need not mean (pace Cranfield, “Romans 1.18,” 335) that the wrath of Rom. 1:18 is also revealed in the gospel. Technically, 1:18 says only that “wrath” is revealed, but a contextual contrast with God’s righteousness as salvation (1:16–17) is rendered more likely because Paul contrasts wrath and salvation elsewhere (Rom. 5:9; 1 Thess. 5:9; cf. Rom. 9:22–24).
22. Contrast Rom. 1:25; 2:8. For Paul, Jewish people, conversely, have some truth in the law (Rom. 2:20), though not the fullness available in Christ; cf. Eph. 1:13; 2 Thess. 2:12–13. Here Paul would envision faith not as a “leap in the dark” (to borrow Kierkegaard’s oft-cited but perhaps differently intended phrase, presupposing a Kantian dichotomy of subjective faith and objective reason) but as a deliberate response to the convincing and persuasive light of truth. He never would have associated it with our popular conception of “make-believe,” in which one tries to convince oneself and so, by strong wishing, to exercise power over internal or (magically) external reality.
23. I condense the following discussion from Keener, John, 237–38, 240–43. Translators typically use “God” for the universal or ultimate deity in these passages, without implying any assimilation to the Judean God.
24. For one mystery cult’s interest in the knowledge of God, as interpreted by an educated Greek for an intellectual audience, see Plut. Isis 2, Mor. 352A. For revelatory knowledge of the divine in the mysteries, cf. also Goodenough, Church, 7. Reitzenstein (Mystery-Religions, 364–425) emphasizes the mysteries but relies much too heavily on later sources, many of which may betray Christian influence. Paul’s desire to transmit λόγος and acquire “knowledge” places him closer to philosophical schools than to the mysteries (cf. also Malherbe, Social Aspects, 47–48, on Edwin Judge’s approach).
25. Heracl. Ep. 4, to Hermodorus; cf. Epict. Diatr. 1.6.24.
26. Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 95.48. For Seneca, to know God (deum nosse) meant to know the mind of the universe (Nat. Q. 1.pref.13). For Musonius Rufus, cutting off the dead part of the soul enabled one to know God (Mus. Ruf. 53, p. 144.24–25).
27. Porph. Marc. 11.194–95; 13.229; 17.282; 20.331; 21.347–48; 22.355, 359; 24.379–81; cf. 11.204.
28. Pyth. Sent. 16 (Malherbe, Moral Exhortation, 110). Apollonius of Tyana reportedly knew the gods personally rather than by mere opinion (Philost. Vit. Apoll. 1.1).
29. Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 31.10.
30. Plato Tim. 28C, as quoted and interpreted in Nock, “Gnosticism,” 267; see also Dodd, “Prologue,” 16.
31. Philo Mos. 1.212; Drunkenness 43, 45; cf. Posterity 12; Dreams 1.231.
32. See Borgen, Bread, 127–28.
33. Philo Flight 76.
34. Philo Conf. 145.
35. For a discussion of Philo’s view of divine ineffability, see Wolfson, Philo, 2:94–164, esp. 110–38; Mondin, “Esistenza.”
36. Philo Unchangeable 143.
37. Philo Alleg. Interp. 3.126.
38. Wolfson, Philo, 1:36, citing Philo Sacr. 78, 79. Wolfson thinks Philonic knowledge is essentially intellectual, although it includes philosophical frenzy (Philo, 2:3–10). Dodd emphasizes the mystical element (Interpretation, 62).
39. Hagner, “Vision,” 87, provides references.
40. This dimension continued in early Judaism; cf. Shapiro, “Wisdom.” Cf. moral dimensions of knowledge, sometimes connected with justice, in the Dead Sea Scrolls (1QM 13.3; Wilcox, “Dualism,” 89, cites 1QS 3.1; 1QH 19.8 [Sukenik 11.8]; cf. 1QS 8.9; 9.17).
41. Dentan, Knowledge, 35.
42. Cf. the sense of knowing in Gen. 4:1; Pss. 1:6; 55:13; 88:18; Dentan, Knowledge, 37–38.
43. Cf. Huffmon, “Background,” 37; cf. obedience in Hosea 4:1; 5:4; 8:2.
44. E.g., Exod. 6:7; 7:5, 17; 10:2; 14:4, 18; 16:12; 1 Kings 20:13; 20:28; and more than fifty times in Ezekiel.
45. See, e.g., Fritsch, Community, 73–74; Allegro, Scrolls, 132–33; Price, “Light from Qumran,” 26; Flusser, Judaism, 57–59; Lohse, Colossians, 25.
46. 1QS 10.12; 11.3.
47. Lohse, Colossians, 25–26, citing 1QS 4.4; 1QSb 5.25; 1QHa 20.11–12; 6.25 (Sukenik 12.11–12; 14.25). Painter, “Gnosticism,” 2, cites 1QS 3.6–7; 4.6.
48. Garnet, “Light,” 20, citing 1QH 4.5–6, 23–24, 27–28; 5.20–39; 8.4–26; 9.29–36.
49. 1QS 4.22; 1QM 11.15; 1Q27 1.7.
50. E.g., Isa. 11:9; 52:6; Jer. 24:7; 31:34 (toned down in Tg. Jer. on 31:34); Ezek. 34:30; 36:23–28; 37:6, 12–14, 27–28; Hosea 2:19–20; Joel 3:17; Hab. 2:14; cf. 1 Cor. 13:8–12.
51. Sir. 36:5 (alternative location 33:5).
52. Wis. 2:22; 12:27; 13:1; 14:22; 16:16; Sir. 36:5.
53. 2 Bar. 48:40.
54. Wis. 2:13.
55. Abot R. Nat. 37 A.
56. E.g., b. Ber. 33a; Sanh. 92a; earlier, Bar. 3:36; 4:1. See also Wewers, “Wissen,” 143–48; Bultmann, “Γινώσκω,” 701.
57. Sipre Deut. 41.3.2.
58. Sipre Deut. 33.1.1.
59. Sipre Deut. 49.2.2.
60. E.g., 4 Ezra 3:32; 2 Bar. 14:5; 48:40.
61. Cic. Tusc. 1.19.44.
62. Cic. Nat. d. 2.16.44 (reporting the Stoic view).
63. Stowers, “Self-Mastery,” 543. Though some atheists existed (see Winiarczyk, “Altertum”), they were a clear minority (Sext. Emp. Pyr. 3.218). Sextus Empiricus suspended judgment about the existence of the gods (Pyr. 3.218–38). For a survey including ancient rationalism and atheism, see Meijer, “Philosophers.” For their arguments, see Ps.-Plut. Plac. 1.7.1–10, especially in Runia, “Atheists.” On Prodicus’s atheism, see Henrichs, “Notes” (though even Prodicus did not reject all deities, only the Olympians; Henrichs, “Atheism”).
64. See Van Nuffelen, “Divine Antiquities.”
65. See Max. Tyre Or. 36.1–2 (in Malherbe, Moral Exhortation, 73); Stowers, Rereading, 85, 98–99, 122 (citing, e.g., Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 90; Anacharsis Ep. 9). For the decline from the primeval golden age, see, e.g., Hesiod W.D. 110–201 (though not all were inferior to their predecessors); Ovid Metam. 1.89–312 (with further impiety growing from the first impieties; Metam. 15.111–13); Babr. prologue 1–4. Moral decline also recapitulated itself in the Roman state (Sall. Catil. 6.6–13.5).
66. Cic. Nat. d. 2.32.81–82; 2.54.133–58.146 (though this Stoic argument also identifies God with the cosmos; cf. Gelinas, “Argument”); Dio Chrys. Or. 12.33–34; Plut. Isis 76, Mor. 382A. Though some readers today know of divine design as a traditional argument in monotheistic religions (sometimes deployed for or against evolution), it was actually common among polytheistic thinkers in antiquity.
67. Dio Chrys. Or. 12.36–37.
68. Xen. Mem. 4.3.12–13. For divine benevolence, see also Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 95.50; Epict. Diatr. 2.14.11.
69. Epict. Diatr. 1.6.7–8; cf. Sen. Y. Nat. Q. 1.pref.14–15. Paul uses further language amenable to Stoics in Rom. 1:26, 28; cf. other passages noted in Glover, Paul, 20–21. For Stoics deploying creation discourse for moral instruction (as Paul does), cf. Sisson, “Discourse.”
70. Epict. Diatr. 1.6.23–24.
71. Di Mattei, “Physiologia.” For Philo’s proofs of God’s existence, see Wolfson, Philo, 2:73–93.
72. Let. Aris. 131–32; Jos. Ag. Ap. 2.190; perhaps T. Naph. 3:3. This revelation of his power does not reveal his essence (Jos. Ag. Ap. 2.167). Gentiles failed to infer the craftsman from his works (Wis. 13:1). The OT writers already saw God’s order in creation, sometimes even in language comparable to laws; cf. Pss. 19:1–6 (in the context of 19:7–11); 33:6, 9 (in the context of 33:4); 119:90–91; 147:15–19; in Egypt and Mesopotamia, cf. Walton, Thought, 192–93.
73. Davies, Paul, 28–29; cf. comment below (p. 15).
74. Paul could mean that it was simply obvious to them (cf. Jer. 40:6 LXX [33:6 ET]; perhaps Gal. 1:16), but analogous language in Rom. 8:17–19 probably suggests that Paul refers to something within them (cf. Rom. 1:24; 2:15; 11:17; 2 Cor. 6:16). Among ancient commentators, see (in Bray, Romans, 38) Chrys. Hom. Rom. 3; Ps.-Const. Rom. (ENPK 24); Pelagius Comm. Rom. on 1:19.
75. E.g., Dio Chrys. Or. 12.27; Iambl. Myst. 1.3. In Stoicism, cf. Jackson-McCabe, “Preconceptions.”
76. Dio Chrys. Or. 12.28 (trans. Cohoon, LCL, 1:33).
77. Cic. Tusc. 1.13.30; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 117.6; cf. Max. Tyre Or. 11.5; Artem. Oneir. 1.8.
78. Cic. Fin. 5.12.35–36; cf. Sen. Y. Ben. 6.23.6–7; Let. Aris. 156–57.
79. Cic. Nat. d. 2.59.147–61.153; Epict. Diatr. 1.6.10; 1.6.25.
80. Philo uses ἀρχιτέκτονος, “master builder,” for God in Creation 24; Names 30. Some Middle Platonists blended Plato’s creator with the Stoic logos (Dillon, “Plato,” 806).
81. Plato thought that God had built the universe according to the ideal pattern shaped by reason (Plato Tim. 29A–30), and some Middle Platonists came to take this literally, attributing matter’s origin to Soul (Plut. Epitome of Gen. of Soul 2, Mor. 1030E; Table 8.2.4, Mor. 720AB; later, cf. Plot. Enn. 3.2).
82. Philo Creation 16; Conf. 171.
83. Philo Creation 20, 26, 31; Migr. 6. I borrow and condense material here from Keener, John, 376–79.
84. Philo Creation 17–19, 25, 31. For the Logos as God’s image, see also Philo Conf. 97; Flight 101; Wisdom as God’s image, Alleg. Interp. 1.43. Thus, God made the world as a copy of his divine image, the logos being his archetypal seal imprinted on them (Philo Creation 16, 26, 36). For God using a pattern in creation, cf. also Jub. 2:2; 1QS 11.11; m. Sanh. 4:5; Gen. Rab. 1:1.
85. Philo Sacr. 8; each individual’s mind fits the image of the universal mind in Creation 69. Cf. logos as the shared element of human reason and the reason that structured the cosmos in Thorsteinsson, “Stoicism,” 23; Long, Philosophy, 108. For Stoics, the human mind was an example of universal reason (Cic. Nat d. 2.6.18–2.8.20; cf. 2.8.21–2.13.32; cf. also Murray, Stages, 167, citing Chrysippus frg. 913 [SVF]). The connection goes back to Heraclitus (see Long, Philosophy, 131, 145), who identified thought (γνώμη) as what guides the cosmos (Diog. Laert. 9.1.1). (Some have doubted Heraclitus’s logos doctrine [Glasson, “Doctrine”], but the evidence, while scant [Glasson, “Doctrine,” 232], remains [Lee, Thought, 79; Miller, “Logos,” 174–75].) Zeno reportedly identified the all-pervasive logos with both the universal law of nature and Zeus (Diog. Laert. 7.1.88). For Stoics, reason (λόγος) was the active principle that acted on matter (Diog. Laert. 7.1.134); Anaxagoras described mind (νοῦς, Diog. Laert. 2.8) in this way. Later Platonism also absorbed many of these concepts (Dillon, Middle Platonists, 80, 83).
86. Philo Creation 146.
87. E.g., Theoph. 1.5–6; and (in Bray, Romans, 37–38) Origen Comm. Rom. on 1:19 (CER 1:136–42), and on 1:20 (esp. regarding philosophers; CER 1:142); Ambrosiaster Comm. (CSEL 81:39, 41); Apollinaris of Laodicea, catena on Rom. 1:19 (PGK 15:59).
88. Most believed that it secured humanity’s just condemnation (Bray, Romans, 34; Reasoner, Full Circle, 12); only rarely did it lead some to divine knowledge (Reasoner, Full Circle, 12–13). But cf. Theodoret Comm. 1 Cor. 171 (in Bray, Corinthians, 14–15).
89. See observations in Moo, Romans, 123.
90. Ott, “Dogmatisches Problem,” 50; Coffey, “Knowledge,” 676; Johnson, “Knowledge,” 73; Talbert, Romans, 62–63 (following Reicke, “Natürliche Theologie”; Brunner, Romans, 17); Efferin, “Study.” For natural revelation as needing or inseparable from special revelation in Christ, cf. Dennison, “Revelation”; historic views in Vandermarck, “Knowledge.”
91. O’Rourke, “Revelation,” 306; Hooker, “Adam,” 299.
92. Cf. Oden, “Excuse”; Young, “Knowledge”; Cobb and Lull, Romans, 41; Calvin in Reasoner, Full Circle, 16–17.
93. E.g., Max. Tyre Or. 6.1. See the discussion later in the book (pp. 207–9; probably 2 Cor. 3:17); much more fully, Keener, John, 247–50; and esp. Keener, Acts, 4:3524–26.
94. E.g., Cic. Tusc. 1.19.44; Marc. Aur. 11.1.1 (cf. 10.26).
95. E.g., Plato Phaedo 65E; 66A; 83A; Max. Tyre Or. 9.6; 10.3; 11.9, 11; 38.3; Iambl. Pyth. Life 6.31; 16.70; 32.228; Plot. Enn. 1.6.9; Porph. Marc. 16.274; cf. Kirk, Vision, 16–18.
96. Cf. Philo Flight 19; Spec. Laws 1.37; 3.4, 6; Unchangeable 181; Sacr. 36, 69, 78; Posterity 8, 118; Worse 22; Plant. 22; Drunkenness 44; Sober 3; Conf. 92; Migr. 39, 48, 165, 191; Heir 89; Prelim. St. 135; Names 3, 203; Abr. 58, 70; Dreams 1.117; 2.160; Mos. 1.185, 289; Rewards 37.
97. Philo Worse 22; Dreams 1.164; Isaacs, Spirit, 50; Dillon, “Transcendence in Philo”; Hagner, “Vision,” 89–90. The image was long standard even in drama; see, e.g., Soph. Oed. tyr. 371, 375, 402–3, 419, 454, 747, 1266–79.
98. Cf., e.g., Philo Abr. 80; Spec. Laws 1.37; for limitations, cf., e.g., Rewards 36, 39–40.
99. Philo Sacr. 78; Conf. 92; Names 3–6; QG 4.138. For “Israel” as “the one who sees God,” see Conf. 92, 146; Dreams 1.171; Abr. 57.
100. See, e.g., Xen. Mem. 2.2.2–3; Cyr. 1.2.6–7; Rhet. Alex. 36, 1442a.13–14; Polyb. 6.6.6; Val. Max. 2.6.6; 2.6.7a; 5.3; Vell. Paterc. 2.57.1; 2.62.5; 2.69.1; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 81.1, 28; Pliny Ep. 8.18.3; Suet. Claud. 25.1; Arius Did. 2.7.11k, pp. 80–81.21–25; Lucian Fisherman 5; Tim. 35; Jos. Ant. 19.361; 2 Tim. 3:2; see, further, the commentary in Keener, Acts, 3:3314–15.
101. Sen. Y. Ben. 1.10.4. Likewise, Cicero charged that ingratitude “includes all sins” (Cic. Att. 8.4 [trans. Winstedt, LCL, 2:117]). For Roman gratitude in terms of repaying benefaction, see Harrison, Grace, 40–43.
102. Porph. Marc. 23.372.
103. With Byrne, Romans, 74. Paul cites the verse more explicitly in 1 Cor. 3:20.
104. E.g., Let. Aris. 136, 139; Wis. 15:8; Sib. Or. 3.29, 547–48, 555; Acts 14:15; probably Wis. 13:1; Lev. 17:7; Jer. 2:5. The LXX sometimes translates “idols” with such language (e.g., 1 Kings 16:13, 26; 2 Kings 17:15; 2 Chron. 11:15; Pss. 30:7 [31:6 ET]; 39:5 [40:4 ET]; Jon. 2:9 [2:8 ET]; Isa. 44:9; Jer. 8:19; 10:3, 14–15; 51:18; Ezek. 8:10). It is associated with pagan background in Eph. 4:17; 1 Pet. 1:18.
105. Lack of understanding in the heart may echo Ps. 75:5–6 LXX (76:4–5 ET; Jewett, Romans, 158). Jewish sources often used darkness and light figuratively for evil and good, respectively (e.g., 1QS 3.3; 1Q27 1.5–6; 4Q183 2.4–8; T. Job 43:6/4; Sib. Or. frg. 1.26–27), or with reference to enlightenment in wisdom (Sir. 34:17 [32:20 ET]); this dualism is especially prominent in the DSS (e.g., 1QS 3.19–22; 1QM 13.5–6, 14–15; cf. Charlesworth, “Comparison”).
106. Darkness is portrayed as ignorance in Max. Tyre Or. 10.6; 29.5. In Val. Max. 7.2.ext.1a, Socrates opines that mortal minds, unlike those of the gods, can be in darkness. Idolatry darkens minds in T. Sol. 26:7.
107. Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 50.3; Epict. Diatr. 1.18.4, 6; 2.20.37; 2.24.19; Marc. Aur. 4.29.
108. E.g., Lucian Phil. Sale 27; Iambl. Pyth. Life 6.31. The image extended beyond philosophic use (e.g., Catullus 64.207–9; Aeschylus Prom. 447–48; Val. Max. 7.3.6; Dio Chrys. Or. 32.26).
109. E.g., Epict. Diatr. 1.18.4, 6; 2.20.37; 2.24.19; Porph. Marc. 18.307.
110. Cic. Tusc. 1.30.72; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 50.3. Cf. sources in Renehan, “Quotations,” 20.
111. See, e.g., Isa. 42:18–20; Jer. 5:21; Ezek. 12:2; Wis. 2:21; Jos. War 5.343; T. Jos. 7:5; cf. 1 En. 89:33, 41, 54; 90:7; 93:8; 99:8.
112. Isa. 6:9–10; 29:9–10; cf. Deut. 29:4; 2 Thess. 2:10–12.
113. Cf., e.g., Lucian Phil. Sale 27.
114. See, e.g., Jub. 6:35; 22:18; t. Shab. 8:5; Eph. 4:17–18.
115. The cognitive defect of such behavior appears widely; among second-century Christians, see, e.g., Diogn. 2.1.
116. See discussion in Albright, Biblical Period, 61; Albright, Yahweh, 264, albeit focused on an earlier era; see examples in Pliny E. N.H. 28.4.18.
117. E.g., Apollod. Bibl. 1.6.3; Pliny E. N.H. 8.71.184–86; Libanius Encom. 8.14; Lewis, Life, 94; Brenk, “Image,” 225, 230–31; cf. the animal necropolis in Dhennin, “Necropolis.”
118. Pliny E. N.H. 2.5.16; Tac. Hist. 5.5; Plut. Isis 71, Mor. 379DE; Lucian Astr. 7; Parl. G. 10–11; Sacr. 14; Portr. 11; Philost. Vit. Apoll. 6.18–19; Max. Tyre Or. 2.5; less judgmental, Sext. Emp. Pyr. 3.219. Cf. also Jews, e.g., Let. Aris. 138; Wis. 11:15; Philo Posterity 165; Jos. Ag. Ap. 1.224–25; 2.81, 128, 139; Strabo 16.2.35; but contrast, distinctively, Artapanus (Collins, “Artapanus,” 893). Cf. Ambrosiaster Comm. 1.23 (Burns, Romans, 31).
119. See, e.g., Gödde, “Hamadryads.” Cf. Stoics linking various deities with various aspects of the universe in Diog. Laert. 7.1.147. Some mocked myths in which deities became animals (cf., e.g., Varro L.L. 5.5.31; Thebaid frg. 11; Apollod. Bibl. 3.1.1), as in Lucian Dial. S-G. 325–26 (15, West Wind and South Wind 2); Dial. G. 206 (6/2, Eros and Zeus 1); 269–71 (2/22, Pan and Hermes 1–2); Ps.-Lucian Patriot 4; or when deities mated with them (Cypria frg. 11; Apollod. Bibl. 3.10.7; 3.12.6; Lucian Dial. S-G. 305–6 (11/7, South Wind and West Wind 1). Earlier, cf. Canaanite myth (Albright, Yahweh, 128; Gordon, Near East, 99)—although the alleged ritual reenactment is less clear.
120. Rives, Religion, 146. Cf. also emperor worship (Keener, Acts, 2:1782–86 [esp. 1784–86], 1963–64), though this was less an issue in Rome itself (the destination of Paul’s letter) than in many cities in Roman Asia.
121. E.g., Max. Tyre Or. 2.3.
122. See Tobin, Rhetoric, 25–28; Judge, First Christians, 427–30; Gager, Anti-Semitism, 57. More generally on Roman Jews, see, e.g., Leon, Jews of Rome; Kraabel, “Jews in Rome”; Penna, “Juifs à Rome”; and esp. Barclay, Jews in Diaspora, 282–319; essays in Donfried and Richardson, Judaism.
123. E.g., Tac. Hist. 5.9; Sib. Or. 5.285; cf. Satlow, “Philosophers.” Originally, Exodus prohibited deity images, not all images (see Tatum, “Second Commandment”; Schubert, “Wurzel”), though some of the Holy Land remained aniconic in this period (e.g., Meyers, “Judaism,” 74; but see, later, Avi-Yonah, “Archaeological Sources,” 53). Birds and other creatures appear in Roman Jewish funerary inscriptions (Leon, Jews of Rome, 196–97, 228).
124. E.g., Mek. Pisha 5.40–41; Sipre Deut. 54.3.2; b. Qid. 40a; cf. Sipra VDDeho. par. 1.34.1.3; sources in Safrai, “Religion,” 829. Most agreed that the prohibition applied also to Gentiles (Sipre Num. 112.2.2).
125. E.g., Sib. Or. 3.34; t. Bek. 3:12; Peah 1:2; Abot R. Nat. 40 A.
126. Jub. 11:12, 16–17; 12:1–8; 21:3; Apoc. Ab. chaps. 1–8; b. Abod. Zar. 3a; Gen. Rab. 38:13; Pesiq. Rab. 33:3; later, cf. Qur’an 21.58–69; 26.70–76. Cf. Job in T. Job chaps. 2–5.
127. See, e.g., T. Mos. 2:8–9; L.A.B. 12:1–10; Sipre Deut. 1.9.1–2; Abot R. Nat. 34 A; Tg. Neof. 1 on Exod. 32.
128. With Schlatter, Romans, 41; Hyldahl, “Reminiscence,” 285; Moo, Romans, 108–9; Fitzmyer, Romans, 283; Hays, Conversion, 152; Schreiner, Romans, 89; Byrne, Romans, 75; Dunn, Theology, 93; Dunn, “Adam,” 128; Matera, Romans, 50. For both Adam and Ps. 106, see Hooker, “Adam,” 300; Allen, “Romans I–VIII,” 15.
129. Hyldahl, “Reminiscence,” 285; Moo, Romans, 108; Hays, Conversion, 152; Byrne, Romans, 75; Dunn, Theology, 93.
130. Hyldahl, “Reminiscence,” 285; Byrne, Romans, 75; Fitzmyer, Romans, 283.
131. Hyldahl, “Reminiscence,” 286–88; Hooker, “Adam,” 300; Byrne, Romans, 75. Summaries of creatures do appear elsewhere, of course (e.g., Gen. 8:17; Lev. 20:25; 1 Kings 4:33; Ezek. 38:20; Hosea 2:18; Cic. Amic. 21.81).
132. The clustering of these verbs in Rom. 1:23–26 seems deliberate. They appear elsewhere in Pauline literature only in 1 Cor. 15:51–52 (twice) and in Gal. 4:20.
133. E.g., Aeschylus Suppl. 299–301; Aetna frg.; Eurip. Bacch. 94–98; Antiope 69–71; Cypria frg. 10; Andromeda frg. 136 (Stob. Anth. 4.20.42); Ap. Rhod. 1.1226–39; Apollod. Bibl. 1.4.1, 3; 1.5.1; 1.9.3; 2.4.1, 3, 8; 3.2.1; 3.4.3–4; 3.5.5; 3.7.6; 3.8.2; 3.10.1, 3; 3.12.2–6; 3.15.2, 4; Epitome 1.9, 22; Callim. Hymn 4 (to Delos), 55–58; Hom. Hymn 3, to Pythian Apollo 343–44; Parth. L.R. 15.3; Ovid Metam. 2.434–37, 477–88, 603–13, 685–707, 714–47; 3.1–2, 260–72; 4.234–44, 368–79, 416–530, 543–62; 5.391–437; 14.765–77; Sen. Y. Herc. fur. 1–29; Sil. It. 5.15–21; Appian R.H. 12.15.101; Lucian Charid. 7; Dial. G. 239–40 (16/14, Hermes and Apollo 1–2). For accounts of their sexual behavior, see, e.g., Dial. G. 219 (9/6, Hera and Zeus ¶5); 229 (14/10, Hermes and Helios 1); 231 (19/11, Aphrodite and Selene 1); 233–34 (20/12, Aphrodite and Eros 1). For accounts of envy, see Dial. G. 228 (12/9, Poseidon and Hermes 2); 241 (17/15, Hermes and Apollo 1); Dial. S-G. 315 (9/10, Iris and Poseidon ¶1); Apul. Metam. 6.22; Philost. Ep. 30 (58); Libanius Narr. 2; 4.1–2; 12; 17; 27.3–4; 39; 41.
134. Pindar Ol. 1.52–53; Val. Max. 4.7.4; Pliny E. N.H. 2.5.17; Dio Chrys. 11.23; [Favorinus] Or. 37.32; Philost. Vit. Apoll. 5.14; Iambl. Pyth. Life 32.218; Hermog. Progymn. 5, “On Refutation and Confirmation,” 11; Proclus Poet. 5, K44.7–16; K45.18–21; 6.1, K72.20–26; Libanius Invect. 7.2.
135. E.g., Pliny E. N.H. 2.5.17; Dio Chrys. Or. 11.154; Lucian Z. Cat. 2–6; Z. Rants 40, 44; Prom. 17; Astr. 7; Sacr. 5–7; Amber 3–6; Parl. G. 7–8; Icar. 9, 28; Indictment 2; Lover of Lies 2–5; Dial. G. 225 (13/8, Hephaistos and Zeus 1); 244 (18/16, Hera and Leto 1); 250 (23/19, Aphrodite and Eros 1); 278–80 (24/25, Zeus and Helios 1–2); 281, 286 (25/26, Apollo and Hermes). See, further, the discussion in Keener, “Exhortation”; Keener, Acts, 2:2159–62.
136. Let. Aris. 134–38; Wis. 13:10–14:7; Sib. Or. 3.8–35; 4.4–23; Athenag. Plea 20–21; Theoph. 1.9; Tatian Or. Gks. 33–34; Tert. Apol. 5.2; Pearson, “Idolatry, Jewish Conception of.”
137. E.g., Cic. Nat. d. 2.28.70 (Stoics); Max. Tyre Or. 35.1; Heracl. Hom. Prob. 26.1, 7; 30.1; 31.1; 52.1–53.1; 68.8; 69.8–16; Proclus Poet. 6.1, K82.2–5; K90.8–14; K131.5–9; K147.21–25; Libanius Encom. 1.10.
138. Jos. Ag. Ap. 2.255; cf. Athenag. Plea 22. For criticism of mythical deities’ immorality, see, e.g., Jos. Ag. Ap. 2.241, 244–46; for their immoral example, Ps.-Clem. 15.1–19.3.
139. Jos. Ag. Ap. 2.275.
140. E.g., Soph. Wom. Tr. 441–48; Gorg. Hel. 19; Ach. Tat. 1.5.5–7; Libanius Thesis 1.3 (ignoring Zeus’s alleged promiscuity); cf. Menander Heros frg. 2.1–3 (in Stob. Anth. 5.20a.21). For peoples’ misbehavior attributed to the gods’ examples, see Pindar frg. 199 (in Strabo 17.1.19); Diod. Sic. 1.27.1.
141. Gorg. Hel. 19. Sext. Emp. Pyr. 1.159 suggests the inconsistency.
142. Philost. Vit. soph. 2.1.554 (trans. Wright, LCL, 155).
143. Note here, e.g., Nock, “Vocabulary,” 139; Grant, Gods, 20, 66–67. Sandnes, “Idolatry and Virtue,” suggests that Paul was sometimes more nuanced.
144. Dio Chrys. Or. 12.52, 54; Lucian Sacr. 11; Portr. D. 23; more fully, Grant, Gods, 20. For later Platonists, images reflected deity; Max. Tyre Or. 2.2; Ritner, Mechanics, 247. For images as bodies for the gods, cf. the Memphite Theology in ANET 5. The idea that the gods animated statues may be rare (Halusza, “Sacred”) or late (Johnston, “Animating Statues”).
145. Dio Chrys. Or. 12.60, 74–75; Max. Tyre Or. 2.5 (cf. 11.12); Iambl. Myst. 7.1.
146. Mac. Magn. Apocrit. 4.20–23; Cook, Interpretation, 94–97.
147. See (in Bray, Romans, 44, 47) Chrys. Hom. Rom. 3; Ambrosiaster Comm. (CSEL 81:47, 49); Ps.-Const. Rom. (ENPK 25–26); Aug. Prop. Rom. 5; Oecumenius, catena on Rom. 1:26 (PGK 15:423). This present judgment contrasts with the more direct future wrath (Rom. 2:5; 5:9; 9:22; cf. 3:5). Early interpreters (in Bray, Romans, 35–36) saw God’s present wrath as corrective, to turn people from the greater wrath to come (Theodore of Mopsuestia, catena on Rom. 1:18 [PGK 15:115]; Chrys. Hom. Rom. 3).
148. See, e.g., Barth, “Speaking,” 290–91; Coffey, “Knowledge,” 675; Hooker, Preface, 37; Fitzmyer, Romans, 271; Jewett, Romans, 163, 165; cf. 1 Sam. 2:25.
149. The repetition is anaphora (Keck, “Pathos,” 85; Longenecker, Introducing Romans, 201) and hammers home the point. Cf. also repeated refrains in, e.g., Judg. 17:6; 19:1; 21:25; Pss. 42:5, 11; 43:5; Catullus 61.4–5, 39–40, 49–50, 59–60; 64.327, 333, 337, 342, 347, 352, 356, 361, 365, 371, 375, 381; Perv. Ven. 1, 8, 27, 36, 48, 57–58, 68, 75, 80, 93. All three occasions here probably represent the same divine act (with Origen Comm. Rom. on 1:26 [CER 1:156, 158; Bray, Romans, 46]). Jeremias (“Zu Rm 1 22–32,” 119–20) suggests that this is a traditional Stichwort (keyword). For various interpretations, cf. Bouwman, “Noch einmal,” 411–12.
150. Jub. 21:22.
151. Jos. War 5.343. For sin leading to more sin, see also Bonsirven, Judaism, 14; for idolatry as the final result of the evil impulse, see Davies, Paul, 30. If one went astray from Wisdom, Ben Sira warned, she would “hand one over” (παραδώσει) to one’s fall (Sir. 4:19). Both YHWH (1 Sam. 2:25; 2 Sam. 17:14) and Greek deities (Hom. Il. 16.688; 18.311; Od. 18.155–56; Sen. Y. Troj. 34–35) could render people senseless to lead them to destruction. God made the wicked go astray (esp. in the Dead Sea Scrolls; e.g., CD 2.13; 4Q266 frg. 11.9–10); the prototypical biblical example is Pharaoh, who hardened his heart (Exod. 8:15, 32; 9:34; 1 Sam. 6:6), yet God also hardened his heart (Exod. 4:21; 7:3; 9:12; 10:1, 20, 27; 11:10; 14:4, 8; Rom. 9:17–18).
152. See, e.g., how he abandoned them to their enemies in Neh. 9:28; Ps. 106:41; cf. similarly, among later Gentiles, Iambl. Myst. 1.13. God also gave Israel over to their ways in the wilderness (Ps. 81:12, though the LXX and MT could be rendered simply “sent”; Acts 7:42).
153. Epict. Diatr. 1.12.21–22; 3.11.1–3; Porph. Marc. 22.348–60, esp. 358–59.
154. Plato Laws 5.728B.
155. Val. Max. 7.2.ext.18 (trans. Bailey, LCL, 2:127).
156. Max. Tyre Or. 25.5 (trans. Trapp, 211).
157. Sir. 27:25–27; 2 Macc. 4:38; 9:5–6; 13:7–8; L.A.B. 44:9–10; 1QpHab 11.5, 7, 15; 12.5–6; 4Q181 frg. 1.1–2; Jub. 4:32; 35:10–11; 37:5, 11; Wis. 11:15–16; m. Ab. 2:6/7; Sipre Deut. 238.3.1; Rev. 16:6; see, further, the discussion in Keener, Acts, 2:1052.
158. For sexual dimensions of dishonor, see, e.g., Eurip. El. 44–45; Lysias Or. 3.6, §97; 3.23, §98; Diod. Sic. 10.31.1; 12.15.2; 12.21.2; 33.15.2; Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 1.78.5; Mus. Ruf. 12, p. 86.11–16, 30–32; Arrian Ind. 17.3; Dio Chrys. Or. 40.27; 71.6; Apul. Apol. 74; Libanius Speech Char. 18.2; Nicolaus Progymn. 7, “On Commonplace,” 45. For dishonor and unrestrained passions, cf. Arist. N.E. 7.6.1, 1149a. For homosexual intercourse or when men were viewed as effeminate, cf. Diod. Sic. 5.32.7; Lucian Lucius 38; a speaker in Ps.-Lucian Affairs 23; Jos. Ant. 19.30–31. Marriage to a hermaphrodite appears in Diod. Sic. 32.10.9.
159. Stoics warned against passion (πάθος) as disobedient to reason and contrary to nature (παρὰ φύσιν; Arius Did. 2.7.10, p. 56.1–4) and potentially overwhelming (56.25); one of the fundamental passions was pleasure (56.9–10). Some deemed uncontrollable passion effeminate (Max. Tyre Or. 19.4; cf. Gemünden, “Femme”).
160. Rom. 8:20 offers the only use of a ματαιο- cognate in Romans outside 1:21. One might therefore suppose that Adam subjects creation to futility by his embrace of the spirit of idolatry (cf. Gen. 3:5–6), but elsewhere Pauline literature uses ὑποτάσσω in the active with respect to God subjecting all things to Christ (1 Cor. 15:27–28; Eph. 1:22) or Christ subjecting all things to himself (Phil. 3:21). While none of these references speak of subjecting creation to “futility,” and Christ is for Paul the second Adam, Pauline usage may still favor God being the one subjecting creation here.
161. For “image” and “glory” in Paul, see 1 Cor. 11:7; 2 Cor. 3:18; 4:4. This is a reversal of distorting God to resemble the “image” of creation (Rom. 1:23). Slavery to “corruption” in Rom. 8:21 echoes the “corruptible” creation worshiped in 1:23 (liberated in the future, in 8:21–23; cf. imperishable resurrection bodies in 1 Cor. 15:42, 50, 53–54).
162. Stowers, “Self-Mastery,” 531–34; for Paul, however, “only identification with Christ . . . can bring about sinlessness and self-mastery” (536; cf. Stowers, Rereading, 82).
163. For discussion of such polemic, see Keener, “Exhortation”; Keener, Acts, 2:2159–62.
164. E.g., Ael. Arist. Def. Or. 432, §§146D–147D; Phil. 1:23; 1 Thess. 2:17. Cf. desire for wisdom in Wis. 6:13–20, esp. 6:13, 20.
165. Max. Tyre Or. 24.4 (trans. Trapp, 203); cf. Apoc. Mos. 19:3. For the sake of brevity, I am treating together ἐπιθυμία, which Paul often uses (even in Romans: 1:24; 6:12; 7:7–8; 13:14), and πάθος, which appears in Pauline literature rarely (only Rom. 1:26; Col. 3:5; 1 Thess. 4:5).
166. E.g., Epict. Diatr. 2.1.10; Iambl. Pyth. Life 31.187; Porph. Marc. 27.438.
167. Galen Grief 42–44, 80; Iambl. Pyth. Life 31.206; Porph. Marc. 29.457–60; cf. Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 9.52.6; Max. Tyre Or. 36.4. Passions spawned all crimes (Cic. Senect. 12.40) and illnesses of the soul (Porph. Marc. 9.157–58). Vice proliferates passion (Lucian Nigr. 16), and one can become psychologically ill through addiction to pleasures (Arius Did. 2.7.10e, p. 62.20–23).
168. Xen. Oec. 1.22; Mus. Ruf. 3, p. 40.19; Pliny Ep. 8.22.1; Plut. Bride 33, Mor. 142E; Arius Did. 2.7.10a, p. 58.15; Iambl. Letter 3, frg. 3.4–6 (Stob. Anth. 3.5.46); Porph. Marc. 34.522–25; 4 Macc. 13:2; T. Jos. 7:8; T. Ash. 3:2. Slavery to pleasure appears in Max. Tyre Or. 25.5–6; 33.3; 36.4.
169. Xen. Hell. 4.8.22; Polyb. 31.25.8; Publ. Syr. 40, 181; Dio Chrys. Or. 8.20; 9.12; T. Reub. 4:9; Jos. Ant. 4.328–29. Alexander as an example of overcoming desire (as in Arrian Alex. 7.28.2) was not plausible outside eulogy (Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 113.29–31; Plut. Flatt. 25, Mor. 65F; Dio Chrys. Or. 4.4, 60; cf. b. Tamid 32a).
170. Apul. Flor. 14.3–4, on Crates the Cynic.
171. Engberg-Pedersen, “Vices,” 612–13. For a Stoic list of negative expressions of desire, see Arius Did. 2.7.10b, pp. 58.32–60.1. Controlling emotion naturally appealed to Roman traditions of discipline (see, e.g., Val. Max. 4.1.pref.; 4.1.13).
172. Arius Did. 2.7.10, p. 56.1–4; 2.7.10a, p. 56.24–25; 2.7.10b, p. 58.17–18. As a type of passion, pleasure also disobeyed reason (2.7.10b, p. 58.29).
173. Porph. Marc. 13.236–37.
174. Cic. Fin. 1.18.57–58.
175. Arius Did. 2.7.10, p. 56.6–7; see also Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and Stoics, 311n32.
176. E.g., Ach. Tat. 2.8.3. On positive Epicurean views of pleasure, see, e.g., Cic. Fin. 1.9.29; Plut. R. Col. 27, Mor. 1122D; Athen. Deipn. 12.546e; Long, Philosophy, 61–69; Klauck, Context, 395–98. Epicurus’s own views appear more moderate; see Cic. Tusc. 3.21.50; Diog. Laert. 10.145–20. For intellectual pleasures in Plato, see Lodge, Ethics, 27–31.
177. Negatively, e.g., Cic. Fin. 2.12.35–2.13.43; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 59.1; Dial. 7.11.1; Arius Did. 2.7.10, p. 56.13–18; 2.7.10b, p. 60.1–2. Earlier Stoic tradition apparently viewed it among indifferents; see Arius Did. 2.7.5a, p. 10.12–13; as not a good, Mus. Ruf. 1, p. 32.22; at least when associated with what is dishonorable, Mus. Ruf. 12, p. 86.27–29; frg. 51, p. 144.8–9; see Brennan, “Theory,” 61–62n31.
178. E.g., Xen. Mem. 1.2.23–24; 4.5.3; Hell. 4.8.22; Cic. Senect. 12.40; Dio Chrys. Or. 1.13; 3.34; 8.20; Pliny Ep. 5.5.4; Plut. Bride 33, Mor. 142E; Max. Tyre Or. 7.7; 14.1–2; 25.5–6; 33.3–8; 38.6; Men. Rhet. 2.10, 416.19; Proclus Poet. 6.1, K121.14–15; Iambl. Pyth. Life 31.204–6; Libanius Comp. 1.7–8; 5.7; Speech Char. 16.2; Porph. Marc. 6.103–8; 7.125–26, 131–34; 33.508–9; 35.535–36.
179. For Stoic criticisms, see Cic. Fin. 2, esp. 2.4.11–2.6.18; Arius Did. 2.7.10a, p. 58.8–11; for others’ criticisms, see, e.g., Cic. Pis. 28.68–69; Aul. Gel. 9.5; Max. Tyre Or. 30–33, esp. 30.3–5; 31; 33; Galen Grief 62, 68. See also Keener, Acts, 3:2584–93 (on Epicureans) and 2593–95 (on Stoicism; cf. Keener, “Epicureans”). Cf. Seneca’s attack on the Epicurean goal of pleasure in Dyson, “Pleasure” (on Sen. Y. Vit. beat. 11.1).
180. See, e.g., Xen. Mem. 1.2.24; Val. Max. 3.3.ext.1; Mus. Ruf. 6, p. 52.15–17; 7, p. 56.27; 12, pp. 86.39–88.1; Max. Tyre Or. 1.9; 7.7; 25.6; Iambl. Letter 3, frg. 3 (Stob. Anth. 3.5.46); Porph. Marc. 31.479–81; Let. Aris. 256; 4 Macc. 13:1; Malherbe, “Beasts.” Many sources use figurative war imagery, discussed later in this book in connection with Rom. 7:23 (pp. 109–11, esp. 110). Control of oneself was the greatest conquest (Sen. Y. Nat. Q. 1.pref.5; 3.pref.10; Ep. Lucil. 113.29–31; Publ. Syr. 137; Prov. 16:32; cf. Xen. Mem. 1.5.1).
181. Tobin, Rhetoric, 229; Dillon, “Philosophy,” 796. In 4 Macc. 3:2–5 reason expressly controls and fights passions rather than eradicates them.
182. E.g., Philo Sacr. 45; cf. discussions—later in this book, chaps. 6 and 7—of 2 Cor. 3:18; Phil. 4:8.
183. Porph. Marc. 31.483.
184. Cic. Inv. 2.54.164; Off. 2.5.18; Leg. 1.23.60; Sall. Catil. 51.3; Plut. Lect. 1, Mor. 37E; Max. Tyre Or. 33.3; Porph. Marc. 6.99; 29.453–60; 31.478–83; 34.521–22; cf. in other cultures, e.g., traditional Morocco (Eickelman, Middle East, 205). For reason ruling the senses, see Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 66.32.
185. Dion. Hal. Ant. rom. 5.8.6; Cic. Senect. 12.40; Char. Chaer. 2.4.4; Arius Did. 2.7.10a, p. 58.5–6, 12–16; Marc. Aur. 3.6.2; Porph. Marc. 9.154–55; for passions as a distraction from attention to God, see Max. Tyre Or. 11.10. One or the other would be in control, with passion being more feminine (Max. Tyre Or. 33.2, from an androcentric perspective; cf. Philo Unchangeable 111). Greek thinkers associated passion both with females and with barbarians; see McCoskey, Race, 56 (for barbarians as like beasts, e.g., Libanius Invect. 2.1; Topics 2.6).
186. Meeks, Moral World, 47.
187. Val. Max. 3.3.ext.1 (trans. Bailey, LCL, 1:275).
188. See Sorabji, Emotion, 2–4; Stowers, “Self-Mastery,” 540; Epict. Diatr. 1.28.6. Cf., however, Arius Did. 2.7.10a, p. 58.11–16, where passions overpower teaching.
189. As with the limitations of Stoicism (Sorabji, Emotion, 153–54), cognitive therapy when used by itself is more useful for some disorders than others (e.g., for reducing phobias but not helpful for anorexia; 155).
190. For the connections between emotion and reason in modern psychology, see discussion in Elliott, Feelings.
191. Sorabji, Emotion, 6, 144–55 (esp. 145–50). Galen viewed emotion as flowing from bodily states (see esp. 253–62). The Stoic emphasis on indifference is not natural or desirable for modern therapy (169–80).
192. Sorabji, Emotion, 2–5. Seneca would have included among such first movements the involuntary stimulation of male organs, more rapid respiration when provoked, loss of color when startled, and the like (11). Such “first movements” become problematic only if, once wrong judgments are identified, one chooses them, allowing emotion to become worse (see more fully 55–65). Thus if one assents to the movement rather than preferring reason, it becomes full-fledged emotion (73); but it is not a matter of choice so long as it remains involuntary, like anything that befalls the body (73–74, citing Sen. Y. Ira 2.2.1–2.4.2). Earlier, Posidonius, who felt that judgments were not always necessary for emotion to occur (Sorabji, Emotion, 121–32; cf. others in 133, 142), accepted something like first movements but did not deny that they involved some emotion (118–19). Because first movements did not involve reason, Aquinas (lecture 1 on Rom. 8:1) denied that they incurred condemnation (Levy, Krey, and Ryan, Romans, 175); cf., similarly, William of St. Thierry on Rom. 2:14–16 (ibid., 90, 91n11).
193. Sorabji, Emotion, 8–9 (quotations from 9); more fully, 343–56 (on Origen, esp. 346–51). This led further to the seven cardinal sins (357–71) and Augustine’s philosophic and linguistic misunderstanding of Stoics regarding emotion, through which sin was thought to pervade every layer of one’s being (372–84). Though respecting Augustine, Sorabji prefers Pelagius’s approach to lust (417); monasticism’s legacy in parts of Europe may have contributed to Freud’s interest in repressed passions. On prepassion, see also Graver, “Origins.”
194. For nonsexual cravings or feelings similarly described, see, e.g., Corn. Nep. 6 (Lysander), 3.1; Cic. Tusc. 1.19.44; Virg. Aen. 7.456; Plut. Coriol. 21.1–2; Fronto Ad M. Caes. 3.13.3; Ep. graec. 6; Men. Rhet. 2.3, 384.29–30; Sir. 28:10–12; 4 Macc. 16:3; Jos. Life 263; Luke 24:32.
195. E.g., Musaeus Hero 40–41; Xen. Cyr. 5.1.16; Menander Fabula Incerta 8.21; Catullus 45.16; 61.169–71; 64.19; Virg. Aen. 1.660, 673; 4.2, 23, 54, 66, 68; Ecl. 8.83; Ovid Fast. 3.545–46; Her. 4.17–20; 7.23; 15.9; Am. 1.1.25–26; 1.2.9, 46; Val. Max. 4.6.2 (conjugal); Plut. Table 1.2.6, Mor. 619A; Dial. L. 16, Mor. 759B; Lucian Lucius 5; Philost. Ep. 13 (59); Athen. Deipn. 1.10d; Sir. 9:8; 23:16; T. Jos. 2:2. In erotic spells, cf. LiDonnici, “Burning”; further in Keener, “Marriage,” 686–87. See esp. the romances, e.g., Longus 3.10; Char. Chaer. 1.1.8, 15; 2.3.8; 2.4.7; 4.7.6; 5.9.9; 6.3.3; 6.4.5; 6.7.1; Ach. Tat. 1.5.5–6; 1.11.3; 1.17.1; 2.3.3; 4.6.1; 4.7.4; 5.15.5; 5.25.6; 6.18.2; Apul. Metam. 2.5, 7; 5.23; Xen. Eph. Anthia 1.3, 5, 9, 14; 2.3; 3.6.
196. For northern Mediterranean disdain for Egyptian animal images, see comment above, p. 14.
197. Iambl. Letter 3, frg. 3.4–6 (Stob. Anth. 3.5.46; cf. Letter 13, frg. 1.18, in Stob. Anth. 2.2.6).
198. Philosophers sometimes depicted the passions as beasts (Malherbe, Philosophers, 82–89; cf. the body in Max. Tyre Or. 7.5), but even more often intellectuals used this imagery for those who were ruled by passions (e.g., Xen. Hiero 7.3; Mem. 1.2.30; Rhet. Alex. pref. 1420ab.4–5; Polyb. 1.80.10; Cic. Mil. 12.32; 31.85; Pis. 1.1; Sen. Y. Ep. Lucil. 103.2; Mus. Ruf. 10, p. 78.27–28; 14, p. 92.21; 18B, p. 116.14; Epict. Diatr. 1.3.7, 9; 2.9.3, 5; 4.1.127; 4.5.21; Dio Chrys. Or. 8.14, 21; 32.26; 77/78.29; Plut. Demosth. 26.4; Bride 7, Mor. 139B; R. Col. 2, Mor. 1108D; Diogenes Ep. 28; Max. Tyre Or. 15.2; 33.7–8; Marc. Aur. 3.16; Philod. Death 35.14–15; Crit. frg. 52.2–3; Philost. Vit. Apoll. 7.30; Libanius Anec. 2.1). Animals’ souls, unlike those of humans, were usually deemed devoid of reason (e.g., Polyb. 6.6.4; Cic. Fin. 2.14.45; Tusc. 1.33.80; Off. 1.4.11; Diog. Laert. 7.1.85–86).
199. Hooker, “Adam”; Barrett, Adam, 17–19; Dunn, Romans, 1:53; Dunn, Theology, 91–92; Dunn, “Adam,” 127–28. For parallels to Adam and Eve in the Life of Adam and Eve, see Levison, “Adam and Eve.” One significant connection may be the futility in Rom. 8:20 (see Hooker, “Adam,” 303).
200. Phrases such as “from creation” or “from the beginning” could imply this period (see, e.g., Mark 10:6; L.A.B. 1:1) or could be used more generally (e.g., 1 En. 69:18; T. Mos. 12:4; L.A.B. 32:7; Incant. Text 20:11–12).
201. In Rom. 16:20 the crushing of Satan underfoot probably alludes to one line of ancient Jewish interpretation about Gen. 3:15 (but cf. Ps. 8:6 in 1 Cor. 15:27); thus, it is plausible that wisdom in what is good and innocence concerning evil in Rom. 16:19 adapts the image of the tree of knowing good and evil (experimenting with sin rather than depending on the Spirit of life, Rom. 8:2). If so, Adam allusions could be among the elements toward the letter’s beginning and ending that frame the letter (cf. also wisdom vs. foolishness here, as in Rom. 1:22). Paul’s terms for “good” and “evil” in 16:19 differ from those in LXX Gen. 2:9; 3:5, however (as, less significantly, his language in Rom. 16:20 differs from that in Gen. 3:15); if Paul intended an allusion in Rom. 16:19, he does not make this clear.
202. See Scroggs, Adam, 75–76n3; Fitzmyer, Romans, 274, 283; Keck, Romans, 63; Stowers, Rereading, 86, 90, 92.
203. See, e.g., Jub. 7:20; van der Horst, “Pseudo-Phocylides,” 569; Mek. Bah. 5.90ff.; Sipre Deut. 343.4.1; b. Sanh. 56a, bar.; Schultz, “Views of Patriarchs,” 48–49; further discussion in Keener, Acts, 3:2264–65.
204. See, e.g., O’Rourke, “Revelation.”
205. Ancient writers recognized the value of rereading a document as often as necessary to catch the main themes and subtleties; for speeches, see, e.g., Quint. Inst. 10.1.20–21. Still, speeches were deliberately designed so as to invite hearers to follow the flow of thought (Theon Progymn. 2.149–53).
206. Herein I offer my belated public apology to Prof. Morna Hooker; as a PhD student in one of her classes, I wrote a paper arguing in part against her case for Adam allusions in Rom. 1.
207. Hooker, “Adam,” 297–98, emphasizing Adam and conceding that by itself ὁμοίωμα (Rom. 1:23) reflects Ps. 105:20 LXX (106:20 ET). Cf. also humanity in Philo Mos. 2.65.
208. For God’s image in humanity here, see also Hooker, “Adam,” 305. “Likeness” (ὁμοίωμα) in Rom. 1:23 may also prepare for references to the likeness of the first (5:14; cf. 8:3; Phil. 2:7) or second (Rom. 6:5) Adam—though its primary echo is Ps. 105:20 LXX (106:20 ET), as just noted.
209. In the context of Gen. 1:27, the complementarity of genders involves procreativity (1:28). That is, it relates not to ancient gender roles, known to vary somewhat among societies, but to distinct persons designed to complement each other.
210. Cf., e.g., Mus. Ruf. 12, pp. 84.2–86.1; Artem. Oneir. 1.80; Diog. Laert. 6.2.65; Jos. Ag. Ap. 2.273–75; Ps.-Phoc. 190–92; T. Naph. 3:4–5; van der Horst, “Hierocles,” 158; Grant, Paul, 55, 124. For both Gentile and Jewish sources on nature as applied to gender reversal especially in sexual contexts, see, e.g., Talbert, Romans, 66, 75–76; Byrne, Romans, 76–77; Jewett, Romans, 175–76; discussion of the diverse sources in Greenberg, Homosexuality, 207. Paul is not thinking in terms of modern genetics, about which he neither knew nor could not have known, but presumably in terms of how the male genital organ fits as if by design inside that of the female.
211. In the next chapter humanity retains some moral sensibility by “nature” (φύσις, Rom. 2:14). For the nature of natural law in ancient thought, see discussion in Keener, Acts, 3:2265–68; also Inwood, “Rules,” 96–97; Inwood, “Natural Law”; Watson, “Natural Law.”
212. As is often noted (e.g., Kennedy, Epistles, 26; Hunter, Romans, 34; Dunn, Romans, 1:66; Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and Stoics, 71; Engberg-Pedersen, “Vices,” 624; Ramelli, Hierocles, lxxii–lxxiii, lxxviii), the term καθήκω appears in Stoic ethics (Mus. Ruf. frg. 31; Arius Did. 2.7.5b2, p. 14.4–5, 25–26; 2.7.6a, p. 38.11–12; 2.7.7b, p. 44.27; 2.7.11a, p. 62.33; 2.7.8, pp. 50.36–52.2; p. 52.6–7, 21–23; 2.7.11m, p. 90.30–31; p. 92.1–3; cf. Inwood, “Rules,” 100–101; Sedley, “Debate,” esp. 128); however, it is in no wise limited to them (Moulton and Milligan, Vocabulary, 312, citing, e.g., P.Lille 1.3.42; P.Fay. 91.20; 107.9; P.Oxy. 1.115.5; see also Jewett, Romans, 183). Nature provides a criterion for choosing among the καθήκοντα (Arius Did. 2.7.8a, p. 52.25–26).
213. See BDAG.
214. Cf. 1 Cor. 2:15, where the spiritual person evaluates everything from the right perspective but cannot be rightly evaluated by those without this eternal, Spirit perspective.
215. Vice lists were widespread in antiquity. See, e.g., Plato Laws 1.649D; Arist. E.E. 2.3.4, 1220b–1221a; Ps.-Arist. V.V. 1249a–1251b; Rhet. Alex. 36, 1442a.13–14; Cic. Pis. 27.66; Cat. 2.4.7; 2.5.10; 2.10.22, 25; Cael. 22.55; Phil. 3.11.28; 8.5.16; Mur. 6.14 (negated); Sen. Y. Dial. 9.2.10–12; Epict. Diatr. 2.8.23; Arius Did. 2.7.5b, p. 12.2–12; 2.7.10b, pp. 58.32–60.1; 2.7.10b, p. 60.1–7; 2.7.10e, p. 62.14–19; 2.7.11e, p. 68.17–20; Dio Chrys. Or. 1.13; 3.53; 4.126; 8.8; 32.28, 91; 33.23, 55; 34.19; Fronto Nep. am. 2.8; Diogenes Ep. 36; Diog. Laert. 2.93; 1QS 4.9–11; Wis. 14:25–26; Philo Posterity 52. See, further, the discussion in Charles, “Vice Lists.”
216. Engberg-Pedersen, Paul and Stoics, 53. Cf. Epictetus (Diatr. 1.2.1–4), who opines that once someone knows that something is rational, one will suffer anything for it. Stoics valued “right reason” (λόγος ὀρθός; Epict. Diatr. 2.8.2; Marc. Aur. 9.9; Arius Did. 2.7.11i, p. 76.31; 2.7.11k, p. 80.28; 2.7.11m, p. 88.38–39; cf. Mus. Ruf. frg. 38, p. 136.1–3), an expression also found in Let. Aris. 161, 244 (Hadas, Aristeas, 195; elsewhere, e.g., Philost. Hrk. 19.3).
217. Jewett, Romans, 181; cf. Schlatter, Romans, 47; Keck, Romans, 188.
218. Cf. Jewish discussions of the basic morality expected for Gentiles in Keener, Acts, 3:2263–69.
219. Owen, “Scope,” 142–43 (Paul addresses only ordinary idolaters in Rom. 1, not philosophers); cf. a particular Gentile in Stowers, Diatribe, 112; Stowers, Rereading, 104; Stowers, “Self-Mastery,” 535; any person that it fits, whether Jewish or Gentile, in Matera, Romans, 69.
220. E.g., Nygren, Romans, 113–16; Käsemann, Romans, 53; Moo, Romans, 126; Fitzmyer, Romans, 297; Schreiner, Romans, 102–3; Wischmeyer, “Römer 2.1–24”; Watson, Gentiles, 198; Keener, Romans, 42. The interlocutor’s Jewish identity may remain ambiguous until Rom. 2:17 (Bryan, Preface, 92; cf. Tobin, Rhetoric, 111–12).
221. Cf. Stowers, “Self-Mastery,” 536.