Romans 1:28

1. “But,” say they, “God hardened the heart of Pharaoh and of his servants.” Those, then, who allege such difficulties, do not read in the Gospel that passage where the Lord replied to the disciples, when they asked Him, “Why speakest Thou unto them in parables?”, “Because it is given unto you to know the mystery of the kingdom of heaven; but to them I speak in parables, that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not hear, understanding they may not understand; in order that the prophecy of Isaiah regarding them may be fulfilled, saying, Make the heart of this people gross and make their ears dull, and blind their eyes. …

But those who are despised for their ignorance, and set down as fools and abject slaves, no sooner commit themselves to God’s guidance by accepting the teaching of Jesus, than, so far from defiling themselves by licentious indulgence or the gratification of shameless passion, they in many cases, like perfect priests, for whom such pleasures have no charm, keep themselves in act and in thought in a state of virgin purity. The Athenians have one hierophant, who, not having confidence in his power to restrain his passions within the limits he prescribed for himself, determined to check them at their seat by the application of hemlock; and thus he was accounted pure, and fit for the celebration of religious worship among the Athenians. …

XII . Nor do the legislators give us only prohibitions concerning idols, but also warn us concerning the luminaries, not to swear by them, nor to serve them. For they say: “Lest, when thou seest the sun, and the moon, and the stars, thou shouldest be seduced to worship them.” And elsewhere: “Do not ye learn to walk after the ways of the heathen, and be not afraid of the signs of heaven.” For the stars and the luminaries were given to men to shine upon them, but not for worship; although the Israelites, by the perverseness of their temper, “worshipped the creature instead of the Creator,” and acted insultingly to their Maker, and admired the creature more than is fit. …

16. So also in deeds of violence, where there is a desire to harm, whether by contumely or injury; and both of these either by reason of revenge, as one enemy against another; or to obtain some advantage over another, as the highwayman to the traveller; or for the avoiding of some evil, as with him who is in fear of another; or through envy, as the unfortunate man to one who is happy; or as he that is prosperous in anything to him who he fears will become equal to himself, or whose equality he grieves at; or for the mere pleasure in another’s pains, as the spectators of gladiators, or the deriders and mockers of others. These be the chief iniquities which spring forth from the lust of the flesh, of the eye, and of power, whether singly, or two together, or all at once. …

11. The inquirer might bring forward as a difficulty the fact that those in whose books these prophecies are found are not united with us in the gospel. But when convinced that this also is foretold, he would feel how strong the evidence is. The prophecies of the unbelief of the Jews no one can avoid seeing, no one can pretend to be blind to them. No one can doubt that Isaiah spoke of the Jews when he said, "The ox knoweth his owner, and the ass his master’s crib; but Israel hath not known, and my people hath not considered;" or again, in the words quoted by the apostle, "I have stretched out my hands all the day to a wicked and gainsaying people;" and especially where he says, "God has given them the spirit of remorse, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, and should not understand," and many similar passages. …

2. Augustin replied: You often speak in your discourses of two gods, as indeed you acknowledge, though at first you denied it. And you give as a reason for thus speaking the words of the apostle: "The god of this world has blinded the minds of them that believe not." Most of us punctuate this sentence differently, and explain it as meaning that the true God has blinded the minds of unbelievers. They put a stop after the word God, and read the following words together. Or without this punctuation you may, for the sake of exposition, change the order of the words, and read, "In whom God has blinded the minds of unbelievers of this world," which gives the same sense. The act of blinding the minds of unbelievers may in one sense be ascribed to God, as the effect not of malice, but of justice. …

9. Whoever, then, denies that our body and its members, which the apostle so approves and extols, are the handiwork of God, you see whom he contradicts, preaching contrary to what you have received. So, instead of refuting his opinions, I may leave him to be accursed of all Christians. The apostle says, God tempered the body. Faustus says, Not God, but Hyle . Anathemas are more suitable than arguments to such contradictions. You cannot say that God is here called the God of this world. And if any one understands the passage where this expression does occur to mean that the devil blinds the minds of unbelievers, we grant that he does so by his evil suggestions, from yielding to which, men lose the light of righteousness in God’s righteous retribution. This is all in accordance with sacred Scripture. …

Attend now to the point which we have laid down for discussion: whether faith is in our own power? We now speak of that faith which we employ when we believe anything, not that which we give when we make a promise; for this too is called faith . We use the word in one sense when we say, “He had no faith in me,” and in another sense when we say, “He did not keep faith with me.” The one phrase means, “He did not believe what I said;” the other, “He did not do what he promised.” According to the faith by which we believe, we are faithful to God; but according to that whereby a thing is brought to pass which is promised, God Himself even is faithful to us; for the apostle declares, “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able.” Well, now, the former is the faith about which we inquire, Whether it be in our power? even the faith by which we believe God, or be …

“The very matter,” says he, “of sin is its punishment, if the sinner is so much weakened that he commits more sins.” He does not consider how justly the light of truth forsakes the man who transgresses the law. When thus deserted he of course becomes blinded, and necessarily offends more; and by so falling is embarrassed and being embarrassed fails to rise, so as to hear the voice of the law, which admonishes him to beg for the Saviour’s grace. Is no punishment due to them of whom the apostle says: “Because that, when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened?” This darkening was, of course, already their punishment and penalty; and yet by this very penalty, that is, by their blindness of heart, which supervenes on the withdrawal of the light of wisdom, they fell into more grievous sins …

Who can help trembling at those judgments of God by which He does in the hearts of even wicked men whatsoever He wills, at the same time rendering to them according to their deeds? Rehoboam, the son of Solomon, rejected the salutary counsel of the old men, not to deal harshly with the people, and preferred listening to the words of the young men of his own age, by returning a rough answer to those to whom he should have spoken gently. Now whence arose such conduct, except from his own will? Upon this, however, the ten tribes of Israel revolted from him, and chose for themselves another king, even Jeroboam, that the will of God in His anger might be accomplished which He had predicted would come to pass. …

Moreover, that which I said, “That the salvation of this religion has never been lacking to him who was worthy of it, and that he to whom it was lacking was not worthy,”, if it be discussed and it be asked whence any man can be worthy, there are not wanting those who say, by human will. But we say, by divine grace or predestination. Further, between grace and predestination there is only this difference, that predestination is the preparation for grace, while grace is the donation itself. When, therefore the apostle says, “Not of works, lest any man should boast. …

48. If any one, however, asserts that if this was the real state of the case, Mark might have mentioned the third hour explicitly at the point at which it really was the third hour, namely, when the voices of the Jews were lifted up demanding that the Lord should be crucified; and, further, that he might have told us plainly there that those vociferators did really crucify Him at that time, such a reasoner is simply imposing laws upon the historians of truth in his own overweening pride. For he might as well maintain that if he were himself to be a narrator of these occurrences, they ought all to be recorded just in the same way and the same order by all other writers as they have been recorded by himself. …