Romans 1:31
Foolish, dissolute, without affection, without fidelity, without mercy.
Open Romans 1:31 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- insipientes, incompositos, sine affectione, absque fœdere, sine misericordia.
- Greek New Testament (SBLGNT)
- ἀσυνέτους, ἀσυνθέτους, ἀστόργους, ἀνελεήμονας·
Haydock's commentary
Dissolute, rude6 in their manners, and behaviour. Some, from the Greek, understand breakers of their word; but this would be the same as without fidelity, which we find afterwards in the same verse. (Witham)
6 asunthetous. See 2 Timothy iii. 3. aspondous, sine fœdere.
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
St Cyprian The Epistles of Cyprian, Epistle LXVII
9. Wherefore, although there have been found some among our colleagues, dearest brethren, who think that the godly discipline may be neglected, and who rashly hold communion with Basilides and Martialis, such a thing as this ought not to trouble our faith, since the Holy Spirit threatens such in the Psalms, saying, “But thou hatest instruction, and castedst my words behind thee: when thou sawest a thief, thou consentedst unto him, and hast been partaker with adulterers.” He shows that they become sharers and partakers of other men’s sins who are associated with the delinquents. …
St Augustine City of God, Of the Perturbations of the Soul Which Appear as Right Affections in the Life of the Righteous
But we must further make the admission, that even when these affections are well regulated, and according to God’s will, they are peculiar to this life, not to that future life we look for, and that often we yield to them against our will. And thus sometimes we weep in spite of ourselves, being carried beyond ourselves, not indeed by culpable desire; but by praiseworthy charity. In us, therefore, these affections arise from human infirmity; but it was not so with the Lord Jesus, for even His infirmity was the consequence of His power. But so long as we wear the infirmity of this life, we are rather worse men than better if we have none of these emotions at all. …
St Augustine A Treatise on Nature and Grace, Sin and the Penalty of Sin the Same
“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 …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Paul's Epistle to the Romans, Homily V on Rom. i. 28
Ver. 31 . “Without natural affection, implacable.”
St Gregory Nazianzen On the Theophany, or Birthday of Christ
XII. This being He placed in Paradise, whatever the Paradise may have been, having honoured him with the gift of Free Will (in order that God might belong to him as the result of his choice, no less than to Him who had implanted the seeds of it), to till the immortal plants, by which is meant perhaps the Divine Conceptions, both the simpler and the more perfect; naked in his simplicity and inartificial life, and without any covering or screen; for it was fitting that he who was from the beginning should be such. Also He gave him a Law, as a material for his Free Will to act upon. This Law was a Commandment as to what plants he might partake of, and which one he might not touch. …