Paul attributes his perseverance not to human merit but to the mercy of God, which first cleanses a person, then makes him righteous, adopts him as a son of God and endows him with a glory like the glory of God’s own Son.

This perseverance is to be attributed to God’s loving kindness, for not only do we not sink down under the weight of all our trials, but we even rejoice and speak boldly.

This is really an invitation. Just while he had been speaking about himself and his associates, Paul is now exhorting the Corinthians to lead a better life.

Some were walking in craftiness. They had a reputation for taking nothing, but in fact they took it and kept it secret. They had the seeming character of saints and apostles but were full of innumerable secret wickednesses. Paul takes nothing and calls the Corinthians as his witnesses. Likewise he does nothing wicked and asks them to testify to the truth of what he is saying.

Paul is talking here about circumcision, which the false apostles were covertly forcing on newly converted Gentiles.

Knowing Christ as the true light,^[1] inaccessible^[2] to falsehood, we learn this, namely, that it is necessary for our lives also to be illuminated by the rays of the true light. But virtues are the rays of the Sun of Justice,^[3] streaming forth for our illumination, through which we lay aside the works of darkness,^[4] so that we walk becomingly as in the day,^[5] and we renounce those things which shame conceals.^[6] By doing all things in the light, we become the light itself, so that it shines before others,^[7] which is the peculiar quality of light. And if we recognize Christ as sanctification,^[8] in whom every action is steadfast and pure, let us prove by our life that we ourselves stand apart, being ourselves true sharers of his name, coinciding in deed and not in word with the power of his sanctification.

Unbelief casts darkness over the splendor of the power of God. This is especially true in the case of the Jews.

It is veiled only to those who are unbelievers. It is not hidden from everyone, as the face of Moses was hidden from all Israel in the Old Testament.^[1]

Paul is saying that God dims the sight of worldly people because they are hostile to the faith of Christ. He is giving them what they want, since it is because they are hostile and tell lies that they move further toward not being able to believe what they do not want to believe.

Every unbeliever is of this world. No one who has overcome it and been deemed worthy of the world to come is blinded in his understanding, for his eyes have been enlightened.

The god of this world may be understood to be the devil, on the ground that he has claimed to rule over unbelievers. Or, on account of the attacks of the heretics it may be understood to mean that God has blinded the minds of unbelievers precisely because of their unbelief.

The god of this world may refer neither to the devil nor to another creator, as the Manichaeans say, but to the God of the universe, who has blinded the minds of the unbelievers of this world. In the world to come there are no unbelievers, only in this one.

Paul is saying that unbelief is limited to this world, because in the next life the truth will be plain to everyone.

Our Educator, O children, resembles his Father, God, whose Son he is. He is without sin, without blame. . . . God immaculate in human form, accomplishing his Father’s will. He is God the Word, who is in the bosom of the Father and also at the right hand of the Father, with even the nature of God. He it is who is the spotless image.^[1] We must try, then, to resemble Him in spirit as far as we are able. . . . Yet we must strive to the best of our ability to be as sinless as we can. There is nothing more important for us than first to be rid of sin and weakness and then to uproot any habitual sinful inclination. The highest perfection, of course, is never to sin in any least way, but this can be said of God alone. The next highest is never deliberately to commit wrong; this is the state proper to the man who possesses wisdom. In the third place comes not sinning except on rare occasions; this marks a man who is well educated. Finally, in the lowest degree we must place delaying in sin for a brief moment, but even this, for those who are called to recover their loss and repent, is a step on the path to salvation.

And the Image,^[1] as of one substance with him, and because he is of the Father, and not the Father of him. For this is of the nature of an image, to be the reproduction of its archetype and of that whose name it bears; only that there is more here. For in ordinary language an image is a motionless representation of that which has motion, but in this case it is the living reproduction of the living one and is more exactly like than was Seth to Adam^[2] or any son to his father.

What is the face of God like? As his image, certainly, for as the apostle says, the image of the Father is the Son.^[1] With his image, therefore, may he shine upon us, that is, may he shine his image, the Son, upon us in order that he himself may shine upon us, for the light of the Father is the light of the Son. He who sees the Father sees also the Son, and he who sees the Son sees also the Father. Where there is no diversity between glory and glory, there glory is one and the same.

For the Son of God is Word and Righteousness. But every sinner is under the tyranny of the prince of this age,^[1] since every sinner is made a friend of the present evil age. For he does not hand himself over to the One who gave himself for our sins to deliver us from the present evil age and to deliver us according to the will of our God and Father, according to the verse in the letter to the Galatians.^[2] And the one who by voluntary sin is under the tyranny of the prince of this age is also ruled by sin. That is why we are commanded by Paul no longer to be subjected to sin that wishes to rule over us. We are so ordered through the following words, Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions.^[3]

But if anyone dares to attribute corruption of substance to what was made according to the image and likeness of God, in my opinion he extends the charge of impiety also to the Son of God himself, since he is also called in Scripture the image of God.^[1] At least the one who holds the opinion will certainly find fault with the authority of Scripture, which says that humanity was made after the image of God. And the traces of the divine image are clearly recognized not through the likeness of the body, which undergoes corruption, but through the intelligence of the soul, its righteousness, temperance, courage, wisdom, discipline, and through the entire chorus of virtues that are present in God by substance and can be in humankind through effort and the imitation of God. The Lord points this out in the Gospel when He says, Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful^[2] and Be perfect, as your Father is perfect.^[3] Consequently, it is quite clear that in God all these virtues can never enter or leave, but they are acquired by us little by little and one by one.

It is not we but he who enables our faith, accepting us and judging us by it.

In expressing himself humbly, Paul spoke in a way which was designed to show that he was not preaching the gospel for his own advantage but for the glory of the Lord Christ, to whom he is obedient.

I am a servant. I am but a minister of those who receive the gospel, transacting everything for Another, and for his glory doing what I do. In warring against me you throw down what is God’s.

And the apostle: For we preach not ourselves but Jesus Christ as Lord, and ourselves merely as your servants in Jesus.^[1] Knowing, then, the fruits of humility and the penalty of conceit, imitate the Master by loving one another and do not shrink from death or any other punishment for the good of each other. But the way which God entered upon for you, do you enter upon for him, proceeding with one body and one soul to the invitation from above, loving God and each other. For love and fear of the Lord are the first fulfillment of the law.

Do you see how Paul shows the glory of Moses flashing with added luster to those who want to see it? It shines in our hearts, he says, just as it shone on the face of Moses.^[1] First he reminds them of what was made at the beginning of creation,^[2] and then he shows that this renewed creation is greater.

Since the divine nature is invisible and always remains so, it is seen for what it is in the humanity of Jesus Christ which shines with divine light and sends out its rays.

Our hearts had been submerged in darkness.

When the Apostle said, God, Who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined into our hearts the resurrection, he showed this resurrection to be the exodus from the old state which in the likeness of Sheol incarcerates a man where the light of the gospel will not shine mystically upon him. This is a breath of life through hope in the resurrection, and by it the dawning of divine wisdom shines in his heart, so that a man should become new, having nothing of the old man.

But does anyone deny that the Godhead of the eternal Trinity is to be adored, when the Scriptures also set forth the inexplicable majesty of the divine Trinity, as the apostle says elsewhere: For the God who commanded the light to shine out of darkness has shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Christ Jesus?^[1] . . . Who is it, then, who shined that we might know God in the face of Christ Jesus? For he said: God shined, that the glory of God might be known in the face of Jesus Christ. Who else do we think but the Spirit who was made manifest? Or who else is it but the Holy Spirit, to whom the power of the Godhead is referred? For those who exclude the Spirit must introduce another to receive with the Father and the Son the glory of the Godhead.

We should accordingly worship and glorify him who raised our dust to such state, recounting ceaselessly the holiness of him who mingled our spirit with his Spirit and mixed into our bodies the gift of his grace, causing the fire of his Holy Spirit to burst into flame in us. For he has shone out in our hearts which had been submerged in darkness.

By treasure, Paul meant the sacrament of God in Christ, which is made manifest to believers but which has been concealed from unbelievers with a veil. Just as a treasure is put in a hidden place, the sacrament of God is hidden within a person, in his heart. The reference to earthen vessels is an allusion to the weakness of human nature, which can do nothing unless empowered by God.

We have a treasure in such vessels of clay.^[1] There are many who construe this last expression in reference to the body and to the Holy Spirit, meaning, of course, that we possess a treasure in earthen vessels. There is certainly that interpretation, but I think the better treasury-concept is that we have a most precious treasure in vessels of clay symbolizing the homely words of the Scripture.

Every word of Scripture is a symbol all its own. These rustic words that persons of every age ponder over are packed full of mystical meaning. But we carry this treasure in vessels of clay; we have a divine treasury of meaning in the most ordinary words.

Both the greatness of the things given and the weakness of them that receive show the power of God, who not only gave great things but also gave them to those who are little. He used the term earthen in allusion to the frailty of our mortal nature and to declare the weakness of our flesh. For it is no better than earthenware, which is soon damaged and destroyed by death, disease and even variations of temperature. The power of God is most conspicuous when it performs mighty works by using vile and lowly things.

But just as divine providence is not proved to be a fiction, particularly for those who are convinced of its existence, because its workings and arrangements are beyond the comprehension of human minds, so neither will the divine inspiration of holy Scripture, which extends through its entire body, be supposed to be nonexistent because the weakness of our understanding cannot discover the deep and hidden thoughts in every sentence. For the treasure of divine wisdom is concealed in vessels of poor and humble words, as the apostle points out when he says: We have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the greatness of the divine power may shine forth the more, when no taint of human eloquence is mingled with the truth of the doctrines.

The afflictions come not only from enemies but even from our own households and friends. These things are permitted by God, not for our defeat but for our discipline.

If none of these things ever happened, the greatness of God’s power would never be revealed.

For God delivers us from afflictions not when we are no longer in affliction ( . . . Paul says we are afflicted in every way, as though there were never a time when we were not afflicted), but when in our affliction we are not crushed because of God’s help. To be afflicted, according to a colloquial usage of the Hebrews, has the meaning of a critical circumstance that happens to us without our free choice, while to be crushed implies our free choice and that it has been conquered by affliction and given into its power. And so Paul is right when he says, We are afflicted in every way but not crushed.

And unless we understand something that has escaped the notice of the many concerning praying not to enter into temptation, it is time to say that the apostles sometimes prayed and were not heard. How many thousand sufferings did they experience throughout their lifetimes with far greater labors, with far more beatings, with countless imprisonments, and often near death? Paul on his own received at the hands of the Jews the forty lashes less one, was beaten with rods three times, was stoned once, was shipwrecked three times, was adrift at sea a night and a day. He was in every way afflicted, perplexed, persecuted and struck down.

God was with them, like a shepherd, when they were in need. He looked after their interests, so that their enemies would not get the better of them.

Christ himself shares in the death of martyrs. Their sufferings are his sufferings. His life is made manifest in their bodies. Their sufferings are evidence of the fact that they are prepared to receive the life to come which Christ promised.

What is the death of Jesus which they carried about with them? It is the daily deaths which they died, by which the resurrection also was shown. This is another reason for the trials, that Christ’s life might be manifested in human bodies. What looks like weakness and destitution in fact proclaims his resurrection.

Paul is saying that Christians are not afraid to die because they have the promise of resurrection.

We do not suffer because of doing wrong but for the sake of the body of Christ, which is the church. He suffered for us so that his life, which is eternal, might be made manifest in our mortal bodies, so that they too might become immortal.

Paul is saying this because he and Timothy were being threatened with death for their sakes. By preaching to the Gentiles they had stirred up hatred from both Jews and Gentiles, risking even death.

We bear about his dying that the power of his life may be manifest.

It is one and the same Spirit who is in the prophets and in the apostles. However, the Spirit dwelt in the prophets sporadically, whereas he abides in believers forever.

Here Paul is attacking those who have believed in false apostles, who claimed that Paul was suffering because he had little faith. According to them, faith ought to guarantee that there will be no suffering at all. But Paul shows that, on the contrary, he has endured all things precisely because of his faith.

Paul reminds us of a psalm^[1] which abounds in heavenly wisdom and is especially fitted to encourage us in dangers. The psalmist uttered these words when he was in great danger, from which there was no possibility of escape except in the power of God.^[2] In similar circumstances, Paul says that we who have the same Spirit will be comforted likewise. Thus he shows that there is a great harmony between the Old and the New Testaments; it is the same Spirit at work in both. The men of old were in danger, just as we are. Like them, we must find a solution through faith and hope.

Moreover, our Mediator, when revealed to us, wished the sacrament of our regeneration to be manifest. But for the just men of old it was something hidden, although they also were to be saved by the same faith which was to be revealed in its own time. For we do not dare to prefer the faithful of our own time to the friends of God by whom those prophecies were to be made, since God so announced himself as the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, the God of Jacob, as to give himself that name forever. If the belief is correct that circumcision served instead of baptism in the saints of old, what shall be said of those who pleased God before this was commanded, except that they pleased him by faith, because, as it is written in Hebrews: Without faith it is impossible to please God?^[1] But having the same spirit of faith, says the apostle, as it is written: I believed, for which cause I have spoken, we also believe, for which reason we also speak. He would not have said the same unless this very spirit of faith was also theirs. For, just as they, when this same mystery was hidden, believed in the incarnation of Christ which was to come, so we also believe that it has come.

Those just men also were saved by their salutary faith in him as man and God. They, before he came in the flesh, believed that he was to come in the flesh. Our faith is the same as theirs, since they believed that this would be, while we believe that it has come to pass. Hence, the apostle Paul says: But having the same spirit of faith, as it is written: I believed for which reason I have spoken: we also believe for which reason we also speak. If, then, those who foretold that Christ would come in the flesh had the same faith as those who have recorded his coming, these religious mysteries could vary according to the diversity of times yet all refer most harmoniously to the unity of the same faith.

Paul the apostle says that he has the same spirit of faith which the blessed David had, which the holy Moses received, just as he himself testifies, saying, Since then we have the same spirit of faith, according to what is written: ‘I believed, therefore, I spoke.’ We too believe and therefore speak. How did they have the one spirit of faith, if they believed differently concerning the faithful God? For the difference in belief is great if what Paul says, There is no injustice with God,^[1] differs from what Moses and David say, There is no iniquity in God.^[2] And if, as Paul says, he has the same spirit of faith which the prophets also had and yet his belief is different from their faith, let the apostle be declared a liar (God forbid), he who testifies that Christ speaks in him. You are looking for proof of Christ speaking in me? But since Christ has truly spoken in Paul, Paul is not a liar. And when he says that he has the same spirit of faith, he does not lie; the belief of each is in agreement so that what Moses and David have said. . . . This is also what Paul says.

Accordingly the apostle Paul says: Since we have the same spirit, as shown in that which is written: ‘I believed, and so I spoke,’ we also believe and so we speak. Therefore, it is one and the same Spirit who is in the prophets and in the apostles. He was, however, in the former only for a while; whereas he abides in the latter forever. In other words, he is in the prophets but not to remain always in them; in the apostles, that he might abide in them forever. He has been apportioned to the former in moderation; to the latter, he has been wholly poured out. He was sparingly given to the one; upon the other, lavishly bestowed.

He who raised Jesus from the dead will raise us also if we do his will and walk in his commandments and love the things which he loved, abstaining from all unrighteousness, covetousness, love of money, evil speaking and false witness.

Once again, Paul fills the Corinthians with lofty thoughts, so that they may not feel indebted to the false apostles.

Paul believed that through the work of Christ he and all believers were made greater than death and that they would all be brought before the terrible seat of judgment.

God does not want anyone to be excluded from his gift. But because not everyone had received the word of faith, God’s apostle, who knew God’s will, was not afraid to suffer persecutions and perils as long as he could preach to everyone faithfully, so that more people might believe.

God did not raise Christ from the dead for the sake of one person only but for the benefit of us all.

In times of persecution the soul advances. Every day it adds something more to its experience of faith. Even the damage done to the body becomes conducive to immortality through the merit of the soul.

The body decays by being scourged and persecuted, but the inward man is renewed by faith, hope and a forward-looking will which braves those extremities. For the hope of the soul is in direct proportion to the suffering of the body.

The renewal of humankind, begun in the sacred bath of baptism, proceeds gradually and is accomplished more quickly in some individuals and more slowly in others. But many are in progress toward the new life if we consider the matter carefully and without prejudice. As the apostle says: Even though our outer man is decaying, yet our inner man is being renewed day by day. He says that the inner man is renewed day by day in order that he may become perfect, but you would have him begin with perfection. Would that you really did desire this! But you seek to lead the unwary astray rather than to uplift the weak.

A man who has his own best interest at heart will therefore be especially concerned for his soul and will spare no pains to keep it stainless and true to itself. If his body is wasted by hunger or by its struggles with heat and cold, if it is afflicted by illness or suffers violence from anyone, he will pay little attention to it, and, echoing the words of Paul, he will say in each of his adversities: but though our outward man is corrupted, yet the inward man is renewed day by day. . . . But, if a man would also have mercy upon his body as being a possession necessary to the soul and its cooperator in carrying on the life on earth, he will occupy himself with its needs only so far as is required to preserve it and keep it vigorous by moderate care in the service of the soul.

It was not a light, momentary affliction to everyone, but it was to Paul and to people like him, because they had the perfect loving affection of God in Christ Jesus through the Holy Spirit poured into their hearts.

Paul is saying that our present afflictions are light because they are happening within time and space. In return for this light tribulation, we shall gain a degree of glory beyond measure.

The human patience which is good, praiseworthy and deserving the name of virtue is said to be that by which we endure evils with equanimity so as not to abandon, through a lack of equanimity, the good through which we arrive at the better. By their unwillingness to suffer evil, the impatient do not effect their deliverance from it; instead, they bring upon themselves the suffering of more grievous ills. But the patient, who prefer to bear wrongs without committing them rather than to commit them by not enduring them, both lessen what they suffer in patience and escape worse things by which, through impatience, they would be submerged. In yielding to evils that are brief and passing, they do not destroy the good which is great and eternal, for the sufferings of the present time are not worthy to be compared, the apostle says, with the glory to come that will be revealed in us.^[1] And he also says: Our present light affliction, which is for the moment, prepares for us an eternal weight of glory that is beyond all measure.

Such, after all, is the way with good people: when they endure something for his sake, far from attending to the appearance of what occurs, they understand the reason behind it and thus bear everything with equanimity. Likewise Paul, the teacher of the Gentiles, identified imprisonment, arraignment, daily peril, all those many unbearable hardships as light burdens, not because they really were so by nature but because the reason behind their happening produced such an attitude in him that he would not turn back in the face of these oncoming threats. Listen, after all, to what he says: For the light weight of our passing distress produces in us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison; expectation of the glory we are destined to attain, he is saying, and of that unceasing enjoyment makes us bear without difficulty these hardships one after another and consider them of no consequence. Do you see how love of God reduces the intensity of troubles and prevents our having any sense of them as they befall us? On this account, of course, this blessed man, too, bore everything with equanimity, sustained by faith and hope in God.

Paul is saying that people who long for heavenly things despise the things of this world, because in comparison with what they want, these things are nothing.

Our present afflictions will be light and our future will be glorious if we turn away from visible things and concentrate on spiritual ones instead. What excuse have we got if we choose the temporal instead of the eternal? Even if the present is enjoyable, it does not last, though the sorrow it engenders does last and cannot be alleviated. What excuse will they have if those who have been accounted worthy of receiving the Spirit and have enjoyed so great a gift grovel and fall down before the things of this earth?

If you seek temporal things, you pray publicly and with your door open. If you ask for eternal things, your prayer is secret because you long to receive not the things which are seen but those which are not seen.

Consider, dearly beloved, that life’s troubles, even if distressing, are still of short duration, whereas the good things that will come to us in the next life are eternal and everlasting. What we see is passing, Scripture says, but what is not seen is everlasting. Accordingly, let us endure what is passing without complaint and not desist from virtue’s struggle so that we may enjoy the good things that are eternal and last forever.

Far from being surprised or troubled, let us endure developments with complete fortitude and endurance, having regard not to the distress but to the gain accruing to us from it. This transaction, you see, is spiritual. People intent on making money and being involved in a transaction of this life would succeed in increasing their wealth in no other way than by being exposed to great danger on land and at sea (they must, after all, put up with the onset of brigands and wiles of pirates), and yet they are ready to accept everything with great enthusiasm, having no sense of hardship through the expectation of gain. In just the same way must we keep our mind on the wealth and spiritual riches accruing to us from this. We must rejoice and be glad, considering not what can be seen but what cannot be seen, as Paul’s exhortation goes, not considering what can be seen.