What Romans 12:1-21 Means

Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata (Miscellanies) Direct teaching

Be not conformed, says the apostle, to this world: but be transformed in the renewal of the mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God. Romans 12:2

Cyprian, Epistles Direct teaching

...ies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God." Romans 12:1-2

Cyprian, Treatises Direct teaching

... of God, that you present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God; and do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed in the renewing of your spirit, that you may prove what is the will of God, good, and acceptable, and perfect." Romans 12:1-2 And again, "We are children of God; but if children, then heirs; heirs indeed of God, but joint-heirs with Christ, if we suffer together, that we may also be glorified together." Romans 8:16-17 And in the Apocalypse the same exhortation of divine preaching speaks, saying, "Hold fast what you have, lest another take your crown." Revelation 3:11 This example of perseverance and persistence is also shown in Exodus, when Moses, for the overthrow of Amalek, who bore the figure of the devil, raised up his open hands in the sign and sacrament of the cross. He could not conquer his adversary except when he steadfastly persevered in the sign with his hands continually lifted up. And it came to pass, it says, when Moses raised up his hands, Israel prevailed; but when he let down his hands, Amalek grew mighty. And they took a stone and placed it under him, and he sat on it. And Aaron and Hur held up his hands, on the one sid

Cyprian, Epistles Supporting witness

And be not conformed to this world; but be you transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God. Romans 12:1-2

Cyprian, Treatises Supporting witness

and be not conformed to this world, but be transformed in the renewing of your spirit, that you may prove what is the will of God, good, and acceptable, and perfect.

Cyprian, Epistles Supporting witness

You offer this sacrifice to God; you celebrate this sacrifice without intermission day and night, being made victims to God, and exhibiting yourselves as holy and unspotted offerings, as the apostle exhorts and says, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God.

Irenaeus, Fragments from the Lost Writings of Irenæus Supporting witness

For, “from the rising of the sun even to the setting my name has been glorified among the Gentiles, and in every place incense is offered to my name, and a pure sacrifice;” as John also declares in the Apocalypse: “The incense is the prayers of the saints.” Then again, Paul exhorts us “to present our bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service.” And again, “Let us offer the sacrifice of praise, that is, the fruit of the lips.” Now those oblations are not according to the law, the handwriting of which the Lord took away from the midst by cancelling it;

Irenaeus, Fragments from the Lost Writings of Irenæus Supporting witness

... “The incense is the prayers of the saints.” Furthermore, Paul urges us “to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.” And again, “Let us offer the sacrifice of praise, which is the fruit of our lips.” These offerings are not according to the law, which the Lord removed by canceling it, but are according to the Spirit, for we must worship God “in spirit and in truth.” Therefore, the offering of the Eucharist is not physical but spiritual, and in this respect, it is pure. For we offer to God the bread and the cup of blessing, thanking Him for commanding the earth to produce these fruits for our nourishment. Then, after perfecting the offering, we invoke the Holy Spirit, so that He may make this sacrifice—both the bread as the body of Christ and the cup as the blood of Christ—so that those who receive these symbols may obtain forgiveness of sins and eternal life. Those who perform these offerings in remembrance of the Lord do not align with Jewish practices, but by performing the service in a spiritual manner, they are called sons of wisdom.

Athenagoras, Connection to Romans 12:1 Supporting witness

it does behoove us to offer a bloodless sacrifice and the service of our reason.

Early Liturgies, Divine Liturgy of St. Mark Background

We offer this reasonable and bloodless sacrifice, which all nations, from the rising to the setting of the sun, from the north and the south, present to You, O Lord;

Origen, Against Celsus Background

so that when these are destroyed, all who are delivered from deception may go on with the prophet to say, I will freely sacrifice unto You, and may offer to the Most High a reasonable and smokeless sacrifice.

Apostolic Constitutions, Apostolic Constitutions Background

Instead of a bloody sacrifice, He has appointed that reasonable and unbloody mystical one of His body and blood, which is performed to represent the death of the Lord by symbols.

Romans 12:9 Direct teaching

Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good.

Romans 12:10 Direct teaching

Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, in honor giving preference to one another;

Romans 12:16 Direct teaching

Be of the same mind one toward another. Mind not high things, but condescend to men of low estate. Be not wise in your own conceits.

Ignatius, Epistle to the Magnesians (Short Version) Supporting witness

Do ye all then, imitating the same divine conduct, pay respect to one another, and let no one look upon his neighbour after the flesh, but do ye continually love each other in Jesus Christ.

Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata (Miscellanies) Supporting witness

Let your love be without dissimulation, it is said;

Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor (Paedagogus) Supporting witness

Let love be without dissimulation. Abhor that which is evil;

Clement of Alexandria, The Stromata (Miscellanies) Supporting witness

and abhorring what is evil, let us become attached to what is good, to brotherly love, and so on, down to If it be possible, as much as lies in you, living peaceably with all men.

Clement of Rome, First Epistle to the Corinthians Supporting witness

Let those who have love in Christ keep the commandments of Christ. Who can describe the blessed bond of the love of God? What person is able to tell the excellence of its beauty as it ought to be told? The height to which love exalts is unspeakable. Love unites us to God. Love covers a multitude of sins. Love bears all things, is long-suffering in all things. There is nothing base, nothing arrogant in love. Love allows no schisms; love gives rise to no seditions; love does all things in harmony. By love, all the elect of God have been made perfect; without love, nothing is well-pleasing to God. In love, the Lord has taken us to Himself. Out of the Love He bore us, Jesus Christ our Lord gave His blood for us by the will of God; His flesh for our flesh, and His soul for our souls.

Clement of Rome, Connection to 1 Peter 4:8 Supporting witness

Love unites us to God. Love covers a multitude of sins. Love bears all things, is long-suffering in all things.

Polycarp, Connection to Romans 12:10 Supporting witness

Stand fast, therefore, in these things, and follow the example of the Lord, being firm and unchangeable in the faith, loving the brotherhood, and being attached to one another, joined together in the truth, exhibiting the meekness of the Lord in your intercourse with one another, and despising no one. When you can do good, defer it not, because "alms delivers from death." Be all of you subject one to another, "having your conduct blameless among the Gentiles,"

Hermas, Connection to Romans 12:9 Supporting witness

Put on a holiness in which there is no wicked cause of offense, but all deeds that are equable and joyful. Practise goodness.

Hermas, Connection to Romans 12:10 Supporting witness

reverencing the aged, practising righteousness, watching the brotherhood, bearing insolence, being long-suffering.

Romans 12:14 Direct teaching

Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse them.

Romans 12:21 Direct teaching

Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.

Cyprian, Connection to Romans 12:21 Direct teaching

Also in the same place: "Not to be overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good."

Lactantius, The Divine Institutes Direct teaching

Romans 12:19; Hebrews 10:30 He must at all times and in all places guard innocence.

Lactantius, The Divine Institutes Supporting witness

...en, should faith be kept toward God, the Ruler of all, who is able to reward virtue not only to the living but also to the dead! Therefore the worship of God, since it belongs to heavenly warfare, requires the greatest devotion and faithfulness. For how will God love the worshiper if He Himself is not loved by him? Or how will He grant the petitioner whatever he asks, when he comes to offer prayer without sincerity or reverence? But when these men come to offer sacrifice, they present to their gods nothing from within, nothing of their own: no uprightness of mind, no reverence, no fear. So when their worthless sacrifices are finished, they leave their religion entirely in the temple, together with the temple, just as they found it. They neither bring anything of it with them nor take anything back. That is why religious observances of this kind can neither make men good nor remain firm and unchanging. And so men are easily led away from them, because nothing is learned in them about life, nothing about wisdom, nothing about faith. For what is the religion of those gods? What is its power? What is its discipline? What is its origin? What is its first principle? What is its founda

Tertullian, Apology Supporting witness

...an obstinate refusal to offer sacrifices, he found in their religious services nothing but meetings early in the morning for singing hymns to Christ and God, and sealing their way of life by a united pledge to remain faithful to their religion, forbidding murder, adultery, dishonesty, and other crimes. In reply, Trajan wrote back that Christians were by no means to be sought out. But if they were brought before him, they should be punished. O miserable deliverance. Under the necessities of the case, it is a self-contradiction. It forbids them to be sought out, as innocent, and it commands them to be punished, as guilty. It is at once merciful and cruel. It passes by, and it punishes. Why do you play this game of evasion with yourself, O Judgment? If you condemn, why do you not also inquire? If you do not inquire, why do you not also absolve? Military stations are set throughout all the provinces for tracking robbers. Against traitors and public enemies every man is a soldier. Search is made even for their confederates and accessories. The Christian alone must not be sought, though he may be brought and accused before the judge, as if a search had any other end than that! And so

Justin Martyr, The First Apology Supporting witness

...ayer to the gods of my country. But, as they did not respond, I called upon those among us known as Christians. Upon investigation, I found a great number and multitude of them and initially acted against them, which was quite inappropriate, as I later understood their power. They began the battle, not with weapons, armor, or bugles, as such preparations are detestable to them because of the God they carry in their conscience. Therefore, it appears that those we think are atheists have God as their guiding force entrenched in their conscience. Throwing themselves on the ground, they prayed not only for me but for the entire army, that we might be saved from the current thirst and hunger. We had been without water for five days because there was none, being deep in Germany, in enemy territory. Simultaneously as they threw themselves on the ground and prayed to God (a God unknown to me), water poured from the sky, refreshingly cool upon us but as withering hail upon Rome's enemies. Immediately we acknowledged the presence of God following their prayer—a God unconquerable and indestructible. Based on this, let us pardon such individuals who are Christians, lest they pray for and ac

Lactantius, The Divine Institutes Supporting witness

...osite practice. So they worship their enemies. They try to satisfy their robbers and murderers with sacrifices. And they place their own souls to be burned with the same incense on hateful altars. These miserable men are also angry because others do not perish in the same way. This shows an unbelievable blindness of mind. For what can those see who do not see the sun? As if, if they were gods, they would need the help of men against those who despise them. Why, then, are they angry with us, if they have no power to do anything? Unless it is that they are destroying their gods, whose power they do not trust, they are more irreligious than those who do not worship them at all. Cicero, in his Laws, while commanding men to come to sacrifices with holiness, says, "Let them put on piety; let them lay aside riches. If anyone acts otherwise, God Himself will be the avenger." This is well said. For it is not right to lose hope about God, whom you worship for this reason, because you think Him powerful. For how can He avenge the wrongs done to His worshipers, if He is unable to avenge His own? Therefore I wish to ask them whom they especially think they are serving when they force people

Cyprian, Treatises Supporting witness

... us peace. He commanded us to live in harmony and to be of one mind. He commanded that the bonds of love and charity be kept pure and unbroken. He cannot show himself to be a martyr if he has not kept brotherly love. The apostle Paul teaches this and bears witness, saying, "And though I have faith, so that I can remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing. And though I give all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profits me nothing. Charity is magnanimous; charity is kind; charity does not envy; charity does not act vainly, is not puffed up, is not easily provoked, thinks no evil; loves all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Charity never fails." Charity, he says, never fails. For it will always be in the kingdom. It will endure forever in the unity of a brotherhood joined to it. Discord cannot attain the kingdom of heaven. He cannot attain the rewards of Christ, who said, "This is my commandment, that you love one another even as I have loved you," John 15:12, if he has violated the love of Christ by faithless dissension. He who does not have charity does not have God. The word of t

Tertullian, Scorpiace Supporting witness

...hteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven." The next saying indeed applies first to all without restriction, then especially to the apostles themselves: "Blessed will you be when men revile you, and persecute you, and say every kind of evil against you, for my sake. Rejoice and be exceedingly glad, since very great is your reward in heaven. For so their fathers used to do even to the prophets." So He also foretold that they themselves too would be killed, after the example of the prophets. Yet even if He had appointed all this persecution, in case He were obeyed, only for those who were apostles at that time, surely through them, together with the whole sacrament, with the shoot of the name, with the layer of the Holy Spirit, the rule about enduring persecution would also have regard to us, as disciples by inheritance, and, so to speak, as bushes from the apostolic seed. For in this way again He speaks words of guidance to the apostles: "Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves." And, "Beware of men, for they will hand you over to councils, and they will scourge you in their synagogues; and you will be brought before governors and kings for my sake, for

Cyprian, Treatises Supporting witness

16. What, then, is this sluggishness of mind? Yes, what blind and stupid madness of fools is this: to be unwilling to come out of darkness into light, and to be unwilling, while bound in the snares of eternal death, to receive the hope of immortality? And why not fear God when He threatens and says, "He that sacrifices to any gods, but to the Lord only, shall be rooted out"? Exodus 22:20 And again: "They worshiped what their fingers made; and the lowly man has bowed down, and the great man has humbled himself, and I will not forgive them." Isaiah 2:8 Why do you humble and bend yourself before false gods? Why do you bow your body, taken captive, before foolish images and things made from earth? God made you upright. While other animals look downward, and their posture bends toward the earth, yours is an exalted posture. Your face is lifted upward to heaven and to God. Look there. Lift your eyes that way. Seek God in the highest, so that you may be free from the things below. Lift your heart to depend on high and heavenly things. Why do you throw yourself down into the ruin of death with the serpent whom you worship? Why do you fall into the devil's destruction, by his means and in h

Romans 12:18 Direct teaching

If it is possible, as much as depends on you, live peaceably with all men.

Romans 12:11 Background

not lagging in diligence, fervent in spirit, serving the Lord;

Hermas, Connection to Romans 12:11 Supporting witness

for they who are occupied with much business commit also many sins, being distracted about their affairs, and not at all serving their Lord.

Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor (Paedagogus) Background

...sdom never fail. In wonder at them, the apostle says, "Oh, the depth of the riches and the wisdom!" Romans 11:33. And through one God many treasures are given out. Some are revealed by the law, others by the prophets, some to the divine mouth, and others to the heptad of the Spirit singing in harmony. And since the Lord is one, He is the same Instructor through all these things. Here, then, is a complete command, and an instruction for life that includes everything: "As you would want people to do to you, do the same to them." Luke 6:31. We can sum up the commandments in two, as the Lord says: "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength; and your neighbor as yourself." Then from these He concludes, "On these hang the law and the prophets." Further, to the one who asked, "What good thing shall I do, that I may inherit eternal life?" He answered, "You know the commandments?" And when the man replied, "Yes," He said, "Do this, and you shall be saved." The love of the Instructor is especially clear in the different commands that bring salvation, so that discovery may be easier through the richness and arrangement of the Scrip

Theophilus of Antioch, To Autolycus Background

1 Timothy 2:2 And it teaches us to render all things to all, Romans 13:7-8 honour to whom honour, fear to whom fear, tribute to whom tribute;

Minucius Felix, Octavius Background

...heless, you will say that this very superstition gave, increased, and established the empire of the Romans, since they prevailed not so much by their valor as by their religion and piety. No doubt the famous and noble justice of the Romans had its beginning from the very cradle of their growing empire. Did they not, in their beginning, when they were gathered together and fortified by crime, grow by the terror of their own fierceness? For the first people were assembled as to an asylum. Abandoned people, profligate people, incestuous people, murderers, and traitors had flocked together. And so that Romulus himself, their commander and ruler, might excel his people in guilt, he committed fratricide. These are the first auspices of the religious state! Soon afterward they carried off, violated, and ruined foreign virgins, already betrothed, already destined for husbands, and even some young women from their marriage vows, a thing unexampled. Then they made war with their parents, that is, with their fathers-in-law, and shed the blood of their own relatives. What could be more irreligious? What could be more audacious? What could be safer than the very confidence of crime? To drive

Minucius Felix, Octavius Background

The argument: Next he shows that Caecilius was wrong when he said that the Romans gained power over the whole world by properly observing superstitions of this kind. Instead, in their beginning, the Romans were gathered together through crime, and they grew through the terror of their violence. Therefore, the Romans were not so great because they were religious, but because they committed sacrilege without punishment.

Tertullian, Apology Supporting witness

...whole, as people who truly care about their salvation. So then, we are not alike in knowledge or in conduct, as you suppose. For what certain knowledge did Thales, the first of the natural philosophers, give when Croesus asked him about God, when his repeated delays for further thought proved useless? There is not a Christian workman who does not find God, show Him, and therefore assign to Him all those qualities that belong to a divine being, though Plato says that it is far from easy to discover the Maker of the universe, and that when He is found, it is difficult to make Him known to all. But if we challenge you to compare us in the virtue of chastity, I point to one part of the sentence passed by the Athenians against Socrates, who was declared a corrupter of youth. The Christian confines himself to the female sex. I have also read how the harlot Phryne stirred up lust in Diogenes, and how a certain Speusippus, from Plato's school, died in the act of adultery. The Christian husband has to do with no one but his own wife. Democritus, by putting out his own eyes because he could not look at women without lusting after them, and was troubled if his desire was not satisfied, pla