Sin Condemned in Christ’s Flesh

…to our bodies, yet not prone to the sickness of fleshly impurity; for that divine temple was holy from the womb.

As far as the concepts and principles that belong to nature are concerned, no one would hesitate to say that, since it was flesh, it would have had in itself its own innate movement.

But since the Word who sanctifies the whole creation made his dwelling in it, the power of sin has been condemned, so that what was achieved might pass over to us as well.

For we have shared in him both spiritually and bodily: when Christ comes to dwell in us too, through the Holy Spirit and through the mystical blessing, then surely the law of sin is condemned in us as well.

It is true, then, that the law’s inability, in that it was weak through the flesh, has ceased through Christ, who condemned and abolished sin in the flesh, so that the just requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us (Romans 8:3-4).

For the just requirement of the law has been fulfilled, that is, the force of what the law decreed, namely the will that looks toward virtue, since the law within us is, as I said, in no way weak any longer through being tyrannized by innate pleasures.

So the just requirement of the law has been fulfilled in us who do not walk according to the flesh (Romans 8:4) but wish rather to live spiritually.

For the mind of the flesh is death, but the mind of the Spirit is life and peace (Romans 8:6).

He says, and quite rightly, that the mind of the flesh is death, while that of the spirit is life and peace. For love of the flesh truly brings about death, whereas the choice to live one’s life spiritually brings about life everlasting and the good things from above.

For if the mind of the flesh is enmity toward God (Romans 8:7), since it does not bear to yield to the divine laws—indeed it cannot, for how could a foul and profane pleasure please God?—then surely the mind that is clean of filth and passions is at peace with God, so far as human nature allows.

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. But you are not in the flesh but in the spirit, if indeed the Spirit of God dwells in you (Romans 8:8-9).

When earthly pleasure prevails over a person’s understanding, he is in the flesh, as one who sets his mind on the things of the flesh; and such a one could not please God.

But when the mind has grown rich in the grace that comes through Christ, is filled with strength from above, is fervent in spirit (Romans 12:11), and hastens toward virtue, such a person is understood to be not in the flesh but in the spirit, and readily does what is pleasing to God.

Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him (Romans 8:9).

If, then, anyone is in the spirit, he will also be in righteousness and in life, since the body of sin is all but dead and every unseemly pleasure has been quenched. For righteousness and unrighteousness, holiness and impurity, cannot exist in the same person at one and the same time.

By “spirit” we mean the human spirit; and in the words “the spirit is life” (Romans 8:10), we mean the spirit given life by the grace of the Holy Spirit and enriched, through its communion with him, …