Section 5

Such is Christianity: even within slavery it grants freedom. A body that is by nature invulnerable proves itself invulnerable when it receives an arrow and suffers no harm; in the same way, a person who is truly free shows that freedom when, even while he has masters, he is not enslaved. This is why Paul tells the slave to remain a slave.

If it were impossible for a slave to be the kind of Christian he ought to be, pagans would accuse the faith of great weakness. But if they learn that slavery does no harm to godliness, they will admire the Gospel. If death does not harm us, nor beatings nor chains, much less can slavery. Fire and iron, countless tyrannies, diseases, poverty, wild beasts, and countless things even more terrible than these have not harmed the faithful; they have made them stronger. How, then, could slavery harm them?

It is not this outward slavery that harms, beloved, but the slavery that is slavery by nature: slavery to sin. If you are not a slave in this sense, take courage and rejoice. No one will be able to wrong you at all if your character cannot be enslaved. But if you are a slave to sin, then even if you are free ten thousand times over, your freedom will do you no good.

Tell me, what profit is there in not being enslaved to another person if you throw yourself down beneath your passions? Human masters often know how to show mercy, but those masters—the passions—are never satisfied until they destroy you. Are you enslaved to a person? Your master also serves you: he arranges your food, takes thought for your health, your clothing and shoes, and all the other necessities. You do not fear offending your master as much as he fears that something necessary may fail you. “But he reclines while you stand.” What of that? The reverse also happens. Often, while you lie down and sleep comfortably, he is not merely standing but enduring endless pressures in the marketplace and keeping a more painful vigil than you.

What did Joseph suffer from his mistress that can compare with what she suffered from her own desire? He did not do what she ordered him to do. But she did everything commanded by her own mistress—I mean lust—and it did not release her until it had covered her with shame.

What human master gives commands like these? What savage tyrant says: “Beg your slave. Plead with your captive. Flatter the man bought with your money. If he rejects you with contempt, persist again. If you have spoken many times and he still will not consent, watch for a time when he is alone, force him, and make yourself ridiculous. And if even then you accomplish nothing, falsely accuse him and deceive your husband”? What could be more dishonorable? What could be more shameful than these words? See how degrading they are, how harsh, savage, and insane. What master ever commanded a slave to do the things that lust commanded that royal woman to do? Yet she did not dare disobey it. Joseph, by contrast, endured none of this slavery. He did the opposite and received glory and honor.

Would you like to see another man given many commands by a cruel mistress who did not dare disobey any of them? Consider Cain and all that envy commanded him to do. It ordered him to slaughter his brother, lie to God, grieve his father, and cast away shame. He did everything and disobeyed nothing.

And why be surprised that this mistress has such power over one person? She has often destroyed whole peoples. The women of Midian, for example, all but took the Jews captive and bound them, conquering the whole people by stirring desire through their beauty. It is this kind of slavery that Paul is casting out when he says, “Do not become slaves of people”—that is, do not obey people when they command what is wrong, and do not even obey yourselves.

Then, having lifted their mind and raised it higher, Paul says, “Now concerning virgins, I have no commandment from the Lord, but I give my judgment as one who has received mercy from the Lord to be faithful.” Proceeding along his way in order, he now turns to virginity. After exercising and training them by his teaching about self-control, he advances to something greater. “I have no commandment,” he says, “but I judge this to be good.” Why? For the same reason he gave when speaking about self-control.

“Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek release. Are you released from a wife? Do not seek a wife.” These words do not contradict what came before; they agree with it completely. Earlier he said, “except perhaps by mutual consent,” and here again, “Are you bound to a wife? Do not seek release.” There is no contradiction. Abstinence against the other spouse’s will produces a rupture; but if both agree to live in continence, there is no rupture.

Then, so that this would not seem to be a law imposed on everyone, he adds, “But if you marry, you have not sinned.” He next points to present circumstances: “the present distress,” “the time has grown short,” and “affliction.” Marriage brings many concerns with it. He hinted at this both here and in his discussion of marital abstinence: there by saying, “The wife does not have authority over herself,” and here by saying, “You are bound.”

“But if you marry, you have not sinned.” He is not speaking about a woman who has already chosen virginity, for in that case, as he understands it, she would be sinning by abandoning that commitment. If widows come under judgment for entering a second marriage after once choosing the state of widowhood, how much more, he says, those who have chosen virginity.

“But such people will have affliction in the flesh.” “They will also have pleasure,” you may say. Yet see how Paul limits even that consideration by the shortness of the time: “The time has grown short.” That is, we are being told to depart and go out, while you are running farther in. Even if marriage had no burdens at all, we would still need to press toward the things to come. But when it also brings affliction, why draw another burden upon yourself? Why take up so great a load when, even after taking it up, you must use it as though you did not possess it? For, he says, “Those who have wives should be as though they had none.”

After inserting something about the future, he brings his argument back to the present. Some of his reasons are spiritual: one person is concerned with the things of her husband, while another is concerned with the things of God. Others concern this present life: “I want you to be free from anxieties.” Yet even after all this, he leaves the choice in their hands. Someone who proves what is preferable and then resorts to compulsion seems not to trust his own argument. Paul therefore draws them more effectively by giving freedom, and then restrains them with these words:

“I say this for your own benefit, not to cast a snare upon you, but for what is honorable and conducive to steadfast devotion.” Let those who are virgins hear that virginity is not defined by this alone. A woman who is concerned with the things of the world would not even be a virgin, nor would she be honorable. When Paul says, “There is a difference between the married woman and the virgin,” this is the difference he identifies between them. In defining the virgin and the one who is not a virgin, he does not point simply to marriage or sexual abstinence, but to freedom from worldly entanglement as opposed to being pulled in many directions. Bodily union is not the evil; the problem is being hindered in the pursuit of philosophy.

“If anyone thinks that he is behaving improperly toward his virgin...” Here Paul seems to be speaking about marriage, but his whole discussion still concerns virginity. He even permits a second marriage, saying only that it must be “in the Lord.” What does “in the Lord” mean? With chastity and with honorable conduct. This is needed everywhere and must be pursued, for otherwise it is impossible to see God.

If we have passed quickly over what Paul says about virginity, let no one accuse us of laziness. We have written an entire book on this passage, and there we treated all these matters with as much care as we were able. We therefore thought it needless to repeat everything here. Referring the hearer to that work for these questions, we will say only this here: we must pursue self-control. For Scripture says, “Pursue peace and holiness, without which no one will see the Lord.”

Therefore, so that we may be counted worthy to see Him—whether we live in virginity, in a first marriage, or in a second—let us pursue this holiness, so that we may attain the kingdom of heaven, by the grace and loving-kindness of our Lord Jesus Christ, with whom to the Father, together with the Holy Spirit, be glory, power, and honor, now and always and unto ages of ages. Amen.