Yet while this took place in the spirit, the soul and body still remain on the side of sin. Through long dwelling in sin, the habit of acting only sinfully was formed in them. They do not know how to act in a holy way. Not only do they not know how, but they also keep their old sympathy for what is sinful.
Therefore, when the spirit, having received new decisions, begins to introduce new orders of life corresponding to them, it always meets resistance in the soul and body. This happens both because they are unused to acting in this way and because they have no sympathy for it.
They do not know the taste of this new life and are not drawn to it. On the contrary, they are drawn to the opposite, to what had always delighted them before. The spirit demands good thoughts. But the head, that is, the mind with memory and imagination, is stuffed full of sinful representations.
Therefore it not only fails to think what is good, but presses what is not good into its consciousness. The spirit demands good undertakings, with self-denial. But the will, that is, desires, plans, aims, and means, is inclined toward self-pleasing and cuts down every good thing through self-pity.
The spirit demands good feelings. But the heart does not respond to the good. Since it cannot find any taste in it, it remains cold toward everything it had not tasted before. The spirit demands vigilance, labor, restraint, purity, and solitude. But the body wants to sleep, comfort itself in everything, eat abundantly, lust, and go everywhere for the delight of its senses.
And here there is the host of passions, settled among the functions of the body and the powers of the soul, coming forward with its own resistances and demands. All this does not remain in us only passively, resisting the good. It is also active, drawing and impelling us toward sin.
Thus the spirit must transform the soul and body by struggling against their resistance to it and by overcoming their inclinations and desires that oppose it. If we call these resistances and desires the sin living in us, then the spirit has a struggle with this sin.
The spirit itself has died to sin, but the soul and body still live to it. They too must be made dead to it. How? By resisting them in what they want and compelling them toward what they do not want.
They want what is sinful. Do not listen to them. Not only do not listen, but compel them to do what is contrary to their desire. This is what the Apostle now says. He speaks of compelling toward the good in the following verse, but of resisting what is sinful in the present one.
"Let not sin reign." Previously it reigned, and whatever it wanted, man followed as one led away. Now another king has sat upon the throne within us and has put an end to the kingdom of sin. By old habit, sin can present its demands, and it does present them. Yet each time it receives refusal from the spirit that has come to hate it.
Why then is there a command, when all this takes shape by itself? It does not take shape by any natural necessity, but by the free decision of the spirit, overshadowed and strengthened by God's grace. A free decision for one thing at the present moment presupposes the possibility of a decision for the opposite at the next.
It can be strong, like a law of nature, by the force of the motives supporting it. Yet it does not rise to natural immutability. The Apostle therefore warns us, as if saying: look, take care. As you have decided, so stand firm.
Sin will again approach with demands, so as to take possession of you. Do not permit it. Do not allow it to reign in you again.
"In your mortal body." He mentioned only the body and was silent about the soul, because the body is the chief seat of sin and passions. Thus, behind the sinful impulses of the body, those of the soul are scarcely seen. "Sin acts chiefly in the body and through the body" (Oecumenius).
Common opinion too has become accustomed to judge in this way. As soon as bodily sinfulness appears in someone, no mention is made of sinfulness in the soul, though usually it governs everything. Perhaps the Apostle did this also because the body, accustomed to sinning, is harder to master.
Whoever overcomes the body in its sinful compulsions will manage the soul also. Because they are inseparable, one cannot refuse the body without refusing the soul. Therefore one may think that by the words "mortal body" the Apostle signified generally all the seats in us where sin, which has begotten death, still hovers.
"To obey it." Sin does not bind by necessity, but only offers itself. We ourselves incline to its proposals and sin. This inclination is voluntary obedience to it. Sin suggests: do this and that. We can listen to it or not listen.
When we listen, we sin. But this does not happen by any necessity, but by our own choice. Thus the whole matter lies in not listening to sin. Let it cry out with its demands. Let it draw you. Do not listen, and by this you will not allow it to reign in you.
"In its desires," that is, the body's. Others read: "to obey its desires." But the thought is one and the same. Temptation to sin appears in the form of desire. There are representations of sinful objects and deeds without any sympathy for them. There are representations of them with sympathy, but without desire for them.
The attraction toward sin begins with the appearance of desire for sinful objects and deeds. This is temptation. The Apostle points directly to desire, because here the danger of sinning properly lies. As a result of sin committed in deed, one again falls under its power or lets it reign within oneself.
Do not listen to sin. Resist its desires and suppress them. Thus you will not allow sin to reign in you.
Saint Chrysostom says on this verse: "The Apostle did not say, 'Let the flesh not live,' or, 'Let it not act,' but, 'Let not sin reign.' Christ came not to abolish nature, but to correct the will. Moreover, the Apostle wishes to show that we are held in the power of vices not by force and compulsion, but by our own choice.
Therefore he did not say, 'Let it not tyrannize,' which would imply compulsion, but, 'Let it not reign.' For it would be absurd for those guided toward the Kingdom of Heaven to have sin as king. It would be absurd for those called to reign with Christ to wish to be captives of sin.
It is just as if someone, having taken the diadem from his head, wished to serve slavishly a mad, beggarly woman dressed in rags. In what way, according to the Apostle's meaning, does sin reign? Not by its own power, but by your negligence.
Therefore, after saying, 'Let it not reign,' he explains the very manner of this reign by adding the following words: 'to obey it in its desires.' It is no honor to yield power and everything else to the body. On the contrary, it is extreme slavery and the height of dishonor."
Explaining this, blessed Theophylact adds: "How does sin reign? If we obey it in bodily desires. Thus it is not the body that causes harm by its nature, but obedience to sin. Note the grace of Christ: Adam sinned, though he had a body that was not mortal. We overcome sin in a mortal body."
THEOSIS