Commenting on Rom 4:5, Augustine wrote:
(Romans 4:5) “He who
justifies the wicked” refers to “transforming the ungodly” into a religious
man, so that from then on he may remain in that attitude of piety and justice.
Because he was justified to continue being righteous, not to come to believe that
he is allowed to sin. (Augustine, “Expressions in Romans,” in Early Commentaries
on Romans: Augustine of Hippo and Theodoret of Cyrus [trans. John Litteral;
Litteral Truth Publishing, 2019], 8)
The transformative language is original to the Latin
original:
Quod autem ait, Qui justificat
impium, hoc est ex impio pium facit, ut de cætero in ipsa pietate permaneat
atque justitia ; quia ideo justi- ficatus est ut justus sit, non ut peccare
sibi licere arbitretur. (PL 35:2066-67)
