AMBROSIASTER A Fourth Century Commentary on Romans

By John Litteral

The author of this commentary on Romans and the other commentaries on Paul's letters is an anonymous author that scholars have given the name Ambrosiaster, which means "star of Ambrose." The name "Ambrosiaster" was given around the 17th century as a nod to the centuries long misunderstanding that Ambrose of Milan was the author of the commentaries on Paul's letters. He is also the author of another large work called Questions on the Old and New Testaments, which I have already translated and published.
As mentioned above, the authorship of the commentaries were thought to be Ambrose of Milan for centuries. The style of the commentaries is obviously not by Ambrose due to the literalness of the style and differences in interpretations of various parts of Scripture. As for the Questions on the Old and New Testaments, it was thought for a period to have been written by Augustine, but due to similar reasons, it differs in style from Augustine and has contrary interpretations on key Scripture passages and doctrinal differences.
One of the reasons why I chose to translate this commentary on Romans by Ambrosiaster is because I wanted to confirm for myself that the author of the Questions on the Old and New Testaments was the same as the one who wrote the commentaries. It did not take me long to realize that it was from the same author when I started this translation project. The style of writing is identical. And there are places throughout this commentary on Romans that is nearly word for word with sections found in the Questions on the Old and New Testaments. Alexander Souter, in his book called A Study of Ambrosiaster, demonstrated those striking similarities found in both sets of works. He shows how various interpretations match up, and he showed that the Scripture text used for both works were related to a family of Old Latin texts that preceded Jerome's Latin Vulgate.
Ambrosiaster appears to have written both works in Rome around the year 380AD. He also appears to have revised his own works over time because there are recensions of both works that are thought to be his own. I provided English translations of both recensions of the Questions on the Old and New Testaments in that work. This English translation of the commentary on Romans comes from the Latin text from Volume 17 of Jacques-Paul Migne's Patrologia Latina.
I added an appendix in the back of the book that compares comments from the commentary on Romans vs sections of the Questions on the Old and New Testaments on related topics and Scripture passages. Some are nearly word for word, and some are presented just to allow for comparison. Ambrosiaster quoted the Epistle of Romas 42 times in his Questions on the Old and New Testaments.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0HFKS4DMS
• ISBN13: 9798193309475
• Release Date: August 2026
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 269 Pages
• Weight: 0.80 lbs.
• Dimensions: 9.0" x 0.6" x 6.0"