https://youtu.be/vIuLUNm4Ef8
In our verse by verse study of Romans we are in Rom 1:21 and we got to the word translated "speculations" in the NASB and has to do with what we think.
Our expanded translation so far is ""Because, when they knew the God, they did not honor Christ as God, nor did they feel obligated to thank him; in fact, as a result of their negative volition they received worthless thoughts in their evil thinking"
We noted that the negative unbeliever receives the action of the verb. The declarative indicative is for a dogmatic statement of factual truth regarding unbeliever reversionism.
This dogmatic statement is necessary to understand what follows. The phrase "in their speculations" is literally, "in their evil deliberations" or "in their evil rationalizations or their evil thinking."
Next we have a prepositional phrase that refers to the doctrine of evil. It is "en" plus the locative plural of "dialogisms" for rationalizations.
Polibius and Demosthenes used this word for deliberation in thought and for concepts of thinking. But by the second century BC it was used for judicial investigations and decisions. Eventually in the New Testament it came to be used primarily for evil thinking or evil thoughts.
It is used in Mark 7:21; Matt 15:19; Luke 2:35; Luke 5:22; Luke 9:47. One of the great linguists of the 19th century, Gotlieb Shrank of Zurich, Switzerland, said that "dialogismos" is used in the New Testament only for evil or anxious thoughts.
Regardless its usage before the Koine Greek "dialognismo" is used for evil thoughts or for panic thoughts.
With this we have a possessive genitive plural from the intensive pronoun "autos", identifying the category of unbeliever reversionism. He is the one who has a vacuum that sucks evil thinking, anxious thinking, and evil deliberation into the mentality of his soul.
"and their foolish heart" we see here that foolishness doesn't come first; it is a result of evil rationalization or evil thinking. The phrase includes the nominative singular subject of the adjective "asuneto" (a is negative' sunatos is understanding) that means "no understanding."
In addition it means ignorance often deliberate ignorance. With this is the possessive genitive plural from the intensive pronoun "autos", and the noun that goes with the adjective, "kardia," correctly translated "heart" it must be understood that the heart is the right lobe of the frontal lobes. This is translated, "and their foolish right lobe" in the NASB and a good translation is "and their ignorant right lobe."
"was darkened" from the aorist passive indicative of the verb "skotizo". It means to receive darkness. Darkness came into their thinking because they rejected truth.
This is a gnomic aorist tense for the fact that doctrine is so fixed and so axiomatic in its character, that it is written in the aorist as though it were a present reality.
The passive voice describes having their soul blacked out because they rejected the truth of God's justice for salvation, so they remain maladjusted to God's justice as a reversionistic unbeliever.
The indicative mood is declarative for a dogmatic statement of doctrinal reality regarding heathenism from reversionism. When an unbeliever has "epignosis" gospel in his soul and says no, then soul is filled with evil resulting in blackout of the soul.
Rom 1:21; Expanded Translation: "Because, when they knew the God, they did not honor Christ as God, nor did they feel obligated to thank him; in fact, as a result of their negative volition they received worthless thoughts in their evil thinking, and their ignorant right lobe received darkness."
This brings us to a couple of side trips into the Doctrine of Heathenism/liberalism and the Doctrine of Evil.
Negative volition suppresses the truth and as a result seeks an alternative and the only alternatives are satan's evil policies of heathenism and liberalism.
This substitute may be socialism, communism, or some other system of philosophical materialism, but always follows the same pattern of man seeking to establish a perfect environment by man's works.
Heathenism and liberalism begin without truth. If your premise is a lie then no matter what the conclusion it will also be a lie.
Liberalism exploits the ignorance of people by appealing to the basic lust and emotional patterns for safety, security and prosperity but its evil polices attack and destroy the divine institutions and human ingenuity that creates dependency on government and enslaves the people.
Liberals satisfy their ego by trying to play God. They say everyone is equal and every one should have equity but they have neither the ability nor the character to achieve their objectives. Their evil policies actually destroy equality and prevent equity while empowering the ruling class.
Liberals seek a perfect world apart from God. They like their father the devil don't have the capacity to do this so liberalism is just another form of heathenism.
Heathenism rejects the truth and seeks false gods and false truths so heathenism rejects Jesus Christ as savior and the absolute truth of God's Word.
Liberalism is simply another manifestation of heathenism but without a primitive culture.
Heathenism sets up a society without God because it seeks to fill the vacuum that their rejection of truth creates with religion or other unrealistic idealistic ideas such as social justice, secular humanism or some or other form of idolatry.
Liberalism is designed to appeal to the unsaved intellect, embraces his culture, and claims to be able to solve all the problems with an endless number of programs and gimmicks but solutions are never found so the unintended consequences of the programs end up destroying all categories of divine establishment that ultimately destroys the nation.
This is what is what has happened in the USA over the past 60 years and the nation is to the point of being destroyed by the liberal citizens of the nation.
When God and His Word of truth are rejected the only thing that remains is to believe satan and his evil lies are truth so this brings us to the doctrine of evil.
This is the principle of narrow is the way to life but broad the way to destruction. Matt 7:13-14;
Evil is satan's policy as the ruler of this world. It is the function of satan from the time of his fall throughout the angelic revolution and down to the point where satan deceived the woman and the man followed the woman into the sin so they both fell and satan usurped Adam as the ruler of the world.