Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Genesis 1:28
There are 53 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 14, footnote 2 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Clement of Rome (HTML)
First Epistle to the Corinthians (HTML)
Chapter XXXIII.—But let us not give up the practice of good works and love. God Himself is an example to us of good works. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 137 (In-Text, Margin)
... are in it, He enclosed them [within their proper bounds] by His own power. Above all, with His holy and undefiled hands He formed man, the most excellent [of His creatures], and truly great through the understanding given him— the express likeness of His own image. For thus says God: “Let us make man in Our image, and after Our likeness. So God made man; male and female He created them.” Having thus finished all these things, He approved them, and blessed them, and said, “Increase and multiply.”[Genesis 1:28] We see, then, how all righteous men have been adorned with good works, and how the Lord Himself, adorning Himself with His works, rejoiced. Having therefore such an example, let us without delay accede to His will, and let us work the work of ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 140, footnote 27 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Barnabas (HTML)
The Epistle of Barnabas (HTML)
Chapter VI.—The sufferings of Christ, and the new covenant, were announced by the prophets. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1512 (In-Text, Margin)
... sins, He hath made us after another pattern, [it is His purpose] that we should possess the soul of children, inasmuch as He has created us anew by His Spirit. For the Scripture says concerning us, while He speaks to the Son, “Let Us make man after Our image, and after Our likeness; and let them have dominion over the beasts of the earth, and the fowls of heaven, and the fishes of the sea.” And the Lord said, on beholding the fair creature man, “Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] These things [were spoken] to the Son. Again, I will show thee how, in respect to us, He has accomplished a second fashioning in these last days. The Lord says, “Behold, I will make the last like the first.” In reference to this, then, the prophet ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 141, footnote 10 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Barnabas (HTML)
The Epistle of Barnabas (HTML)
Chapter VI.—The sufferings of Christ, and the new covenant, were announced by the prophets. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1525 (In-Text, Margin)
... glorified?” He says, “I will confess to thee in the Church in the midst of my brethren; and I will praise thee in the midst of the assembly of the saints.” We, then, are they whom He has led into the good land. What, then, mean milk and honey? This, that as the infant is kept alive first by honey, and then by milk, so also we, being quickened and kept alive by the faith of the promise and by the word, shall live ruling over the earth. But He said above, “Let them increase, and rule over the fishes.”[Genesis 1:28] Who then is able to govern the beasts, or the fishes, or the fowls of heaven? For we ought to perceive that to govern implies authority, so that one should command and rule. If, therefore, this does not exist at present, yet still He has promised it ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 228, footnote 4 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Justin Martyr (HTML)
Dialogue with Trypho (HTML)
Chapter LXII.—The words “Let Us make man” agree with the testimony of Proverbs. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2174 (In-Text, Margin)
... the creation of man with the very same design, in the following words: ‘Let Us make man after our image and likeness. And let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the heaven, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over all the creeping things that creep on the earth. And God created man: after the image of God did He create him; male and female created He them. And God blessed them, and said, Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and have power over it.’[Genesis 1:28] And that you may not change the [force of the] words just quoted, and repeat what your teachers assert,—either that God said to Himself, ‘Let Us make,’ just as we, when about to do something, oftentimes say to ourselves, ‘Let us make;’ or that God ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 474, footnote 7 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book IV (HTML)
Chapter XI.—The old prophets and righteous men knew beforehand of the advent of Christ, and earnestly desired to see and hear Him, He revealing himself in the Scriptures by the Holy Ghost, and without any change in Himself, enriching men day by day with benefits, but conferring them in greater abundance on later than on former generations. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3929 (In-Text, Margin)
... ever been revealed and shown to believers by one and the same God through the Word; He at one time conferring with His creature, and at another propounding His law; at one time, again, reproving, at another exhorting, and then setting free His servant, and adopting him as a son (in filium); and, at the proper time, bestowing an incorruptible inheritance, for the purpose of bringing man to perfection? For He formed him for growth and increase, as the Scripture says: “Increase and multiply.”[Genesis 1:28]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 259, footnote 3 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Instructor (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Chapter X. (HTML)
... iis scopus est et institutum, liberorum susceptio: finis autem, ut boni sint liberi: quemadmodum agricolæ seminis quidem dejectionis causa est, quod nutrimenti habendi curam gerat; agriculturæ autem finis est, fructuum perceptio. Multo autem melior est agricola, qui terram colit animatam: ille enim ed tempus alimentum expetens, hic vero ut universum permanent, curam gerens, agricolæofficio fungitur: et ille quidem propter se, hic vero propter Deum plantat ac seminat. Dixit enim: “Multiplicemini;”[Genesis 1:27-28] ubi hoc subaudiendum est: “Et ea ratione fit homo Dei imago, quatenus homo co-operatur ad generationem hominis.” Non est quælibet terra apta ad suscipienda semina: quod si etiam sit quælibet, non tamen eidem agricolæ. Neque vero seminandum est supra ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 377, footnote 9 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Chapter XXIII.—On Marriage. (HTML)
But they who approve of marriage say, Nature has adapted us for marriage, as is evident from the structure of our bodies, which are male and female. And they constantly proclaim that command, “Increase and replenish.”[Genesis 1:28] And though this is the case, yet it seems to them shameful that man, created by God, should be more licentious than the irrational creatures, which do not mix with many licentiously, but with one of the same species, such as pigeons and ringdoves, and creatures like them. Furthermore, they say, “The childless man fails in the perfection which is according to nature, not having ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 387, footnote 4 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2472 (In-Text, Margin)
... dissolvere, quanam de causa, illud quidem: “Non mœchaberis;” et hoc: “Stuprom puero non inferes,” et quæ cunque ad continentiam conferunt, dissolvere conamini, propter vestram intemperantiam non dissolvitis autem, quæ ab ipso fit, hiemem, ut media adhuc hieme æstatem faciatis: neque terram navigabilem, mare autem pedibus pervium, facitis, ut qui historias composuerunt, barbarum Xerxem dicunt voluisse facere? Cur vero non omnibus præceptis repugnatis? Nam cum ille dicat; “Crescite et multiplicamini,”[Genesis 1:28] oporteret vos, qui adversamini, nullo modo uti coitu. Et cure dixit: “Dedi vobis omnia ad vescendum” et fruendum, vos nullo frui oportuit. Quinetiam eo dicente: “Oculum pro oculo,” oportuit vos decertationem contraria non rependere decertatione. Et ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 400, footnote 12 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2636 (In-Text, Margin)
... mea:” dicit prophetice quidem matrem Evam; sed Eva quidem fuit “mater viventium;” et si is “in peccatis fuit conceptus,” at non ipse in peccato, neque vero ipse peccatum. Utrum vero quicunque etiam a peccato ad fidem convertitur, a peccandi consuetudine tanquam a “matre” converti dicatur ad “vitam,” feret mihi testimonium unus ex duodecim prophetis, qui dixit: “Si dedero primogenita pro impietate fructum yeniris mei, pro peccatis animæ meæ.” Non accusat eum, qui dixit: “Crescite et multiplicamini:”[Genesis 1:28] sed primos post generationera motus, quorum tempore Deum non cognoscimus, dicit “impietates.” Si quis autem ea ratione dicit malam generationem, idem eam dicat bonam, quatenus in ipso veritatem cognoscimus. “Abluamini juste, et ne peccetis. ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 584, footnote 7 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Fragments of Clemens Alexandrinus (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3828 (In-Text, Margin)
As it is possible even now for man to form men, according to the original formation of Adam, He no longer now creates, on account of His having granted once for all to man the power of generating men, saying to our nature, “Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] So also, by His omnipotent and omniscient power, He arranged that the dissolution and death of our bodies should be effected by a natural sequence and order, through the change of their elements, in accordance with His divine knowledge and comprehension.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 208, footnote 2 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
A Treatise on the Soul. (HTML)
Soul and Body Conceived, Formed and Perfected in Element Simultaneously. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1697 (In-Text, Margin)
... let no one take offence or feel ashamed at an interpretation of the processes of nature which is rendered necessary (by the defence of the truth). Nature should be to us an object of reverence, not of blushes. It is lust, not natural usage, which has brought shame on the intercourse of the sexes. It is the excess, not the normal state, which is immodest and unchaste: the normal condition has received a blessing from God, and is blest by Him: “Be fruitful, and multiply, (and replenish the earth.)”[Genesis 1:28] Excess, however, has He cursed, in adulteries, and wantonness, and chambering. Well, now, in this usual function of the sexes which brings together the male and the female in their common intercourse, we know that both the soul and the flesh ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 208, footnote 5 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
A Treatise on the Soul. (HTML)
Soul and Body Conceived, Formed and Perfected in Element Simultaneously. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1700 (In-Text, Margin)
... channel; and finding their way together into their appointed seed-plot, they fertilize with their combined vigour the human fruit out of their respective natures. And inherent in this human product is his own seed, according to the process which has been ordained for every creature endowed with the functions of generation. Accordingly from the one (primeval) man comes the entire outflow and redundance of men’s souls—nature proving herself true to the commandment of God, “Be fruitful, and multiply.”[Genesis 1:28] For in the very preamble of this one production, “Let us make man,” man’s whole posterity was declared and described in a plural phrase, “Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea,” etc. And no wonder: in the seed lies the promise and ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 294, footnote 6 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
The Five Books Against Marcion. (HTML)
Book I. Wherein is described the god of Marcion. He is shown to be utterly wanting in all the attributes of the true God. (HTML)
Marcion Forbids Marriage. Tertullian Eloquently Defends It as Holy, and Carefully Discriminates Between Marcion's Doctrine and His Own Montanism. (HTML)
... costlily adorned, it becomes inflated with vanity and pride. So, on the same principle, the estate of matrimony is not to be refused, because, when enjoyed without moderation, it is fanned into a voluptuous flame. There is a great difference between a cause and a fault, between a state and its excess. Consequently it is not an institution of this nature that is to be blamed, but the extravagant use of it; according to the judgment of its founder Himself, who not only said, “Be fruitful, and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] but also, “Thou shalt not commit adultery,” and, “Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s wife;” and who threatened with death the unchaste, sacrilegious, and monstrous abomination both of adultery and unnatural sin with man and beast. Now, if any ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 477, footnote 8 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Hermogenes. (HTML)
The Opinions of Hermogenes, by the Prescriptive Rule of Antiquity Shown to Be Heretical. Not Derived from Christianity, But from Heathen Philosophy. Some of the Tenets Mentioned. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 6136 (In-Text, Margin)
... truth, predicted as (one day) to happen. Now, the doctrine of Hermogenes has this taint of novelty. He is, in short, a man living in the world at the present time; by his very nature a heretic, and turbulent withal, who mistakes loquacity for eloquence, and supposes impudence to be firmness, and judges it to be the duty of a good conscience to speak ill of individuals. Moreover, he despises God’s law in his painting, maintaining repeated marriages, alleges the law of God in defence of lust,[Genesis 1:28] and yet despises it in respect of his art. He falsifies by a twofold process—with his cautery and his pen. He is a thorough adulterer, both doctrinally and carnally, since he is rank indeed with the contagion of your marriage-hacks, and has ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 578, footnote 3 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
On the Resurrection of the Flesh. (HTML)
The Old Man and the New Man of St. Paul Explained. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7582 (In-Text, Margin)
... really the former. For everything which gives the finishing stroke and perfection to a work, although it is subsequent in its mere order, yet has the priority in its effect. Much more is that prior, without which preceding things could have no existence. If the flesh be the old man, when did it become so? From the beginning? But Adam was wholly a new man, and of that new man there could be no part an old man. And from that time, ever since the blessing which was pronounced upon man’s generation,[Genesis 1:28] the flesh and the soul have had a simultaneous birth, without any calculable difference in time; so that the two have been even generated together in the womb, as we have shown in our Treatise on the Soul. Contemporaneous in the womb, they ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 657, footnote 4 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Ethical. (HTML)
On Repentance. (HTML)
True Repentance a Thing Divine, Originated by God, and Subject to His Laws. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 8424 (In-Text, Margin)
... In short, they would regulate the limit of their repentance, because they would reach (a limit) in sinning too—by fearing God, I mean. But where there is no fear, in like manner there is no amendment; where there is no amendment, repentance is of necessity vain, for it lacks the fruit for which God sowed it; that is, man’s salvation. For God—after so many and so great sins of human temerity, begun by the first of the race, Adam, after the condemnation of man, together with the dowry of the world[Genesis 1:28] after his ejection from paradise and subjection to death—when He had hasted back to His own mercy, did from that time onward inaugurate repentance in His own self, by rescinding the sentence of His first wrath, engaging to grant pardon to His own ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 39, footnote 14 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
To His Wife. (HTML)
I (HTML)
Marriage Lawful, But Not Polygamy. (HTML)
We do not indeed forbid the union of man and woman, blest by God as the seminary of the human race, and devised for the replenishment of the earth[Genesis 1:28] and the furnishing of the world, and therefore permitted, yet singly. For Adam was the one husband of Eve, and Eve his one wife, one woman, one rib. We grant, that among our ancestors, and the patriarchs themselves, it was lawful not only to marry, but even to multiply wives. There were concubines, too, (in those days.) But although the Church did come in figuratively in the synagogue, yet (to interpret simply) it was ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 53, footnote 8 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Exhortation to Chastity. (HTML)
The Objection from the Polygamy of the Patriarchs Answered. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 533 (In-Text, Margin)
“But withal the blessed patriarchs,” you say, “made mingled alliances not only with more wives (than one), but with concubines likewise.” Shall that, then, make it lawful for us also to marry without limit? I grant that it will, if there still remain types—sacraments of something future—for your nuptials to figure; or if even now there is room for that command, “Grow and multiply;”[Genesis 1:28] that is, if no other command has yet supervened: “The time is already wound up; it remains that both they who have wives act as if they had not:” for, of course, by enjoining continence, and restraining concubitance, the seminary of our race, (this latter command) has abolished that “Grow and multiply.” As ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 64, footnote 4 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Monogamy. (HTML)
From Patriarchal, Tertullian Comes to Legal, Precedents. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 622 (In-Text, Margin)
... according to that crafty question of the Sadducees; men for that reason think that frequency of marriage is permitted in other cases as well: it will be their duty to understand first the reason of the precept itself; and thus they will come to know that that reason, now ceasing, is among those parts of the law which have been cancelled. Necessary it was that there should be a succession to the marriage of a brother if he died childless: first, because that ancient benediction, “Grow and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] had still to run its course; secondly, because the sins of the fathers used to be exacted even from the sons; thirdly, because eunuchs and barren persons used to be regarded as ignominious. And thus, for fear that such as had died childless, not ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 344, footnote 6 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen De Principiis. (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
On the End of the World. (HTML)
... to become as like to God as possible. But this definition I regard not so much as a discovery of theirs, as a view derived from holy Scripture. For this is pointed out by Moses, before all other philosophers, when he describes the first creation of man in these words: “And God said, Let Us make man in Our own image, and after Our likeness;” and then he adds the words: “So God created man in His own image: in the image of God created He him; male and female created He them, and He blessed them.”[Genesis 1:27-28] Now the expression, “In the image of God created He him,” without any mention of the word” likeness,” conveys no other meaning than this, that man received the dignity of God’s image at his first creation; but that the perfection of his likeness has ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 70, footnote 11 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Hippolytus. (HTML)
The Refutation of All Heresies. (HTML)
Book V. (HTML)
Justinus' Triad of Principles; His Angelography Founded on This Triad; His Explanation of the Birth, Life, and Death of Our Lord. (HTML)
... Elohim the spirit. And the man Adam is produced as some actual seal and memento of love, and as an everlasting emblem of the marriage of Edem and Elohim. And in like manner also Eve was produced, he says, as Moses has described, an image and emblem (as well as) a seal, to be preserved for ever, of Edem. And in like manner also a soul was deposited in Eve,—an image—from Edem, but a spirit from Elohim. And there were given to them commandments, “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth,”[Genesis 1:28] that is, Edem; for so he wishes that it had been written. For the entire of the power belonging unto herself, Edem conferred upon Elohim as a sort of nuptial dowry. Whence, he says, from imitation of that primary marriage up to this day, women bring ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 313, footnote 5 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Methodius. (HTML)
The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity. (HTML)
Theophila. (HTML)
Marriage Not Abolished by the Commendation of Virginity. (HTML)
Let us begin with Genesis, that we may give its place of antiquity and supremacy to this scripture. Now the sentence and ordinance of God respecting the begetting of children[Genesis 1:28] is confessedly being fulfilled to this day, the Creator still fashioning man. For this is quite manifest, that God, like a painter, is at this very time working at the world, as the Lord also taught, “My Father worketh hitherto.” But when the rivers shall cease to flow and fall into the reservoir of the sea, and the light shall be perfectly separated from the darkness,—for the separation is still going ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 313, footnote 7 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Methodius. (HTML)
The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity. (HTML)
Theophila. (HTML)
Marriage Not Abolished by the Commendation of Virginity. (HTML)
... sea, and the light shall be perfectly separated from the darkness,—for the separation is still going on,—and the dry land shall henceforth cease to bring forth its fruits with creeping things and four-footed beasts, and the predestined number of men shall be fulfilled; then from henceforth shall men abstain from the generation of children. But at present man must cooperate in the forming of the image of God, while the world exists and is still being formed; for it is said, “Increase and multiply.”[Genesis 1:28] And we must not be offended at the ordinance of the Creator, from which, moreover, we ourselves have our being. For the casting of seed into the furrows of the matrix is the beginning of the generation of men, so that bone taken from bone, and flesh ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 462, footnote 3 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Constitutions of the Holy Apostles (HTML)
Book VI (HTML)
Sec. V.—The Teaching of the Apostles in Opposition to Jewish and Gentile Superstitions, Especially in Regard to Marriage and Funerals (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3315 (In-Text, Margin)
... Wherefore, beloved, avoid and eschew such observations, for they are heathenish. For we do not abominate a dead man, as do they, seeing we hope that he will live again. Nor do we hate lawful mixture; for it is their practice to act impiously in such instances. For the conjunction of man and wife, if it be with righteousness, is agreeable to the mind of God. “For He that made them at the beginning made them male and female; and He blessed them, and said, Increase and multiply, and fill the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] If, therefore, the difference of sexes was made by the will of God for the generation of multitudes, then must the conjunction of male and female be also acceptable to His mind.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 463, footnote 7 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Constitutions of the Holy Apostles (HTML)
Book VI (HTML)
Sec. V.—The Teaching of the Apostles in Opposition to Jewish and Gentile Superstitions, Especially in Regard to Marriage and Funerals (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3322 (In-Text, Margin)
... they are guilty; let them die.” And afterwards: “There shall not be a fornicator among the children of Israel, and there shall not be an whore among the daughters of Israel. Thou shalt not offer the hire of an harlot to the Lord thy God upon the altar, nor the price of a dog.” “For the vows arising from the hire of an harlot are not clean.” These things the laws have forbidden, but they have honoured marriage, and have called it blessed, since God has blessed it who joined male and female together.[Genesis 1:28] And wise Solomon somewhere says: “A wife is suited to her husband by the Lord.” And David says: “Thy wife is like a flourishing vine in the sides of thine house; thy children like olive-branches round about thy table. Behold, thus shall the man be ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 56, footnote 6 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Two Epistles Concerning Virginity. (HTML)
The First Epistle of the Blessed Clement, the Disciple of Peter the Apostle. (HTML)
True Virgins Prove Themselves Such by Self-Denial, as Does the True Believer by Good Works. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 315 (In-Text, Margin)
... denies its power.” For virginity of such a kind is impure, and disowned by all good works. For “every tree whatsoever is known from its fruits.” “See that thou understand what I say: God will give thee understanding.” For whosoever engages before God to preserve sanctity must be girded with all the holy power of God. And, if with true fear he crucify his body, he for the sake of the fear of God excuses himself from that word in which the Scripture has said: “Be fruitful, and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] and shuns all the display, and care, and sensuality, and fascination of this world, and its revelries and its drunkenness, and all its luxury and ease, and withdraws from the entire life of this world, and from its snares, and nets, and ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 239, footnote 5 (Image)
Gospel of Peter, Diatessaron, Apocalypses, Visio Pauli, Testament of Abraham, Acts of X/P, Zosimus, Aristides, Clement, Origen
The Epistles of Clement. (HTML)
The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians. (HTML)
But Let Us Not Give Up the Practice of Good Works and Love. God Himself is an Example to Us of Good Works. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4166 (In-Text, Margin)
... are in it, He enclosed them [within their proper bounds] by His own power. Above all, with His holy and undefiled hands He formed man, the most excellent [of His creatures], and truly great through the understanding given him—the express likeness of His own image. For thus says God: “Let us make man in our image, and after our likeness. So God made man; male and female He created them.” Having thus finished all these things, He approved them, and blessed them, and said, “Increase and multiply.”[Genesis 1:28] We see, then, how all righteous men have been adorned with good works, and how the Lord Himself, adorning Himself with His works, rejoiced. Having therefore such an example, let us without delay accede to His will, and let us work the work of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 202, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
Of the goodness of God explained in the creation of things, and of the Trinity as found in the first words of Genesis. The story concerning the origin of the world (Gen. I.) is allegorically explained, and he applies it to those things which God works for sanctified and blessed man. Finally, he makes an end of this work, having implored eternal rest from God. (HTML)
Why God Has Blessed Men, Fishes, Flying Creatures, and Not Herbs and the Other Animals (Ver. 28). (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1389 (In-Text, Margin)
35. But what is this, and what kind of mystery is it? Behold, Thou blessest men, O Lord, that they may “be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth;”[Genesis 1:28] in this dost Thou not make a sign unto us that we may understand something? Why hast Thou not also blessed the light, which Thou calledst day, nor the firmament of heaven, nor the lights, nor the stars, nor the earth, nor the sea? I might say, O our God, that Thou, who hast created us after Thine Image,—I might say, that Thou hast willed to bestow this gift of blessing especially upon man, hadst Thou not in like ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 271, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the punishment and results of man’s first sin, and of the propagation of man without lust. (HTML)
Whether It is to Be Believed that Our First Parents in Paradise, Before They Sinned, Were Free from All Perturbation. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 722 (In-Text, Margin)
... committed adultery with her already in his heart.” As happy, then, as were these our first parents, who were agitated by no mental perturbations, and annoyed by no bodily discomforts, so happy should the whole human race have been, had they not introduced that evil which they have transmitted to their posterity, and had none of their descendants committed iniquity worthy of damnation; but this original blessedness continuing until, in virtue of that benediction which said, “Increase and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] the number of the predestined saints should have been completed, there would then have been bestowed that higher felicity which is enjoyed by the most blessed angels,—a blessedness in which there should have been a secure assurance that no one would ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 278, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the punishment and results of man’s first sin, and of the propagation of man without lust. (HTML)
That Man’s Transgression Did Not Annul the Blessing of Fecundity Pronounced Upon Man Before He Sinned But Infected It with the Disease of Lust. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 750 (In-Text, Margin)
Far be it, then, from us to suppose that our first parents in Paradise felt that lust which caused them afterwards to blush and hide their nakedness, or that by its means they should have fulfilled the benediction of God, “Increase and multiply and replenish the earth;”[Genesis 1:28] for it was after sin that lust began. It was after sin that our nature, having lost the power it had over the whole body, but not having lost all shame, perceived, noticed, blushed at, and covered it. But that blessing upon marriage, which encouraged them to increase and multiply and replenish the earth, though it continued even after they had sinned, was yet ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 278, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the punishment and results of man’s first sin, and of the propagation of man without lust. (HTML)
Of the Conjugal Union as It Was Originally Instituted and Blessed by God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 752 (In-Text, Margin)
But we, for our part, have no manner of doubt that to increase and multiply and replenish the earth in virtue of the blessing of God, is a gift of marriage as God instituted it from the beginning before man sinned, when He created them male and female,—in other words, two sexes manifestly distinct. And it was this work of God on which His blessing was pronounced. For no sooner had Scripture said, “Male and female created He them,”[Genesis 1:27-28] than it immediately continues, “And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it,” etc. And though all these things may not unsuitably be interpreted in a spiritual sense, yet “male and female” cannot be understood of two ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 502, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the eternal happiness of the saints, the resurrection of the body, and the miracles of the early Church. (HTML)
Of the Blessings with Which the Creator Has Filled This Life, Obnoxious Though It Be to the Curse. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1658 (In-Text, Margin)
But we must now contemplate the rich and countless blessings with which the goodness of God, who cares for all He has created, has filled this very misery of the human race, which reflects His retributive justice. That first blessing which He pronounced before the fall, when He said, “Increase, and multiply, and replenish the earth,”[Genesis 1:28] He did not inhibit after man had sinned, but the fecundity originally bestowed remained in the condemned stock; and the vice of sin, which has involved us in the necessity of dying, has yet not deprived us of that wonderful power of seed, or rather of that still more marvellous power by which seed is produced, and which seems to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 158, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
After premising the difference between wisdom and knowledge, he points out a kind of trinity in that which is properly called knowledge; but one which, although we have reached in it the inner man, is not yet to be called the image of God. (HTML)
Why This Opinion is to Be Rejected. (HTML)
... image of God before a wife was made for him, and before they procreated a son; because there was not yet a trinity. Will any one say there was already a trinity, because, although not yet in their proper form, yet in their original nature, both the woman was already in the side of the man, and the son in the loins of his father? Why then, when Scripture had said, “God made man after the image of God,” did it go on to say, “God created him; male and female created He them: and God blessed them”?[Genesis 1:27-28] (Or if it is to be so divided, “And God created man,” so that thereupon is to be added, “in the image of God created He him,” and then subjoined in the third place, “male and female created He them;” for some have feared to say, He made him male and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 399, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Good of Marriage. (HTML)
Section 2 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1935 (In-Text, Margin)
2. Nor is it now necessary that we enquire, and put forth a definite opinion on that question, whence could exist the progeny of the first men, whom God had blessed, saying, “Increase, and be ye multiplied, and fill the earth;”[Genesis 1:28] if they had not sinned, whereas their bodies by sinning deserved the condition of death, and there can be no sexual intercourse save of mortal bodies. For there have existed several and different opinions on this matter; and if we must examine, which of them be rather agreeable to the truth of Divine Scriptures, there is matter for a lengthened discussion. Whether, therefore, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 250, footnote 11 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin. (HTML)
On Original Sin. (HTML)
Marriage Existed Before Sin Was Committed. How God’s Blessing Operated in Our First Parents. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2026 (In-Text, Margin)
There was, however, undoubtedly marriage, even when sin had no prior existence; and for no other reason was it that woman, and not a second man, was created as a help for the man. Moreover, those words of God, “Be fruitful and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] are not prophetic of sins to be condemned, but a benediction upon the fertility of marriage. For by these ineffable words of His, I mean by the divine methods which are inherent in the truth of His wisdom by which all things were made, God endowed the primeval pair with their seminal power. Suppose, however, that nature had not been dishonoured by sin, God forbid that we should ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 265, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
On Marriage and Concupiscence. (HTML)
On Marriage and Concupiscence (HTML)
The Censuring of Lust is Not a Condemnation of Marriage; Whence Comes Shame in the Human Body. Adam and Eve Were Not Created Blind; Meaning of Their 'Eyes Being Opened.' (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2073 (In-Text, Margin)
Now, this being the real state of the question, they undoubtedly err who suppose that, when fleshly lust is censured, marriage is condemned; as if the malady of concupiscence was the outcome of marriage and not of sin. Were not those first spouses, whose nuptials God blessed with the words, “Be fruitful and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] naked, and yet not ashamed? Why, then, did shame arise out of their members after sin, except because an indecent motion arose from them, which, if men had not sinned, would certainly never have existed in marriage? Or was it, forsooth, as some hold (who give little heed to what they read), that human beings were, like dogs, at first ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 287, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
On Marriage and Concupiscence. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Eve’s Name Means Life, and is a Great Sacrament of the Church. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2221 (In-Text, Margin)
... father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife; and they twain shall be one flesh.” The Lord Jesus, however, in the Gospel mentions God as having said this of Eve; and the reason, no doubt, is, that God declared through the man what the man, in fact, uttered as a prophecy. Now, observe what follows in the paper of extracts: “By that primitive name,” says he, “He showed for what labour the woman had been provided; and He said accordingly, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.’”[Genesis 1:28] Now, who amongst ourselves denies that the woman was provided for the work of child-bearing by the Lord God, the beneficent Creator of all good? See further what he goes on to say: “God, therefore, who created them male and female, furnished them ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 287, footnote 8 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
On Marriage and Concupiscence. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
The Pelagian Argument to Show that the Devil Has No Rights in the Fruits of Marriage. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2225 (In-Text, Margin)
... claim as his property the fruit which they produce. Is it the difference of the sexes? But this is inherent in the bodies which God made. Is it their union? But this union is justified in the privilege of the primeval blessing no less than institution. For it is the voice of God that says, ‘A man shall leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave to his wife; and they two shall be one flesh.’ It is again the voice of God which says, ‘Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.’[Genesis 1:28] Or is it, perchance, their fertility? But this is the very reason why matrimony was instituted.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 300, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
On Marriage and Concupiscence. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
The Pelagians Try to Get Rid of Original Sin by Their Praise of God’s Works; Marriage, in Its Nature and by Its Institution, is Not the Cause of Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2284 (In-Text, Margin)
... that marriage, which is a good, is not the cause of evil; and that consequently from it no man could be born in a sinful state, and having need of a Saviour: just as if we said that marriage is the cause of sin, though it is true that the human being which is born in wedlock is not born without sin. Marriage was instituted not for the purpose of sinning, but of producing children. Accordingly the Lord’s blessing on the married state ran thus: “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] The sin, however, which is derived to children from marriage does not belong to marriage, but to the evil which accrues to the human agents, from whose union marriage comes into being. The truth is, both the evil of shameful lust can exist without ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 557, footnote 4 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Letters of Athanasius with Two Ancient Chronicles of His Life. (HTML)
The Festal Letters, and their Index. (HTML)
Personal Letters. (HTML)
Letter to Amun. Written before 354 A.D. (HTML)
... channels. What sin then is there in God’s name, elder most beloved of God, if the Master who made the body willed and made these parts to have such passages? But since we must grapple with the objections of evil persons, as they may say, ‘If the organs have been severally fashioned by the Creator, then there is no sin in their genuine use,’ let us stop them by asking this question: What do you mean by use? That lawful use which God permitted when He said, ‘Increase and multiply, and replenish the earth[Genesis 1:28],’ and which the Apostle approves in the words, ‘Marriage is honourable and the bed undefiled,’ or that use which is public, yet carried on stealthily and in adulterous fashion? For in other matters also which go to make up life, we shall find ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 29, footnote 6 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Eustochium. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 459 (In-Text, Margin)
19. Some one may say, “Do you dare detract from wedlock, which is a state blessed by God?” I do not detract from wedlock when I set virginity before it. No one compares a bad thing with a good. Wedded women may congratulate themselves that they come next to virgins. “Be fruitful,” God says, “and multiply, and replenish the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] He who desires to replenish the earth may increase and multiply if he will. But the train to which you belong is not on earth, but in heaven. The command to increase and multiply first finds fulfilment after the expulsion from paradise, after the nakedness and the fig-leaves which speak of sexual passion. Let them marry and be ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 67, footnote 11 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Pammachius. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1048 (In-Text, Margin)
... also which God has created for us to enjoy. We know that in a large house there are vessels not only of silver and of gold, but of wood also and of earth. We know, too, that on the foundation of Christ which Paul the master builder has laid, some build up gold, silver, and precious stones; others, on the contrary, hay, wood, and stubble. We are not ignorant that ‘marriage is honorable…and the bed undefiled.’ We have read the first decree of God: ‘Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.’[Genesis 1:28] But while we allow marriage, we prefer the virginity which springs from it. Gold is more precious than silver, but is silver on that account the less silver? Is it an insult to a tree to prefer its apples to its roots or its leaves? Is it an injury ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 85, footnote 13 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
From Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis, in Cyprus, to John, Bishop of Jerusalem. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1259 (In-Text, Margin)
... the Greek idiom supplies is by many taken to mean a funeral monument, because the soul is shut up within it in the same way as the corpses of the dead are shut up in tombs and barrows. If this doctrine is true what becomes of our faith? Where is the preaching of the resurrection? Where is the teaching of the apostles, which lasts on to this day in the churches of Christ? Where is the blessing to Adam, and to his seed, and to Noah and his sons? “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] According to Origen, these words must be a curse and not a blessing; for he turns angels into human souls, compelling them to leave the place of highest rank and to come down lower, as though God were unable through the action of His blessing to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 94, footnote 9 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Nepotian. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1369 (In-Text, Margin)
... Why do we cherish and love what it is Peter’s boast not to possess? Or if we insist on keeping to the letter and find the mention of gold and wealth so pleasing, let us keep to everything else as well as the gold. Let the bishops of Christ be bound to marry wives, who must be virgins. Let the best-intentioned priest be deprived of his office if he bear a scar and be disfigured. Let bodily leprosy be counted worse than spots upon the soul. Let us be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth,[Genesis 1:28] but let us slay no lamb and celebrate no mystic passover, for where there is no temple, the law forbids these acts. Let us pitch tents in the seventh month and noise abroad a solemn fast with the sound of a horn. But if we compare all these things ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 135, footnote 14 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Pammachius. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1930 (In-Text, Margin)
... having children and had to allow her own reluctance to give way to the eagerness of her mother-in-law and the chagrin of her husband. Thus she suffered much as Rachel suffered, although instead of bringing forth like her a son of pangs and of the right hand, the heir she had longed for was no other than her husband. I have learned on good authority that her wish in submitting herself to her husband was not to take advantage of God’s primitive command “Be faithful and multiply and replenish the earth”[Genesis 1:28] but that she only desired children that she might bring forth virgins to Christ.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 144, footnote 1 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Oceanus. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2034 (In-Text, Margin)
... would not have married another; but as for you, how can you defend the bestial unions you indiscriminately make? Perhaps indeed you will say that you feared to contract marriage lest by so doing you might disqualify yourself for ordination. He took a wife that he might have children by her; you by taking a harlot have lost the hope of children. He withdrew into the privacy of his own chamber when he sought to obey nature and to win God’s blessing: “Be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] You on the contrary outraged public decency in the hot eagerness of your lust. He covered a lawful indulgence beneath a veil of modesty; you pursued an unlawful one shamelessly before the eyes of all. For him it is written “Marriage is honourable ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 195, footnote 4 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Laeta. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2724 (In-Text, Margin)
... chastity. O happy virgin! happy Paula, daughter of Toxotius, who through the virtues of her grandmother and aunt is nobler in holiness than she is in lineage! Yes, Laeta: were it possible for you with your own eyes to see your mother-in-law and your sister, and to realize the mighty souls which animate their small bodies; such is your innate thirst for chastity that I cannot doubt but that you would go to them even before your daughter, and would emancipate yourself from God’s first decree of the Law[Genesis 1:28] to put yourself under His second dispensation of the Gospel. You would count as nothing your desire for other offspring and would offer up yourself to the service of God. But because “there is a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 234, footnote 20 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Ageruchia. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3285 (In-Text, Margin)
... her to be a harlot; and according to the letter that killeth the prophet Hosea married not only a whore but an adulteress. If these instances are to justify us let us neigh after every woman that we meet; like the people of Sodom and Gomorrah let us be found by the last day buying and selling, marrying and giving in marriage; and let us only end our marrying with the close of our lives. And if both before and after the deluge the maxim held good: “be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth:”[Genesis 1:28] what has that to do with us upon whom the ends of the ages are come, unto whom it is said, “the time is short,” and “now the axe is laid unto the root of the trees;” that is to say, the forests of marriage and of the law must be cut down by the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 344, footnote 1 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
The Perpetual Virginity of Blessed Mary. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4244 (In-Text, Margin)
... between virginity and marriage, I beseech my readers not to suppose that in praising virginity I have in the least disparaged marriage, and separated the saints of the Old Testament from those of the New, that is to say, those who had wives and those who altogether refrained from the embraces of women: I rather think that in accordance with the difference in time and circumstance one rule applied to the former, another to us upon whom the ends of the world have come. So long as that law remained,[Genesis 1:28] “Be fruitful, and multiply and replenish the earth”; and “Cursed is the barren woman that beareth not seed in Israel,” they all married and were given in marriage, left father and mother, and became one flesh. But once in tones of thunder the words ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 347, footnote 6 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against Jovinianus. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4265 (In-Text, Margin)
... impure; he condemns and rejects not only marriage but also food which God created for the use of man. We know that in a great house, there are not only vessels of gold and silver, but also of wood and earthenware. And that upon the foundation, Christ, which Paul the master-builder laid, some build gold, silver, precious stones: others, on the contrary, hay, wood, straw. We are not ignorant of the words, “Marriage is honourable among all, and the bed undefiled.” We have read God’s first command,[Genesis 1:28] “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth”; but while we honour marriage we prefer virginity which is the offspring of marriage. Will silver cease to be silver, if gold is more precious than silver? Or is despite done to tree and corn, if ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 348, footnote 9 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against Jovinianus. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4275 (In-Text, Margin)
5. First of all, he says, God declares that “therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.” And lest we should say that this is a quotation from the Old Testament, he asserts that it has been confirmed by the Lord in the Gospel—“What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder”: and he immediately adds,[Genesis 1:28] “Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth.” He next repeats the names of Seth, Enos, Cainan, Mahalalel, Jared, Enoch, Methuselah, Lamech, Noah, and tells us that they all had wives and in accordance with the will of God begot sons, as though there could be any table of descent or any history of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 8, page 214, footnote 4 (Image)
Basil: Letters and Select Works
The Letters. (HTML)
To Diodorus. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2536 (In-Text, Margin)
... may not take his wife’s sister, because he may not take his own sister. And, on the other hand, it will not be lawful for the wife to be joined with the husband’s kin, for the rights of relationship hold good on both sides. But, for my part, to every one who is thinking about marriage I testify that, “the fashion of this world passeth away,” and the time is short: “it remaineth that both they that have wives be as though they had none.” If he improperly quotes the charge “Increase and multiply,”[Genesis 1:28] I laugh at him, for not discerning the signs of the times. Second marriage is a remedy against fornication, not a means of lasciviousness. “If they cannot contain,” it is said “let them marry;” but if they marry they must not break the law.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 466, footnote 2 (Image)
Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian
The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)
The Conferences of John Cassian. Part II. Containing Conferences XI-XVII. (HTML)
Conference XVII. The Second Conference of Abbot Joseph. On Making Promises. (HTML)
Chapter XIX. The answer, that leave to lie, which was not even granted under the old Covenant, has rightly been taken by many. (HTML)
Joseph: All liberty in the matter of wives and many concubines, as the end of time is approaching and the multiplying of the human race completed, ought rightly to be cut off by evangelical perfection, as being no longer necessary. For up to the coming of Christ it was well that the blessing of the original sentence should be in full vigour, whereby it was said: “Increase and multiply, and fill the earth.”[Genesis 1:28] And therefore it was quite right that from the root of human fecundity which happily flourished in the synagogue, in accordance with that dispensation of the times, the buds of angelical virginity should spring, and the fragrant flowers of continence be produced in the Church. But ...