Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Psalms 8:3
There are 12 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 256, footnote 4 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Justin Martyr (HTML)
Dialogue with Trypho (HTML)
Chapter CXIV.—Some rules for discerning what is said about Christ. The circumcision of the Jews is very different from that which Christians receive. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2379 (In-Text, Margin)
... before the shearer,’ He speaks as if the suffering had already taken place. And when He says again, ‘I have stretched out my hands to a disobedient and gainsaying people;’ and when He says, ‘Lord, who hath believed our report?’ —the words are spoken as if announcing events which had already come to pass. For I have shown that Christ is oftentimes called a Stone in parable, and in figurative speech Jacob and Israel. And again, when He says, ‘I shall behold the heavens, the works of Thy fingers,’[Psalms 8:3] unless I understand His method of using words, I shall not understand intelligently, but just as your teachers suppose, fancying that the Father of all, the unbegotten God, has hands and feet, and fingers, and a soul, like a composite being; and ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 475, footnote 5 (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 3935 (In-Text, Margin)
... boughs, crying out with great joy and gladness, “Hosanna to the Son of David; blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord: hosanna in the highest.” But to the envious wicked stewards, who circumvented those under them, and ruled over those that had no great intelligence, and for this reason were unwilling that the king should come, and who said to Him, “Hearest thou what these say?” did the Lord reply, “Have ye never read, Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings hast Thou perfected praise?”[Psalms 8:3] —thus pointing out that what had been declared by David concerning the Son of God, was accomplished in His own person; and indicating that they were indeed ignorant of the meaning of the Scripture and the dispensation of God; but declaring that it ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 190, footnote 1 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
Exhortation to the Heathen (HTML)
Chapter IV.—The Absurdity and Shamefulness of the Images by Which the Gods are Worshipped. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 919 (In-Text, Margin)
Human art, moreover, produces houses, and ships, and cities, and pictures. But how shall I tell what God makes? Behold the whole universe; it is His work: and the heaven, and the sun, and angels, and men, are the works of His fingers.[Psalms 8:3] How great is the power of God! His bare volition was the creation of the universe. For God alone made it, because He alone is truly God. By the bare exercise of volition He creates; His mere willing was followed by the springing into being of what He willed. Consequently the choir of philosophers are in error, who indeed most nobly confess that man was made for the contemplation ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 274, footnote 2 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen De Principiis. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
On the Beginning of the World, and Its Causes. (HTML)
... see, moreover, lest perhaps it is with reference to this that the apostle says, “While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are unseen are eternal. For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.” And when he says elsewhere, “Because I shall see the heavens, the works of Thy fingers,”[Psalms 8:3] and when God said, regarding all things visible, by the mouth of His prophet, “My hand has formed all these things,” He declares that that eternal house in the heavens which He promises to His saints was not made with hands, pointing out, doubtless, ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 761, footnote 4 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Remains of the Second and Third Centuries. (HTML)
Melito, the Philosopher. (HTML)
From 'The Key.' (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3660 (In-Text, Margin)
The fingers of the Lord —The lawgiver Moses, or the prophets. In the Psalm: “I will regard the heavens,” that is, the books of the Law and the Prophets, “the works of Thy fingers.”[Psalms 8:3]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 195, footnote 28 (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)
Allegorical Explanation of the Firmament and Upper Works, Ver. 6. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1267 (In-Text, Margin)
17. Let us look, O Lord, “upon the heavens, the work of Thy fingers;”[Psalms 8:3] clear from our eyes that mist with which Thou hast covered them. There is that testimony of Thine which giveth wisdom unto the little ones. Perfect, O my God, Thy praise out of the mouth of babes and sucklings. Nor have we known any other books so destructive to pride, so destructive to the enemy and the defender, who resisteth Thy reconciliation in defence of his own sins. I know not, O Lord, I know not other such “pure” words which so persuade me to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 429, footnote 4 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
To Pammachius against John of Jerusalem. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5011 (In-Text, Margin)
9. It is alleged that your master, whom you call a Catholic, and whom you resolutely defend, said, “the Son sees not the Father, and the Holy Spirit sees not the Son.” And you tell me that the Father is invisible, the Son invisible, the Holy Ghost invisible, as though the angels, both cherubim and seraphim, were not also, in accordance with their nature, invisible to our eyes. David was certainly in doubt even as regards the appearance of the heavens:[Psalms 8:3] “I shall see,” he says, “the heavens, the works of Thy fingers.” I shall see, not I see. I shall see when with unveiled face I shall behold the glory of the Lord: but now we see in part, and we know in part. The question is whether the Son sees the Father, and you say ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 20, footnote 8 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
On the Ten Points of Doctrine. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 657 (In-Text, Margin)
5. This Father of our Lord Jesus Christ is not circumscribed in any place, nor is He less than the heaven; but the heavens are the works of His fingers[Psalms 8:3], and the whole earth is held in His grasp: He is in all things and around all. Think not that the sun is brighter than He, or equal to Him: for He who at first formed the sun must needs be incomparably greater and brighter. He foreknoweth the things that shall be, and is mightier than all, knowing all things and doing as He will; not being subject to any necessary sequence of events, nor to nativity, nor ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 290, footnote 4 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Second Theological Oration. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3437 (In-Text, Margin)
... on this point. As to what concerns us, it is not only the Peace of God which passeth all understanding and knowledge, nor only the things which God hath stored up in promise for the righteous, which “eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, nor mind conceived” except in a very small degree, nor the accurate knowledge of the Creation. For even of this I would have you know that you have only a shadow when you hear the words, “I will consider the heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars,”[Psalms 8:3] and the settled order therein; not as if he were considering them now, but as destined to do so hereafter. But far before them is That nature Which is above them, and out of which they spring, the Incomprehensible and Illimitable—not, I mean, as to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 9, page 23b, footnote 9 (Image)
Hilary of Poitiers, John of Damascus
John of Damascus: Exposition of the Orthodox Faith. (HTML)
An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Concerning light, fire, the luminaries, sun, moon and stars. (HTML)
The course which the Creator appointed for them to run is unceasing and remaineth fixed as He established them. For the divine David says, The moon and the stars which Thou establishedst[Psalms 8:3], and by the word ‘establishedst,’ he referred to the fixity and unchangeableness of the order and series granted to them by God. For He appointed them for seasons, and signs, and days and years. It is through the Sun that the four seasons are brought about. And the first of these is spring: for in it God created all things, and even down to the present time its presence is evidenced by the bursting ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 139, footnote 9 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Chapter V. The writer sums up the argument he had commenced, and confirms the statement that unity is signified by the terms finger and right hand, from the fact that the works of God are the same as are the works of hands; and that those of hands are the same as those of fingers; and lastly, that the term hand applies equally to the Son and the Spirit, and that of finger applies to the Spirit and the Son. (HTML)
32. But those which are the works of the hands are also the works of the fingers, for it is equally written: “For I will behold Thy heavens, the works of Thy fingers, the moon, and the stars, which Thou hast established.”[Psalms 8:3] What less are the fingers here said to have made than the hands, since they made the same as the hands, as it is written: “For Thou, Lord, hast made me glad through Thy work, and in the works of Thy hands will I rejoice.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 8, footnote 5 (Image)
Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian
The Works of Sulpitius Severus. (HTML)
On the Life of St. Martin. (HTML)
Chapter IX. High Esteem in which Martin was held. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 24 (In-Text, Margin)
... when it so happened that the reader, whose duty it was to read in public that day, being blocked out by the people, failed to appear, the officials falling into confusion, while they waited for him who never came, one of those standing by, laying hold of the Psalter, seized upon the first verse which presented itself to him. Now, the Psalm ran thus: “Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings thou hast perfected praise because of thine enemies, that thou mightest destroy the enemy and the avenger.”[Psalms 8:3] On these words being read, a shout was raised by the people, and the opposite party were confounded. It was believed that this Psalm had been chosen by Divine ordination, that Defensor might hear a testimony to his own work, because the praise of ...