Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Psalms 51:17
There are 25 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 10, footnote 11 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Clement of Rome (HTML)
First Epistle to the Corinthians (HTML)
Chapter XVIII.—David as an example of humility. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 85 (In-Text, Margin)
... Thy governing Spirit. I will teach transgressors Thy ways, and the ungodly shall be converted unto Thee. Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, the God of my salvation: my tongue shall exult in Thy righteousness. O Lord, Thou shalt open my mouth, and my lips shall show forth Thy praise. For if Thou hadst desired sacrifice, I would have given it; Thou wilt not delight in burnt-offerings. The sacrifice [acceptable] to God is a bruised spirit; a broken and a contrite heart God will not despise.”[Psalms 51:1-17]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 19, footnote 9 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Clement of Rome (HTML)
First Epistle to the Corinthians (HTML)
Chapter LII.—Such a confession is pleasing to God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 235 (In-Text, Margin)
... need of nothing; and He desires nothing of any one, except that confession be made to Him. For, says the elect David, “I will confess unto the Lord; and that will please Him more than a young bullock that hath horns and hoofs. Let the poor see it, and be glad.” And again he saith, “Offer unto God the sacrifice of praise, and pay thy vows unto the Most High. And call upon Me in the day of thy trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify Me.” For “the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit.”[Psalms 51:17]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 482, footnote 11 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book IV (HTML)
Chapter XVII.—Proof that God did not appoint the Levitical dispensation for His own sake, or as requiring such service; for He does, in fact, need nothing from men. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4010 (In-Text, Margin)
... them that God desires obedience, which renders them secure, rather than sacrifices and holocausts, which avail them nothing towards righteousness; and [by this declaration] he prophesies the new covenant at the same time. Still clearer, too, does he speak of these things in the fiftieth Psalm: “For if Thou hadst desired sacrifice, then would I have given it: Thou wilt not delight in burnt-offerings. The sacrifice of God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart the Lord will not despise.”[Psalms 51:17] Because, therefore, God stands in need of nothing, He declares in the preceding Psalm: “I will take no calves out of thine house, nor he-goats out of thy fold. For Mine are all the beasts of the earth, the herds and the oxen on the mountains: I know ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 293, footnote 3 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Instructor (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
Chapter XII.—Continuation: with Texts from Scripture. (HTML)
... multitude of your sacrifices to me? saith the Lord. I am full of burnt-offerings and of rams; and the fat of lambs, and the blood of bulls and kids I do not wish; nor that ye should come to appear before me. Who hath required this at your hands? You shall no more tread my court. If ye bring fine flour, the vain oblation is an abomination to me. Your new moons and your sabbaths I cannot away with.” How, then, shall I sacrifice to the Lord? “The sacrifice of the Lord is,” He says, “a broken heart.”[Psalms 51:17] How, then, shall I crown myself, or anoint with ointment, or offer incense to the Lord? “An odour of a sweet fragrance,” it is said, “is the heart that glorifies Him who made it.” These are the crowns and sacrifices, aromatic odours, and flowers of ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 430, footnote 2 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book IV. (HTML)
Chapter XVIII.—On Love, and the Repressing of Our Desires. (HTML)
... permits not to sin; but if it fall into any such case, by reason of the interference of the adversary, in imitation of David, it will sing: “I will confess unto the Lord, and it will please Him above a young bullock that has horns and hoofs. Let the poor see it, and be glad.” For he says, “Sacrifice to God a sacrifice of praise, and pay to the Lord thy vows; and call upon me in the day of trouble, and I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.” “For the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit.”[Psalms 51:17]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 526, footnote 7 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book VII (HTML)
Chapter III.—The Gnostic Aims at the Nearest Likeness Possible to God and His Son. (HTML)
... those who hear him; assimilating as far as possible the moderation which, arising from practice, tends to impassibility, to Him who by nature possesses impassibility; and especially having uninterrupted converse and fellowship with the Lord. Mildness, I think, and philanthropy, and eminent piety, are the rules of gnostic assimilation. I affirm that these virtues “are a sacrifice acceptable in the sight of God;” Scripture alleging that “the humble heart with right knowledge is the holocaust of God;”[Psalms 51:17] each man who is admitted to holiness being illuminated in order to indissoluble union.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 156, footnote 10 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
An Answer to the Jews. (HTML)
Of Sacrifices. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1204 (In-Text, Margin)
... they offer clean sacrifices to my Name.” Again, in the Psalms, David says: “Bring to God, ye countries of the nations”—undoubtedly because “unto every land” the preaching of the apostles had to “go out” —“bring to God fame and honour; bring to God the sacrifices of His name: take up victims and enter into His courts.” For that it is not by earthly sacrifices, but by spiritual, that offering is to be made to God, we thus read, as it is written, An heart contribulate and humbled is a victim for God;”[Psalms 51:17] and elsewhere, “Sacrifice to God a sacrifice of praise, and render to the Highest thy vows.” Thus, accordingly, the spiritual “sacrifices of praise” are pointed to, and “an heart contribulate” is demonstrated an acceptable sacrifice to God. And ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 104, footnote 1 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Fasting. (HTML)
The Principle of Fasting Traced Back to Its Earliest Source. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1021 (In-Text, Margin)
... been able, have habitually accounted food as poison, and taken the antidote, hunger; through which to purge the primordial cause of death—a cause transmitted to me also, concurrently with my very generation; certain that God willed that whereof He nilled the contrary, and confident enough that the care of continence will be pleasing to Him by whom I should have understood that the crime of in continence had been condemned. Further: since He Himself both commands fasting, and calls “a soul[Psalms 51:17] wholly shattered”—properly, of course, by straits of diet—“a sacrifice;” who will any longer doubt that of all dietary macerations the rationale has been this, that by a renewed interdiction of food and observation of precept the primordial sin ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 471, footnote 11 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
On the Mortality. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3493 (In-Text, Margin)
... patiently whatever things happen in the world; since the people of the Jews in this matter always offended, that they constantly murmured against God, as the Lord God bears witness in the book of Numbers, saying, “Let their murmuring cease from me, and they shall not die.” We must not murmur in adversity, beloved brethren, but we must bear with patience and courage whatever happens, since it is written, “The sacrifice to God is a broken spirit; a contrite and humbled heart God does not despise;”[Psalms 51:17] since also in Deuteronomy the Holy Spirit warns by Moses, and says, “The Lord thy God will vex thee, and will bring hunger upon thee; and it shall be known in thine heart if thou hast well kept His commandments or no.” And again: “The Lord your God ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 534, footnote 12 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
In Solomon: “The furnace proveth the vessels of the potter, and the trial of tribulation righteous men.” Also in the fiftieth Psalm: “The sacrifice to God is a contrite spirit; a contrite and humbled heart God will not despise.”[Psalms 51:17] Also in the thirty-third Psalm: “God is nearest to them that are contrite in heart, and He will save the lowly in spirit.” Also in the same place: “Many are the afflictions of the righteous, but out of them all the Lord will deliver them.” Of this same matter in Job: “Naked came I out of my mother’s womb, naked also shall I go under the earth: the Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 460, footnote 11 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Constitutions of the Holy Apostles (HTML)
Book VI (HTML)
Sec. IV.—Of the Law (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3290 (In-Text, Margin)
... goats? Sacrifice to God the sacrifice of praise, and pay thy vows to the Most High.” And in all the Scriptures in like manner He refuses their sacrifices on account of their sinning against Him. For “the sacrifices of the impious are an abomination with the Lord, since they offer them in an unlawful manner.” And again: “Their sacrifices are to them as bread of lamentation; all that eat of them shall be defiled.” If, therefore, before His coining He sought for “a clean heart and a contrite spirit”[Psalms 51:17] more than sacrifices, much rather would He abrogate those sacrifices, I mean those by blood, when He came. Yet He so abrogated them as that He first fulfilled them. For He was both circumcised, and sprinkled, and offered sacrifices and whole ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 617, footnote 10 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
The Decretals. (HTML)
The Epistles of Pope Callistus. (HTML)
To All the Bishops of Gaul. (HTML)
As to whether a priest may minister after a lapse. (HTML)
... with Thy free Spirit.” And he indeed, after his repentance, taught others also, and offered sacrifice to God, giving thereby an example to the teachers of the holy Church, that if they have fallen, and thereafter have exhibited a right repentance to God, they may do both things in like manner. For he taught when he said: “I will teach transgressors Thy ways, and sinners shall be converted unto Thee.” And he offered sacrifice for himself, while he said: “The sacrifice for God is a broken spirit.”[Psalms 51:17] For the prophet, seeing his own transgressions purged by repentance, had no doubt as to healing those of others by preaching, and by making offering to God. Thus the shedding of tears moves the mind’s feeling (passionem). And when the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 235, footnote 3 (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)
David as an Example of Humility. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4093 (In-Text, Margin)
... Thy governing Spirit. I will teach transgressors Thy ways, and the ungodly shall be converted unto Thee. Deliver me from blood-guiltiness, O God, the God of my salvation: my tongue shall exult in Thy righteousness. O Lord, Thou shalt open my mouth, and my lips shall show forth Thy praise. For if Thou hadst desired sacrifice, I would have given it; Thou wilt not delight in burnt-offerings. The sacrifice [acceptable] to God is a bruised spirit; a broken and a contrite heart God will not despise.”[Psalms 51:1-17]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 245, 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)
Such a Confession is Pleasing to God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4282 (In-Text, Margin)
... in need of nothing; and He desires nothing of any one except that confession be made to Him. For, says the elect David, “I will confess unto the Lord; and that will please Him more than a young bullock that hath horns and hoofs. Let the poor see it, and be glad.” And again he saith, “Offer unto God the sacrifice of praise, and pay thy vows unto the Most High. And call upon me in the day of thy trouble: I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me.” For “the sacrifice of God is a broken spirit.”[Psalms 51:17]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 69, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
Then follows a period of nine years from the nineteenth year of his age, during which having lost a friend, he followed the Manichæans—and wrote books on the fair and fit, and published a work on the liberal arts, and the categories of Aristotle. (HTML)
Not Even the Most Experienced Men Could Persuade Him of the Vanity of Astrology to Which He Was Devoted. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 281 (In-Text, Margin)
... salutary advice they endeavour to destroy when they say, “The cause of thy sin is inevitably determined in heaven;” and, “This did Venus, or Saturn, or Mars;” in order that man, forsooth, flesh and blood, and proud corruption, may be blameless, while the Creator and Ordainer of heaven and stars is to bear the blame. And who is this but Thee, our God, the sweetness and well-spring of righteousness, who renderest “to every man according to his deeds,” and despisest not “a broken and a contrite heart!”[Psalms 51:17]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 115, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
He recalls the beginning of his youth, i.e. the thirty-first year of his age, in which very grave errors as to the nature of God and the origin of evil being distinguished, and the Sacred Books more accurately known, he at length arrives at a clear knowledge of God, not yet rightly apprehending Jesus Christ. (HTML)
What He Found in the Sacred Books Which are Not to Be Found in Plato. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 577 (In-Text, Margin)
... deliver him from the body of this death,” but Thy grace only, “through Jesus ‘Christ our Lord,’” whom Thou hast begotten co-eternal, and createdst in the begin ning of Thy ways, in whom the Prince of this world found nothing worthy of death, yet killed he Him, and the handwriting which was contrary to us was blotted out? This those writings contain not. Those pages contain not the expression of this piety,—the tears of confession, Thy sacrifice, a troubled spirit, “a broken and a contrite heart,”[Psalms 51:17] the salvation of the people, the espoused city, the earnest of the Holy Ghost, the cup of our redemption. No man sings there, Shall not my soul be subject unto God? For of Him cometh my salvation, for He is my God and my salvation, my defender, I ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 183, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Porphyry’s doctrine of redemption. (HTML)
Of the Sacrifices Which God Does Not Require, But Wished to Be Observed for the Exhibition of Those Things Which He Does Require. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 383 (In-Text, Margin)
... signified the things which we do for the purpose of drawing near to God, and inducing our neighbor to do the same. A sacrifice, therefore, is the visible sacrament or sacred sign of an invisible sacrifice. Hence that penitent in the psalm, or it may be the Psalmist himself, entreating God to be merciful to his sins, says, “If Thou desiredst sacrifice, I would give it: Thou delightest not in whole burnt-offerings. The sacrifice of God is a broken heart: a heart contrite and humble God will not despise.”[Psalms 51:16-17] Observe how, in the very words in which he is expressing God’s refusal of sacrifice, he shows that God requires sacrifice. He does not desire the sacrifice of a slaughtered beast, but He desires the sacrifice of a contrite heart. Thus, that ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 258, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
The Enchiridion. (HTML)
God Pardons Sins, But on Condition of Penitence, Certain Times for Which Have Been Fixed by the Law of the Church. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1212 (In-Text, Margin)
But even crimes themselves, however great, may be remitted in the Holy Church; and the mercy of God is never to be despaired of by men who truly repent, each according to the measure of his sin. And in the act of repentance, where a crime has been committed of such a nature as to cut off the sinner from the body of Christ, we are not to take account so much of the measure of time as of the measure of sorrow; for a broken and a contrite heart God doth not despise.[Psalms 51:17] But as the grief of one heart is frequently hid from another, and is not made known to others by words or other signs, when it is manifest to Him of whom it is said, “My groaning is not hid from Thee,” those who govern the Church have rightly appointed times of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 298, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Catechising of the Uninstructed. (HTML)
Of the Remedy Against the Fifth and Sixth Sources of Weariness. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1418 (In-Text, Margin)
22. If, however, grief has taken possession of us on account of something in which we ourselves have erred or sinned, we should bear in mind not only that a “broken spirit is a sacrifice to God,”[Psalms 51:17] but also the saying, “Like as water quencheth fire, so alms sin;” and again, “I will have mercy,” saith He, “rather than sacrifice.” Therefore, as in the event of our being in peril from fire we would certainly run to the water in order to get the fire extinguished, and we would be grateful if any person were to offer it in the immediate vicinity; so, if some flame of sin has risen from our own ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 365, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings
Writings in Connection with the Manichæan Controversy. (HTML)
Concerning the Nature of Good, Against the Manichæans. (HTML)
Augustin Prays that the Manichæans May Be Restored to Their Senses. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1141 (In-Text, Margin)
... wilt render to every man according to his works; who in the day when a man shall have turned from his iniquity to Thy mercy and truth, wilt forget all his iniquities: stand before us, grant unto us that through our ministry, by which Thou hast been pleased to refute this execrable and too horrible error, as many have already been liberated, many also may be liberated, and whether through the sacrament of Thy holy baptism, or through the sacrifice of a broken spirit and a contrite and humbled heart,[Psalms 51:17] in the sorrow of repentance, they may deserve to receive the remission of their sins and blasphemies, by which through ignorance they have offended Thee. For nothing is of any avail, save Thy surpassing mercy and power, and the truth of Thy baptism, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 9, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm IV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 99 (In-Text, Margin)
7. “Offer the sacrifice of righteousness, and hope in the Lord” (ver. 5). He says the same in another Psalm, “the sacrifice for God is a troubled spirit.”[Psalms 51:17] Wherefore that this is the sacrifice of righteousness which is offered through repentance it is not unreasonably here understood. For what more righteous, than that each one should be angry with his own sins, rather than those of others, and that in self-punishment he should sacrifice himself unto God? Or are righteous works after repentance the sacrifice of righteousness? For the interposition of Diapsalma not ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 184, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm L (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1750 (In-Text, Margin)
... thy pen and thy walls, seeking what thou mayest give Me. “I will not reprove thee because of thy sacrifices.” What then: Dost Thou not accept my sacrifices? “But thy holocausts are always in My sight” (ver. 9). Certain holocausts concerning which it is said in another Psalm, “If Thou hadst desired sacrifice, I would surely have given, with holocausts Thou wilt not be delighted:” and again he turneth himself, “Sacrifice to God is a troubled spirit, a heart broken and humbled God doth not despise.”[Psalms 51:17] Which be then holocausts that He despiseth not? Which holocausts that are always in His sight? “Kindly, O Lord,” he saith, “deal in Thy good will with Sion, and be the walls of Jerusalem builded, then shalt Thou accept the sacrifice of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 473, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XCVI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4434 (In-Text, Margin)
9. “Ascribe unto the Lord glory unto His Name” (ver. 8). Not unto the name of man, not unto your own name, but unto His ascribe worship.…Confession is a present unto God. O heathen, if ye will enter into His courts, enter not empty. “Bring presents.” What presents shall we bring with us? The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, “O God, shalt not Thou despise.”[Psalms 51:17] Enter with an humble heart into the house of God, and thou hast entered with a present. But if thou art proud, thou enterest empty. For whence wouldest thou be proud, if thou wert not empty? For if thou wast full, thou wouldest not be puffed up. How couldest thou be full? If thou wert to bring a ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 615, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXXXI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5578 (In-Text, Margin)
... Priest. But if we have a High Priest in Heaven, who intercedeth with the Father for us (for He hath entered into the Holy of Holies, within the veil),…we are safe, for we have a Priest; let us offer our sacrifice there. Let us consider what sacrifice we ought to offer; for God is not pleased with burnt-offerings, as ye have heard in the Psalm. But in that place he next showeth what he offereth: “The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit: a broken and a contrite heart, O God, shalt Thou not despise.[Psalms 51:17]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 159, footnote 18 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Oceanus. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2347 (In-Text, Margin)
... smiting his breast with his hands, “would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven.” Yet for all that the publican with his humble confession of his faults went back justified far more than the Pharisee with his arrogant boasting of his virtues. This is not however the place to preach penitence, neither am I writing against Montanus and Novatus. Else would I say of it that it is “a sacrifice…well pleasing to God,” I would cite the words of the psalmist: “the sacrifices of God are a broken spirit,”[Psalms 51:17] and those of Ezekiel “I prefer the repentance of a sinner rather than his death,” and those of Baruch, “Arise, arise, O Jerusalem,” and many other proclamations made by the trumpets of the prophets.