Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Psalms 147
There are 36 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 494, footnote 10 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book VI (HTML)
Chapter VIII.—Philosophy is Knowledge Given by God. (HTML)
... understanding as the greatest free gift, and beseeches, saying, “I am Thy servant; give me understanding.” And does not David, while asking the abundant experience of knowledge, write, “Teach me gentleness, and discipline, and knowledge: for I have believed in Thy commandments?” He confessed the covenants to be of the highest authority, and that they were given to the more excellent. Accordingly the psalm again says of God, “He hath not done thus to any nation; and He hath not shown His judgments to them.”[Psalms 147:20] The expression “He hath not done so” shows that He hath done, but not “thus.” The “thus,” then, is put comparatively, with reference to pre-eminence, which obtains in our case. The prophet might have said simply, “He hath not done,” without ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 456, footnote 19 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
The Five Books Against Marcion. (HTML)
Book V. Wherein Tertullian proves, with respect to St. Paul's epistles, what he had proved in the preceding book with respect to St. Luke's gospel. Far from being at variance, they were in perfect unison with the writings of the Old Testament, and therefore testified that the Creator was the only God, and that the Lord Jesus was his Christ. As in the preceding books, Tertullian supports his argument with profound reasoning, and many happy illustrations of Holy Scripture. (HTML)
The Eternal Home in Heaven. Beautiful Exposition by Tertullian of the Apostle's Consolatory Teaching Against the Fear of Death, So Apt to Arise Under Anti-Christian Oppression. The Judgment-Seat of Christ--The Idea, Anti-Marcionite. Paradise. Judicial Characteristics of Christ Which are Inconsistent with the Heretical Views About Him; The Apostle's Sharpness, or Severity, Shows Him to Be a Fit Preacher of the Creator's Christ. (HTML)
... Creator in Elijah. But what will excite my surprise still more is the case (next supposed by Marcion), that a God so good and gracious, and so averse to blows and cruelty, should have suborned the angel Satan—not his own either, but the Creator’s—“to buffet” the apostle, and then to have refused his request, when thrice entreated to liberate him! It would seem, therefore, that Marcion’s god imitates the Creator’s conduct, who is an enemy to the proud, even “putting down the mighty from their seats.”[Psalms 147:6] Is he then the same God as He who gave Satan power over the person of Job that his “strength might be made perfect in weakness?” How is it that the censurer of the Galatians still retains the very formula of the law: “In the mouth of two or three ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 424, footnote 5 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen Against Celsus. (HTML)
I (HTML)
Chapter LXII (HTML)
... “And my speech and my preaching was not with enticing words of man’s wisdom, but in demonstration of the Spirit and of power; that your faith should not stand in the wisdom of men, but in the power of God.” For, according to the predictions in the prophets, foretelling the preaching of the Gospel, “the Lord gave the word in great power to them who preached it, even the King of the powers of the Beloved,” in order that the prophecy might be fulfilled which said, “His words shall run very swiftly.”[Psalms 147:15] And we see that “the voice of the apostles of Jesus has gone forth into all the earth, and their words to the end of the world.” On this account are they who hear the word powerfully proclaimed filled with power, which they manifest both by their ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 438, footnote 1 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Apocrypha of the New Testament. (HTML)
The Gospel of Nicodemus; Part II.--The Descent of Christ into Hell: Greek Form. (HTML)
Chapter 10. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1952 (In-Text, Margin)
The saints hearing these things, all cried out with a loud voice: Great is our Lord, and great is His strength.[Psalms 147:5]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 45, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
Commencing with the invocation of God, Augustin relates in detail the beginning of his life, his infancy and boyhood, up to his fifteenth year; at which age he acknowledges that he was more inclined to all youthful pleasures and vices than to the study of letters. (HTML)
He Proclaims the Greatness of God, Whom He Desires to Seek and Invoke, Being Awakened by Him. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 121 (In-Text, Margin)
1. art Thou, O Lord, and greatly to be praised; great is Thy power, and of Thy wisdom there is no end.[Psalms 147:5] And man, being a part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee, man, who bears about with him his mortality, the witness of his sin, even the witness that Thou “resistest the proud,” —yet man, this part of Thy creation, desires to praise Thee. Thou movest us to delight in praising Thee; for Thou hast formed us for Thyself, and our hearts are restless till they find rest in Thee. Lord, teach me to know and understand which of these should be ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 80, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
He describes the twenty-ninth year of his age, in which, having discovered the fallacies of the Manichæans, he professed rhetoric at Rome and Milan. Having heard Ambrose, he begins to come to himself. (HTML)
Having Heard Faustus, the Most Learned Bishop of the Manichæans, He Discerns that God, the Author Both of Things Animate and Inanimate, Chiefly Has Care for the Humble. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 370 (In-Text, Margin)
5. But the way—Thy Word, by whom Thou didst make these things which they number, and themselves who number, and the sense by which they perceive what they number, and the judgment out of which they number—they knew not, and that of Thy wisdom there is no number.[Psalms 147:5] But the Only-begotten has been “made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification,” and has been numbered amongst us, and paid tribute to Cæsar. This way, by which they might descend to Him from themselves, they knew not; nor that through Him they might ascend unto Him. This way they knew not, and they think themselves exalted with the stars and shining, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 238, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the creation of angels and men, and of the origin of evil. (HTML)
Against Those Who Assert that Things that are Infinite Cannot Be Comprehended by the Knowledge of God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 560 (In-Text, Margin)
... knowledge of God; for Plato, their great authority, represents God as framing the world on numerical principles: and in our books also it is said to God, “Thou hast ordered all things in number, and measure, and weight.” The prophet also says,” Who bringeth out their host by number.” And the Saviour says in the Gospel, “The very hairs of your head are all numbered.” Far be it, then, from us to doubt that all number is known to Him “whose understanding,” according to the Psalmist, “is infinite.”[Psalms 147:5] The infinity of number, though there be no numbering of infinite numbers, is yet not incomprehensible by Him whose understanding is infinite. And thus, if everything which is comprehended is defined or made finite by the comprehension of him who ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 407, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
A review of the philosophical opinions regarding the Supreme Good, and a comparison of these opinions with the Christian belief regarding happiness. (HTML)
Of the Happiness of the Eternal Peace, Which Constitutes the End or True Perfection of the Saints. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1278 (In-Text, Margin)
And thus we may say of peace, as we have said of eternal life, that it is the end of our good; and the rather because the Psalmist says of the city of God, the subject of this laborious work, “Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem; praise thy God, O Zion: for He hath strengthened the bars of thy gates; He hath blessed thy children within thee; who hath made thy borders peace.”[Psalms 147:12-14] For when the bars of her gates shall be strengthened, none shall go in or come out from her; consequently we ought to understand the peace of her borders as that final peace we are wishing to declare. For even the mystical name of the city itself, that is, Jerusalem, means, as I have already said, “Vision ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 88, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter. (HTML)
Keeping the Law; The Jews’ Glorying; The Fear of Punishment; The Circumcision of the Heart. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 750 (In-Text, Margin)
... but of God.” Here he plainly showed in what sense he said, “Thou makest thy boast of God.” For undoubtedly if one who was truly a Jew made his boast of God in the way which grace demands (which is bestowed not for merit of works, but gratuitously), then his praise would be of God, and not of men. But they, in fact, were making their boast of God, as if they alone had deserved to receive His law, as the Psalmist said: “He did not the like to any nation, nor His judgments has He displayed to them.”[Psalms 147:20] And yet, they thought they were fulfilling the law of God by their righteousness, when they were rather breakers of it all the while! Accordingly, it “wrought wrath” upon them, and sin abounded, committed as it was by them who knew the law. For ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 433, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)
On the words of the Gospel, Luke xi. 5, ‘Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight,’ etc. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3361 (In-Text, Margin)
9. The city which has given us birth according to the flesh still abideth, God be thanked. O that it may receive a spiritual birth, and together with us pass over unto eternity! If the city which has given us birth according to the flesh abide not, yet that which has given us birth according to the Spirit abides for ever. “The Lord doth build up Jerusalem.”[Psalms 147:2] Has He by sleeping brought His building to ruin, or by not keeping it, let the enemy into it? “Except the Lord keep the city, he that keepeth it waketh but in vain.” And what “city”? “He that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep.” What is Israel, but the seed of Abraham? What the seed of Abraham, but Christ? ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 494, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)
On the words of the Gospel, John v. 31, ‘If I bear witness of myself,’ etc.; and on the words of the apostle, Galatians v. 16, ‘Walk by the spirit, and ye shall not fulfil the lust of the flesh. For the flesh lusteth,’ etc. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3839 (In-Text, Margin)
... ye shall live.” I ask, through what spirit; my own, or God’s? For I hear thy words, and am still perplexed by this ambiguity. For when the word “spirit” is used, it is used sometimes of the spirit of a man, and of cattle, as it is written, that “all flesh which had in itself the spirit of life, died by the flood.” And so the word spirit is spoken of cattle, and spoken of man too. Sometimes even the wind is called spirit; as it is in the Psalm, “Fire, hail, snow, frost, the spirit of the tempest.”[Psalms 147:8] For as much then as the word “spirit” is used in many ways, by what spirit, O Apostle, hast thou said that the deeds of the flesh are to be mortified; by mine own, or by the Spirit of God? Hear what follows, and understand. The difficulty is removed ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 501, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)
On the words of the Gospel, John vi. 9, where the miracle of the five loaves and the two fishes is related. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3906 (In-Text, Margin)
... labours soever we shall have endured in this world, all that passeth away, is nothing. The good things shall come which shall not pass away; by labours we arrive at them. But when we have arrived, no one teareth us away from them. The gates of Jerusalem are shut; they receive the bolts too, that to that city it may be said, “Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, praise thy God, O Sion. For He hath strengthened the bolts of thy gates; He hath blessed thy children within thee. Who hath made thy borders peace.”[Psalms 147:12-14] When the gates are shut, and the bolts drawn, no friend goeth out, no enemy entereth in. There shall we have true and assured security, if here we shall not have abandoned the truth.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 223, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies
Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John. (HTML)
Chapter VIII. 26, 27. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 707 (In-Text, Margin)
... something ineffable which cannot be explained in words, that there should both be, and not be, number. For see if there appear not a kind of number, Father, and Son, and Holy Ghost—the Trinity. If three, three what? Here number fails. And so God neither keeps apart from number, nor is comprehended by number. Because there are three, there is a kind of number. If you ask three what, number ceases. Hence it is said, “Great is our Lord, and great His power; and of His understanding there is no number.”[Psalms 147:5] When you have begun to reflect, you begin to number; when you have numbered, you cannot tell what you have numbered. The Father is Father, the Son is Son, the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit. What are these three, the Father, the Son, and the Holy ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 483, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies
Ten Homilies on the First Epistle of John. (HTML)
1 John II. 27–III. 8. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2196 (In-Text, Margin)
... if they be compared with God: yet if there be any perfect righteousness of souls and spirits which God hath created, it is in the angels, holy, just, good, by no lapse turned aside, by no pride falling, but remaining ever in the contemplation of the Word of God, and having nothing else sweet unto them save Him by whom they were created; in them is perfect righteousness: but in us it has begun to be, of faith, by the Spirit. Ye heard when the Psalm was read, “Begin ye to the Lord in confession.”[Psalms 147:7] “Begin,” saith it; the beginning of our righteousness is the confession of sins. Thou hast begun not to defend thy sin; now hast thou made a beginning of righteousness: but it shall be perfected in thee when to do nothing else shall delight thee, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 147, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XLV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1388 (In-Text, Margin)
... and were they not made, we should not be formed to a certain extent by these visible things to the knowledge of the “Invisible One.” So then with this mean simile of the pen; let us not compare it to His excellent greatness, so let us not reject it with contempt. For I ask, why He compares His “tongue” to “the pen of a writer writing rapidly”? But how swiftly soever the transcriber writes, still it is not comparable to that swiftness of which another Psalm says, “His word runneth very swiftly.”[Psalms 147:15] But it appears to me (if human understanding may presume so far) that this too may be understood as spoken in the Person of the Father: “My tongue is the pen of a writer.” Inasmuch as what is spoken by the “tongue,” sounds once and passes away, what ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 288, footnote 13 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXVIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2722 (In-Text, Margin)
... saith the Apostle. Is perchance the Law itself to be understood in Mount Sina, as that which “the Heavens dropped from the face of God,” in order that the earth might be moved? And is this the very moving of the earth, when men are troubled, because the Law they cannot fulfil? But if so it is, this is the voluntary rain, whereof in confirmation he saith, “Voluntary rain God severing to Thine inheritance:” because “He hath not done so to any nation, and His judgment He hath not manifested to them.”[Psalms 147:20] God therefore set apart this voluntary rain to His inheritance because He gave the Law. And “there was made weak,” either the Law, or the inheritance. The Law may be understood to have been made weak, because it was not fulfilled; not that of itself ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 356, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXXVI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3452 (In-Text, Margin)
... manner thou art quarrelling with God. For how art thou not disputing with Him, who art praising that which displeaseth Him? He punisheth a thief, thou dost praise theft: He doth punish a drunken man, thou dost praise drunkenness. Thou art disputing with God, thou hast not made for Him a place in thy heart: because in peace is His place. And how dost thou begin to have peace with God? Thou beginnest with Him in confession. There is a voice of a Psalm, saying, “Begin ye to the Lord in confession.”[Psalms 147:7] What is, “Begin ye to the Lord in confession”? Begin ye to be joined to the Lord. In what manner? So that the same thing may displease you as displeaseth Him. There displeaseth Him thy evil life; if it please thyself, thou art disunited from Him; if ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 489, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm C (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4547 (In-Text, Margin)
... about to fulfil that holy life, which has all things in common, where no man calleth anything his own, who have one soul and one heart in God: they have been put into the furnace, and have cracked. How then knowest thou him who is unknown even to himself?…Where then is security? Here nowhere; in this life nowhere, except solely in the hope of the promise of God. But there, when we shall reach thereunto, is complete security, when the gates are shut, and the bars of the gates of Jerusalem made fast;[Psalms 147:13] there is truly full jubilance, and great delight. Only do not thou feel secure in praising any sort of life: “judge no man blessed before his death.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 490, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm C (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4553 (In-Text, Margin)
... Psalm of Confession:” there be joyful. Confess that ye were not made by yourselves, praise Him by whom ye were made. Let thy good come from Him, in departing from whom thou hast caused thine evil. “Enter into His gates with confession.” Let the flock enter into the gates: let it not remain outside, a prey for wolves. And how is it to enter? “With confession.” Let the gate, that is, the commencement for thee, be confession. Whence it is said in another Psalm, “Begin unto the Lord with confession.”[Psalms 147:7] What he there calleth “Begin,” here he calleth “Gates.” “Enter into His gates in confession.” What? And when we have entered, shall we not still confess? Always confess Him: thou hast always what to confess for. It is hard in this life for a man to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 512, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CIV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4711 (In-Text, Margin)
12. These beasts, then, drink those waters, but passing; not staying, but passing; for all that teaching which in all this time is dispensed passeth.…Unless perchance your love thinketh that in that city to which it is said, “Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, praise thy God, O Sion; for He hath made strong the bars of thy gates;”[Psalms 147:12-13] when the bars are now strengthened and the city closed, whence, as we said some time since, no friend goeth out, no enemy entereth; that there we shall have a book to read, or speech to be explained as it is now explained to you. Therefore is it now treated, that there it may be held fast: therefore is it now divided by syllables, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 512, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CIV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4712 (In-Text, Margin)
12. These beasts, then, drink those waters, but passing; not staying, but passing; for all that teaching which in all this time is dispensed passeth.…Unless perchance your love thinketh that in that city to which it is said, “Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem, praise thy God, O Sion; for He hath made strong the bars of thy gates;” when the bars are now strengthened and the city closed, whence, as we said some time since,[Psalms 147] no friend goeth out, no enemy entereth; that there we shall have a book to read, or speech to be explained as it is now explained to you. Therefore is it now treated, that there it may be held fast: therefore is it now divided by syllables, that there it may be contemplated whole and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 517, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CIV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4757 (In-Text, Margin)
... silver, to form His coin, and we now see the earth full of Christians believing in God, turning themselves away from their former uncleanness and idolatry, from a past hope to the hope of a new age: and behold it is not yet realized, but is already possessed in hope, and through that very hope we now sing, and say, “The earth is full of Thy creation.” We do not as yet sing this in our country, nor yet in that rest which is promised, the bars of the gates of Jerusalem not being as yet made fast;[Psalms 147:13] but still in our pilgrimage gazing upon the whole of this world, upon men who on every side are running unto the faith, fearing hell, despising death, loving eternal life, scorning the present, and filled with joy at such a spectacle, we say, “The ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 369, footnote 4 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch. (HTML)
Homily IV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1213 (In-Text, Margin)
11. And first of all, let us discipline our tongue to be the minister of the grace of the Spirit, expelling from the mouth all virulence and malignity, and the practice of using disgraceful words. For it is in our power to make each one of our members an instrument of wickedness, or of righteousness. Hear then how men make the tongue an instrument, some of sin, others of righteousness! “Their tongue is a sharp sword.” But another speaks thus of his own tongue: “My tongue[Psalms 147] is the pen of a ready writer.” The former wrought destruction; the latter wrote the divine law. Thus was one a sword, the other a pen, not according to its own nature, but according to the choice of those who employed it. For the nature of this tongue and of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 369, footnote 4 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
The Homilies on the Statues to the People of Antioch. (HTML)
Homily IV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1213 (In-Text, Margin)
11. And first of all, let us discipline our tongue to be the minister of the grace of the Spirit, expelling from the mouth all virulence and malignity, and the practice of using disgraceful words. For it is in our power to make each one of our members an instrument of wickedness, or of righteousness. Hear then how men make the tongue an instrument, some of sin, others of righteousness! “Their tongue is a sharp sword.” But another speaks thus of his own tongue: “My tongue[Psalms 147] is the pen of a ready writer.” The former wrought destruction; the latter wrote the divine law. Thus was one a sword, the other a pen, not according to its own nature, but according to the choice of those who employed it. For the nature of this tongue and of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 330, footnote 5 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)
Letters of the Blessed Theodoret, Bishop of Cyprus. (HTML)
Letter or Address of Theodoret to the Monks of the Euphratensian, the Osrhoene, Syria, Phœnicia, and Cilicia. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2210 (In-Text, Margin)
... strangers have rejoiced over our troubles. A little while ago we were of one mind and one tongue and now are divided into many tongues. But, O Lord our God, give us Thy peace which we have lost by setting Thy commandments at naught. O Lord we know none other than Thee. We call Thee by Thy name. ‘Make both one and break down the middle wall of the partition,’ namely the iniquity that has sprung up. Gather us one by one, Thy new Israel, building up Jerusalem and gathering together the outcasts of Israel.[Psalms 147:2] Let us be made once more one flock and all be fed by Thee; for Thou art the good Shepherd ‘Who giveth His life for the sheep ’ ‘Awake, why sleepest Thou O Lord, arise cast us not off forever.’ Rebuke the winds and the sea; give Thy Church calm and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 28, footnote 10 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Against the Heathen. (Contra Gentes.) (HTML)
Contra Gentes. (Against the Heathen.) (HTML)
Part III (HTML)
Doctrine of Scripture on the subject of Part 3. (HTML)
... love the Lord thy God with all thy heart and with all thy strength;” and again, “Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve, and shalt cleave to Him.” 2. But that the providence and ordering power of the Word also, over all and toward all, is attested by all inspired Scripture, this passage suffices to confirm our argument, where men who speak of God say: “Thou hast laid the foundation of the earth and it abideth. The day continueth according to Thine ordinance.” And again[Psalms 147:7-9]: “Sing to our God upon the harp, that covereth the heaven with clouds, that prepareth rain for the earth, that bringeth forth grass upon the mountains, and green herb for the service of man, and giveth food to the cattle.” 3. But by whom does He ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 34, footnote 4 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
Concerning the Unity of God. On the Article, I Believe in One God. Also Concerning Heresies. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 828 (In-Text, Margin)
4. If any man attempt to speak of God, let him first describe the bounds of the earth. Thou dwellest on the earth, and the limit of this earth which is thy dwelling thou knowest not: how then shalt thou be able to form a worthy thought of its Creator? Thou beholdest the stars, but their Maker thou beholdest not: count these which are visible, and then describe Him who is invisible, Who telleth the number of the stars, and calleth them all by their names[Psalms 147:4]. Violent rains lately came pouring down upon us, and nearly destroyed us: number the drops in this city alone: nay, I say not in the city, but number the drops on thine own house for one single hour, if thou canst: but thou canst not. Learn then thine own weakness; ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 53, footnote 12 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
On the Words, Maker of Heaven and Earth, and of All Things Visible and Invisible. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1091 (In-Text, Margin)
... Him. For so many measures of waters lie upon the clouds, yet they are not rent: but come down with all good order upon the earth. Who bringeth the winds out of their treasuries? And who, as we said before, is he that hath begotten the drops of dew? And out of whose womb cometh the ice? For its substance is like water, and its strength like stone. And at one time the water becomes snow like wool, at another it ministers to Him who scattereth the mist like ashes[Psalms 147:16], and at another it is changed into a stony substance; since He governs the waters as He will. Its nature is uniform, and its action manifold in force. Water becomes in vines wine that maketh glad the heart of man: and in olives oil ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 141, footnote 3 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
On the Words, And in One Holy Catholic Church, and in the Resurrection of the Flesh, and the Life Everlasting. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2322 (In-Text, Margin)
... days amid persecutions and tribulations crowned the holy martyrs with the varied and blooming chaplets of patience, and now in times of peace by God’s grace receives her due honours from kings and those who are in high place, and from every sort and kindred of men. And while the kings of particular nations have bounds set to their authority, the Holy Church Catholic alone extends her power without limit over the whole world; for God, as it is written, hath made her border peace[Psalms 147:14]. But I should need many more hours for my discourse, if I wished to speak of all things which concern her.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 300, footnote 3 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Second Theological Oration. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3504 (In-Text, Margin)
Do you know the nature and phenomena of the Moon, and the measures and courses of light, and how it is that the sun bears rule over the day, and the moon presides over the night; and while She gives confidence to wild beasts, He stirs Man up to work, raising or lowering himself as may be most serviceable? Know you the bond of Pleiades, or the fence of Orion as He who counteth the number of the stars and calleth them all by their names?[Psalms 147:4] Know you the differences of the glory of each, and the order of their movement, that I should trust you, when by them you weave the web of human concerns, and arm the creature against the Creator?
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 333, footnote 3 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
Against The Arians, and Concerning Himself. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3778 (In-Text, Margin)
XVI. These I call by name (for they are not nameless like the stars which are numbered and have names),[Psalms 147:4] and they follow me, for I rear them up beside the waters of rest; and they follow every such shepherd, whose voice they love to hear, as you see; but a stranger they will not follow, but will flee from him, because they have a habit of distinguishing the voice of their own from that of strangers. They will flee from Valentinus with his division of one into two, refusing to believe that the Creator is other than the Good. They will flee from ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 387, footnote 16 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Last Farewell in the Presence of the One Hundred and Fifty Bishops. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4315 (In-Text, Margin)
5. But since God, Who maketh poor and maketh rich, Who killeth and maketh alive; Who maketh and transformeth all things; Who turneth night into day, winter into spring, storm into calm, drought into abundance of rain; and often for the sake of the prayers of one righteous man sorely persecuted; Who lifteth up the meek on high, and bringeth the ungodly down to the ground;[Psalms 147:6] since God said to Himself, I have surely seen the affliction of Israel; and they shall no longer be further vexed with clay and brick-making; and when He spake He visited, and in His visitation He saved, and led forth His people with a mighty hand and outstretched arm, by the hand of Moses and Aaron, His ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 442, footnote 7 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Letters of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
Letters on the Apollinarian Controversy. (HTML)
To Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4713 (In-Text, Margin)
... meaning every Man. Or, again, they must suppose that our fathers went down into Egypt without bodies and invisible, and that only the Soul of Joseph was imprisoned by Pharaoh, because it is written, “They went down into Egypt with threescore and fifteen Souls,” and “The iron entered into his Soul,” a thing which could not be bound. They who argue thus do not know that such expressions are used by Synecdoche, declaring the whole by the part, as when Scripture says that the young ravens call upon God,[Psalms 147:8] to indicate the whole feathered race; or Pleiades, Hesperus, and Arcturus are mentioned, instead of all the Stars and His Providence over them.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 8, page 66, footnote 6 (Image)
Basil: Letters and Select Works
The Hexæmeron. (HTML)
On the Firmament. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1465 (In-Text, Margin)
... they doubt the power of creative wisdom to bring several heavens into being! We find, however, if we raise our eyes towards the omnipotence of God, that the strength and grandeur of the heavens differ from the drops of water bubbling on the surface of a fountain. How ridiculous, then, is their argument of impossibility! As for myself, far from not believing in a second, I seek for the third whereon the blessed Paul was found worthy to gaze. And does not the Psalmist in saying “heaven of heavens”[Psalms 147:4] give us an idea of their plurality? Is the plurality of heaven stranger than the seven circles through which nearly all the philosophers agree that the seven planets pass,—circles which they represent to us as placed in connection with each other ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 309, footnote 2 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book V. (HTML)
Chapter XVI. The Arians are condemned by the Holy Spirit through the mouth of David: for they dare to limit Christ's knowledge. The passage cited by them in proof of this is by no means free from suspicion of having been corrupted. But to set this right, we must mark the word “Son.” For knowledge cannot fail Christ as Son of God, since He is Wisdom; nor the recognition of any part, for He created all things. It is not possible that He, who made the ages, cannot know the future, much less the day of judgment. Such knowledge, whether it concerns anything great or small, may not be denied to the Son, nor yet to the Holy Spirit. Lastly, various proofs are given from which we can gather that this knowledge exists in Christ. (HTML)
... inhabitant of a city knows them in another way—and a pilot in yet a third way. But although all do not know all things, they are said to know them; but He alone knows all things in full, Who made all things. The pilot knows for how many watches Arcturus continues, what sort of a rising of Orion he will discover, but he knows nothing of the connection of the Vergiliæ and of the other stars, or of their number or names, as does He “Who numbers the multitude of stars, and calleth them all by their names;”[Psalms 147:4] Whom indeed the power of His work cannot escape.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 438, footnote 3 (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 XIV. The First Conference of Abbot Nesteros. On Spiritual Knowledge. (HTML)
Chapter VIII. Of spiritual knowledge. (HTML)
... bearest not, break forth and cry, thou that travailest not, for many are the children of the desolate more than of her that hath an husband.” The tropological sense is the moral explanation which has to do with improvement of life and practical teaching, as if we were to understand by these two covenants practical and theoretical instruction, or at any rate as if we were to want to take Jerusalem or Sion as the soul of man, according to this: “Praise the Lord, O Jerusalem: praise thy God, O Sion.”[Psalms 147:12] And so these four previously mentioned figures coalesce, if we desire, in one subject, so that one and the same Jerusalem can be taken in four senses: historically as the city of the Jews; allegorically as Church of Christ, anagogically as the ...