Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts

Song of Solomon 6:8

There are 8 footnotes for this reference.

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 332, footnote 4 (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)

Procilla. (HTML)
Virgins Being Martyrs First Among the Companions of Christ. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2690 (In-Text, Margin)

... enduring them through all their life, not shrinking from truly wrestling in an Olympian contest for the prize of chastity; but resisting the fierce torments of pleasures and fears and griefs, and the other evils of the iniquity of men, they first of all carry off the prize, taking their place in the higher rank of those who receive the promise. Undoubtedly these are the souls whom the Word calls alone His chosen spouse and His sister, but the rest concubines and virgins and daughters, speaking thus:[Song of Solomon 6:8-9] “There are threescore queens and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number. My dove, my undefiled, is but one; she is the only one of her mother, she is the choice one of her that bare her: the daughters saw her and blessed her: yea, the ...

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 334, footnote 1 (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)

Procilla. (HTML)
The Virgins, the Righteous Ancients; The Church, the One Only Spouse, More Excellent Than the Others. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2700 (In-Text, Margin)

... they hear. For verily I say unto you, That many prophets have desired to see those things which ye see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard them.” For this reason, then, the prophets count them blessed, and admire them, because the Church was thought worthy to participate in those things which they did not attain to hear or see. For “there are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number. My dove, my undefiled, is but one.”[Song of Solomon 6:8-9]

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 480, footnote 2 (Image)

Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings

Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy. (HTML)

On Baptism, Against the Donatists. (HTML)

In which is considered the Council of Carthage, held under the authority and presidency of Cyprian, to determine the question of the baptism of heretics. (HTML)
Chapter 3 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1588 (In-Text, Margin)

5. But I think that we have sufficiently shown, both from the canon of Scripture, and from the letters of Cyprian himself, that bad men, while by no means converted to a better mind, can have, and confer, and receive baptism, of whom it is most clear that they do not belong to the holy Church of God, though they seem to be within it, inasmuch as they are covetous, robbers, usurers, envious, evil thinkers, and the like; while she is one dove,[Song of Solomon 6:8-9] modest and chaste, a bride without spot or wrinkle, a garden enclosed, a fountain sealed, an orchard of pomegranates with pleasant fruits, with all similar properties which are attributed to her; and all this can only be understood to be in the good, and holy, and ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 35, 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 I. 33. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 100 (In-Text, Margin)

10. This, then, my brethren, John learned. What John learned by means of the dove let us also learn. For the dove did not teach John without teaching the Church, the Church to which it was said, “My dove is one.”[Song of Solomon 6:8] Let the dove teach the dove; let the dove know what John learned by the dove. The Holy Spirit descended in the form of a dove. But this which John learned in the dove, wherefore did he learn it in the dove? For it behoved him to learn, and perhaps it did not so much behove him to learn as to learn by the dove. What shall I say, my brethren, concerning the dove? or when will faculty of ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 41, footnote 2 (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 I. 32, 33. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 124 (In-Text, Margin)

... the Holy Ghost. This he did know; but that he should do this so as to retain the authority to Himself and transfer it to none of His ministers, this is what he learnt in the dove. For by this authority, which Christ has retained to Himself alone, and conferred upon none of His ministers, though He has deigned to baptize by His ministers; by this authority, I say, stands the unity of the Church, which is figured in the dove, concerning which it is said, “My dove is one, the only one of her mother.”[Song of Solomon 6:8] For if, as I have already said, my brethren, the authority were transferred by the Lord to His minister, there would be as many baptisms as ministers, and the unity of baptism would no longer exist.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 649, footnote 6 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm CXLII (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 5798 (In-Text, Margin)

... commandments.…For every path is a way, but not every way is a path. Why then are those ways called paths, save because they are narrow? Broad is the way of the wicked, narrow the way of the righteous. That which is “the way” is also “the ways,” just as “the Church” is also “the Churches,” the “heaven” also the “heavens:” they are spoken of in the plural, they are spoken of also in the singular. On account of the unity of the Church it is one Church; “My dove is one, she is the only one of her mother.”[Song of Solomon 6:8] On account of the congregation of brethren in various places there are many Churches. “The Churches of Judæa which are in Christ rejoiced,” saith Paul, “and they glorified God in me.” Thus he spake of Churches; and of one Church he thus speaketh, ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 234, footnote 10 (Image)

Jerome: Letters and Select Works

The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)

To Ageruchia. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 3275 (In-Text, Margin)

... Christians. And as the accursed Lamech made of the first Eve two separate wives, so also the heretics sever the second into several churches which, according to the apocalypse of John, ought rather to be called synagogues of the devil than congregations of Christ. In the Book of Songs we read as follows:—“there are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines, and virgins without number. My dove, my undefiled is but one; she is the only one of her mother, she is the choice one of her that bare her.”[Song of Solomon 6:8-9] It is to this choice one that the same John addresses an epistle in these words, “the elder unto the elect lady and her children.” So too in the case of the ark which the apostle Peter interprets as a type of the church, Noah brings in for his three ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 364, footnote 1 (Image)

Jerome: Letters and Select Works

Treatises. (HTML)

Against Jovinianus. (HTML)

Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4403 (In-Text, Margin)

... of the Lord. But as for us, if we cause one of the least to stumble, and if we say to a brother Raca, or use our eyes improperly, it were good that a millstone were hanged about our neck, we shall be in danger of Gehenna, and a mere glance will be reckoned to us for adultery. He passes on to Solomon, through whom wisdom itself sang its own praises. Seeing that not content with dwelling upon his praises, he calls him uxorious, I am surprised that he did not add the words of the Canticles:[Song of Solomon 6:8] “There are threescore queens, and fourscore concubines, and maidens without number,” and those of the First Book of Kings; And he had seven hundred wives, princesses, and three hundred concubines, and others without number.” These are they who ...

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