Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Matthew 7:18
There are 14 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 249, footnote 14 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Instructor (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Chapter V.—On Laughter. (HTML)
For since all forms of speech flow from mind and manners, ludicrous expressions could not be uttered, did they not proceed from ludicrous practices. For the saying, “It is not a good tree which produces corrupt fruit, nor a corrupt tree which produces good fruit,”[Matthew 7:18] is to be applied in this case. For speech is the fruit of the mind. If, then, wags are to be ejected from our society, we ourselves must by no manner of means be allowed to stir up laughter. For it were absurd to be found imitators of things of which we are prohibited to be listeners; and still more absurd for a man to set about making himself a laughing-stock, ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 484, footnote 13 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Hermogenes. (HTML)
Another Ground of Hermogenes that Matter Has Some Good in It. Its Absurdity. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 6259 (In-Text, Margin)
Here the question will arise How creatures were made good out of it, which were formed without any change at all? How occurs the seed of what is good, nay, very good, in that which is evil, nay, very evil? Surely a good tree does not produce evil fruit,[Matthew 7:18] since there is no God who is not good; nor does an evil tree yield good fruit, since there is not Matter except what is very evil. Or if we were to grant him that there is some germ of good in it, then there will be no longer a uniform nature (pervading it), that is to say, one which is evil throughout; but instead thereof (we now encounter) a double nature, ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 280, footnote 4 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen De Principiis. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
On Justice and Goodness. (HTML)
4. They again recall us, however, to the words of Scripture, by bringing forward that celebrated question of theirs, affirming that it is written, “A bad tree cannot produce good fruits; for a tree is known by its fruit.”[Matthew 7:18] What, then, is their position? What sort of tree the law is, is shown by its fruits, i.e., by the language of its precepts. For if the law be found to be good, then undoubtedly He who gave it is believed to be a good God. But if it be just rather than good, then God also will be considered a just legislator. The Apostle Paul makes use of no circumlocution, when he says, “The law is ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 146, footnote 3 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Hippolytus. (HTML)
The Refutation of All Heresies. (HTML)
Book X. (HTML)
Marcion and Cerdo. (HTML)
... and matter. But they all affirm that the good (Being) has made nothing at all, though some denominate the just one likewise evil, whereas others that his only title is that of just. And they allege that (the just Being) made all things out of subjacent matter, for that he made them not well, but irrationally. For it is requisite that the things made should be similar to the maker; wherefore also they thus employ the evangelical parables, saying, “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit,”[Matthew 7:18] and the rest of the passage. Now Marcion alleges that the conceptions badly devised by the (just one) himself constituted the allusion in this passage. And (he says) that Christ is the Son of the good Being, and was sent for the salvation of ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 182, footnote 3 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Archelaus. (HTML)
The Acts of the Disputation with the Heresiarch Manes. (HTML)
Chapter V. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1474 (In-Text, Margin)
... thus thoughtlessly to identify these two things in the irrational and foolish fashion common to the mass of men, and ascribe no such confusion to the God of goodness. For these men refer the beginning and the end and the paternity of these ills to God Himself,—“whose end is near a curse.” For they do not believe the word spoken by our Saviour and Lord Jesus Christ Himself in the Gospels, namely, that “a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit.”[Matthew 7:18] And how they can be bold enough to call God the maker and contriver of Satan and his wicked deeds, is a matter of great amazement to me. Yea, would that even this had been all the length to which they had gone with their silly efforts, and that they ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 187, footnote 7 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Archelaus. (HTML)
The Acts of the Disputation with the Heresiarch Manes. (HTML)
Chapter XIII. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1553 (In-Text, Margin)
... iniquity. By such doctrine ye do, indeed, bring forth from the same fountain both sweet water and bitter,—a thing which can in no possible way be either done or apprehended. For who ought to be believed? Should it be those masters of yours whose enjoyment is in the flesh, and who pamper themselves with the richest delights; or our Saviour Jesus Christ, who says, as it is written in the book of the Gospels, “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit,”[Matthew 7:18] and who in another place assures us that the “father of the devil is a liar and a murderer from the beginning,” and tells us again that men’s desire was for the darkness, so that they would not follow that Word that had been sent forth in the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 189, footnote 9 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Archelaus. (HTML)
The Acts of the Disputation with the Heresiarch Manes. (HTML)
Chapter XV. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1586 (In-Text, Margin)
... cannot be two unbegotten natures. What do you say, then? Are these two natures inconvertible? or are they convertible? or is one of them converted? Manes, however, held back, because he did not find a suitable reply; for he was pondering the conclusion which might be drawn from either of two answers which he might make, turning the matter over thus in his thoughts: If I say that they are converted, he will meet me with that statement which is recorded in the Gospel about the trees;[Matthew 7:15-20] but if I say that they are not convertible, he will necessarily ask me to explain the condition and cause of their intermingling. In the meantime, after a little delay, Manes replied: They are indeed both inconvertible in so far as contraries ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 60, footnote 12 (Image)
Gospel of Peter, Diatessaron, Apocalypses, Visio Pauli, Testament of Abraham, Acts of X/P, Zosimus, Aristides, Clement, Origen
The Diatessaron of Tatian. (HTML)
The Diatessaron. (HTML)
Section X. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 802 (In-Text, Margin)
[34] Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, while within [35] they are ravening wolves. But by their fruits ye shall know them. For every tree is known by its fruit. For figs are not gathered of thorns, neither are grapes plucked of [36] briers. Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit, but the evil tree bringeth [37] [Arabic, p. 41] forth evil fruit.[Matthew 7:18] The good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can the [38] evil tree bring forth good fruit. The good man from the good treasures that are in his heart bringeth forth good things; and the evil man from the evil treasures that are in his heart bringeth forth evil things: and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 273, 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)
That in Adam’s Sin an Evil Will Preceded the Evil Act. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 730 (In-Text, Margin)
... have turned away to find satisfaction in itself, and so become frigid and benighted; the woman would not have believed the serpent spoke the truth, nor would the man have preferred the request of his wife to the command of God, nor have supposed that it was a venial trangression to cleave to the partner of his life even in a partnership of sin. The wicked deed, then,—that is to say, the trangression of eating the forbidden fruit,—was committed by persons who were already wicked. That “evil fruit”[Matthew 7:18] could be brought forth only by “a corrupt tree.” But that the tree was evil was not the result of nature; for certainly it could become so only by the vice of the will, and vice is contrary to nature. Now, nature could not have been depraved by vice ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 241, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
The Enchiridion. (HTML)
The Preceding Argument is in No Wise Inconsistent with the Saying of Our Lord: ‘A Good Tree Cannot Bring Forth Evil Fruit.’ (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1106 (In-Text, Margin)
But when we say that evil springs out of good, let it not be thought that this contradicts our Lord’s saying: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit.”[Matthew 7:18] For, as He who is the Truth says, you cannot gather grapes of thorns, because grapes do not grow on thorns. But we see that on good soil both vines and thorns may be grown. And in the same way, just as an evil tree cannot bring forth good fruit, so an evil will cannot produce good works. But from the nature of man, which is good, may spring either a good or an evil will. And certainly there was at first no source from ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 223, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin. (HTML)
On the Grace of Christ. (HTML)
The Two Roots of Action, Love and Cupidity; And Each Brings Forth Its Own Fruit. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1827 (In-Text, Margin)
... which yields and produces diversely according to the will of man, and which is capable, at the planter’s own choice, of either shedding a beautiful bloom of virtues, or of bristling with the thorny thickets of vices.” Scarcely heeding what he says, he here makes one and the same root productive both of good and evil fruits, in opposition to gospel truth and apostolic teaching. For the Lord declares that “a good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit;”[Matthew 7:18] and when the Apostle Paul says that covetousness is “the root of all evils,” he intimates to us, of course, that love may be regarded as the root of all good things. On the supposition, therefore, that two trees, one good and the other corrupt, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 300, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
On Marriage and Concupiscence. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
The Good Tree in the Gospel that Cannot Bring Forth Evil Fruit, Does Not Mean Marriage. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2286 (In-Text, Margin)
... works out of an evil will, and evil ones out of a good will? If, however, we were to suppose marriage to be the good tree, according to the Gospel simile which he has mentioned, then, of course, we must on the other hand assume fornication to be the corrupt tree. Wherefore, if a human being is said to be the fruit of marriage, in the sense of the good fruit of a good tree, then undoubtedly a human being could never have been born in fornication. “For a corrupt tree bringeth not forth good fruit.”[Matthew 7:18] Once more, if he were to say that not adultery must be supposed to occupy the place of the tree, but rather human nature, of which man is born, then in this way not even marriage can stand for the tree, but only the human nature of which man is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 461, footnote 9 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
Life and Works of Rufinus with Jerome's Apology Against Rufinus. (HTML)
The Apology of Rufinus. Addressed to Apronianus, in Reply to Jerome's Letter to Pammachius. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Jerome has not only allowed perjury but has practised it. (HTML)
4. But I should like, now that I have satisfied you on my own account, and supported my opinion by an anathema, to make this plain to you further, that he himself declares that in certain orgies and mystical societies to which he belongs perjury is practised by the votaries and associates. That is a certain and most true saying of our God, “By their fruits ye shall know them,”[Matthew 7:16-20] and this also “A tree is known by its fruits.” Well: he says that I have accepted this doctrine of perjury. If then I have been trained to this practice, and this evil tree has indeed its roots within me, it is impossible but that corresponding fruits should have grown upon me, and also that I should have ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 521, footnote 5 (Image)
Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian
The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)
The Conferences of John Cassian. Part III. Containing Conferences XVIII.-XXIV. (HTML)
Conference XXIII. The Third Conference of Abbot Theonas. On Sinlessness. (HTML)
Chapter IV. How man's goodness and righteousness are not good if compared with the goodness and righteousness of God. (HTML)
But if we want also to establish the force of this opinion by still clearer proofs, is it not the case that while we read of many things as called good in the gospel, as a good tree, and good treasure, and a good man, and a good servant, for He says: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit;” and: “a good man out of the good treasure of his heart brings forth good things;” and: “Well done, good and faithful servant;”[Matthew 7:18] and certainly there can be no doubt that none of these are good in themselves, yet if we take into consideration the goodness of God, none of them will be called good, as the Lord says: “None is good save God alone”? In whose sight even the apostles themselves, who in the ...