Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Matthew 10:34
There are 23 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 320, footnote 7 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book I (HTML)
Chapter III.—Texts of Holy Scripture used by these heretics to support their opinions. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2704 (In-Text, Margin)
... faculties,—the one of supporting, and the other of separating; and in so far as he supports and sustains, he is Stauros, while in so far as he divides and separates, he is Horos. They then represent the Saviour as having indicated this twofold faculty: first, the sustaining power, when He said, “Whosoever doth not bear his cross (Stauros), and follow after me, cannot be my disciple;” and again, “Taking up the cross, follow me;” but the separating power when He said, “I came not to send peace, but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] They also maintain that John indicated the same thing when he said, “The fan is in His hand, and He will thoroughly purge the floor, and will gather the wheat into His garner; but the chaff He will burn with fire unquenchable.” By this declaration ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 66, footnote 3 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Tatian (HTML)
Address to the Greeks (HTML)
Chapter IV. The Christians Worship God Alone. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 426 (In-Text, Margin)
For what reason, men of Greece, do you wish to bring the civil powers, as in a pugilistic encounter, into collision with us? And, if I am not disposed to comply with the usages of some of them, why am I to be abhorred as a vile miscreant?[Matthew 10:22-39] Does the sovereign order the payment of tribute, I am ready to render it. Does my master command me to act as a bondsman and to serve, I acknowledge the serfdom. Man is to be honoured as a fellow-man; God alone is to be feared,—He who is not visible to human eyes, nor comes within the compass of human art. Only when I am commanded to deny Him, will I not obey, but will rather ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 333, footnote 6 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
The Five Books Against Marcion. (HTML)
Book III. Wherein Christ is shown to be the Son of God, Who created the world; to have been predicted by the prophets; to have taken human flesh like our own, by a real incarnation. (HTML)
Figurative Style of Certain Messianic Prophecies in the Psalms. Military Metaphors Applied to Christ. (HTML)
... If, however, you will not acknowledge John, you have our common master Paul, who “girds our loins about with truth, and puts on us the breastplate of righteousness, and shoes us with the preparation of the gospel of peace, not of war; who bids us take the shield of faith, wherewith we may be able to quench all the fiery darts of the devil, and the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which (he says) is the word of God.” This sword the Lord Himself came to send on earth, and not peace.[Matthew 10:34] If he is your Christ, then even he is a warrior. If he is not a warrior, and the sword he brandishes is an allegorical one, then the Creator’s Christ in the psalm too may have been girded with the figurative sword of the Word, without any martial ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 644, footnote 1 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Scorpiace. (HTML)
Chapter X. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 8284 (In-Text, Margin)
... spoken. Here I endure the entire course (in question), the Lord Himself not appointing a different quarter of the world for my doing so. For what does He add after finishing with confession and denial? “Think not that I am come to send peace on earth, but a sword,”—undoubtedly on the earth. “For I am come to set a man at variance against his father, and the daughter against her mother, and the mother-in-law against her daughter-in-law. And a man’s foes shall be they of his own household.”[Matthew 10:34] For so is it brought to pass, that the brother delivers up the brother to death, and the father the son: and the children rise up against the parents, and cause them to die. And he who endureth to the end let that man be saved. So that this whole ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 68, footnote 2 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Hippolytus. (HTML)
The Refutation of All Heresies. (HTML)
Book V. (HTML)
The Sethian Theory Concerning “Mixture” And “Composition;” Application of It to Christ; Illustration from the Well of Ampa. (HTML)
... likewise, by some art superior to that of mixing, are distinguished. But already some one also distinguishes water mingled with wine. So, say they, though all things are commingled, they are capable of being separated. Nay, but, he says, derive the same lesson from the case of animals. For when the animal is dead, each of its parts is separated; and when dissolution takes place, the animal in this way vanishes. This is, he says, what has been spoken: “I came not to send peace on the earth, but a sword,”[Matthew 10:34] —that is, the division and separation of the things that have been commingled. For each of the things that have been commingled is separated and divided when it reaches its proper place. For as there is one place of mixture for all animals, so also ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 220, footnote 17 (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 XLIV. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1987 (In-Text, Margin)
... Lord, so that the children of Israel could not stedfastly look upon his face, on account of the glory of his countenance; and here, the Lord Jesus Christ shone like the sun, and His disciples were not able to look upon His face by reason of the glory of His countenance and the intense splendour of the light. There, Moses smote down with the sword those who had set up the calf; and here, the Lord Jesus said, “I came to send a sword upon the earth, and to set a man at variance with his neighbour,”[Matthew 10:34] and so on. There, Moses went without fear into the darkness of the clouds that carry water; and here, the Lord Jesus walked with all power upon the waters. There, Moses gave his commands to the sea; and here, the Lord Jesus, when he was on the sea, ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 234, footnote 10 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Archelaus. (HTML)
A Fragment of the Same Disputation. (HTML)
Chapter I. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2166 (In-Text, Margin)
... to send fire upon the earth?” If you find fault with one who says, “The Lord killeth and maketh alive,” why do you honour Peter, who raised Tabitha to life, but also put Sapphira to death? And if again, you find fault with the one because He has prepared a fire, why do you not find fault with the other, who says, “Depart from me into everlasting fire?” If you find fault with Him who says, “I, God, make peace, and create evil,” explain to us how Jesus says, “I came not to send peace, but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] Since both persons speak in the same terms, one or other of these two things must follow: namely, either they are both good because they use the same language; or, if Jesus passes without censure though He speaks in such terms, you must tell us why ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 345, footnote 2 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Victorinus (HTML)
Commentary on the Apocalypse of the Blessed John (HTML)
From the first chapter (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2249 (In-Text, Margin)
... both now declared the word of the Gospel, and previously by Moses declared the knowledge of the law to the whole world. But because from the same word, as well of the New as of the Old Testament, He will assert Himself upon the whole human race, therefore He is spoken of as two-edged. For the sword arms the soldier, the sword slays the enemy, the sword punishes the deserter. And that He might show to the apostles that He was announcing judgment, He says: “I came not to send peace, but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] And after He had completed His parables, He says to them: “Have ye understood all these things? And they said, We have. And He added, Therefore is every scribe instructed in the kingdom of God like unto a man that is a father of a family, bringing ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 104, footnote 1 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Pseudo-Clementine Literature. (HTML)
The Recognitions of Clement. (HTML)
Book II. (HTML)
Simon's Interruption. (HTML)
... bring forward, be pleased to answer me in the first place.” Then Peter said: “I am ready, only provided that our discussion may be with peace.” Then Simon said: “Do not you see, O simpleton, that in pleading for peace you act in opposition to your Master, and that what you propose is not suitable to him who promises that he will overthrow ignorance? Or, if you are right in asking peace from the audience, then your Master was wrong in saying, ‘I have not come to send peace on earth, but a sword.’[Matthew 10:34] For either you say well, and he not well; or else, if your Master said well, then you not at all well: for you do not understand that your statement is contrary to his, whose disciple you profess yourself to be.”
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 153, footnote 4 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Pseudo-Clementine Literature. (HTML)
The Recognitions of Clement. (HTML)
Book VI. (HTML)
Not Peace, But a Sword. (HTML)
... knowledge of the truth. For it is necessary that, for the sake of salvation, the son, for example, who has received the word of truth, be separated from his unbelieving parents; or again, that the father be separated from his son, or the daughter from her mother. And in this manner the battle of knowledge and ignorance, of truth and error, arises between believing and unbelieving kinsmen and relations. And therefore He who has sent us said again, ‘I am not come to send peace on earth, but a sword.’[Matthew 10:34]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 288, footnote 3 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Pseudo-Clementine Literature. (HTML)
The Clementine Homilies. (HTML)
Homily XI. (HTML)
Not Peace, But a Sword. (HTML)
“Whence the Prophet of the truth, knowing that the world was much in error, and seeing it ranged on the side of evil, did not choose that there should be peace to it while it stood in error. So that till the end he sets himself against all those who are in concord with wickedness, setting truth over against error, sending as it were fire upon those who are sober, namely wrath against the seducer, which is likened to a sword,[Matthew 10:34] and by holding forth the word he destroys ignorance by knowledge, cutting, as it were, and separating the living from the dead. Therefore, while wickedness is being conquered by lawful knowledge, war has taken hold of all. For the submissive son is, for the sake of salvation, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 441, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the last judgment, and the declarations regarding it in the Old and New Testaments. (HTML)
Utterances of the Prophet Isaiah Regarding the Resurrection of the Dead and the Retributive Judgment. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1423 (In-Text, Margin)
... calls simply flesh when He says, “My Spirit shall not always remain in these men, for they are flesh.” As to the words, “Many shall be wounded by the Lord,” this wounding shall produce the second death. It is possible, indeed, to understand fire, sword, and wound in a good sense. For the Lord said that He wished to send fire on the earth. And the cloven tongues appeared to them as fire when the Holy Spirit came. And our Lord says, “I am not come to send peace on earth, but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] And Scripture says that the word of God is a doubly sharp sword, on account of the two edges, the two Testaments. And in the Song of Songs the holy Church says that she is wounded with love, —pierced, as it were, with the arrow of love. But here, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 54, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XIX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 553 (In-Text, Margin)
6. “In the sun hath He set His tabernacle.” Now that He might war against the powers of temporal error, the Lord, being about to send not peace but a sword on earth,[Matthew 10:34] in time, or in manifestation, set so to say His military dwelling, that is, the dispensation of His incarnation. “And He as a bridegroom coming forth out of His chamber” (ver. 5). And He, coming forth out of the Virgin’s womb, where God was united to man’s nature as a bridegroom to a bride. “Rejoiced as a giant to run His way.” Rejoiced as One exceeding strong, and surpassing all other men in power incomparable, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 148, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XLV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1395 (In-Text, Margin)
10. “Gird Thy sword upon Thy thigh, O most Mighty” (ver. 3). What is meant by “Thy sword,” but “Thy word”? It was by that sword He scattered His enemies; by that sword he divided the son from the father, “the daughter from the mother, the daughter-in-law from the mother-in-law.” We read these words in the Gospel, “I came not to send peace, but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] And, “In one house shall five be divided against each other; three against two, and two against three;” i.e. “the father against the son, the daughter against the mother, the daughter-in-law against the mother-in-law.” By what “sword,” but that which Christ brought, was this division wrought? And indeed, my brethren, we ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 245, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2299 (In-Text, Margin)
... that is to say, their being smitten and driven back, that were evil men, and again their being made alive and returning in order that they might be good men? That destruction indeed that David made, strong of hand, our Christ, whose figure that man was bearing; He did those things, He made this destruction with His sword and with His fire: for both He brought into this world. Both “Fire I am come to send into the world,” thou hast in the Gospel: and “A sword I have come to send into the earth,”[Matthew 10:34] thou hast in the Gospel. He brought in fire, whereby might be burned up Mesopotamia in Syria, and Syria Sobal: He brought in a sword whereby might be smitten Edom. Now again this destruction was made for the sake of “those that are changed unto the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 286, footnote 12 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXVIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2697 (In-Text, Margin)
... whereby He may come and possess the nations, ye are to suffer in the sight of men many sorrowful things. But not only faint not, but even exult, not in the sight of men, but in the sight of God. “In hope rejoicing, in tribulation enduring:” “exult ye in the sight of Him.” For they that in the sight of men trouble you, “shall be troubled by the face of Him, the Father of orphans and Judge of widows” (ver. 5). For desolate they suppose them to be, from whom ofttimes by the sword of the Word of God[Matthew 10:34] both parents from sons, and husbands from wives, are severed: but persons destitute and widowed have the consolation “of the Father of orphans and Judge of widows:” they have the consolation of Him that say to Him, “For my father and my mother have ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 476, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XCVII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4460 (In-Text, Margin)
... contrary, will go before Him. What fire then is this?…Behold, we have understood the fire that goeth before Him, that is to be understood of a kind of temporal punishment of the unbelieving and ungodly: let us understand the fire, if possible, of the salvation of the redeemed also; for thus we had proposed. The Lord Himself saith: “I am come to send fire on the earth:” “fire” in the same way as a “sword;” as in another passage He saith, that He was not come to send peace, but a sword, upon earth.[Matthew 10:34] The sword to divide, the fire to burn: but each salutary: for the sword of His own word hath in salutary wise separated us from evil habits. For He brought a sword, and separated every believer either from his father who believed not in Christ, or ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 656, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXLIV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5856 (In-Text, Margin)
8. “Who giveth salvation to kings, who redeemeth David His servant” (ver. 10). Ye know who David is; be yourselves David. Whence “redeemeth He David His servant”? Whence redeemeth He Christ? Whence redeemeth He the Body of Christ? “From the sword of ill intent deliver me.” “From the sword” is not sufficient; he addeth, “of ill intent.” Without doubt there is a sword of good intent. What is the sword of good intent? That whereof the Lord saith, “I came not to send peace on earth, but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] For He was about to separate believers from unbelievers, sons from parents, and to sever all other ties, while the sword cut off what was diseased, but healed the members of Christ. Of good intent then is the sword twice sharpened, powerful with both ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 679, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXLIX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5990 (In-Text, Margin)
... in that it is sharp on both sides. By “swords sharpened on both sides,” we understand the Word of the Lord: it is one sword, but therefore are they called many, because there are many mouths and many tongues of the saints. How is it two edged? It speaks of things temporal, it speaks also of things eternal. In both cases it proveth what it saith, and him whom it strikes, it severeth from the world. Is not this the sword whereof the Lord said, “I am not come to send peace upon earth, but a sword”?[Matthew 10:34] Observe how He came to divide, how He came to sever. He divideth the saints, He divideth the ungodly, He severeth from thee that which hindereth thee. The son willeth to serve God, the father willeth not: the sword cometh, the Word of God cometh, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 23, footnote 24 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Eustochium. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 364 (In-Text, Margin)
... the forest do creep forth. The young lions roar after their prey and seek their meat from God.” The devil looks not for unbelievers, for those who are without, whose flesh the Assyrian king roasted in the furnace. It is the church of Christ that he “makes haste to spoil.” According to Habakkuk, “His food is of the choicest.” A Job is the victim of his machinations, and after devouring Judas he seeks power to sift the [other] apostles. The Saviour came not to send peace upon the earth but a sword.[Matthew 10:34] Lucifer fell, Lucifer who used to rise at dawn; and he who was bred up in a paradise of delight had the well-earned sentence passed upon him, “Though thou exalt thyself as the eagle, and though thou set thy nest among the stars, thence will I bring ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 41, footnote 10 (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 932 (In-Text, Margin)
... came to send fire on the earth? If thou findest fault with Him who saith, The Lord killeth, and maketh alive, why dost thou honour Peter, who raised up Tabitha, but struck Sapphira dead? If again thou findest fault, because He prepared fire, wherefore dost thou not find fault with Him who saith, Depart from Me into everlasting fire? If thou findest fault with Him who saith, I am God that make peace, and create evil, explain how Jesus saith, I came not to send peace but a sword[Matthew 10:34]. Since both speak alike, of two things one, either both are good, because of their agreement, or if Jesus is blameless in so speaking. why blamest thou Him that saith the like in the Old Testament?”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 140, footnote 5 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Chapter VI. The Spirit rebukes just as do the Father and the Son; and indeed judges could not judge without Him, as is shown by the judgments of Solomon and Daniel, which are explained in a few words, by the way; and no other than the Holy Spirit inspired Daniel. (HTML)
... arising from those who were contending, as one, having overlain the child which she had borne, wished to claim the child of another, and the other was protecting her own son, he both discovered deceit in the very hidden thoughts, and affection in the mother’s heart, was certainly so admirable only by the gift of the Holy Spirit. For no other sword would have penetrated the hidden feeling of those women, except the sword of the Spirit, of which the Lord says: “I am not come to send peace but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] For the inmost mind cannot be penetrated by steel, but by the Spirit: “For the Spirit of understanding is holy, one only, manifold, subtle, lively,” and, farther on, “overseeing all things.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 141, footnote 6 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Chapter VII. The Son Himself does not judge or punish without the Spirit, so that the same Spirit is called the Sword of the Word. But inasmuch as the Word is in turn called the Sword of the Spirit, the highest unity of power is thereby recognized in each. (HTML)
45. And since that instance comes before us, that the Lord Jesus shall slay with the Spirit of His mouth, the Spirit is understood to be as it were the Sword of the Word. Lastly, in the Gospel also the Lord Jesus Himself says: “I came not to send peace but a sword.”[Matthew 10:34] For He came that He might give the Spirit; and so there is in His mouth a two-edged sword, which is in truth the grace of the Spirit. So the Spirit is the Sword of the Word.