Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Matthew 23:37
There are 31 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 518, footnote 6 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book IV (HTML)
Chapter XXXVI.—The prophets were sent from one and the same Father from whom the Son was sent. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4392 (In-Text, Margin)
... seeking the fruit of righteousness from them, which he did not find), and also by the circumstance that, for the reason already mentioned, the fig-tree should be hewn down. And, without using a parable, the Lord said to Jerusalem, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest those that are sent unto thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together, as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house shall be left unto you desolate.”[Matthew 23:37] For that which had been said in the parable, “Behold, for three years I come seeking fruit,” and in clear terms, again, [where He says], “How often would I have gathered thy children together,” shall be [found] a falsehood, if we do not understand ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 518, footnote 8 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book IV (HTML)
Chapter XXXVII.—Men are possessed of free will, and endowed with the faculty of making a choice. It is not true, therefore, that some are by nature good, and others bad. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4394 (In-Text, Margin)
1. This expression [of our Lord], “How often would I have gathered thy children together, and thou wouldest not,”[Matthew 23:37] set forth the ancient law of human liberty, because God made man a free [agent] from the beginning, possessing his own power, even as he does his own soul, to obey the behests (ad utendum sententia) of God voluntarily, and not by compulsion of God. For there is no coercion with God, but a good will [towards us] is present with Him continually. And therefore does He give good counsel to all. And in man, as well as in angels, He has ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 520, footnote 5 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book IV (HTML)
Chapter XXXVII.—Men are possessed of free will, and endowed with the faculty of making a choice. It is not true, therefore, that some are by nature good, and others bad. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4412 (In-Text, Margin)
... for this reason, “he that believeth in Him has eternal life while he who believeth not the Son hath not eternal life, but the wrath of God shall remain upon him.” In the same manner therefore the Lord, both showing His own goodness, and indicating that man is in his own free will and his own power, said to Jerusalem, “How often have I wished to gather thy children together, as a hen [gathereth] her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Wherefore your house shall be left unto you desolate.”[Matthew 23:37-38]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 212, footnote 14 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Instructor (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter V.—All Who Walk According to Truth are Children of God. (HTML)
And that He calls us chickens the Scripture testifies: “As a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings.”[Matthew 23:37] Thus are we the Lord’s chickens; the Word thus marvellously and mystically describing the simplicity of childhood. For sometimes He calls us children, sometimes chickens, sometimes infants, and at other times sons, and “a new people,” and “a recent people.” “And my servants shall be called by a new name” (a new name, He says, fresh and eternal, pure and simple, and childlike and true), which shall be blessed on the earth. And again, He ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 228, footnote 9 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Instructor (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter IX.—That It is the Prerogative of the Same Power to Be Beneficent and to Punish Justly. Also the Manner of the Instruction of the Logos. (HTML)
Admonition, then, is the censure of loving care, and produces understanding. Such is the Instructor in His admonitions, as when He says in the Gospel, “How often would I have gathered thy children, as a bird gathers her young ones under her wings, and ye would not!”[Matthew 23:37] And again, the Scripture admonishes, saying, “And they committed adultery with stock and stone, and burnt incense to Baal.” For it is a very great proof of His love, that, though knowing well the shamelessness of the people that had kicked and bounded away, He notwithstanding exhorts them to repentance, and says by Ezekiel, “Son of man, thou dwellest in the midst ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 229, footnote 20 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Instructor (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter IX.—That It is the Prerogative of the Same Power to Be Beneficent and to Punish Justly. Also the Manner of the Instruction of the Logos. (HTML)
Visitation is severe rebuke. He uses this species in the Gospel: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee!” The reduplication of the name gives strength to the rebuke. For he that knows God, how does he persecute God’s servants? Wherefore He says, “Your house is left desolate; for I say unto you, Henceforth ye shall not see Me, till ye shall say, Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.”[Matthew 23:37-39] For if you do not receive His love, ye shall know His power.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 305, footnote 15 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter V.—Philosophy the Handmaid of Theology. (HTML)
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children, as a hen her chickens!”[Matthew 23:37] And Jerusalem is, when interpreted, “a vision of peace.” He therefore shows prophetically, that those who peacefully contemplate sacred things are in manifold ways trained to their calling. What then? He “would,” and could not. How often, and where? Twice; by the prophets, and by the advent. The expression, then, “How often,” shows wisdom to be manifold; every mode of quantity and quality, it by all means saves some, both in time and in eternity. ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 389, footnote 1 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
A Letter from Origen to Africanus. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3042 (In-Text, Margin)
... blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias, son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation.” And what follows is of the same tenor: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.”[Matthew 23:29-38]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 510, footnote 6 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews. (HTML)
Book I. (HTML)
... and as a keeper’s lodge in a garden of cucumbers, as a city which is besieged. And unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we should have been as Sodoma, and we should have been like unto Gomorrah.” Also in the Gospel the Lord says: “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, that killest the prophets, and stonest them that are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and thou wouldst not! Behold, your house shall be left unto you desolate.”[Matthew 23:37-38]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 242, 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 III. (HTML)
Reign of Christ. (HTML)
... neglected His own kindred. For He, being thought worthy to be King of the world to come, fights against him who, by predestination, has usurped the kingdom that now is. And the thing which exceedingly grieved Him is this, that by those very persons for whom, as for sons, he did battle, He was assailed, on account of their ignorance. And yet He loved even those who hated Him, and wept over the unbelieving, and blessed those who slandered Him, and prayed for those who were in enmity against Him.[Matthew 23:37] And not only did He do this as a father, but also taught His disciples to do the like, bearing themselves as towards brethren. This did our Father, this did our Prophet. This is reasonable, that He should be King over His children; that by the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 106, footnote 21 (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 XLI. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2808 (In-Text, Margin)
[4] [Arabic, p. 155][Matthew 23:37] O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, slayer of the prophets, and stoner of them that are sent unto her! how many times did I wish to gather thy children, as [5] a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Your house shall [6] be left over you desolate. Verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 268, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
The Enchiridion. (HTML)
In What Sense Does the Apostle Say that ’God Will Have All Men to Be Saved,’ When, as a Matter of Fact, All are Not Saved? (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1278 (In-Text, Margin)
... willing.” This, indeed cannot be said of infants, for it is not in their power either to will or not to will. But if we could attribute to their will the childish movements they make at baptism, when they make all the resistance they can, we should say that even they are not willing to be saved. Our Lord says plainly, however, in the Gospel, when upbraiding the impious city: “How often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!”[Matthew 23:37] as if the will of God had been overcome by the will of men, and when the weakest stood in the way with their want of will, the will of the strongest could not be carried out. And where is that omnipotence which hath done all that it pleased on earth ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 294, 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 Attainment of Cheerfulness in the Duty of Catechising, and of Various Causes Producing Weariness in the Catechumen. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1400 (In-Text, Margin)
... ears? For this reason, therefore, He became a little child in the midst of us, (and) like a nurse cherishing her children. For is it a pleasure to lisp shortened and broken words, unless love invites us? And yet men desire to have infants to whom they have to do that kind of service; and it is a sweeter thing to a mother to put small morsels of masticated food into her little son’s mouth, than to eat up and devour larger pieces herself. In like manner, accordingly, let not the thought of the hen[Matthew 23:37] recede from your heart, who covers her tender brood with her drooping feathers, and with broken voice calls her chirping young ones to her, while they that turn away from her fostering wings in their pride become a prey to birds. For if intelligence ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 434, 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, Luke xi. 5, ‘Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight,’ etc. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3374 (In-Text, Margin)
... answer in defence of your hope against the deriders and blasphemers of the Christian name. Let no one by his murmuring turn you back from waiting for the things to come. All who by reason of these adversities blaspheme our Christ, are the “scorpion’s” tail. Let us put our egg under the wings of that Hen of the Gospel, which crieth out to that false and abandoned city, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen her chickens, and thou wouldest not!”[Matthew 23:37] Let it not be said to us, “How often would I, and thou wouldest not!” For that hen is the Divine Wisdom; but assumed flesh to accommodate Itself to its chickens. See the hen with feathers bristling, with wings hanging down, with voice broken, and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 101, 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 IV. 1–42. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 330 (In-Text, Margin)
7. As weak, then, He nourishes the weak, as a hen her chickens; for He likened Him self to a hen: “How often,” He saith to Jerusalem, “would I have gathered thy children under my wings, as a hen her chickens; but thou wouldest not!”[Matthew 23:37] And you see, brethren, how a hen becomes weak with her chickens. No other bird, when it is a mother, is recognized at once to be so. We see all kinds of sparrows building their nests before our eyes; we see swallows, storks, doves, every day building their nests; but we do not know them to be parents, except when we see them on their nests. But the hen is so enfeebled over her ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 238, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LIX (HTML)
Part 1 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2238 (In-Text, Margin)
9. Something else I am admonished to say in this place of the loftiness of our Head Himself: for He was made weak even unto death, and He took on Him the weakness of flesh, in order that the chickens of Jerusalem He might gather under His wings, like a hen showing herself weak with her little ones.[Matthew 23:37] For have we not observed this thing in some bird at some time or other, even in those which build nests before our eyes, as the house-sparrows, as swallows, so to speak, our annual guests, as storks, as various sorts of birds, which before our eyes build nests, and hatch eggs, feed chickens, as the very doves which daily we see; and some bird to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 262, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2480 (In-Text, Margin)
... helper to him in a good work, lest through his weakness he fail. “And in the covering of Thy wings I will exult.” I am cheerful in good works, because over me is the covering of Thy wings. If thou protect me not, forasmuch as I am a chicken, the kite will seize me. For our Lord Himself saith in a certain place to that Jerusalem, a certain city, where He was crucified: “Jerusalem,” He saith, “Jerusalem, how often I have willed to gather thy sons, as though a hen her chickens, and thou wouldest not.”[Matthew 23:37] Little ones we are: therefore may God protect us under the shadow of His wings. What when we shall have grown greater? A good thing it is for us that even then He should protect us, so that under Him the greater, alway we be chickens. For alway He ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 309, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXIX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2997 (In-Text, Margin)
... in saying, “If we shall have let go this man thus, there will come the Romans, and take away from us both place and kingdom”? Behold, both they did not let Him go alive, and He liveth: and there have come the Romans, and have taken from them both place and kingdom. But now we heard, when the Gospel was being read, “Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how often would I have gathered together thy sons, as a hen her chickens under her wings, and thou wouldest not? Behold there is left to you your house forsaken.”[Matthew 23:37-38] …
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 447, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XCI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4294 (In-Text, Margin)
... careful never to leave that spot, where no foe dares approach. If the hen defends her chickens beneath her wings; how much more shalt thou be safe beneath the wings of God, even against the devil and his angels, the powers who fly about in mid air like hawks, to carry off the weak young one? For the comparison of the hen to the very Wisdom of God is not without ground; for Christ Himself, our Lord and Saviour, speaks of Himself as likened to a hen; “how often would I have gathered thy children,” etc.[Matthew 23:37] That Jerusalem would not: let us be willing.…If you consider other birds, brethren, you will find many that hatch their eggs, and keep their young warm: but none that weakens herself in sympathy with her chickens, as the hen does. We see swallows, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 497, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4597 (In-Text, Margin)
... blows of their beaks, and for three days to mourn them when slain by themselves in the nest: after which they say the mother wounds herself deeply, and pours forth her blood over her young, bathed in which they recover life. This may be true, it may be false: yet if it be true, see how it agreeth with Him, who gave us life by His blood. It agreeth with Him in that the mother’s flesh recalleth to life her young with her blood; it agreeth well. For He calleth Himself a hen brooding over her young.[Matthew 23:37] …If, then, it be so truly, this bird doth closely resemble the flesh of Christ, by whose blood we have been called to life. But how may it agree with Christ, that the bird herself slays her own young? Doth not this agree with it? “I will slay, and I ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 537, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CIX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4924 (In-Text, Margin)
... own free-will, and not by compulsion? But this very hatred is the greatest crime of the persecutor, although it be the willing atonement of the sufferer. And he hath sufficiently explained the sense of the above words, “In place of loving me,” since they owed love not as a general duty only, but in return for His love: in that he hath here added, “for my good will.” This love He mentioneth in the Gospel, when He saith, “How often would I have gathered thy children together, and thou wouldest not!”[Matthew 23:37]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 593, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXXII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5427 (In-Text, Margin)
... Jerusalem.” What Jerusalem? This earthly Jerusalem also is wont to be called by the name: though this Jerusalem is but the shadow of that. And what great thing is it to stand in this Jerusalem, since this Jerusalem hath not been able to stand, but hath been turned into a ruin? Doth then the Holy Spirit pronounce this, out of the kindled heart of the loving Psalmist, as a great thing? Is not it that Jerusalem, unto whom the Lord said, “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the Prophets,” etc.[Matthew 23:37] What great thing then did he desire; to stand among those who slew the Prophets, and stoned them that were sent unto them? God forbid that he should think of that Jerusalem, who so loveth, who so burneth, who so longeth to reach that Jerusalem, “our ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 103, footnote 5 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
An Exhortation to Theodore After His Fall. (HTML)
Letter I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 274 (In-Text, Margin)
... Scriptures. See at least, both in the introduction of Jeremiah, and many other places of the prophets, when He is despised and contemned, how He again hastens forward and pursues the friendship of those who turn away from him; which also He Himself made clear in the Gospels saying, “O Jerusalem! Jerusalem! thou that killest the prophets and stonest them that are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not?”[Matthew 23:37] And Paul writing to the Corinthians said “that God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not reckoning their trespasses unto them, and having committed unto us the word of reconciliation. We are ambassadors therefore on behalf of Christ, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 457, footnote 3 (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 XVII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1722 (In-Text, Margin)
... iniquity is there. “If,” saith the prophet, “the number of the sons of Israel be as the sand of the sea, the remnant shall be saved;” that is to say, “Multitude will never prevail with Me.” So also Christ spoke. He called cities wretched; not because of their littleness, nor because they were not of metropolitan rank. And Jerusalem itself again, He calls wretched for the very same reason, speaking thus; “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem; thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee!”[Matthew 23:37] For what advantage, I ask, does a multitude bring, if their system of living be vicious? Nay, on the contrary, even injury results from it. What else, indeed, hath wrought the evils which have lately sprung up? Was it not the sloth, the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 497, footnote 2 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
Life and Works of Rufinus with Jerome's Apology Against Rufinus. (HTML)
Jerome's Apology for Himself Against the Books of Rufinus. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
As to “Men loving their wives as their own bodies.” (HTML)
... flesh which is to see the salvation of God, that it nourishes and cherishes it, and trains it by discipline and satisfies it with the bread of heaven, and gives it to drink of the blood of Christ: so that it may become well-liking through wholesome food, and may follow its husband freely, without being weighed down by any weakness. It is by a beautiful image that the soul is said to nourish and cherish the body as Christ nourishes and cherishes the church, since it was he who said to Jerusalem:[Matthew 23:37]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 60, footnote 13 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
Paula and Eustochium to Marcella. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 938 (In-Text, Margin)
... own.[Matthew 23:37] And will you now let us fly about at random with no mother near us? Will you leave us to dread the swoop of the hawk and the shadow of each passing bird of prey? Separated from you, we do what we can: we utter our mournful plaint, and more by sobs ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 62, footnote 1 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
Paula and Eustochium to Marcella. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 964 (In-Text, Margin)
... verses, however, are susceptible of a deeper interpretation. But things are changed since then. The risen Lord has proclaimed in tones of thunder: “Your house is left unto you desolate.” With tears He has prophesied its downfall: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent un to thee; how often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not. Behold your house is left unto you desolate.”[Matthew 23:37-38] The veil of the temple has been rent; an army has encompassed Jerusalem, it has been stained by the blood of the Lord. Now, therefore, its guardian angels have forsaken it and the grace of Christ has been withdrawn. Josephus, himself a Jewish ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 119, footnote 16 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Paulinus. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1747 (In-Text, Margin)
... virtue. What a contrast he offers to us, the disciples of a poor Christ, who cram our pockets with gold and cling under pretext of almsgiving to our old riches. How can we faithfully distribute what belongs to another when we thus timidly keep back what is our own? When the stomach is full, it is easy to talk of fasting. What is praiseworthy is not to have been at Jerusalem but to have lived a good life while there. The city which we are to praise and to seek is not that which has slain the prophets[Matthew 23:37] and shed the blood of Christ, but that which is made glad by the streams of the river, which is set upon a mountain and so cannot be hid, which the apostle declares to be a mother of the saints, and in which he rejoices to have his citizenship with ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 35, 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 846 (In-Text, Margin)
... There have been many imaginations by many persons, and all have failed. Some have thought that God is fire; others that He is, as it were, a man with wings, because of a true text ill understood, Thou shalt hide me under the shadow of Thy wings. They forgot that our Lord Jesus Christ, the Only-begotten, speaks in like manner concerning Himself to Jerusalem, How often would I have gathered thy children together even as a hen doth gather her chickens under her wings, and ye would not[Matthew 23:37]. For whereas God’s protecting power was conceived as wings, they failing to understand this sank down to the level of things human, and supposed that the Unsearchable exists in the likeness of man. Some again dared to say that He has seven eyes, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 9, page 197, footnote 4 (Image)
Hilary of Poitiers, John of Damascus
Title Page (HTML)
De Trinitate or On the Trinity. (HTML)
De Trinitate or On the Trinity. (HTML)
Book X (HTML)
... debt of His tears, Jerusalem, the godless parricide, whom no suffering could requite for the slaughter of Apostles and Prophets, and the murder of her Lord Himself? He might weep for the disasters and death which befall mankind: but could He grieve for the fall of that doomed and desperate race? What, I ask, was this mystery of weeping? His soul wept for sorrow; was not it the soul which sent forth the Prophets? Which would so often have gathered the chickens together under the shadow of His wings[Matthew 23:37]? But God the Word cannot grieve, nor can the Spirit weep: nor could His soul possibly do anything before the body existed. Yet we cannot doubt that Jesus Christ truly wept.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 425, footnote 6 (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 XIII. The Third Conference of Abbot Chæremon. On the Protection of God. (HTML)
Chapter VII. Of the main purpose of God and His daily Providence. (HTML)
... men, but only some instead of all to be saved? Those then who perish, perish against His will, as He testifies against each one of them day by day: “Turn from your evil ways, and why will ye die, O house of Israel?” And again: “How often would I have gathered thy children together as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not;” and: “Wherefore is this people in Jerusalem turned away with a stubborn revolting? They have hardened their faces and refused to return.”[Matthew 23:37] The grace of Christ then is at hand every day, which, while it “willeth all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth,” calleth all without any exception, saying: “Come unto Me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will ...