Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
John 5:17
There are 32 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 302, footnote 3 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter I.—Preface—The Author’s Object—The Utility of Written Compositions. (HTML)
... water; and that of which no one partakes, turns to putrefaction. Use keeps steel brighter, but disuse produces rust in it. For, in a word, exercise produces a healthy condition both in souls and bodies. “No one lighteth a candle, and putteth it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may give light to those who are regarded worthy of the feast.” For what is the use of wisdom, if it makes not him who can hear it wise? For still the Saviour saves, “and always works, as He sees the Father.”[John 5:17] For by teaching, one learns more; and in speaking, one is often a hearer along with his audience. For the teacher of him who speaks and of him who hears is one—who waters both the mind and the word. Thus the Lord did not hinder from doing good while ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 164, footnote 9 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
An Answer to the Jews. (HTML)
Of the Prophecies of the Birth and Achievements of Christ. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1312 (In-Text, Margin)
... moreover, He was to do acts of power from the Father: “Behold, our God will deal retributive judgment; Himself will come and save us: then shall the infirm be healed, and the eyes of the blind shall see, and the ears of the deaf shall hear, and the mutes’ tongues shall be loosed, and the lame shall leap as an hart,” and so on; which works not even you deny that Christ did, inasmuch as you were wont to say that, “on account of the works ye stoned Him not, but because He did them on the Sabbaths.”[John 5:17-18]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 616, footnote 8 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Praxeas. (HTML)
In This and the Four Following Chapters It is Shewn, by a Minute Analysis of St. John's Gospel, that the Father and Son are Constantly Spoken of as Distinct Persons. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 8025 (In-Text, Margin)
... but the wrath of God abideth on him.” Whom, indeed, did He reveal to the woman of Samaria? Was it not “the Messias which is called Christ?” And so He showed, of course, that He was not the Father, but the Son; and elsewhere He is expressly called “the Christ, the Son of God,” and not the Father. He says, therefore,” My meat is to do the will of Him that sent me, and to finish His work;” whilst to the Jews He remarks respecting the cure of the impotent man, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] “My Father and I”—these are the Son’s words. And it was on this very account that “the Jews sought the more intently to kill Him, not only because He broke the Sabbath, but also because He said that God was His Father, thus making Himself equal with ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 639, footnote 8 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Novatian. (HTML)
A Treatise of Novatian Concerning the Trinity. (HTML)
He Proves Also that the Words Spoken to Philip Make Nothing for the Sabellians. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5245 (In-Text, Margin)
... doubt. And thus the Lord in the present passage said, “Henceforth ye have known and have seen Him.” Now He said that the Father should be seen by whomsoever had followed the Son, not as if the Son Himself should be the Father seen, but that whosoever was willing to follow Him, and be His disciple, should obtain the reward of being able to see the Father. For He also is the image of God the Father; so that it is added, moreover, to these things, that “as the Father worketh, so also the Son worketh.”[John 5:17] And the Son is an imitator of all the Father’s works, so that every one may regard it just as if he saw the Father, when he sees Him who always imitates the invisible Father in all His works. But if Christ is the Father Himself, in what manner does ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 203, footnote 11 (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 XXXI. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1730 (In-Text, Margin)
... the right vision, an emblematic law, and also a real law. Thus, to take an example, after God had made the world, and all things that are in it, in the space of six days, He rested on the seventh day from all His works; by which statement I do not mean to affirm that He rested because He was fatigued, but that He did so as having brought to its perfection every creature which He had resolved to introduce. And yet in the sequel it, the new law, says: “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] Does that mean, then, that He is still making heaven, or sun, or man, or animals, or trees, or any such thing? Nay; but the meaning is, that when these visible objects were perfectly finished, He rested from that kind of work; while, however, He ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 313, footnote 6 (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)
Theophila. (HTML)
Marriage Not Abolished by the Commendation of Virginity. (HTML)
Let us begin with Genesis, that we may give its place of antiquity and supremacy to this scripture. Now the sentence and ordinance of God respecting the begetting of children is confessedly being fulfilled to this day, the Creator still fashioning man. For this is quite manifest, that God, like a painter, is at this very time working at the world, as the Lord also taught, “My Father worketh hitherto.”[John 5:17] But when the rivers shall cease to flow and fall into the reservoir of the sea, and the light shall be perfectly separated from the darkness,—for the separation is still going on,—and the dry land shall henceforth cease to bring forth its fruits with creeping things and four-footed beasts, and ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 369, footnote 3 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Methodius. (HTML)
From the Discourse on the Resurrection. (HTML)
Part I. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2892 (In-Text, Margin)
... earth and water, conceded the growth to God alone, where he says, “Neither is he that planteth anything, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.” For he knew that Wisdom, the first-born of God, the parent and artificer of all things, brings forth everything into the world; whom the ancients called Nature and Providence, because she, with constant provision and care, gives to all things birth and growth. “For,” says the Wisdom of God, “my Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] Now it is on this account that Solomon called Wisdom the artificer of all things, since God is in no respect poor, but able richly to create, and make, and vary, and increase all things.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 78, footnote 3 (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 XXII. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1565 (In-Text, Margin)
... for Jesus had removed from that place to another, because of the press of the great multitude [22] which was in that place. And after two days Jesus happened upon him in the temple, and said unto him, Behold, thou art whole: sin not again, lest there come upon [23] thee what is worse than the first. And that man went, and said to the Jews that it [24] was Jesus that had healed him. And because of that the Jews persecuted Jesus and [25] sought to kill him, because he was doing this on the sabbath.[John 5:17] And Jesus said unto [26] them, My Father worketh until now, and I also work. And because of this especially the Jews sought to kill him, not because he profaned the sabbath only; but for his saying also that God was his Father, and his making ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 502, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the eternal happiness of the saints, the resurrection of the body, and the miracles of the early Church. (HTML)
Of the Blessings with Which the Creator Has Filled This Life, Obnoxious Though It Be to the Curse. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1659 (In-Text, Margin)
Of these two blessings, then, which we have said flow from God’s goodness, as from a fountain, towards our nature, vitiated by sin and condemned to punishment, the one, propagation, was conferred by God’s benediction when He made those first works, from which He rested on the seventh day. But the other, conformation, is conferred in that work of His wherein “He worketh hitherto.”[John 5:17] For were He to withdraw His efficacious power from things, they should neither be able to go on and complete the periods assigned to their measured movements, nor should they even continue in possession of that nature they were created in. God, then, so created man that He gave him what we may call ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 221, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings
Writings in Connection with the Manichæan Controversy. (HTML)
Reply to Faustus the Manichæan. (HTML)
Faustus willing to believe not only that the Jewish but that all Gentile prophets wrote of Christ, if it should be proved; but he would none the less insist upon rejecting their superstitions. Augustin maintains that all Moses wrote is of Christ, and that his writings must be either accepted or rejected as a whole. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 573 (In-Text, Margin)
... and therefore blessed or sanctified it as His haven of repose after toil, and commanded that breaking the Sabbath should be punished with death. The Jews, in obedience to Moses, insisted strongly on this, and so would not even listen to Christ when He told them that God always works, and that no day is appointed for the intermission of His pure and unwearied energy, and that accordingly He Himself had to work incessantly even on Sabbath. "My Father," he says, "worketh always, and I too must work."[John 5:17] Again, Moses places circumcision among the rites pleasing to God, and commands every male to be circumcised in the foreskin of his flesh, and declares that this is a necessary sign of the covenant which God made with Abraham, and that every male not ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 231, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
The Harmony of the Gospels. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Of the Evangelist John, and the Distinction Between Him and the Other Three. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1635 (In-Text, Margin)
... sentence, “The Jews sought to kill Him, because He not only broke the Sabbath, but said also that God was His Father, making Himself equal with God.” In this passage it is made sufficiently plain that He did not speak of God as His Father in the ordinary sense in which holy men are in the habit of using the phrase, but that He meant that He is His equal. For, a little before this, He had said to those who were impeaching Him with violating the Sabbath-day, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] Then their fury flamed forth, not merely because He said that God was His Father, but because He wished it to be understood that He was equal with God, when He used the phrase, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.” In which utterance He also ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 327, 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, Matt. xii. 32, ‘Whosoever shall speak a word against the Holy Spirit, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, nor in that which is to come.’ Or, ‘on the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost.’ (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2428 (In-Text, Margin)
... seem to resist the gift of the Holy Spirit, because by that gift is wrought the remission of sins?” Now on this point, I will also ask, Whether Christ only cast out devils, or the Father and the Holy Spirit also? For if Christ only, what means His saying, “The Father that dwelleth in Me, He doeth the works.” For so it is said, “He doeth the works,” as if the Son doeth them not, but the Father who dwelleth in the Son. Why then in another place doth He say, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] And a little after, “For what things soever He doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise.” But when in another place He says, “If I had not done amongst them the works which none other man did,” He speaks as if He did them alone. Now if these things ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 477, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)
Again in John v. 2, etc., on the five porches, where lay a great multitude of impotent folk, and of the pool of Siloa. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3703 (In-Text, Margin)
4. The Jews then were troubled. What is this? “Why doeth He these things on the sabbath days?” And especially at those words of the Lord, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] Their carnal understanding of this, that God rested on the seventh day from all His works, “troubled them.” For this is written in Genesis, and most excellently written it is, and on the best reasons. But they thinking that God as it were rested from fatigue on the seventh day after all, and that He therefore blessed it, because on it He was refreshed from His weariness, did not in their foolishness ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 478, 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)
Again in John v. 2, etc., on the five porches, where lay a great multitude of impotent folk, and of the pool of Siloa. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3712 (In-Text, Margin)
... excellently said by the Lord Jesus Christ, “My Father worketh even hitherto.” In that He doth not abandon the creature which He made. And He said, “As He worketh, so do I also work.” In this He at once signified that He was equal with God. “My Father,” saith He, “worketh hitherto, and I work.” Their carnal sense touching the rest was troubled. For they thought that the Lord being wearied rested, that He should work no more. They hear, “My Father worketh even hitherto:” they are troubled. “And I work:”[John 5:17] He hath made Himself equal with God: they are troubled. But be not alarmed. The water is troubled, now the sick man is to be cured. What meaneth this? Therefore are they troubled, that the Lord may suffer. The Lord doth suffer, the precious Blood is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 132, 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 V. 19. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 404 (In-Text, Margin)
2. Now you need to be reminded whence this discourse arose, by reason of what precedes this passage, where the Lord had cured a certain man among those who were lying in the five porches of that pool of Solomon, and to whom He had said, “Take up thy bed, and go unto thy house.” But this He had done on the Sabbath; and hence the Jews, being troubled, were falsely accusing Him as a destroyer and transgressor of the law. He then said to them, “My Father worketh even until now, and I work.”[John 5:17] For they, taking the observance of the Sabbath in a carnal sense, fancied that God had, as it were, slept after the labor of framing the world even to this day; and that therefore He had sanctified that day, from which He began to rest as from labor. ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 456, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XCIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4343 (In-Text, Margin)
... lastly, He on that very day created man in His own likeness and image. For these days were not without reason ordained in such order, but for that ages also were to run in a like course, before we rest in God. But then we rest if we do good works. As a type of this, it is written of God, “God rested on the seventh day,” when He had made all His works very good. For He was not wearied, so as to need rest, nor hath He now left off to work, for our Lord Christ saith openly, “My Father worketh hitherto.”[John 5:17] For He saith this unto the Jews, who thought carnally of God, and understood not that God worketh in quiet, and always worketh, and is always in quiet. We also, then, whom God willed then to figure in Himself, shall have rest after all good ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 218, footnote 3 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
Homily on the Paralytic Let Down Through the Roof: and Concerning the Equality of the Divine Father and the Son. (HTML)
Homily on the Paralytic Let Down Through the Roof. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 728 (In-Text, Margin)
... Himself equal with God, which is a far greater thing, for He effected this by the demonstration of His deeds. How then do the envious and wicked act, and those who seek to find a handle in every direction? “Why does this man blaspheme?” they say for “no man can forgive sins save God alone.” As they persecuted Him there because He broke the Sabbath, and took occasion from their reproaches to declare His equality with the Father in the form of a defence, saying “my Father worketh hitherto and I work,”[John 5:17] so here also starting from the accusations which they make He proves from these His exact likeness to the Father. For what was it they said? “No man can forgive sins save God alone.” Inasmuch then as they themselves laid down this definition, they ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 241, footnote 2 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)
Dialogues. The “Eranistes” or “Polymorphus” of the Blessed Theodoretus, Bishop of Cyrus. (HTML)
The Impassible. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1559 (In-Text, Margin)
From his discourse on the words “My Father worketh hitherto and I work”:[John 5:17] —
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 232, footnote 8 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Circular to Bishops of Egypt and Libya. (Ad Episcopos Ægypti Et Libyæ Epistola Encyclica.) (HTML)
To the Bishops of Egypt. (HTML)
Chapter II (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1248 (In-Text, Margin)
... again from the dead. And as, being Word and Wisdom of the Father, He has all the attributes of the Father, His eternity, and His unchangeableness, and the being like Him in all respects and in all things, and is neither before nor after, but co-existent with the Father, and is the very form of the Godhead, and is the Creator, and is not created: (for since He is in essence like the Father, He cannot be a creature, but must be the Creator, as Himself hath said, ‘My Father worketh hitherto, and I work[John 5:17]:’) so being made man, and bearing our flesh, He is necessarily said to be created and made, and that is proper to all flesh; however, these men, like Jewish vintners, who mix their wine with water, debase the Word, and subject His Godhead to their ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 359, footnote 7 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Discourse II (HTML)
Chapter XVI.--Introductory to Proverbs viii. 22, that the Son is not a Creature. Arian formula, a creature but not as one of the creatures; but each creature is unlike all other creatures; and no creature can create. The Word then differs from all creatures in that in which they, though otherwise differing, all agree together, as creatures; viz. in being an efficient cause; in being the one medium or instrumental agent in creation; moreover in being the revealer of the Father; and in being the object of worship. (HTML)
... Zorobabel the wise says, ‘All the earth calleth upon the Truth, and the heaven blesseth it: all works shake and tremble at it.’ But if the whole earth hymns the Framer and the Truth, and blesses, and fears it, and its Framer is the Word, and He Himself says, ‘I am the Truth,’ it follows that the Word is not a creature, but alone proper to the Father, in whom all things are disposed, and He is celebrated by all, as Framer; for ‘I was by Him disposing;’ and ‘My Father worketh hitherto, and I work[John 5:17].’ And the word ‘hitherto’ shews His eternal existence in the Father as the Word; for it is proper to the Word to work the Father’s works and not to be external to Him.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 363, footnote 12 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Discourse II (HTML)
Introduction to Proverbs viii. 22 continued. Absurdity of supposing a Son or Word created in order to the creation of other creatures; as to the creation being unable to bear God's immediate hand, God condescends to the lowest. Moreover, if the Son a creature, He too could not bear God's hand, and an infinite series of media will be necessary. Objected, that, as Moses who led out the Israelites was a man, so our Lord; but Moses was not the Agent in creation:--again, that unity is found in created ministrations, but all such ministrations are defective and dependent:--again, that He learned to create, yet could God's Wisdom need teaching? and why should He learn, if the Father worketh hitherto? If the Son was created to create us, He is for (HTML)
... made by God alone, since they consider the Son to be of such a nature and so made. But God is deficient in nothing: perish the thought! for He has said Himself, ‘I am full.’ Nor did the Word become Framer of all from teaching; but being the Image and Wisdom of the Father, He does the things of the Father. Nor hath He made the Son for the making of things created; for behold, though the Son exists, still the Father is seen to work, as the Lord Himself says, ‘My Father worketh hitherto and I work[John 5:17].’ If however, as you say, the Son came into being for the purpose of making the things after Him, and yet the Father is seen to work even after the Son, you must hold even in this light the making of such a Son to be superfluous. Besides, why, when ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 441, footnote 5 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Discourse IV (HTML)
Since the Word is from God, He must be Son. Since the Son is from everlasting, He must be the Word; else either He is superior to the Word, or the Word is the Father. Texts of the New Testament which state the unity of the Son with the Father; therefore the Son is the Word. Three hypotheses refuted--1. That the Man is the Son; 2. That the Word and Man together are the Son; 3. That the Word became Son on His incarnation. Texts of the Old Testament which speak of the Son. If they are merely prophetical, then those concerning the Word may be such also. (HTML)
22. For if, while He is not Son, we are sons, God is our Father and not His. How then does He appropriate the name instead, saying, ‘My Father,’ and ‘I from the Father[John 5:17]?’ for if He be common Father of all, He is not His Father only, nor did He alone come out from the Father. But he says, that He is sometimes called our Father also, because He has Himself become partaker in our flesh. For on this account the Word has become flesh, that, since the Word is Son, therefore, because of the Son dwelling in us, He may be called our Father also; for ‘He sent forth,’ says Scripture, ‘the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 5, page 132, footnote 2 (Image)
Gregory of Nyssa: Dogmatic Treatises; Select Writings and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises. (HTML)
Against Eunomius. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Lastly he displays at length the folly of Eunomius, who at times speaks of the Holy Spirit as created, and as the fairest work of the Son, and at other times confesses, by the operations attributed to Him, that He is God, and thus ends the book. (HTML)
... alone, and surpassing all the creations of the Son in essence and dignity of nature, accomplishing every operation and all teaching according to the good pleasure of the Son, being sent by Him, and receiving from Him, and declaring to those who are instructed, and guiding into truth.” He speaks of the Holy Ghost as “accomplishing every operation and all teaching.” What operation? Does he mean that which the Father and the Son execute, according to the word of the Lord Himself Who “hitherto worketh[John 5:17] ” man’s salvation, or does he mean some other? For if His work is that named, He has assuredly the same power and nature as Him Who works it, and in such an one difference of kind from Deity can have no place. For just as, if anything should perform ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 252, footnote 4 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Marcellinus and Anapsychia. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3514 (In-Text, Margin)
... greatest with which the church has to deal. You ask whether it has fallen from heaven, as Pythagoras, all Platonists, and Origen suppose; or whether it is part of God’s essence as the Stoics, Manes, and the Spanish Priscillianists hint. Whether souls created long since are kept in God’s storehouse as some ecclesiastical writers foolishly imagine; or whether they are formed by God and introduced into bodies day by day according to that saying in the Gospel: “my Father worketh hitherto and I work;”[John 5:17] or whether, lastly, they are transmitted by propagation. This is the view of Tertullian, Apollinaris, and most western writers who hold that soul is derived from soul as body is from body and that the conditions of life are the same for men and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 276, footnote 4 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Ctesiphon. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3831 (In-Text, Margin)
... freedom, but we never forget to thank the Giver; knowing that we are powerless unless He continually preserves in us His own gift. As the apostle says, “it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that sheweth mercy.” To will and to run are mine, but they will cease to be mine unless God brings me His continual aid. For the same apostle says “it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do.” And in the Gospel the Saviour says: “my Father worketh hitherto and I work.”[John 5:17] He is always a giver, always a bestower. It is not enough for me that he has given me grace once; He must give it me always. I seek that I may obtain, and when I have obtained I seek again. I am covetous of God’s bounty; and as He is never slack in ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 434, footnote 1 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
To Pammachius against John of Jerusalem. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5033 (In-Text, Margin)
... descendants. I ask whence Cain and Abel, who were the firstborn of our first parents, had their souls? And the whole human race downwards, what, are we to think, was the origin of their souls? Did they come by propagation, like brute beasts? So that, as body springs from body, so soul from soul. Or is it the case that rational creatures, longing for bodily existence, sink by degrees to earth, and at last are tied even to human bodies? Surely (as the Church teaches in accordance with the Saviour’s words,[John 5:17] “My Father worketh hitherto and I work”; and the passage in Isaiah, “Who maketh the spirit of man in him”; and in the Psalms, “Who fashioneth one by one the hearts of them”) God is daily making souls—He, with whom to will is to do, and who never ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 45, footnote 20 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
The Father. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 990 (In-Text, Margin)
... But if any one from unbelief wishes to receive yet more proofs as to the Father of Christ being the same as the Maker of the world, let him hear Him say again, Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing, and not one of them shall fall on the ground without My Father which is in heaven; this also, Behold the fowls of the heaven that they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; and your heavenly Father feedeth them; and this, My Father worketh hitherto, and I work[John 5:17].
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 313, footnote 14 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Fourth Theological Oration, Which is the Second Concerning the Son. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3648 (In-Text, Margin)
... same actions, and the Word brings them to pass, yet not in slavish or unskilful fashion, but with full knowledge and in a masterly way, or, to speak more properly, like the Father? For in this sense I understand the words that whatsoever is done by the Father, these things doeth the Son likewise; not, that is, because of the likeness of the things done, but in respect of the Authority. This might well also be the meaning of the passage which says that the Father worketh hitherto and the Son also;[John 5:17] and not only so but it refers also to the government and preservation of the things which He has made; as is shewn by the passage which says that He maketh His Angels Spirits, and that the earth is founded upon its steadfastness (though once for all ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 9, page 62b, footnote 2 (Image)
Hilary of Poitiers, John of Damascus
John of Damascus: Exposition of the Orthodox Faith. (HTML)
An Exact Exposition of the Orthodox Faith. (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
Concerning the energies in our Lord Jesus Christ. (HTML)
... have also one and the same energy, and things which have different essences have also different energies,” and that it is not right to transfer to the dispensation what has reference to matters of theology, we shall answer that if it has been said by the Fathers solely with reference to theology, and if the Son has not even after the incarnation the same energy as the Father, assuredly He cannot have the same essence. But to whom shall we attribute this, My Father worketh hitherto and I work[John 5:17]: and this, What things soever He seeth the Father doing, these also doeth the Son likewise: and this, If ye believe not Me, believe My works: and this, The work which I do bear witness concerning Me: and this, As the Father ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 115, footnote 7 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book II. (HTML)
Introduction. (HTML)
3. But that we may more fully recognize the equality of the Father and the Son, as the Father spoke, the Son made, so, too, the Father works and the Son speaks. The Father works, as it is written: “My Father worketh hitherto.”[John 5:17] You find it said to the Son: “Say the word and he shall be healed.” And the Son says to the Father: “I will that where I am, they too shall be with Me.” The Father did what the Son said.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 132, footnote 9 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book II. (HTML)
Chapter XII. After proof that the Spirit is the Giver of revelation equally with the Father and the Son, it is explained how the same Spirit does not speak of Himself; and it is shown that no bodily organs are to be thought of in Him, and that no inferiority is to be supposed from the fact of our reading that He hears, since the same would have to be attributed to the Son, and indeed even to the Father, since He hears the Son. The Spirit then hears and glorifies the Son in the sense that He revealed Him to the prophets and apostles, by which the Unity of operation of the Three Persons is inferred; and, since the Spirit does the same works as the Father, the substance of each is also declared to be the same. (HTML)
136. Lastly, that one may not think that there is any difference of work either in time or in order between the Father and the Son, but may believe the oneness of the same operation, He says: “The works which I do He doeth.”[John 5:17] And again, that one may not think that there is any difference in the distinction of the works, but may judge that the will, the working, and the power of the Father and the Son are the same, Wisdom says concerning the Father: “For whatsoever things He doeth, the Son likewise doeth the same.” So that the action of neither Person is before or after that of the Other, but the same ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 282, footnote 6 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book IV. (HTML)
Chapter XI. The particular distinction which the Arians endeavoured to prove upon the Apostle's teaching that all things are “of” the Father and “through” the Son, is overthrown, it being shown that in the passage cited the same Omnipotence is ascribed both to Father and to Son, as is proved from various texts, especially from the words of St. Paul himself, in which heretics foolishly find a reference to the Father only, though indeed there is no diminution or inferiority of the Son's sovereignty proved, even by such a reference. Finally, the three phrases, “of Whom,” “through Whom,” “in Whom,” are shown to suppose or imply no difference (of power), and each and all to hold true of the Three Persons. (HTML)
154. Now, I ask, wherein does He, through Whom are all things, appear less than He, of Whom are all things? Is it because He is declared to be the Worker? But the Father also works, for He is true who said, “My Father worketh hitherto, and I work.”[John 5:17] Therefore, even as the Father worketh, so worketh the Son also; and so He Who worketh is not limitary in power nor abject, for the Father also worketh; which being so, that which is common to the Son with the Father, or even which the Son has by the Father, ought not to be the less esteemed, lest heretics further dishonour the Father in the Person of the Son.