Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
Acts 17
There are 105 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 28, footnote 8 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Mathetes (HTML)
Epistle to Diognetus (HTML)
Chapter IX.—Why the Son was sent so late. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 309 (In-Text, Margin)
As long then as the former time[Acts 17:30] endured, He permitted us to be borne along by unruly impulses, being drawn away by the desire of pleasure and various lusts. This was not that He at all delighted in our sins, but that He simply endured them; nor that He approved the time of working iniquity which then was, but that He sought to form a mind conscious of righteousness, so that being convinced in that time of our unworthiness of attaining life through our own works, it should now, through the kindness of God, be ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 33, footnote 10 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Polycarp (HTML)
Epistle to the Philippians (HTML)
Chapter II.—An exhortation to virtue. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 348 (In-Text, Margin)
“Wherefore, girding up your loins,” “serve the Lord in fear” and truth, as those who have forsaken the vain, empty talk and error of the multitude, and “believed in Him who raised up our Lord Jesus Christ from the dead, and gave Him glory,” and a throne at His right hand. To Him all things in heaven and on earth are subject. Him every spirit serves. He comes as the Judge of the living and the dead.[Acts 17:31] His blood will God require of those who do not believe in Him. But He who raised Him up from the dead will raise up us also, if we do His will, and walk in His commandments, and love what He loved, keeping ourselves from all unrighteousness, covetousness, love of money, evil speaking, false ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 224, footnote 6 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Justin Martyr (HTML)
Dialogue with Trypho (HTML)
Chapter LVI.—God who appeared to Moses is distinguished from God the Father. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2138 (In-Text, Margin)
... you from Scriptures themselves, that He whom the Scripture calls Lord is not one of the two angels that went to Sodom, but He who was with them, and is called God, that appeared to Abraham.”And Trypho said, “Prove this; for, as you see, the day advances, and we are not prepared for such perilous replies; since never yet have we heard any man investigating, or searching into, or proving these matters; nor would we have tolerated your conversation, had you not referred everything to the Scriptures:[Acts 17:11] for you are very zealous in adducing proofs from them; and you are of opinion that there is no God above the Maker of all things.”
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 433, footnote 8 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Irenæus (HTML)
Against Heresies: Book III (HTML)
Chapter XII.—Doctrine of the rest of the apostles. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3507 (In-Text, Margin)
... certain men of your own have said, For we are also His offspring. Inasmuch, then, as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Deity is like unto gold or silver, or stone graven by art or man’s device. Therefore God, winking at the times of ignorance, does now command all men everywhere to turn to Him with repentance; because He hath appointed a day, on which the world shall be judged in righteousness by the man Jesus; whereof He hath given assurance by raising Him from the dead.”[Acts 17:24] Now in this passage he does not only declare to them God as the Creator of the world, no Jews being present, but that He did also make one race of men to dwell upon all the earth; as also Moses declared: “When the Most High divided the nations, as ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 36, footnote 7 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
The Pastor of Hermas (HTML)
Book Third.—Similitudes (HTML)
Similitude Fifth. Of True Fasting and Its Reward: Also of Purity of Body. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 287 (In-Text, Margin)
... which inhabits it may bear witness to it, and your flesh may be justified. See that the thought never arise in your mind that this flesh of yours is corruptible, and you misuse it by any act of defilement. If you defile your flesh, you will also defile the Holy Spirit; and if you defile your flesh [and spirit], you will not live.” “And if any one, sir,” I said, “has been hitherto ignorant, before he heard these words, how can such a man be saved who has defiled his flesh?” “Respecting former sins[Acts 17:30] of ignorance,” he said, “God alone is able to heal them, for to Him belongs all power. [But be on your guard now, and the all-powerful and compassionate God will heal former transgressions], if for the time to come you defile not your body nor your ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 311, footnote 15 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter XI.—What is the Philosophy Which the Apostle Bids Us Shun? (HTML)
... power of God.” “For the spiritual man judgeth all things, but he himself is judged of no man.” I hear also those words of his, “And these things I say, lest any man should beguile you with enticing words, or one should enter in to spoil you.” And again, “Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ;” branding not all philosophy, but the Epicurean, which Paul mentions in the Acts of the Apostles,[Acts 17:18] which abolishes providence and deifies pleasure, and whatever other philosophy honours the elements, but places not over them the efficient cause, nor apprehends the Creator.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 321, footnote 6 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
Chapter XIX.—That the Philosophers Have Attained to Some Portion of Truth. (HTML)
... though He needed anything, seeing He giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek God, if haply they might feel after Him, and find Him; though He be not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we also are His offspring.”[Acts 17:22-28] Whence it is evident that the apostle, by availing himself of poetical examples from the Phenomena of Aratus, approves of what had been well spoken by the Greeks; and intimates that, by the unknown God, God the Creator was in a roundabout way ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 462, footnote 5 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book V (HTML)
Chapter XI.—Abstraction from Material Things Necessary in Order to Attain to the True Knowledge of God. (HTML)
... the other gods and demons, winning a kind of revenue from creation, and from us, fumes, and from the gods and demons, their proper ministries,” says Plato. Most instructively, therefore, says Paul in the Acts of the Apostles: “The God that made the world, and all things in it, being the Lord of heaven and earth, dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is worshipped by men’s hands, as if He needed anything; seeing that it is He Himself that giveth to all breath, and life, and all things.”[Acts 17:24-25] And Zeno, the founder of the Stoic sect, says in this book of the Republic, “that we ought to make neither temples nor images; for that no work is worthy of the gods.” And he was not afraid to write in these very words: “There will be no need ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 464, footnote 2 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book V (HTML)
Chapter XII.—God Cannot Be Embraced in Words or by the Mind. (HTML)
It remains that we understand, then, the Unknown, by divine grace, and by the word alone that proceeds from Him; as Luke in the Acts of the Apostles relates that Paul said, “Men of Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious. For in walking about, and beholding the objects of your worship, I found an altar on which was inscribed, To the Unknown God. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, Him declare I unto you.”[Acts 17:22-23]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 519, footnote 5 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book VI (HTML)
Chapter XVIII.—The Use of Philosophy to the Gnostic. (HTML)
The primacy of knowledge the apostle shows to those capable of reflection, in writing to those Greeks of Corinth, in the following terms: “But having hope, when your faith is increased, that we shall be magnified in you according to our rule abundantly, to preach the Gospel beyond you.” He does not mean the extension of his preaching locally: for he says also that in Achaia faith abounded; and it is related also in the Acts of the Apostles that he preached the word in Athens.[Acts 17] But he teaches that knowledge (gnosis), which is the perfection of faith, goes beyond catechetical instruction, in accordance with the magnitude of the Lord’s teaching and the rule of the Church. Wherefore also he proceeds to add, “And if I am rude in ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 137, footnote 11 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
Ad Nationes. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
The Power of Rome. Romanized Aspect of All the Heathen Mythology. Varro's Threefold Distribution Criticised. Roman Heroes (Æneas Included,) Unfavourably Reviewed. (HTML)
... germs of superstitions gathered from all quarters. Well, but even the gods of the Romans have received from (the same) Varro a threefold classification into the certain, the uncertain, and the select. What absurdity! What need had they of uncertain gods, when they possessed certain ones? Unless, forsooth, they wished to commit themselves to such folly as the Athenians did; for at Athens there was an altar with this inscription: “ To the unknown gods.”[Acts 17:23] Does, then, a man worship that which he knows nothing of? Then, again, as they had certain gods, they ought to have been contented with them, without requiring select ones. In this want they are even found to be irreligious! For if gods are selected ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 183, footnote 6 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
A Treatise on the Soul. (HTML)
The Soul's Origin Defined Out of the Simple Words of Scripture. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1510 (In-Text, Margin)
... ever necessary, in order that they which are approved may be made manifest!” We should then be never required to try our strength in contests about the soul with philosophers, those patriarchs of heretics, as they may be fairly called. The apostle, so far back as his own time, foresaw, indeed, that philosophy would do violent injury to the truth. This admonition about false philosophy he was induced to offer after he had been at Athens, had become acquainted with that loquacious city,[Acts 17:21] and had there had a taste of its huckstering wiseacres and talkers. In like manner is the treatment of the soul according to the sophistical doctrines of men which “mix their wine with water.” Some of them deny the immortality of the soul; others ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 573, footnote 9 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
On the Resurrection of the Flesh. (HTML)
Additional Evidence Afforded to Us in the Acts of the Apostles. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7542 (In-Text, Margin)
... of the dead; (and in so doing) he must have known that it would be a rising in the body, since requisition will have to be made therein of the blood of man. He declared it then to be of such a character as the Pharisees had admitted it, and such as the Lord had Himself maintained it, and such too as the Sadducees refused to believe it—such refusal leading them indeed to an absolute rejection of the whole verity. Nor had the Athenians previously understood Paul to announce any other resurrection.[Acts 17:32] They had, in fact, derided his announcement; but they would have indulged no such derision if they had heard from him nothing but the restoration of the soul, for they would have received that as the very common anticipation of their own ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 612, footnote 10 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Praxeas. (HTML)
Early Manifestations of the Son of God, as Recorded in the Old Testament; Rehearsals of His Subsequent Incarnation. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7974 (In-Text, Margin)
... the angels) on our account; whereas the Scripture informs us that He who was made less was so affected by another, and not Himself by Himself. What, again, if He was One who was “crowned with glory and honour,” and He Another by whom He was so crowned, —the Son, in fact, by the Father? Moreover, how comes it to pass, that the Almighty Invisible God, “whom no man hath seen nor can see; He who dwelleth in light unapproachable;” “He who dwelleth not in temples made with hands;”[Acts 17:24] “from before whose sight the earth trembles, and the mountains melt like wax;” who holdeth the whole world in His hand “like a nest;” “whose throne is heaven, and earth His footstool;” in whom is every place, but Himself is in no place; who is the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 269, footnote 5 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen De Principiis. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
On the World. (HTML)
... soul. This also, I think, is indicated in sacred Scripture by the declaration of the prophet, “Do not I fill heaven and earth? saith the Lord;” and again, “The heaven is My throne, and the earth is My footstool;” and by the Saviour’s words, when He says that we are to swear “neither by heaven, for it is God’s throne; nor by the earth, for it is His footstool.” To the same effect also are the words of Paul, in his address to the Athenians, when he says, “In Him we live, and move, and have our being.”[Acts 17:28] For how do we live, and move, and have our being in God, except by His comprehending and holding together the whole world by His power? And how is heaven the throne of God, and the earth His footstool, as the Saviour Himself declares, save by His ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 499, footnote 5 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen Against Celsus. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Chapter V (HTML)
... “God Himself will come down to men.” He imagines also that it follows from this, that “He has left His own abode;” for he does not know the power of God, and that “the Spirit of the Lord filleth the world, and that which upholdeth all things hath knowledge of the voice.” Nor is he able to understand the words, “Do I not fill heaven and earth? saith the Lord.” Nor does he see that, according to the doctrine of Christianity, we all “in Him live, and move, and have our being,”[Acts 17:28] as Paul also taught in his address to the Athenians; and therefore, although the God of the universe should through His own power descend with Jesus into the life of men, and although the Word which was in the beginning with God, which is also God ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 114, footnote 4 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Hippolytus. (HTML)
The Refutation of All Heresies. (HTML)
Book VII. (HTML)
The System of Cerinthus Concerning Christ. (HTML)
... the God that is above all. And he supposed that Jesus was not generated from a virgin, but that he was born son of Joseph and Mary, just in a manner similar with the rest of men, and that (Jesus) was more just and more wise (than all the human race). And (Cerinthus alleges) that, after the baptism (of our Lord), Christ in form of a dove came down upon him, from that absolute sovereignty which is above all things. And then, (according to this heretic,) Jesus proceeded to preach the unknown Father,[Acts 17:23] and in attestation (of his mission) to work miracles. It was, however, (the opinion of Cerinthus,) that ultimately Christ departed from Jesus, and that Jesus suffered and rose again; whereas that Christ, being spiritual, remained beyond the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 507, footnote 4 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews. (HTML)
Preface. (HTML)
... He has come who was announced according to the Scriptures, and has done and perfected all those things whereby He was foretold as being able to be perceived and known. And these things may be of advantage to you meanwhile, as you read, for forming the first lineaments of your faith. More strength will be given you, and the intelligence of the heart will be effected more and more, as you examine more fully the Scriptures, old and new, and read through the complete volumes of the spiritual books.[Acts 17:11] For now we have filled a small measure from the divine fountains, which in the meantime we would send to you. You will be able to drink more plentifully, and to be more abundantly satisfied, if you also will approach to drink together with us at the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 277, footnote 4 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Peter of Alexandria. (HTML)
The Canonical Epistle, with the Commentaries of Theodore Balsamon and John Zonaras. (HTML)
Canon XII. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2327 (In-Text, Margin)
... “The ransom of a man’s life are his riches.” For we read also in the Acts of the Apostles that those who in the stead of Paul and Silas were dragged before the magistrates at Thessalonica, were dismissed with a heavy fine. For after that they had been very burdensome to them for his name, and had troubled the people and the rulers of the city, “having taken security,” he says, “of Jason, and of the others, they let them go. And the brethren immediately sent away Paul and Silas by night unto Berea.”[Acts 17:9-10]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 140, footnote 10 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Lactantius (HTML)
The Divine Institutes (HTML)
Book V. Of Justice (HTML)
Chap. V.—there was true justice under Saturnus, but it was banished by Jupiter (HTML)
as Cicero[Acts 17:28] relates in his poem; and this is peculiar to our religion. “It was not even allowed to mark out or to divide the plain with a boundary: men sought all things in common;” since God had given the earth in common to all, that they might pass their life in common, not that mad and raging avarice might claim all things for itself, and that that which was produced for all might not be wanting to any. And this saying of the poet ought so to be taken, not as suggesting the idea that individuals at ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 262, footnote 3 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Lactantius (HTML)
A Treatise on the Anger of God Addressed to Donatus (HTML)
Chap. V.—The opinion of the Stoics concerning God; of His anger and kindness (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1649 (In-Text, Margin)
... who loves also hates, and he who hates also loves; for there are those who ought to be loved, and there are those who ought to be hated. And as he who loves confers good things on those whom he loves, so he who hates inflicts evils upon those whom he hates; which argument, because it is true, can in no way be refuted. Therefore the opinion of those is vain and false, who, when they attribute the one to God, take away the other, not less than the opinion of those who take away both. But the latter,[Acts 17:18] as we have shown, in part do not err, but retain that which is the better of the two; whereas the former, led on by the accurate method of their reasoning, fall into the greatest error, because they have assumed premises which are altogether false. ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 503, footnote 3 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Apocrypha of the New Testament. (HTML)
The Acts of Philip. (HTML)
Acts of Saint Philip the Apostle When He Went to Upper Hellas. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2186 (In-Text, Margin)
And having done so, they came together to the same place, and say to Philip: We have doctrines of our fathers in which we are pleased, seeking after knowledge; but if thou hast anything new, O stranger, show it to us without envy boldly: for we have need of nothing else, but only to hear something new.[Acts 17:21]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 8, page 544, footnote 8 (Image)
Twelve Patriarchs, Excerpts and Epistles, The Clementina, Apocryphal Gospels and Acts, Syriac Documents
Apocrypha of the New Testament. (HTML)
Acts of the Holy Apostle Thomas. (HTML)
Acts of the Holy Apostle Thomas, When He Came into India, and Built the Palace in the Heavens. (HTML)
About the Dragon and the Young Man. (HTML)
... if he has compassion upon us, and pities us, and delivers us, overlooking our former doings; and if he set us free from the evil things which we did when we were in error, and shall not take into account nor keep the recollection of our former sins, we shall become his servants, and we shall do his will to the end. And the apostle answered and said to them: He does not reckon against you the sins which you did, being in error; but He overlooks your transgressions which you have done in ignorance.[Acts 17:30]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 384, footnote 9 (Image)
Gospel of Peter, Diatessaron, Apocalypses, Visio Pauli, Testament of Abraham, Acts of X/P, Zosimus, Aristides, Clement, Origen
Epistle to Gregory and Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John. (HTML)
Origen's Commentary on the Gospel of John. (HTML)
Book X. (HTML)
Paul Also Makes Contradictory Statements About Himself, and Acts in Opposite Ways at Different Times. (HTML)
... gain the weak, it is clear that these statements must be examined each by itself, that he becomes a Jew, and that sometimes he is under the law and at another time without law, and that sometimes he is weak. Where, for example, he says something by way of permission and not by commandment, there we may recognize that he is weak; for who, he says, is weak, and I am not weak? When he shaves his head and makes an offering, or when he circumcises Timothy, he is a Jew; but when he says to the Athenians,[Acts 17:23] “I found an altar with the inscription, To the unknown God. That, then, which ye worship not knowing it, that declare I unto you,” and, “As also some of your own poets have said, For we also are His offspring,” then he becomes to those without the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 109, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
He recalls the beginning of his youth, i.e. the thirty-first year of his age, in which very grave errors as to the nature of God and the origin of evil being distinguished, and the Sacred Books more accurately known, he at length arrives at a clear knowledge of God, not yet rightly apprehending Jesus Christ. (HTML)
He Compares the Doctrine of the Platonists Concerning the Λόγος With the Much More Excellent Doctrine of Christianity. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 526 (In-Text, Margin)
... them. For it pleased Thee, O Lord, to take away the reproach of diminution from Jacob, that the elder should serve the younger; and Thou hast called the Gentiles into Thine inheritance. And I had come unto Thee from among the Gentiles, and I strained after that gold which Thou willedst Thy people to take from Egypt, seeing that wheresoever it was it was Thine. And to the Athenians Thou saidst by Thy apostle, that in Thee “we live, and move, and have our being;” as one of their own poets has said.[Acts 17:28] And verily these books came from thence. But I set not my mind on the idols of Egypt, whom they ministered to with Thy gold, “who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 151, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Some account of the Socratic and Platonic philosophy, and a refutation of the doctrine of Apuleius that the demons should be worshipped as mediators between gods and men. (HTML)
That the Excellency of the Christian Religion is Above All the Science of Philosophers. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 304 (In-Text, Margin)
... are such as do this, he hears the same apostle say concerning certain of them, “Because that which is known of God is manifest among them, for God has manifested it to them. For His invisible things from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things which are made, also His eternal power and Godhead.” And, when speaking to the Athenians, after having spoken a mighty thing concerning God, which few are able to understand, “In Him we live, and move, and have our being,”[Acts 17:28] he goes on to say, “As certain also of your own have said.” He knows well, too, to be on his guard against even these philosophers in their errors. For where it has been said by him, “that God has manifested to them by those things which are made ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 395, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
A parallel history of the earthly and heavenly cities from the time of Abraham to the end of the world. (HTML)
Of the Very Foolish Lie of the Pagans, in Feigning that the Christian Religion Was Not to Last Beyond Three Hundred and Sixty-Five Years. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1256 (In-Text, Margin)
... shall reign from sea even to sea, and from the river even to the ends of the earth.” But since, before He suffered and rose from the dead, the faith had not yet been defined to all, but was defined in the resurrection of Christ (for so the Apostle Paul speaks to the Athenians, saying, “But now He announces to men that all everywhere should repent, because He hath appointed a day in which to judge the world in equity, by the Man in whom He hath defined the faith to all men, raising Him from the dead”[Acts 17:30-31]), it is better that, in settling this question, we should start from that point, especially because the Holy Spirit was then given, just as He behoved to be given after the resurrection of Christ in that city from which the second law, that is, the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 71, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
Augustin explains for what the Son of God was sent; but, however, that the Son of God, although made less by being sent, is not therefore less because the Father sent Him; nor yet the Holy Spirit less because both the Father sent Him and the Son. (HTML)
We are Made Perfect by Acknowledgement of Our Own Weakness. The Incarnate Word Dispels Our Darkness. (HTML)
... light of men;” the light certainly of rational minds, by which men differ from beasts, and therefore are men. Therefore not corporeal light, which is the light of the flesh, whether it shine from heaven, or whether it be lighted by earthly fires; nor that of human flesh only, but also that of beasts, and down even to the minutest of worms. For all these things see that light: but that life was the light of men; nor is it far from any one of us, for in it “we live, and move, and have our being.”[Acts 17:27-28]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 81, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
Augustin explains for what the Son of God was sent; but, however, that the Son of God, although made less by being sent, is not therefore less because the Father sent Him; nor yet the Holy Spirit less because both the Father sent Him and the Son. (HTML)
In How Many Ways Things Future are Foreknown. Neither Philosophers, Nor Those Who Were Distinguished Among the Ancients, are to Be Consulted Concerning the Resurrection of the Dead. (HTML)
23. Therefore, neither concerning the successions of ages, nor concerning the resurrection of the dead, ought we to consult those philosophers, who have understood as much as they could the eternity of the Creator, in whom “we live, and move, and have our being.”[Acts 17:28] Since, knowing God through those things which are made, they have not glorified Him as God, neither were thankful but professing themselves wise, they became fools. And whereas they were not fit to fix the eye of the mind so firmly upon the eternity of the spiritual and unchangeable nature, as to be able to see, in the wisdom itself of the Creator and Governor of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 118, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
He advances reasons to show not only that the Father is not greater than the Son, but that neither are both together anything greater than the Holy Spirit, nor any two together in the same Trinity anything greater than one, nor all three together anything greater than each singly. He also intimates that the nature of God may be understood from our understanding of truth, from our knowledge of the supreme good, and from our implanted love of righteousness; but above all, that our knowledge of God is to be sought through love, in which he notices a trio of things which contains a trace of the Trinity. (HTML)
How God May Be Known to Be the Chief Good. The Mind Does Not Become Good Unless by Turning to God. (HTML)
... to that from which it was: but that as yet was not, that could wish to be before it was. And herein is our [supreme] good, when we see whether the thing ought to be or to have been, respecting which we comprehend that it ought to be or to have been, and when we see that the thing could not have been unless it ought to have been, of which we also do not comprehend in what manner it ought to have been. This good then is not far from every one of us: for in it we live, and move, and have our being.[Acts 17:27-28]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 192, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
He speaks of the true wisdom of man, viz. that by which he remembers, understands, and loves God; and shows that it is in this very thing that the mind of man is the image of God, although his mind, which is here renewed in the knowledge of God, will only then be made the perfect likeness of God in that image when there shall be a perfect sight of God. (HTML)
The Trinity in the Mind is the Image of God, in that It Remembers, Understands, and Loves God, Which to Do is Wisdom. (HTML)
... a nature not made, which made all other natures, great and small, and is without doubt more excellent than those which it has made, and therefore also than that of which we are speaking; viz. than the rational and intellectual nature, which is the mind of man, made after the image of Him who made it. And that nature, more excellent than the rest, is God. And indeed “He is not far from every one of us,” as the apostle says, who adds, “For in Him we live, and are moved, and have our being.”[Acts 17:27-28] And if this were said in respect to the body, it might be understood even of this corporeal world; for in it too in respect to the body, we live, and are moved, and have our being. And therefore it ought to be taken in a more excellent way, and one ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 194, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
He speaks of the true wisdom of man, viz. that by which he remembers, understands, and loves God; and shows that it is in this very thing that the mind of man is the image of God, although his mind, which is here renewed in the knowledge of God, will only then be made the perfect likeness of God in that image when there shall be a perfect sight of God. (HTML)
Although the Soul Hopes for Blessedness, Yet It Does Not Remember Lost Blessedness, But Remembers God and the Rules of Righteousness. The Unchangeable Rules of Right Living are Known Even to the Ungodly. (HTML)
... even be reminded of it. But it believes what the trustworthy Scriptures of its God tell of that blessedness, which were written by His prophet, and tell of the blessedness of Paradise, and hand down to us historical information of that first both good and ill of man. And it remembers the Lord its God; for He always is, nor has been and is not, nor is but has not been; but as He never will not be, so He never was not. And He is whole everywhere. And hence it both lives, and is moved, and is in Him;[Acts 17:28] and so it can remember Him. Not because it recollects the having known Him in Adam or anywhere else before the life of this present body, or when it was first made in order to be implanted in this body; for it remembers nothing at all of all this. ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 514, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
Of the Work of Monks. (HTML)
Section 21 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2546 (In-Text, Margin)
... discourse was prolonged even until midnight, as though it had slipped from their minds that on that day it was not a fast: but when he was making longer stay in any place and disputing daily, who can doubt that he had certain hours set apart for this office? For at Athens, because he had there found most studious inquirers of things, it is thus written of him: “He disputed therefore with the Jews in the synagogue, and with the Gentile inhabitants in the market every day to those who were there.”[Acts 17:17-18] Not, namely, in the synagogue every day, for there it was his custom to discourse on the sabbath; but “in the market,” saith he, “every day;” by reason, doubtless, of the studiousness of the Athenians. For so it follows: “Certain however of the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 514, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
Of the Work of Monks. (HTML)
Section 21 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2546 (In-Text, Margin)
... discourse was prolonged even until midnight, as though it had slipped from their minds that on that day it was not a fast: but when he was making longer stay in any place and disputing daily, who can doubt that he had certain hours set apart for this office? For at Athens, because he had there found most studious inquirers of things, it is thus written of him: “He disputed therefore with the Jews in the synagogue, and with the Gentile inhabitants in the market every day to those who were there.”[Acts 17:21] Not, namely, in the synagogue every day, for there it was his custom to discourse on the sabbath; but “in the market,” saith he, “every day;” by reason, doubtless, of the studiousness of the Athenians. For so it follows: “Certain however of the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 277, footnote 1 (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 states his objections to the morality of the law and the prophets, and Augustin seeks by the application of the type and the allegory to explain away the moral difficulties of the Old Testament. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 817 (In-Text, Margin)
... under the name of Christianity, bring such objections against the Christian Scriptures, we have to defend the authority of the divine record in both Testaments against the Manichæans as much as against the Pagans. A Pagan might find fault with passages in the New Testament in the same way as Faustus does with what he calls unworthy representations of God in the Old Testament; and the Pagan might be answered by the quotation of similar passages from his own authors, as in Paul’s speech at Athens.[Acts 17:28] Even in Pagan writings we might find the doctrine that God created and constructed the world, and that He is the giver of light, which does not imply that before light was made He abode in darkness; and that when His work was finished He was elated ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 498, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings
Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy. (HTML)
On Baptism, Against the Donatists. (HTML)
In which is considered the Council of Carthage, held under the authority and presidency of Cyprian, to determine the question of the baptism of heretics. (HTML)
Chapter 44 (HTML)
... themselves could have anything holy and right in their doctrines, our saints did not condemn it, however much the Gentiles themselves were to be detested for their superstitions and idolatry and pride, and the rest of their corruptions, and to be punished with judgment from heaven unless they submitted to correction. For when Paul the apostle also was saying something concerning God before the Athenians, he adduced as a proof of what he said, that certain of them had said something to the same effect,[Acts 17:28] which certainly would not be condemned but recognized in them if they should come to Christ. And the holy Cyprian uses similar evidence against the same heathens; for, speaking of the magi, he says, "The chief of them, however, Hostanes, asserts ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 547, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings
Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy. (HTML)
Answer to the Letters of Petilian, the Donatist. (HTML)
In which Augustin replies to all the several statements in the letter of Petilianus, as though disputing with an adversary face to face. (HTML)
Chapter 30 (HTML)
... was true? or did he, because of the truth which he found upon it, therefore persuade them that they ought also to follow the sacrilegious practices of the pagans? Surely he did neither of the two; but presently, when, as he judged fitting, he wished to introduce to their knowledge the Lord Himself unknown to them, but known to him, he says among other things, that "He is not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said."[Acts 17:23] Can it be said that here also, because he found among the sacrilegious, the evidence of truth, he either approved their wickedness because of the evidence, or condemned the evidence because of their wickedness? But it is unavoidable that you should ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 547, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings
Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy. (HTML)
Answer to the Letters of Petilian, the Donatist. (HTML)
In which Augustin replies to all the several statements in the letter of Petilianus, as though disputing with an adversary face to face. (HTML)
Chapter 30 (HTML)
... was true? or did he, because of the truth which he found upon it, therefore persuade them that they ought also to follow the sacrilegious practices of the pagans? Surely he did neither of the two; but presently, when, as he judged fitting, he wished to introduce to their knowledge the Lord Himself unknown to them, but known to him, he says among other things, that "He is not far from every one of us: for in Him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said."[Acts 17:27-28] Can it be said that here also, because he found among the sacrilegious, the evidence of truth, he either approved their wickedness because of the evidence, or condemned the evidence because of their wickedness? But it is unavoidable that you should ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 246, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Grace of Christ, and on Original Sin. (HTML)
On Original Sin. (HTML)
The Heresy of Pelagius and Cœlestius Aims at the Very Foundations of Our Faith. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1962 (In-Text, Margin)
... doing his own will instead of His who created him; the latter has saved us in Himself, by not doing His own will, but the will of Him who sent Him: and it is in what concerns these two men that the Christian faith properly consists. For “there is one God, and one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;” since “there is none other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved;” and “in Him hath God defined unto all men their faith, in that He hath raised Him from the dead.”[Acts 17:31] Now without this faith, that is to say, without a belief in the one Mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus; without faith, I say, in His resurrection by which God has given assurance to all men and which no man could of course truly ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 326, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Soul and its Origin. (HTML)
Treatise on the Soul and Its Origin (HTML)
Augustin Did Not Venture to Define Anything About the Propagation of the Soul. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2378 (In-Text, Margin)
For whence comes it that he is so careless about the Scriptures, which he talks of, as not to notice that when he reads of human beings being from God, it is not merely, as he contends, in respect of their soul and spirit, but also as regards their body? For the apostle’s statement, “We are His offspring,”[Acts 17:28] this man supposes must not be referred to the body, but only to the soul and spirit. If, indeed, our human bodies are not of God, then that is false which the Scripture says: “For of Him are all things, through Him are all things, and in Him are all things.” Again, with reference to the same apostle’s statement, “For as the woman is of the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 327, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Soul and its Origin. (HTML)
Treatise on the Soul and Its Origin (HTML)
A Natural Figure of Speech Must Not Be Literally Pressed. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2382 (In-Text, Margin)
He goes on to remark: “But the apostle, by saying, ‘And He Himself giveth life and spirit to all,’ and then by adding the words, ‘And hath made the whole race of men of one blood,’[Acts 17:25] has referred this soul and spirit to the Creator in respect of their origin, and the body to propagation.” Now, certainly any one who does not wish to deny at random the propagation of souls, before ascertaining clearly whether the opinion is correct or not, has ground for understanding, from the apostle’s words, that he meant the expression, of one blood, to be equivalent to of one man, by ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 340, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Soul and its Origin. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Victor Quotes Scriptures for Their Silence, and Neglects the Biblical Usage. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2428 (In-Text, Margin)
As for the passage which affirms that “God hath made of one blood all nations of men,”[Acts 17:26] and that in which Adam says, “This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh,” inasmuch as it is not said in the one, “ of one soul, ” and in the other, “ soul of my soul, ” he supposes that it is denied that children’s souls come from their parents, or the first woman’s from her husband just as if, forsooth, had the sentence run in the way suggested, “ of one soul, ” instead of “of one blood,” anything else than the whole ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 314, footnote 13 (Image)
Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels
Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)
Again on the words of the Gospel, Matt. xi. 25, ‘I thank thee, O Father, Lord of Heaven and Earth,’ etc. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2301 (In-Text, Margin)
... were they; but far unlike them, who by means of this visible creation were able to attain to the understanding of the Creator, and to say of these things which God hath made; Behold what things He hath made, He governeth and containeth also. He who hath made them, Himself filleth what He hath made with His own presence. Thus much they were enabled to say. For these Paul also made mention of in the Acts of the Apostles, where, when he had said of God, “For in Him we live and move and have our being”[Acts 17:28] (forasmuch as he was speaking to the Athenians among whom those learned men had existed); he subjoined immediately; “As certain also of your own have said.” Now it was no trivial thing they said; “That in Him we live and move and have our being.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 422, footnote 6 (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 x. 2, ‘The harvest truly is plenteous,’ etc. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3267 (In-Text, Margin)
... Gospel” unto the Apostles, that their right hands were given to him, the sign of harmony, the sign of agreement, that what they had learnt from him differed in no respect from them. Afterwards he says that it was agreed between him and them, that he should go to the Gentiles, and they unto the circumcision, he as a sower, they as reapers. So also with good reason, though they knew it not, did the Athenians give him his name. For as they heard the word from him, they said, “Who is this sower of words?”[Acts 17:18]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 407, footnote 9 (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 XVII. 20. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1758 (In-Text, Margin)
... resurrection of Christ, it is said by the same apostle, “Whether it were I, or they, so we preach, and so ye believed;” and again, “This is the word of faith,” he says, “which we preach, that if thou shalt confess with thy mouth that Jesus is the Lord, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.” And in the Acts of the Apostles we read that in Christ, God hath marked out [the ground of] faith unto all men, in that He hath raised Him from the dead.[Acts 17:31] Accordingly, this word of faith, because principally and primarily preached by the apostles who adhered to Him, was called their word. Not, however, on that account does it cease to be the word of God because it is called their word; for the same ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 82, footnote 11 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XXXV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 773 (In-Text, Margin)
... bosom” (ver. 13)…Brethren, if for some little space with pious curiosity we lift the veil, and search with the intent eye of the heart the inner part of this Scripture, we find that even this the Lord did. Sackcloth, haply He calleth His mortal flesh. Wherefore Sackcloth? For the likeness of sinful flesh. For the Apostle saith, “God sent His Son in the likeness of sinful flesh, that through sin He might condemn sin in the flesh:” that is, He clothed His Own Son with sackcloth, that through sackcloth[Acts 17:3] He might condemn the goats. Not that there was sin, I say not in the Word of God, but not even in that Holy Soul and Mind of a Man, which the Word and Wisdom of God had so joined to Himself as to be One Person. Nay, nor even in His very Body was any ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 83, footnote 13 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XXXV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 787 (In-Text, Margin)
... as one mourning and sorrowful, so I humbled myself” (ver. 14). Now looketh He back to His Own Body: let us now look to this. When we rejoice in prayer, when our mind is calmed, not by the world’s prosperity, but by the light of Truth: (who perceiveth this light, knoweth what I say, and he seeth and acknowledgeth what is said, “As a Neighbour, as our Brother, so I pleased Him”): even then our soul pleaseth God, not placed afar off, for, “In Him,” saith one, “we live and move and have our being,”[Acts 17:28] but as a Brother, as a Neighbour, as a Friend. But if it be not such that it can so rejoice, so shine, so approach, so cleave unto Him, and seeth itself far off thence, then let it do what followeth, “As one mourning and sorrowful, so I humbled ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 157, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XLVI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1484 (In-Text, Margin)
6. “The waters thereof roared, and were troubled” (ver. 3): when the Gospel was preached, “What is this? He seemeth to be a setter forth of strange gods:”[Acts 17:18] this the Athenians; but the Ephesians, with what tumult would they have slain the Apostles, when in the theatre, for their goddess Diana, they made such an uproar, as to be shouting, “Great is Diana of the Ephesians!” Amidst which waves and roaring of the sea, feared not they who to that refuge had fled. Nay, the Apostle Paul would enter in to the theatre, and was kept back by the disciples, because it was necessary ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 357, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXXVI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3455 (In-Text, Margin)
6. “There have been troubled all the unwise in heart” (ver. 5).…How have they been troubled? When the Gospel is preached. And what is life eternal? And who is He that hath risen from the dead? The Athenians wondered, when the Apostle Paul spake of the resurrection of the dead, and thought that he spake but fables.[Acts 17:18] But because he said that there was another life which neither eye hath seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it gone up into the heart of man, therefore the unwise in heart were troubled. But what hath befallen them? “They have slept their sleep, and all men of riches have found nothing in their hands.” They have loved things present, and have ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 357, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXXVI (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3455 (In-Text, Margin)
6. “There have been troubled all the unwise in heart” (ver. 5).…How have they been troubled? When the Gospel is preached. And what is life eternal? And who is He that hath risen from the dead? The Athenians wondered, when the Apostle Paul spake of the resurrection of the dead, and thought that he spake but fables.[Acts 17:32] But because he said that there was another life which neither eye hath seen, nor ear heard, nor hath it gone up into the heart of man, therefore the unwise in heart were troubled. But what hath befallen them? “They have slept their sleep, and all men of riches have found nothing in their hands.” They have loved things present, and have ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 387, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXXX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3757 (In-Text, Margin)
5. “Thou hast set us for a contradiction to our neighbours” (ver. 6). Evidently this did come to pass: for out of Asaph were chosen they that should go to the Gentiles and preach Christ, and should have it said to them, “Who is this proclaimer of new demons?”[Acts 17:18] “Thou hast set us for a contradiction to our neighbours.” For they were preaching Him who was the subject of the contradiction. Whom did they preach? That after He was dead, Christ rose again. Who would hear this? Who would know this? It is a new thing. But signs did follow, and to an incredible thing miracles gave credibility. He was contradicted, but the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 633, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXXXVIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5703 (In-Text, Margin)
... burnt-offering of praise I offer to Thee.…“I will confess to Thee, O Lord, with my whole heart: for Thou hast heard the words of my mouth” (ver. 1). What mouth, save my heart? For there have we the voice which God heareth, which ear of man knoweth not at all. We have then a mouth within, there do we ask, thence do we ask, and if we have prepared a lodging or an house for God, there do we speak, there are we heard. “For He is not far from every one of us, for in Him we live, and move, and have our being.”[Acts 17:27-28] Nought maketh thee far off from God, save sin only. Cast down the middle wall of sin, and thou art with Him whom thou askest.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 67, footnote 9 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
Treatise Concerning the Christian Priesthood. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 172 (In-Text, Margin)
... his life? At that time, as I said, he had not begun to work miracles, nor could any one say that the masses looked upon him with astonishment on account of any glory belonging to his mighty works, or that they who contended with him were overpowered by the force of public opinion concerning him. For at this time he conquered by dint of argument only. How was it, moreover, that he contended and disputed successfully with those who tried to Judaize in Antioch? and how was it that that Areopagite,[Acts 17:34] an inhabitant of Athens, that most devoted of all cities to the gods, followed the apostle, he and his wife? was it not owing to the discourse which they heard? And when Eutychus fell from the lattice, was it not owing to his long attendance even ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 68, footnote 1 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
Treatise Concerning the Christian Priesthood. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 174 (In-Text, Margin)
... devoted of all cities to the gods, followed the apostle, he and his wife? was it not owing to the discourse which they heard? And when Eutychus fell from the lattice, was it not owing to his long attendance even until midnight to St. Paul’s preaching? How do we find him employed at Thessalonica and Corinth, in Ephesus and in Rome itself? Did he not spend whole nights and days in interpreting the Scriptures in their order? and why should any one recount his disputes with the Epicureans and Stoics.[Acts 17:18] For were we resolved to enter into every particular, our story would grow to an unreasonable length.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 138, footnote 1 (Image)
Chrysostom: On the Priesthood, Ascetic Treatises, Select Homilies and Letters, Homilies on the Statutes
Homilies on S. Ignatius and S. Babylas. (HTML)
Eulogy. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 378 (In-Text, Margin)
... for one to come and teach after many teachers, and himself to be the first to sow seeds. For that which has been already practised, and has become customary with many, would be easily accepted; but that which is now for the first time heard, agitates the mind of the hearers, and gives the teacher a great deal to do. This at least it was which disturbed the audience at Athens, and on this account they turned away from Paul, reproaching him with, “Thou bringest certain strange things to our ears.”[Acts 17:20] For if the oversight of the Church now furnishes much weariness and work to those who govern it, consider how double and treble and manifold was the work then, when there were dangers and fighting and snares, and fear continually. It is not possible ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 410, footnote 11 (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 X (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1470 (In-Text, Margin)
... And again, “Am I a God nigh at hand, and not a God afar off?” And again, David says, “I have said unto the Lord, Thou art my Lord, for Thou hast no need of my good things.” But Paul, demonstrating this independence of help, and shewing that both these things especially belong to God; to stand in need of nothing, and of Himself to supply all things to all; speaks on this wise, “God that made the heaven, and the earth, and the sea, Himself needeth not any thing, giving to all life and all things.”[Acts 17:25]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 11, page 21, footnote 3 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Romans
A Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles (HTML)
Homily III on Acts i. 12. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 74 (In-Text, Margin)
... the very beginning there were many that then followed Him. Observe, for instance, how this appears in these words: “One of the two which heard John speak, and followed Jesus.—All the time,” he says, “that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John.” (John i. 40.) True! for no one knew what preceded that event, though they did learn it by the Spirit. “Unto that same day that He was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of His resurrection.”[Acts 17:18] He said not, a witness of the rest of his actions, but a witness of the resurrection alone. For indeed that witness had a better right to be believed, who was able to declare, that He Who ate and drank, and was crucified, the same rose again. ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 11, page 21, footnote 3 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Romans
A Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles (HTML)
Homily III on Acts i. 12. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 74 (In-Text, Margin)
... the very beginning there were many that then followed Him. Observe, for instance, how this appears in these words: “One of the two which heard John speak, and followed Jesus.—All the time,” he says, “that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John.” (John i. 40.) True! for no one knew what preceded that event, though they did learn it by the Spirit. “Unto that same day that He was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of His resurrection.”[Acts 17:32] He said not, a witness of the rest of his actions, but a witness of the resurrection alone. For indeed that witness had a better right to be believed, who was able to declare, that He Who ate and drank, and was crucified, the same rose again. ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 11, page 258, footnote 3 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Romans
A Commentary on the Acts of the Apostles (HTML)
Homily XLII on Acts xix. 21, 23. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 982 (In-Text, Margin)
... concern, but that “the temple also of the great goddess Diana is in danger to be destroyed.” Then, lest he should seem to say this for the sake of lucre, see what he adds: “Whom the whole world worshippeth.” Observe how he showed Paul’s power to be the greater, proving all (their gods) to be wretched and miserable creatures, since a mere man, who was driven about, a mere tentmaker, had so much power. Observe the testimonies borne to the Apostles by their enemies, that they overthrew their worship.[Acts 17:23] There (at Lystra) they brought “garlands and oxen.” (ch. xiv. 13.) Here he says, “This our craft is in danger to be set at naught.—Ye have filled (all) everywhere with your doctrine.” (ch. v. 28.) So said the Jews also with regard to Christ: “Ye see ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 11, page 337, footnote 1 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles and the Epistle to the Romans
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Paul's Epistle to the Romans (HTML)
The Argument (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1188 (In-Text, Margin)
... too then, in imitation of him, each one bring into order, if not the world, or not entire cities and nations, yet at all events his own house, his wife, his children, his friends, his neighbors. And let no one say to me, “I am unskilled and unlearned:” nothing were less instructed than Peter, nothing more rude than Paul, and this himself confessed, and was not ashamed to say, “though I be rude in speech, yet not in knowledge.” (2 Cor. xi. 6.) Yet nevertheless this rude one, and that unlearned man,[Acts 17:28] overcame countless philosophers, stopped the mouths of countless orators, and did all by their own ready mind and the grace of God. What excuse then shall we have, if we are not equal to twenty names, and are not even of service to them that live ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 13, page 324, footnote 6 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians. (HTML)
Homilies on First Thessalonians. (HTML)
1 Thessalonians 1:1-3 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 937 (In-Text, Margin)
... from love, and we hold out against them all, is it not labor? For what did not these men suffer, that they might not revolt from their love? Did not they that warred against the Preaching go to Paul’s host, and not having found him, drag Jason before the rulers of the city? (Acts xvii. 5, 6.) Tell me, is this a slight labor, when the seed had not yet taken root, to endure so great a storm, so many trials? And they demanded security of him. And having given security, he says, Jason sent away Paul.[Acts 17:9] Is this a small thing, tell me? Did not Jason expose himself to danger for him? and this he calls a labor of love, because they were thus bound to him.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 13, page 328, footnote 2 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians. (HTML)
Homilies on First Thessalonians. (HTML)
1 Thessalonians 1:8-10 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 949 (In-Text, Margin)
What means, “What manner of entering in we had unto you”? That it was full of dangers, and numberless deaths, but that none of these things troubled you. But as if nothing had happened, so you adhered to us; as if ye had suffered no evil, but had enjoyed infinite good, so you received us after these things. For this was the second entering.[Acts 17] They went to Berœa, they were persecuted, and when they came after this they so received them, as though they had been honored by these also, so that they even laid down their lives for them. The expression, “What manner of entering in we had,” is complicated, and contains an encomium both of them and of themselves. But he ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 13, page 333, footnote 4 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians. (HTML)
Homilies on First Thessalonians. (HTML)
1 Thessalonians 2:9-12 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 962 (In-Text, Margin)
“Who both killed the Lord,” he says—but, perhaps, they did not know Him,—assuredly they did know Him. What then? Did they not slay and stone their own prophets, whose books even they carry about with them? And they did not do this for the sake of truth. There is therefore not only a consolation under the temptations, but they are reminded not to think that (the Jews) did it for the truth’s sake, and be troubled on that account. “And drave out us,”[Acts 17:5] he says. And we also, he says, have suffered numberless evils. “And please not God, and are contrary to all men; forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles, that they may be saved.” “Contrary to all men,” he says. How? Because if we ought to speak to the world, and they forbid ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 13, page 333, footnote 4 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians. (HTML)
Homilies on First Thessalonians. (HTML)
1 Thessalonians 2:9-12 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 962 (In-Text, Margin)
“Who both killed the Lord,” he says—but, perhaps, they did not know Him,—assuredly they did know Him. What then? Did they not slay and stone their own prophets, whose books even they carry about with them? And they did not do this for the sake of truth. There is therefore not only a consolation under the temptations, but they are reminded not to think that (the Jews) did it for the truth’s sake, and be troubled on that account. “And drave out us,”[Acts 17:14] he says. And we also, he says, have suffered numberless evils. “And please not God, and are contrary to all men; forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles, that they may be saved.” “Contrary to all men,” he says. How? Because if we ought to speak to the world, and they forbid ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 13, page 334, footnote 5 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Philippians, Colossians, and Thessalonians. (HTML)
Homilies on First Thessalonians. (HTML)
1 Thessalonians 2:9-12 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 967 (In-Text, Margin)
What sayest thou? does Satan hinder? Yes, truly, for this was not the work of God. For in the Epistle to the Romans, he says this, that God hindered him (from Rom. xv. 22.); and elsewhere Luke says, that “the Spirit” hindered them from going into Asia. (Acts xvi. 7.) And in the Epistle to the Corinthians he says, that it is the work of the Spirit, but here only of Satan. But what hindrance of Satan is he speaking of? Some unexpected and violent temptations:[Acts 17:5] for a plot, it says, being formed against him by the Jews, he was detained three months in Greece. But it is another thing to remain for the sake of the dispensation, and willingly. For there he says, “Wherefore having no more place in these parts” (Rom. xv. 23.), ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 13, page 410, footnote 3 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Epistles to the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, Thessalonians, Timothy, Titus, and Philemon
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. (HTML)
Homilies on 1 Timothy. (HTML)
1 Timothy 1:1,2 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1096 (In-Text, Margin)
... entertain no doubt. For if the things asserted were human, we ought to examine them; but since they are of God, they are only to be revered and believed. If we believe not, how shall we be persuaded of the existence of a God? For how knowest thou that there is a God, when thou callest Him to account? The knowledge of God is best shown by believing in Him without proofs and demonstrations. Even the Greeks know this; for they believed their Gods telling them, saith one, even without proof; and what?—That[Acts 17:28] they were the offspring of the Gods. But why do I speak of the Gods? In the case of the man, a deceiver and sorcerer, (I speak of Pythagoras,) they acted in like manner, for of him it was said, He said it. And over their temples was an image of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 14, page 23, footnote 6 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Gospel of St. John and the Epistle to the Hebrews
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Gospel of St. John. (HTML)
John 1.3 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 122 (In-Text, Margin)
... the greatness of the creation. Nay, if need were that ten thousand, or even an infinite number of such worlds be created, He remains the same, sufficient for them all not merely to produce, but also to control them after their creation. For the word “Life” here refers not merely to the act of creation, but also to the providence (engaged) about the permanence of the things created; it also lays down beforehand the doctrine of the resurrection, and is the beginning of these marvelous good tidings.[Acts 17:28] Since when “life” has come to be with us, the power of death is dissolved; and when “light” has shone upon us, there is no longer darkness, but life ever abides within us, and death cannot overcome it. So that what is asserted of the Father might be ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 14, page 520, footnote 10 (Image)
Chrysostom: Homilies on the Gospel of St. John and the Epistle to the Hebrews
The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom on the Epistle to the Hebrews. (HTML)
Hebrews 13.17 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3512 (In-Text, Margin)
I suppose that they were not at all unfavorably disposed towards Timothy: wherefore he also put him forward. For (ver. 23) “know ye,” he says, “that our brother Timothy is set at liberty, with whom, if he come shortly, I will see you.” “Set at liberty,” he says; from whence? I suppose he had been cast into prison: or if not this, that he was sent away from Athens. For this also is mentioned in the Acts.[Acts 17:16]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 137, footnote 6 (Image)
Eusebius: Church History from A.D. 1-324, Life of Constantine the Great, Oration in Praise of Constantine
The Church History of Eusebius. (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
The First Successors of the Apostles. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 620 (In-Text, Margin)
11. Besides these, that Areopagite, named Dionysius, who was the first to believe after Paul’s address to the Athenians in the Areopagus (as recorded by Luke in the Acts)[Acts 17:34] is mentioned by another Dionysius, an ancient writer and pastor of the parish in Corinth, as the first bishop of the church at Athens.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 193, footnote 10 (Image)
Eusebius: Church History from A.D. 1-324, Life of Constantine the Great, Oration in Praise of Constantine
The Church History of Eusebius. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Justin the Philosopher preaches the Word of Christ in Rome and suffers Martyrdom. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1176 (In-Text, Margin)
3. His words are as follows: “I, too, therefore, expect to be plotted against and put in the stocks[Acts 17:24] by some one of those whom I have named, or perhaps by Crescens, that unphilosophical and vainglorious man. For the man is not worthy to be called a philosopher who publicly bears witness against those concerning whom he knows nothing, declaring, for the sake of captivating and pleasing the multitude, that the Christians are atheistical and impious.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 201, footnote 1 (Image)
Eusebius: Church History from A.D. 1-324, Life of Constantine the Great, Oration in Praise of Constantine
The Church History of Eusebius. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, and the Epistles which he wrote. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1250 (In-Text, Margin)
3. He mentions Quadratus also, stating that he was appointed their bishop after the martyrdom of Publius, and testifying that through his zeal they were brought together again and their faith revived. He records, moreover, that Dionysius the Areopagite, who was converted to the faith by the apostle Paul, according to the statement in the Acts of the Apostles,[Acts 17:34] first obtained the episcopate of the church at Athens.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 234, footnote 7 (Image)
Eusebius: Church History from A.D. 1-324, Life of Constantine the Great, Oration in Praise of Constantine
The Church History of Eusebius. (HTML)
Book V (HTML)
Miltiades and His Works. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1610 (In-Text, Margin)
3. They cannot show that one of the old or one of the new prophets was thus carried away in spirit. Neither can they boast of Agabus, or Judas, or Silas,[Acts 15-18] or the daughters of Philip, or Ammia in Philadelphia, or Quadratus, or any others not belonging to them.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 2, page 88, footnote 3 (Image)
Socrates: Church History from A.D. 305-438; Sozomenus: Church History from A.D. 323-425
The Ecclesiastical History of Socrates Scholasticus. (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
Of the Literary Labors of the Two Apollinares and the Emperor's Prohibition of Christians being instructed in Greek Literature. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 532 (In-Text, Margin)
... the Scriptures from their legitimate construction, let it be remembered that the Apostle not only does not forbid our being instructed in Greek learning, but that he himself seems by no means to have neglected it, inasmuch as he knows many of the sayings of the Greeks. Whence did he get the saying, ‘The Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, slow-bellies,’ but from a perusal of The Oracles of Epimenides, the Cretan Initiator? Or how would he have known this, ‘For we are also his offspring,’[Acts 17:28] had he not been acquainted with The Phenomena of Aratus the astronomer? Again this sentence, ‘Evil communications corrupt good manners,’ is a sufficient proof that he was conversant with the tragedies of Euripides. But what need is there of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 2, page 127, footnote 2 (Image)
Socrates: Church History from A.D. 305-438; Sozomenus: Church History from A.D. 323-425
The Ecclesiastical History of Socrates Scholasticus. (HTML)
Book V (HTML)
Of the Hieroglyphics found in the Temple of Serapis. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 743 (In-Text, Margin)
... from ages and from generations,’ as the apostle declares; and if the devil himself, the prince of wickedness, knew nothing of it, his ministers, the Egyptian priests, are likely to have been still more ignorant of the matter; but Providence doubtless purposed that in the enquiry concerning this character, there should something take place analogous to what happened heretofore at the preaching of Paul. For he, made wise by the Divine Spirit, employed a similar method in relation to the Athenians,[Acts 17:23] and brought over many of them to the faith, when on reading the inscription on one of their altars, he accommodated and applied it to his own discourse. Unless indeed any one should say, that the Word of God wrought in the Egyptian priests, as it ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 124, footnote 5 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)
The Ecclesiastical History of Theodoret. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Narrative of events at Alexandria in the time of Lucius the Arian, taken from a letter of Petrus, Bishop of Alexandria. (HTML)
... sighing sounded through all the town, and from every eye flowed a river of tears which threatened to overwhelm the very sea with its tide. There was the aforesaid Magnus on the port ordering the rowers to hoist the sails, and up went a mingled cry of maids and matrons, old men and young, all sobbing and lamenting together, and the noise of the multitude overwhelmed the roar raised by the waves on the foaming sea. So the martyrs sailed off for Heliopolis, where every man is given over to superstition,[Acts 17:22] where flourish the devil’s ways of pleasure, and where the situation of the city, surrounded on all sides by mountains that approach the sky, is fitted for the terrifying lairs of wild beasts. All the friends they left behind now alike in public in ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 186, footnote 4 (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 Unconfounded. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1199 (In-Text, Margin)
“And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent: Because he hath appointed a day in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom he hath ordained, whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead.”[Acts 17:30-31] He then who excuses himself from using the name appointed and preached by the Lord and his Apostles deems himself wiser than even these great instructors, aye, even than the very well-spring of the wisest.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 199, footnote 5 (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 Unconfounded. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1288 (In-Text, Margin)
Orth. —I would not so say persuaded only by human arguments, for I am not so rash as to say anything concerning which divine Scripture is silent. But I have heard the divine Paul exclaiming “God hath appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained whereof He hath given assurance unto all men in that He hath raised Him from the dead,”[Acts 17:31] and I have learnt from the holy Angels that He will come in like manner as the disciples saw Him going into heaven. Now they saw His nature not unlimited. For I have heard the words of the Lord, “Ye shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven,” and I acknowledge that what is seen of men ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 327, footnote 6 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)
Letters of the Blessed Theodoret, Bishop of Cyprus. (HTML)
Letter or Address of Theodoret to the Monks of the Euphratensian, the Osrhoene, Syria, Phœnicia, and Cilicia. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2178 (In-Text, Margin)
... die even so in Christ shall all be made alive.” And writing to Timothy he says, “For there is one God and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus.” In the Acts in his speech at Athens “The times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent; because He hath appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He hath ordained, whereof He hath given assurance unto all men, in that He hath raised him from the dead.”[Acts 17:30-31] And the blessed Peter preaching to the Jews says, “Ye men of Israel, hear these words Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you by miracles and wonders and signs which God did by Him in the midst of you,” and the prophet Isaiah when ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 40, footnote 3 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
The Incarnation of the Word. (HTML)
On the Incarnation of the Word. (HTML)
The Word, then, visited that earth in which He was yet always present ; and saw all these evils. He takes a body of our Nature, and that of a spotless Virgin, in whose womb He makes it His own, wherein to reveal Himself, conquer death, and restore life. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 218 (In-Text, Margin)
For this purpose, then, the incorporeal and incorruptible and immaterial Word of God comes to our realm, howbeit he was not far from us[Acts 17:27] before. For no part of Creation is left void of Him: He has filled all things everywhere, remaining present with His own Father. But He comes in condescension to shew loving-kindness upon us, and to visit us. 2. And seeing the race of rational creatures in the way to perish, and death reigning over them by corruption; seeing, too, that the threat against transgression gave a firm hold to the corruption which was upon us, and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 59, footnote 1 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
The Incarnation of the Word. (HTML)
On the Incarnation of the Word. (HTML)
His union with the body is based upon His relation to Creation as a whole. He used a human body, since to man it was that He wished to reveal Himself. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 313 (In-Text, Margin)
... by the Word out of nothing. 3. But if, even though creation be a thing made, it is not absurd that the Word should be in it, then neither is it absurd that He should be in man. For whatever idea they form of the whole, they must necessarily apply the like idea to the part. For man also, as I said before, is a part of the whole. 4. Thus it is not at all unseemly that the Word should be in man, while all things are deriving from Him their light and movement and light, as also their authors say, “In[Acts 17:28] him we live and move and have our being.” 5. So, then, what is there to scoff at in what we say, if the Word has used that, wherein He is, as an instrument to manifest Himself? For were He not in it, neither could He have used it; but if we have ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 163, footnote 7 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Defence of the Nicene Definition. (De Decretis.) (HTML)
De Decretis. (Defence of the Nicene Definition.) (HTML)
Defence of the Council's Phrases, “from the essence,” And “one in essence.” Objection that the phrases are not scriptural; we ought to look at the sense more than the wording; evasion of the Arians as to the phrase “of God” which is in Scripture; their evasion of all explanations but those which the Council selected, which were intended to negative the Arian formulæ; protest against their conveying any material sense. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 894 (In-Text, Margin)
... contradict, being put to shame by the arguments which were urged against them; but withal they were caught whispering to each other and winking with their eyes, that ‘like,’ and ‘always,’ and ‘power,’ and ‘in Him,’ were, as before, common to us and the Son, and that it was no difficulty to agree to these. As to ‘like,’ they said that it is written of us, ‘Man is the image and glory of God:’ ‘always,’ that it was written, ‘For we which live are alway:’ ‘in Him,’ ‘In Him we live and move and have our being[Acts 17:28]:’ ‘unalterable,’ that it is written, ‘Nothing shall separate us from the love of Christ:’ as to ‘power,’ that the caterpillar and the locust are called ‘power’ and ‘great power,’ and that it is often said of the people, for instance, ‘All the power ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 290, footnote 7 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Arian History. (Historia Arianorum ad Monachos.) (HTML)
Arian History. (Historia Arianorum ad Monachos.) (HTML)
Persecution at Alexandria. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1692 (In-Text, Margin)
... had held out to them; just as if the matter had been the appointment of a general, or other magistrate. Indeed what as heathen, were they likely to do, except whatever was pleasing to the Emperor? But the people having assembled in the great Church (for it was the fourth day of the week), Count Heraclius on the following day takes with him Cataphronius the Prefect of Egypt, and Faustinus the Receiver-General, and Bithynus a heretic; and together they stir up the younger men of the common multitude[Acts 17:5] who worshipped idols, to attack the Church, and stone the people, saying that such was the Emperor’s command. As the time of dismissal however had arrived, the greater part had already left the Church, but there being a few women still remaining, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 393, footnote 14 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Against the Arians. (Orationes contra Arianos IV.) (HTML)
Discourse III (HTML)
Texts Explained; Seventhly, John xiv. 10. Introduction. The doctrine of the coinherence. The Father and the Son Each whole and perfect God. They are in Each Other, because their Essence is One and the Same. They are Each Perfect and have One Essence, because the Second Person is the Son of the First. Asterius's evasive explanation of the text under review; refuted. Since the Son has all that the Father has, He is His Image; and the Father is the One God, because the Son is in the Father. (HTML)
... they ought to see, nor understanding what they read, as if in vomit from the depth of their irreligious heart, have next proceeded to disparage our Lord’s words, ‘I in the Father and the Father in Me;’ saying, ‘How can the One be contained in the Other and the Other in the One?’ or ‘How at all can the Father who is the greater be contained in the Son who is the less?’ or ‘What wonder, if the Son is in the Father,’ considering it is written even of us, ‘In Him we live and move and have our being[Acts 17:28]?’ And this state of mind is consistent with their perverseness, who think God to be material, and understand not what is ‘True Father’ and ‘True Son,’ nor ‘Light Invisible’ and ‘Eternal,’ and Its ‘Radiance Invisible,’ nor ‘Invisible Subsistence,’ ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 447, footnote 1 (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)
That the Son is the Co-existing Word, argued from the New Testament. Texts from the Old Testament continued; especially Ps. cx. 3. Besides, the Word in Old Testament may be Son in New, as Spirit in Old Testament is Paraclete in New. Objection from Acts x. 36; answered by parallels, such as 1 Cor. i. 5. Lev. ix. 7. &c. Necessity of the Word's taking flesh, viz. to sanctify, yet without destroying, the flesh. (HTML)
35. But if Scripture often calls even the body by the name of Christ, as in the blessed Peter’s words to Cornelius, when he teaches him of ‘Jesus of Nazareth, whom God anointed with the Holy Ghost,’ and again to the Jews, ‘Jesus of Nazareth, a Man approved of God for you,’ and again the blessed Paul to the Athenians, ‘By that Man, whom He ordained, giving assurance to all men, in that He raised Him from the dead[Acts 17:31] ’ (for we find the appointment and the mission often synonymous with the anointing; from which any one who will may learn, that there is no discordance in the words of the sacred writers, but that they but give various names to the union of God the Word with the Man from Mary, sometimes as ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 556, footnote 5 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Letters of Athanasius with Two Ancient Chronicles of His Life. (HTML)
The Festal Letters, and their Index. (HTML)
Personal Letters. (HTML)
Letter to Amun. Written before 354 A.D. (HTML)
... tell me, beloved and most pious friend, what sin or uncleanness there is in any natural secretion,—as though a man were minded to make a culpable matter of the cleanings of the nose or the sputa from the mouth? And we may add also the secretions of the belly, such as are a physical necessity of animal life. Moreover if we believe man to be, as the divine Scriptures say, a work of God’s hands, how could any defiled work proceed from a pure Power? and if, according to the divine Acts of the Apostles[Acts 17:28], ‘we are God’s offspring,’ we have nothing unclean in ourselves. For then only do we incur defilement, when we commit sin, that foulest of things. But when any bodily excretion takes place independently of will, then we experience this, like other ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 579, footnote 9 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Letters of Athanasius with Two Ancient Chronicles of His Life. (HTML)
The Festal Letters, and their Index. (HTML)
Personal Letters. (HTML)
To John and Antiochus. (HTML)
I was glad to receive your letter just now, the more so as you wrote from Jerusalem. I thank you for informing me about the brethren that there assembled, and about those who wish, on account of disputed points, to disturb the simple. But about these things let the Apostle charge them not to give heed to those who contend about words, and seek nothing else than to tell and hear some new thing[Acts 17:21]. But do you, having your foundation sure, even Jesus Christ our Lord, and the confession of the fathers concerning the faith, avoid those who wish to say anything more or less than that, and rather aim at the profit of the brethren, that they may fear God and keep His commandments, in order that both ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 5, page 70, footnote 1 (Image)
Gregory of Nyssa: Dogmatic Treatises; Select Writings and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises. (HTML)
Against Eunomius. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
It will not do to apply this conception, as drawn out above, of the Father and Son to the Creation, as they insist on doing: but we must contemplate the Son apart with the Father, and believe that the Creation had its origin from a definite point. (HTML)
This is the Being in which, to use the words of the Apostle, all things are formed; and we, with our individual share in existence, live and move, and have our being[Acts 17:28]. It is above beginning, and presents no marks of its inmost nature: it is to be known of only in the impossibility of perceiving it. That indeed is its most special characteristic, that its nature is too high for any distinctive attribute. A very different account to the Uncreate must be given of Creation: it is this very thing that takes it out of all comparison and connexion with its Maker; this difference, I ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 149, footnote 6 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Magnus an Orator of Rome. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2133 (In-Text, Margin)
... Half of which line was afterwards adopted by Callimachus. It is not surprising that a literal rendering of the words into Latin should fail to preserve the metre, seeing that Homer when translated into the same language is scarcely intelligible even in prose. In another epistle Paul quotes a line of Menander: “Evil communications corrupt good manners.” And when he is arguing with the Athenians upon the Areopagus he calls Aratus as a witness citing from him the words “For we are also his offspring;”[Acts 17:28] in Greek τοῦ γὰρ καὶ γένος ἐσμεν, the close of a heroic verse. And as if this were not enough, that leader of the Christian army, that unvanquished pleader for the cause of Christ, skilfully turns a chance ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 149, footnote 7 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Magnus an Orator of Rome. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2134 (In-Text, Margin)
... quotes a line of Menander: “Evil communications corrupt good manners.” And when he is arguing with the Athenians upon the Areopagus he calls Aratus as a witness citing from him the words “For we are also his offspring;” in Greek τοῦ γὰρ καὶ γένος ἐσμεν, the close of a heroic verse. And as if this were not enough, that leader of the Christian army, that unvanquished pleader for the cause of Christ, skilfully turns a chance inscription into a proof of the faith.[Acts 17:22] For he had learned from the true David to wrench the sword of the enemy out of his hand and with his own blade to cut off the head of the arrogant Goliath. He had read in Deuteronomy the command given by the voice of the Lord that when a captive ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 352, footnote 11 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against Jovinianus. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4306 (In-Text, Margin)
... and to support the rest of the body with a stick, than to crawl with broken legs. What do you say, Apostle? I do not believe you when you say “Though I be rude in speech, yet am I not in knowledge.” As humility is the source of the sayings “For I am not worthy to be called an Apostle,” and “To me who am the least of the Apostles,” and “As to one born out of due time,” so here also we have an utterance of humility. You know the meaning of language, or you would not quote Epimenides, Menander, and[Acts 17:28] Aratus. When you are discussing continence and virginity you say, “It is good for a man not to touch a woman.” And, “It is good for them if they abide even as I.” And, “I think that this is good by reason of the present distress.” And, “That it is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 134, footnote 1 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
On the Words, And in One Holy Catholic Church, and in the Resurrection of the Flesh, and the Life Everlasting. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2241 (In-Text, Margin)
... it, abandons itself to perdition. He who believes that his body shall remain to rise again, is careful of his robe, and defiles it not with fornication; but he who disbelieves the Resurrection, gives himself to fornication, and misuses his own body, as though it were not his own. Faith therefore in the Resurrection of the dead, is a great commandment and doctrine of the Holy Catholic Church; great and most necessary, though gainsaid by many, yet surely warranted by the truth. Greeks contradict it[Acts 17:32], Samaritans disbelieve it, heretics mutilate it; the contradiction is manifold, but the truth is uniform.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 272, footnote 13 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
On the Great Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3302 (In-Text, Margin)
... treatment of Theology had not made its way into the schools of divinity, but playing with pebbles which deceive the eye by the quickness of their changes, or dancing before an audience with varied and effeminate contortions, were looked upon as all one with speaking or hearing of God in a way unusual or frivolous. But since the Sextuses and Pyrrhos, and the antithetic style, like a dire and malignant disease, have infected our churches, and babbling is reputed culture, and, as the book of the Acts[Acts 17:21] says of the Athenians, we spend our time in nothing else but either to tell or to hear some new thing. O what Jeremiah will bewail our confusion and blind madness; he alone could utter lamentations befitting our misfortunes.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 317, footnote 2 (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 3691 (In-Text, Margin)
... not correct to say of them that they are Like in one particular and Unlike in another; but they are a complete resemblance, and should rather be called Identical than Like. Moreover he is called Light as being the Brightness of souls cleansed by word and life. For if ignorance and sin be darkness, knowledge and a godly life will be Light.…And He is called Life, because He is Light, and is the constituting and creating Power of every reasonable soul. For in Him we live and move and have our being,[Acts 17:28] according to the double power of that Breathing into us; for we were all inspired by Him with breath, and as many of us as were capable of it, and in so far as we open the mouth of our mind, with God the Holy Ghost. He is Righteousness, because He ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 386, footnote 5 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Last Farewell in the Presence of the One Hundred and Fifty Bishops. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4282 (In-Text, Margin)
1. What think ye of our affairs, dear shepherds and fellow-shepherds: whose feet are beautiful, for you bring glad tidings of peace and of the good things with which ye have come; beautiful again in our eyes, to whom ye have come in season, not to convert a wandering sheep, but to converse with a pilgrim shepherd? What think ye of this our pilgrimage? And of its fruit, or rather of that of the Spirit within us, by Whom we are ever moved,[Acts 17:28] and specially have now been moved, desiring to have, and perhaps having, nothing of our own? Do you of yourselves understand and perceive—and are you kindly critics of our actions? Or must we, like those from whom a reckoning is demanded as to their military ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 8, page 25, footnote 14 (Image)
Basil: Letters and Select Works
De Spiritu Sancto. (HTML)
That the Holy Spirit is in every conception inseparable from the Father and the Son, alike in the creation of perceptible objects, in the dispensation of human affairs, and in the judgment to come. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1067 (In-Text, Margin)
40. Moreover by any one who carefully uses his reason it will be found that even at the moment of the expected appearance of the Lord from heaven the Holy Spirit will not, as some suppose, have no functions to discharge: on the contrary, even in the day of His revelation, in which the blessed and only potentate will judge the world in righteousness,[Acts 17:31] the Holy Spirit will be present with Him. For who is so ignorant of the good things prepared by God for them that are worthy, as not to know that the crown of the righteous is the grace of the Spirit, bestowed in more abundant and perfect measure in that day, when spiritual glory shall be distributed to each in proportion ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 8, page 27, footnote 1 (Image)
Basil: Letters and Select Works
De Spiritu Sancto. (HTML)
Against those who say that the Holy Ghost is not to be numbered with, but numbered under, the Father and the Son. Wherein moreover there is a summary notice of the faith concerning right sub-numeration. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1080 (In-Text, Margin)
... of the cheapness of the material, is subnumerated to gold? And do you attribute so much importance to number as that it can either exalt the value of what is cheap, or destroy the dignity of what is valuable? Therefore, again, you will number gold under precious stones, and such precious stones as are smaller and without lustre under those which are larger and brighter in colour. But what will not be said by men who spend their time in nothing else but either ‘to tell or to hear some new thing’?[Acts 17:21] Let these supporters of impiety be classed for the future with Stoics and Epicureans. What sub-numeration is even possible of things less valuable in relation to things very valuable? How is a brass obol to be numbered under a golden stater? ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 8, page 41, footnote 1 (Image)
Basil: Letters and Select Works
De Spiritu Sancto. (HTML)
Of the origin of the word “with,” and what force it has. Also concerning the unwritten laws of the church. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1269 (In-Text, Margin)
66. Of the beliefs and practices whether generally accepted or publicly enjoined which are preserved in the Church[Acts 17:7] some we possess derived from written teaching; others we have received delivered to us “in a mystery” by the tradition of the apostles; and both of these in relation to true religion have the same force. And these no one will gainsay;—no one, at all events, who is even moderately versed in the institutions of the Church. For were we to attempt to reject such customs as have no written authority, on the ground that the importance they ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 9, page 73, footnote 14 (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 IV (HTML)
... Father has prescience of all things, as the blessed Susanna says, O eternal God, that knowest secrets, and knowest all things before they be; that He is incomprehensible, as it is written, The heaven is My throne, and the earth is the footstool of My feet. What house will ye build Me, or what is the place of My rest? For these things hath My hand made, and all these things are mine; that He contains all things, as Paul bears witness, For in Him we live and move and have our being[Acts 17:28], and the psalmist, Whither shall I go from Thy Spirit, and whither shall I fly from Thy face? If I climb up into heaven, Thou art there; if I go down to hell, Thou art present. If I take my wings before the light and dwell in the uttermost parts ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 204, footnote 6 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book I. (HTML)
Chapter II. The Emperor is exhorted to display zeal in the Faith. Christ's perfect Godhead is shown from the unity of will and working which He has with the Father. The attributes of Divinity are shown to be proper to Christ, Whose various titles prove His essential unity, with distinction of Person. In no other way can the unity of God be maintained. (HTML)
18. Moreover, if in all them that believed there was, as it is written, one soul and one heart: if every one that cleaveth to the Lord is one spirit, as the Apostle hath said: if a man and his wife are one flesh: if all we mortal men are, so far as regards our general nature, of one substance: if this is what the Scripture saith of created men, that, being many, they are one,[Acts 17:26] who can in no way be compared to Divine Persons, how much more are the Father and the Son one in Divinity, with Whom there is no difference either of substance or of will!
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 224, footnote 2 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book II. (HTML)
Introduction. (HTML)
7. The three that follow—to wit, the names “God,” “Life,” “Truth,” reveal His Power, whereby He hath laid the foundations of, and upheld, the created world. “For,” as Paul said, “in Him we live and move and have our being;”[Acts 17:28] and therefore, in the first three the Son’s natural right, in the other three the unity of action subsisting between Father and Son is made manifest.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 242, footnote 4 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Chapter I. Statement of the reasons wherefore the matters, treated of shortly in the two former, are dealt with more at length in the three later books. Defence of the employment of fables, which is supported by the example of Holy Writ, wherein are found various figures of poetic fable, in particular the Sirens, which are figures of sensual pleasures, and which Christians ought to be taught to avoid, by the words of Paul and the deeds of Christ. (HTML)
4. Whence, for instance, came that verse, “His offspring truly are we,”[Acts 17:28] whereof Paul, by prophetic experience, taught, makes use? The course of prophetic speech avoids neither the Giants nor the Valley of the Titans, and Isaiah spake of sirens and the daughters of ostriches. Jeremiah also hath prophesied concerning Babylon, that the daughters of sirens shall dwell therein, in order to show that the snares of Babylon, that is, of the tumult of this world, are to be likened to stories of old-time lust, that seemed upon this life’s ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 248, footnote 9 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Chapter VI. In order to dispose of an objection grounded on a text in St. John, St. Ambrose first shows that the Arian interpretation lends countenance to the Manichæans; then, after setting forth the different ways of dividing the words in this same passage, he shows plainly that it cannot, without dishonour to the Father, be understood with such reference to the Godhead as the Arians give it, and expounds the true meaning thereon. (HTML)
... part of those who are learned in the Faith read the passage as follows: “All things were made by Him, and without Him was not anything made that has been made.” Others read thus: “All things were made by Him, and without Him was nothing made.” Then they proceed: “What has been made,” and to this they join the words “in Him;” that is to say, “But whatsover is has been made in Him.” But what mean the words “in Him”? The Apostle tells us, when he says: “In Him we have our being, and live, and move.”[Acts 17:28]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 460, footnote 1 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Selections from the Letters of St. Ambrose. (HTML)
Epistle LXIII: To the Church at Vercellæ. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3676 (In-Text, Margin)
21. Do not they by these various arguments show themselves to us as differing and disagreeing one with the other? And Scripture too condemns them, not passing over those whom the Apostle refuted, as Luke, who wrote the book as a history, tells us in the Acts of the Apostles, “And certain also of the Epicurean and Stoic philosophers disputed with him. And some said, What does this babbler mean? And others said, He seemeth to be a setter forth of new gods.”[Acts 17:18]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 468, footnote 1 (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 XVII. The Second Conference of Abbot Joseph. On Making Promises. (HTML)
Chapter XX. How even Apostles thought that a lie was often useful and the truth injurious. (HTML)
... Divine law, he chose to bring forward a verse of a heathen poet rather than a saying of Moses or Christ, saying: “As some also of your own poets have said: for we are also His offspring.” And when he had thus approached them with their own authorities, which they could not reject, thus confirming the truth by things false, he added and said: “Since then we are the offspring of God we ought not to think that the Godhead is like to gold or silver or stone sculptured by the art and device of man.”[Acts 17:23] But to the weak he became weak, when, by way of permission, not of command, he allowed those who could not contain themselves to return together again, or when he fed the Corinthians with milk and not with meat, and says that he was with them in ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 468, footnote 1 (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 XVII. The Second Conference of Abbot Joseph. On Making Promises. (HTML)
Chapter XX. How even Apostles thought that a lie was often useful and the truth injurious. (HTML)
... Divine law, he chose to bring forward a verse of a heathen poet rather than a saying of Moses or Christ, saying: “As some also of your own poets have said: for we are also His offspring.” And when he had thus approached them with their own authorities, which they could not reject, thus confirming the truth by things false, he added and said: “Since then we are the offspring of God we ought not to think that the Godhead is like to gold or silver or stone sculptured by the art and device of man.”[Acts 17:29] But to the weak he became weak, when, by way of permission, not of command, he allowed those who could not contain themselves to return together again, or when he fed the Corinthians with milk and not with meat, and says that he was with them in ...