Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts

Galatians 4:31

There are 10 footnotes for this reference.

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 437, footnote 2 (Image)

Tertullian (I, II, III)

Anti-Marcion. (HTML)

The Five Books Against Marcion. (HTML)

Book V. Wherein Tertullian proves, with respect to St. Paul's epistles, what he had proved in the preceding book with respect to St. Luke's gospel. Far from being at variance, they were in perfect unison with the writings of the Old Testament, and therefore testified that the Creator was the only God, and that the Lord Jesus was his Christ. As in the preceding books, Tertullian supports his argument with profound reasoning, and many happy illustrations of Holy Scripture. (HTML)
Another Instance of Marcion's Tampering with St. Paul's Text. The Fulness of Time, Announced by the Apostle, Foretold by the Prophets.  Mosaic Rites Abrogated by the Creator Himself. Marcion's Tricks About Abraham's Name. The Creator, by His Christ, the Fountain of the Grace and the Liberty Which St. Paul Announced. Marcion's Docetism Refuted. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5353 (In-Text, Margin)

... the Mount Sinai,” in relation to the synagogue of the Jews, according to the law, “which gendereth to bondage”—“the other gendereth” (to liberty, being raised) above all principality, and power, and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but in that which is to come, “which is the mother of us all,” in which we have the promise of (Christ’s) holy church; by reason of which he adds in conclusion: “So then, brethren, we are not children of the bond woman, but of the free.”[Galatians 4:31] In this passage he has undoubtedly shown that Christianity had a noble birth, being sprung, as the mystery of the allegory indicates, from that son of Abraham who was born of the free woman; whereas from the son of the bond maid came the legal ...

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 22, footnote 3 (Image)

Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen

Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)

On the Apparel of Women. (HTML)

II (HTML)
Of Elaborate Dressing of the Hair in Other Ways, and Its Bearing Upon Salvation. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 198 (In-Text, Margin)

... (open) contending against the Lord’s prescripts! It has been pronounced that no one can add to his own stature. You, however, do add to your weight some kind of rolls, or shield-bosses, to be piled upon your necks! If you feel no shame at the enormity, feel some at the pollution; for fear you may be fitting on a holy and Christian head the slough of some one else’s head, unclean perchance, guilty perchance and destined to hell. Nay, rather banish quite away from your “free”[Galatians 4:31] head all this slavery of ornamentation. In vain do you labour to seem adorned: in vain do you call in the aid of all the most skilful manufacturers of false hair. God bids you “be veiled.” I believe (He does so) for fear the heads of some should be ...

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 63, footnote 8 (Image)

Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen

Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)

On Monogamy. (HTML)

The Case of Abraham, and Its Bearing on the Present Question. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 613 (In-Text, Margin)

Thenceforward let matters see to themselves. Figures are one thing; laws another. Images are one thing; statutes another. Images pass away when fulfilled: statutes remain permanently to be fulfilled. Images prophesy: statutes govern. What that digamy of Abraham portends, the same apostle fully teaches,[Galatians 4:21-31] the interpreter of each testament, just as he likewise lays it down that our “seed” is called in Isaac. If you are “of the free woman,” and belong to Isaac, he, at all events, maintained unity of marriage to the last.

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 151, footnote 8 (Image)

Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen

Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)

Appendix (HTML)

Five Books in Reply to Marcion. (HTML)
Of the Harmony of the Fathers of the Old and New Testaments. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1462 (In-Text, Margin)

From the free woman,[Galatians 4:19-31] joys: (the slave expelled,

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 285, footnote 4 (Image)

Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine

City of God (HTML)

The progress of the earthly and heavenly cities traced by the sacred history. (HTML)

Of the Children of the Flesh and the Children of the Promise. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 771 (In-Text, Margin)

... many more children than she which hath an husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now. Nevertheless, what saith the Scripture? Cast out the bond woman and her son: for the son of the bond woman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman. And we, brethren, are not children of the bond woman, but of the free, in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free.”[Galatians 4:21-31] This interpretation of the passage, handed down to us with apostolic authority, shows how we ought to understand the Scriptures of the two covenants—the old and the new. One portion of the earthly city became an image of the heavenly city, not ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 338, footnote 3 (Image)

Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine

City of God (HTML)

The history of the city of God from Noah to the time of the kings of Israel. (HTML)

Of the Three-Fold Meaning of the Prophecies, Which are to Be Referred Now to the Earthly, Now to the Heavenly Jerusalem, and Now Again to Both. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 983 (In-Text, Margin)

... the possessing of eternal life and the kingdom of the heavens. Therefore they pertain partly to the bond maid who gendereth to bondage, that is, the earthly Jerusalem, which is in bondage with her children; but partly to the free city of God, that is, the true Jerusalem eternal in the heavens, whose children are all those that live according to God in the earth: but there are some things among them which are understood to pertain to both,—to the bond maid properly, to the free woman figuratively.[Galatians 4:22-31]

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 637, footnote 1 (Image)

Augustine: The Anti-Manichaean Writings, The Anti-Donatist Writings

Writings in Connection with the Donatist Controversy. (HTML)

The Correction of the Donatists. (HTML)

Chapter 2 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2492 (In-Text, Margin)

11. But this, I say, I forbear to urge. Yet one point I must press: If the true Church is the one which actually suffers persecution, not the one which inflicts it, let them ask the apostle of what Church Sarah was a type, when she inflicted persecution on her hand-maid. For he declares that the free mother of us all, the heavenly Jerusalem, that is to say, the true Church of God, was prefigured in that woman who cruelly entreated her hand-maid.[Galatians 4:22-31] But if we investigate the story further, we shall find that the handmaid rather persecuted Sarah by her haughtiness, than Sarah the handmaid by her severity: for the handmaid was doing wrong to her mistress; the mistress only imposed on her a proper discipline in her ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 403, footnote 6 (Image)

Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings

A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)

Book III. (HTML)

Scriptural Confirmation of the Catholic Doctrine. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2687 (In-Text, Margin)

... until the seed should come to whom the promise was made;” and, “If there had been a law given which could have given life, righteousness should altogether have been by the law; but the Scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.” Hence it is that the Old Testament, from the Mount Sinai, where the law was given, gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. “Now we,” says he, “are not children of the bondmaid but of the freewoman.”[Galatians 4:31] Therefore they are not children of the freewoman who have accepted the law of the letter, whereby they can be shown to be not only sinners, but moreover transgressors; but they who have received the Spirit of grace, whereby the law itself, holy and ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 407, footnote 8 (Image)

Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings

A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)

Book III. (HTML)

The Old Testament is Properly One Thing—The Old Instrument Another. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2727 (In-Text, Margin)

... bondage, which is Agar. For Sinai is a mountain in Arabia, which is associated with Jerusalem which now is, for it is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem that is above is free, which is our mother?” What is more clear, what more certain, what more remote from all obscurity and ambiguity to the children of the promise? And a little after, “Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise.” Also a little after, “But we, brethren, are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free,”[Galatians 4:31] with the liberty with which Christ has made us free. Let us, therefore, choose whether to call the righteous men of old the children of the bondwoman or of the free. Be it far from us to say, of the bondwoman; therefore if of the free, they pertain ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 430, footnote 2 (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 XIX. 17–22. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 1881 (In-Text, Margin)

... counted for the seed.” And the Gentiles were those to whom he said, “But if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” Christ therefore is king of the Jews, but of those who are Jews by the circumcision of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God; who belong to the Jerusalem that is free, our eternal mother in heaven, the spiritual Sarah, who casteth out the bond maid and her children from the house of liberty.[Galatians 4:22-31] And therefore what Pilate wrote he wrote, because what the Lord said He said.

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