Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts

Ephesians 3:17

There are 33 footnotes for this reference.

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 574, footnote 5 (Image)

Tertullian (I, II, III)

Anti-Marcion. (HTML)

On the Resurrection of the Flesh. (HTML)

Sundry Passages of St. Paul Which Attest Our Doctrine Rescued from the Perversions of Heresy. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7547 (In-Text, Margin)

... man is, in a certain sense, the bond between the two closely united substances, under which designation they cannot but be coherent natures. As for the inward man, indeed, the apostle prefers its being regarded as the mind and heart rather than the soul; in other words, not so much the substance itself as the savour of the substance. Thus when, writing to the Ephesians, he spoke of “Christ dwelling in their inner man,” he meant, no doubt, that the Lord ought to be admitted into their senses.[Ephesians 3:17] He then added, “in your hearts by faith, rooted and grounded in love,”—making “faith” and “love” not substantial parts, but only conceptions of the soul. But when he used the phrase “in your hearts,” seeing that these are substantial parts of ...

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 89, footnote 3 (Image)

Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix

Hippolytus. (HTML)

The Refutation of All Heresies. (HTML)

Book VI. (HTML)
The Other Valentinian Emanations in Conformity with the Pythagorean System of Numbers. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 705 (In-Text, Margin)

... soul and demons, at another time of soul and Logoi. And these are the Logoi that have been dispersed from above, from the “Joint Fruit of the Pleroma” and (from) Sophia, into this world. And they dwell in an earthly body, with a soul, when demons do not take up their abode with that soul. This, he says, is what has been written in Scripture: “On this account I bend my knees to the God and Father and Lord of our Lord Jesus Christ, that God would grant you to have Christ dwelling in the inner man,”[Ephesians 3:14-18] —that is, the natural (man), not the corporeal (one),—“that you may be able to understand what is the depth,” which is the Father of the universe, “and what is the breadth,” which is Staurus, the limit of the Pleroma, “or what is the length,” that ...

Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 337, footnote 12 (Image)

Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius

Methodius. (HTML)

The Banquet of the Ten Virgins; or Concerning Chastity. (HTML)

Thekla. (HTML)
The Faithful in Baptism Males, Configured to Christ; The Saints Themselves Christs. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2730 (In-Text, Margin)

... swells and travails in birth until Christ is formed in us, so that each of the saints, by partaking of Christ, has been born a Christ. According to which meaning it is said in a certain scripture, “Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm,” as though those who were baptized into Christ had been made Christs by communication of the Spirit, the Church contributing here their clearness and transformation into the image of the Word. And Paul confirms this, teaching it plainly, where he says:[Ephesians 3:14-17] “For this cause I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, of whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 192, footnote 3 (Image)

Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters

The Confessions (HTML)

Of the goodness of God explained in the creation of things, and of the Trinity as found in the first words of Genesis. The story concerning the origin of the world (Gen. I.) is allegorically explained, and he applies it to those things which God works for sanctified and blessed man. Finally, he makes an end of this work, having implored eternal rest from God. (HTML)

That the Holy Spirit Brings Us to God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1184 (In-Text, Margin)

8. Hence let him that is able now follow Thy apostle with his understanding where he thus speaks, because Thy love “is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost, which is given unto us;” and where, “concerning spiritual gifts,” he teacheth and showeth unto us a more excellent way of charity; and where he bows his knees unto Thee for us, that we may know the super-eminent knowledge of the love of Christ.[Ephesians 3:14-19] And, therefore, from the beginning was He super-eminently “borne above the waters.” To whom shall I tell this? How speak of the weight of lustful desires, pressing downwards to the steep abyss? and how charity raises us up again, through Thy Spirit which was “borne over the waters?” To whom ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 311, footnote 6 (Image)

Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters

Letters of St. Augustin (HTML)

Letters of St. Augustin (HTML)

To Januarius (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1805 (In-Text, Margin)

... emblem of that patient continuance in the will of God, on account of which those who are patient are said to be long-suffering. The depth also, i.e. the part which is fixed in the ground, represents the occult nature of the holy mystery. For you remember, I suppose, the words of the apostle, which in this description of the cross I aim at expounding: “That ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height.”[Ephesians 3:17-18]

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 555, footnote 5 (Image)

Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine

On Christian Doctrine (HTML)

Book II (HTML)

What Kind of Spirit is Required for the Study of Holy Scripture. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1829 (In-Text, Margin)

... whom knowledge doth not puff up, but charity edifieth? Let them remember, then, that those who celebrated the passover at that time in type and shadow, when they were ordered to mark their door-posts with the blood of the lamb, used hyssop to mark them with. Now this is a meek and lowly herb, and yet nothing is stronger and more penetrating than its roots; that being rooted and grounded in love, we may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height,[Ephesians 3:17-18] —that is, to comprehend the cross of our Lord, the breadth of which is indicated by the transverse wood on which the hands are stretched, its length by the part from the ground up to the cross-bar on which the whole body from the head downwards is ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 51, footnote 2 (Image)

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

Writings in Connection with the Manichæan Controversy. (HTML)

On the Morals of the Catholic Church. (HTML)

Only in the Catholic Church is Perfect Truth Established on the Harmony of Both Testaments. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 91 (In-Text, Margin)

... Jesus Christ, from whom the whole family in heaven and earth is named, that He would grant unto you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with might by His Spirit in the inner man: that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the height, and length, and breadth, and depth, and to know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled with all the fullness of God?"[Ephesians 3:14-19] Could anything be more plainly expressed?

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 13, footnote 2 (Image)

Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels

Our Lord’s Sermon on the Mount. (HTML)

Explanation of the First Part of the Sermon Delivered by Our Lord on the Mount, as Contained in the Fifth Chapter of Matthew. (HTML)

Chapter X (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 90 (In-Text, Margin)

... having the altar, i.e. true faith, have spoken blasphemies for praise; being weighed down, to wit, with earthly opinions, and thus, as it were, throwing down their offering on the ground. But there ought also to be purity of intention on the part of the offerer. And therefore, when we are about to present any such offering in our heart, i.e. in the inner temple of God (“For,” as it is said, “the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are;” and, “That Christ may dwell in the inner man[Ephesians 3:17] by faith in your hearts”) if it occur to our mind that a brother hath ought against us, i.e. if we have injured him in anything (for then he has something against us whereas we have something against him if he has injured us, and in that case ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 270, footnote 7 (Image)

Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels

Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)

On the words of the Gospel, Matt. Chap. v. 3 and 8, 'Blessed are the poor in spirit:' etc., but especially on that, 'Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.' (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 1926 (In-Text, Margin)

... to which God speaketh is within. The ears, and eyes, and all the rest of the visible members, are either the dwelling place or the instrument of some thing within. It is the inner man where Christ doth dwell, now by faith, and hereafter He will dwell in it, by the presence of His Divinity, when we shall have known “what is the length, and breadth, and depth, and height; when we shall have known also the love of Christ that surpasseth knowledge, that we may be filled with all the fulness of God.”[Ephesians 3:17] Now then if thou wouldest enter into the meaning of these words, summon all thy powers to comprehend the breadth, and length, and height, and depth. Wander not in the imagination of the thoughts through the spaces of the world, and the yet ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 304, footnote 3 (Image)

Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels

Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)

On the words of the Gospel, Matt. viii. 23, ‘And when he was entered into a boat,’ etc. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 2207 (In-Text, Margin)

... you upon the lesson of the Holy Gospel which has just been read, and take occasion thereby to exhort you, that against the tempest and waves of this world, faith sleep not in your hearts. “For the Lord Christ had not indeed death nor sleep in His power, and peradventure sleep overcame the Almighty One as He was sailing against His will?” If ye believe this, He is asleep in you; but if Christ be awake in you, your faith is awake. The Apostle saith, “that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.”[Ephesians 3:17] This sleep then of Christ is a sign of a high mystery. The sailors are the souls passing over the world in wood. That ship also was a figure of the Church. And all, individually indeed are temples of God, and his own heart is the vessel in which ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 332, footnote 12 (Image)

Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels

Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)

On the words of the Gospel, Matt. xii. 33, ‘Either make the tree good, and its fruit good,’ etc. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 2495 (In-Text, Margin)

... all the world, and yet a certain tree remained unfruitful. Still is there a certain portion of mankind, which doth not yet amend itself. The husbandman intercedes; the Apostle prays for the people; “I bow my knees,” he saith, “unto the Father for you, that being rooted and grounded in love, ye may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the breadth, and length, and depth, and height; and to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with all the fulness of God.”[Ephesians 3:17-19] By bowing the knees, he intercedes with the Master of the house for us, that we be not rooted up. Therefore since He must necessarily come, let us take care that He find us fruitful. The digging about the tree is the lowliness of the penitent. For ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 356, footnote 2 (Image)

Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels

Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)

On the words of the Gospel, Matt. xviii. 7, where we are admonished to beware of the offences of the world. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 2722 (In-Text, Margin)

... new thing, what new thing, I ask, is told thee, Christian? “In Christian times is the world laid waste, the world is failing.” Did not thy Lord tell thee, the world shall be laid waste? Did not thy Lord tell thee, the world shall fail? Why when the promise was made, didst thou believe, and art disturbed now, when it is being completed? So then the tempest beats furiously against thine heart; beware of shipwreck, awake up Christ. The Apostle says, “that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.”[Ephesians 3:17] Christ dwelleth in thee by faith. Present faith, is Christ present; waking faith, is Christ awake; slumbering faith, is Christ asleep. Arise and stir thyself; say, “Lord, we perish.” See what the Heathen say to us; and what is worse, what evil ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 432, footnote 5 (Image)

Augustine: Sermon on the Mount, Harmony of the Gospels, Homilies on the Gospels

Sermons on Selected Lessons of the New Testament. (HTML)

On the words of the Gospel, Luke xi. 5, ‘Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight,’ etc. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 3351 (In-Text, Margin)

... bridegroom, and by this plighted faith is he held bound. Now to the fish the Lord opposed the serpent, to faith the devil. Wherefore to this betrothed one does the Apostle say, “I have betrothed you to One Husband, to present you a chaste virgin to Christ.” And, “I fear lest as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds also should be corrupted from the purity which is in Christ;” that is, which is in the faith of Christ. For he says, “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.”[Ephesians 3:17] Therefore let not the devil corrupt our faith, let him not devour the fish.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 465, footnote 1 (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, John i. 1, ‘In the beginning was the word, and the word was with God, and the word was God,’ etc. Against the Arians. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 3597 (In-Text, Margin)

... rooted. Consider a tree; first it strikes downwards, that it may grow up on high; fixes its root low in the ground, that it may extend its top to heaven. Does it make an effort to grow except from humiliation? And wouldest thou without charity comprehend these transcendent matters, shoot toward the heaven without a root? This were a ruin, not a growing. With “Christ” then “dwelling in your hearts by faith, be ye rooted and grounded in charity, that ye may be filled with all the fulness of God.”[Ephesians 3:17]

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 255, footnote 5 (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 X. 1–10. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 875 (In-Text, Margin)

... could not then be commended by the good Shepherd, when He said, “And he shall go in and out, and find pasture.” There is therefore not only some sort of entrance, but some outgoing also that is good, by the good door, which is Christ. But what is that praiseworthy and blessed outgoing? I might say, indeed, that we enter when we engage in some inward exercise of thought; and go out, when we take to some active work without: and since, as the apostle saith, Christ dwelleth in our hearts by faith,[Ephesians 3:17] to enter by Christ is to give ourselves to thought in accordance with that faith; but to go out by Christ is, in accordance also with that same faith, to take to outside works, that is to say, in the presence of others. Hence, also, we read in a ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 276, footnote 4 (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 XI. 1–54. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 986 (In-Text, Margin)

... heard the gospel, and despised it; I have been baptized, and returned again to the same course: what am I doing? whither am I going? how shall I escape? When thou speakest thus, Christ is already groaning; for thy faith is groaning. In the voice of one who groaneth thus, there comes to light the hope of his rising again. If such faith is within, there is Christ groaning; for if there is faith in us, Christ is in us. For what else says the apostle: “That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.”[Ephesians 3:17] Therefore thy faith in Christ is Christ Himself in thy heart. This is why He slept in the ship; and why, when His disciples were in danger and already on the verge of shipwreck, they came to Him and awoke Him. Christ arose, laid His commands on the ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 304, footnote 3 (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 XIII. 6–10 (continued), and Song of Sol. V. 2, 3. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 1157 (In-Text, Margin)

... descending upon the Son of man”? If they ascend to Him because He is above, how do they descend to Him, but because He is also here? Therefore saith the Church: “I have washed my feet; how shall I defile them?” She says so even in the case of those who, purified from all dross, can say: “I desire to depart, and to be with Christ; nevertheless to abide in the flesh is more needful for you.” She says it in those who preach Christ, and open to Him the door, that He may dwell by faith in the hearts of men.[Ephesians 3:17] In such she says it, when they deliberate whether to undertake such a ministry, for which they do not consider themselves qualified, so as to discharge it blamelessly, and so as not, after preaching to others, themselves to become castaways. For it ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 373, footnote 12 (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 XVI. 12, 13. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 1576 (In-Text, Margin)

... bodies; the one is perpetrated in the filthiness of the flesh, the other is scarcely perceivable by the pure mind. “Be ye therefore renewed in the spirit of your mind,” and “understand what is the will of God, which is good, and acceptable, and perfect;” that, “rooted and grounded in love, ye may be able to comprehend, with all saints, what is the length, and breadth, and height, and depth, even to know the love of Christ which passeth knowledge, that ye may be filled with all the fullness of God.”[Ephesians 3:17-19] For in such a way will the Holy Spirit teach you all truth, when He shall shed abroad that love ever more and more largely in your hearts.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 473, footnote 18 (Image)

Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies

Ten Homilies on the First Epistle of John. (HTML)

1 John II. 12–17. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 2113 (In-Text, Margin)

... unto damnation, not as means of strengthening unto salvation. That which strengthens unto salvation is, to have the root of charity, to have the “power of godliness,” not “the form” only. Good is the form, holy the form: but what avails the form, if it hold not the root? The branch that is cut off, is it not cast into the fire? Have the form, but in the root. But in what way are ye rooted so that ye be not rooted up? By holding charity, as saith the Apostle Paul, “rooted and grounded in charity.”[Ephesians 3:17] How shall charity be rooted there, amid the overgrown wilderness of the love of the world? Make clear riddance of the woods. A mighty seed ye are about to put in: let there not be that in the field which shall choke the seed. These are the uprooting ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 10, footnote 4 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm IV (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 104 (In-Text, Margin)

... As if He had said, In like manner as Cæsar exacts from you the impression of his image, so also does God: that as the tribute money is rendered to him, so should the soul to God, illumined and stamped with the light of His countenance. (Ver. 7.) “Thou hast put gladness into my heart.” Gladness then is not to be sought without by them, who, being still heavy in heart, “love vanity, and seek a lie;” but within, where the light of God’s countenance is stamped. For Christ dwelleth in the inner man,[Ephesians 3:16-17] as the Apostle says; for to Him doth it appertain to see truth, since He hath said, “I am the truth.” And again, when He spake in the Apostle, saying, “Would you receive a proof of Christ, who speaketh in me?” He spake not of course from without to ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 28, footnote 8 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm VIII (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 285 (In-Text, Margin)

... administered by the most excellent Power and Wisdom of God, even in the Sacrament of the assumed Manhood, in which there is salvation for every one that believeth; to the end that moved by Its authority each one may obey Its precepts, whereby being purified and “rooted and grounded in love,” he may be able to run with Saints, no more now a child in milk, but a young man in meat, “to comprehend the breadth, the length, the height, and depth, to know also the surpassing knowledge of the love of Christ.”[Ephesians 3:17-19]

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 36, footnote 4 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm IX (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 371 (In-Text, Margin)

... time it goes before, not in dignity: because more honourable is that whither we are striving to arrive, than what we practise, that we may attain to arrive; now we practise watching, that we may arrive at vision. But again this same Church which now is, unless the Lord inhabit her, the most earnest watching might run into any sort of error. And to this Church it was said, “For the temple of God is holy, which temple ye are:” again, “that Christ may dwell in the inner man in your hearts by faith.”[Ephesians 3:17] It is enjoined us then, that we sing to the Lord who dwelleth in Sion, that with one accord we praise the Lord, the Inhabitant of the Church. “Show forth His wonders among the heathen.” It has both been done, and will not cease to be done.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 37, footnote 1 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm IX (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 378 (In-Text, Margin)

... persecute the Church, have been fixed in that corruption, which they thought to inflict. For they were desiring to kill the body, whilst they themselves were dying in soul. “In that snare which they hid, has their foot been taken.” The hidden snare is crafty devising. The foot of the soul is well understood to be its love: which, when depraved, is called coveting or lust; but when upright, love or charity.…And the Apostle says, “That being rooted and grounded in love, ye may be able to take in.”[Ephesians 3:17-18] The foot then of sinners, that is, their love, is taken in the snare, which they hide: for when delight shall have followed on to deceitful dealing, when God shall have delivered them over to the lust of their heart; that delight at once binds them, ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 200, footnote 2 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm LII (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 1907 (In-Text, Margin)

... they have not, with the risen sun forthwith do wither. But, on the other hand, they that fix a root more deeply, hear from the Apostle what? “I bow my knees for you to the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, that ye may be in love rooted and grounded.” And because there now is root, “That ye may be able,” he saith, “to comprehend what is the height, and breadth, and length, and depth: to know also the supereminent knowledge of the love of Christ, that ye may be filled unto all the fulness of God.”[Ephesians 3:17-19] Of such fruits so great a root is worthy, being so single, so budding, for buddings so deeply grounded. But truly this man’s root shall be rooted up from the land of the living.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 541, footnote 3 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm CIX (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 4954 (In-Text, Margin)

... (ver. 29).…Is He said to “praise among the multitude” because He is with His Church here even unto the end of the world; so that we may understand by “among the multitude,” that He is honoured by this very multitude? For he is said to be in the midst, unto whom the chief honour is paid. But if the heart is, as it were, that which is mid-most of a man, no better construction can be put on this passage than this, I will praise Him in the hearts of many. For Christ dwelleth through faith in our hearts;[Ephesians 3:17] and therefore he saith, “with my mouth,” that is, with the mouth of my body, which is the Church.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 648, footnote 7 (Image)

Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms

Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)

Psalm CXLII (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 5792 (In-Text, Margin)

1. …“With my voice have I cried unto the Lord” (ver. 1). It were enough to say, “with voice:” not for nothing perhaps has “my” been added. For many cry unto the Lord, not with their own voice, but with the voice of their body. Let the “inner man” then, in whom “Christ” hath begun to “dwell by faith,”[Ephesians 3:17] cry unto the Lord, not with the din of his lips, but with the affection of his heart. God heareth not, where man heareth: unless thou criest with the voice of lungs and side and tongue, man heareth thee not: thy thought is thy cry to the Lord. “With my voice have I prayed unto the Lord.” What he meant by, “I have cried,” he explained when he ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 9, page 466, footnote 4 (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 XIX (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 1765 (In-Text, Margin)

... fishermen, the publicans, and the tent-makers, in a few years brought over the whole world to the truth; and when from that time, ten thousand perils have been constantly arising, the preaching of the Gospel was so far from being put down, that it still flourishes and increases; and they taught simple people, tillers of the ground, and occupied with cattle, to be lovers of wisdom. Such are the persons, who beside all the rest having deeply rooted in them that love which is the source of all good things,[Ephesians 3:17] have hastened to us, undertaking so long a journey, that they might come and embrace their fellow-members.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 27, footnote 5 (Image)

Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome

The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)

Counter-statements of Theodoret. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 185 (In-Text, Margin)

... man we divide the natures, and call the mortal nature body, but the immortal nature soul, and both man, much more consonant is it with right reason to recognise the properties alike of the God who took and of the man who was taken. We find the blessed Paul dividing the one man into two where he says in one passage, “Though our outward man perish yet the inward man is renewed,” and in another “For I delight in the law of God after the inward man.” And again “that Christ may dwell in the inner man.”[Ephesians 3:17] Now if the apostle divides the natural conjunction of the synchronous natures, with what reason can the man who describes the mixture to us by means of other terms indite us as impious when we divide the properties of the natures of the everlasting ...

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 179, footnote 14 (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 Immutable. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1150 (In-Text, Margin)

... one says that the flesh came down from heaven, and not from this earth, and from us, let him be Anathema. For the words ‘The second man is from heaven,’ and ‘as is the heavenly such are they also that are heavenly’ and ‘no man hath ascended up to heaven but the son of man that came down from heaven,’ and any other similar passage, must be understood to be spoken on account of the union with man, as also the statement that ‘all things were made by Christ,’ and that ‘Christ dwells in our hearts,’[Ephesians 3:17] must be understood not according to the sensible, but according to the intellectual conception of the Godhead, the terms being commingled together just as are the natures.”

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 209, footnote 8 (Image)

Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen

Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)

In Defence of His Flight to Pontus, and His Return, After His Ordination to the Priesthood, with an Exposition of the Character of the Priestly Office. (HTML)

CCEL Footnote 2590 (In-Text, Margin)

... circumstances, which are naturally indifferent, and do not incline in one direction more than in another, produce a good or bad effect according to the will of, and the manner in which they are used by the persons who experience them. But the scope of our art is to provide the soul with wings, to rescue it from the world and give it to God, and to watch over that which is in His image, if it abides, to take it by the hand, if it is in danger, or restore it, if ruined, to make Christ to dwell in the heart[Ephesians 3:17] by the Spirit: and, in short, to deify, and bestow heavenly bliss upon, one who belongs to the heavenly host.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 440, footnote 4 (Image)

Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen

Select Letters of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)

Letters on the Apollinarian Controversy. (HTML)

To Cledonius the Priest Against Apollinarius. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4701 (In-Text, Margin)

... flesh came down from heaven, and is not from hence, nor of us though above us, let him be anathema. For the words, The Second Man is the Lord from Heaven; and, As is the Heavenly, such are they that are Heavenly; and, No man hath ascended up into Heaven save He which came down from Heaven, even the Son of Man which is in Heaven; and the like, are to be understood as said on account of the Union with the heavenly; just as that All Things were made by Christ, and that Christ dwelleth in your hearts[Ephesians 3:17] is said, not of the visible nature which belongs to God, but of what is perceived by the mind, the names being mingled like the natures, and flowing into one another, according to the law of their intimate union.

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 242, footnote 1 (Image)

Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian

The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)

The Twelve Books on the Institutes of the Cœnobia, and the Remedies for the Eight Principal Faults. (HTML)

Book V. Of the Spirit of Gluttony. (HTML)
Chapter XXI. Of the inward peace of a monk, and of spiritual abstinence. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 861 (In-Text, Margin)

... the Holy Ghost. For it is not so much the corruptible flesh as the clean heart, which is made a shrine for God, and a temple of the Holy Ghost. We ought therefore, whenever the outward man fasts, to restrain the inner man as well from food which is bad for him: that inner man, namely, which the blessed Apostle above all urges us to present pure before God, that it may be found worthy to receive Christ as a guest within, saying “that in the inner man Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith.”[Ephesians 3:16-17]

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 582, footnote 5 (Image)

Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian

The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)

The Seven Books of John Cassian on the Incarnation of the Lord, Against Nestorius. (HTML)

Book V. (HTML)
Chapter IV. What the difference is between Christ and the saints. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2499 (In-Text, Margin)

... one who dwells in it, for certainly it is the doing of the dweller not the dwelling, if it is inhabited, for on him it depends both to build the house and to occupy it. I mean, that he can choose, if he will, to make it a dwelling, and when he has made it, to live in it. “Or do you seek a proof,” says the Apostle, “of Christ speaking in me?” And elsewhere, “Know ye not that Jesus Christ is in you except ye be reprobate?” And again: “in the inner man, that Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith.”[Ephesians 3:16-17] Do you not see what a difference there is between the Apostle’s doctrine and your blasphemies? You say that God dwells in Christ as in a man. He testifies that Christ Himself dwells in men: which certainly, as you admit, flesh and blood cannot do; ...

Online Dictionary & Commentary of Early Church Beliefs