Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
1 Peter 2:21
There are 21 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 1, page 35, footnote 7 (Image)
Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus
Polycarp (HTML)
Epistle to the Philippians (HTML)
Chapter VIII.—Persevere in hope and patience. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 389 (In-Text, Margin)
Let us then continually persevere in our hope, and the earnest of our righteousness, which is Jesus Christ, “who bore our sins in His own body on the tree,” “who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth,” but endured all things for us, that we might live in Him. Let us then be imitators of His patience; and if we suffer for His name’s sake, let us glorify Him. For He has set us this example[1 Peter 2:21] in Himself, and we have believed that such is the case.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 486, footnote 8 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
On the Advantage of Patience. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3605 (In-Text, Margin)
... Apostle John instructs us, saying, “He who saith he abideth in Christ, ought himself also to walk even as He walked.” Peter also, upon whom by the Lord’s condescension the Church was founded, lays it down in his epistle, and says, “Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example, that ye should follow His steps, who did no sin, neither was deceit found in His mouth; who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, threatened not, but gave Himself up to him that judged Him unjustly.”[1 Peter 2:21-23]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 494, footnote 5 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
On Jealousy and Envy. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3667 (In-Text, Margin)
... departing, that is, from the light of Christ, who warns and says, “I am the light of the world. He that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.” But he follows Christ who stands in His precepts, who walks in the way of His teaching, who follows His footsteps and His ways, who imitates that which Christ both did and taught; in accordance with what Peter also exhorts and warns, saying, “Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example that ye should follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 545, footnote 5 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
In the Epistle of Peter to them of Pontus: “For Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example, that ye may follow His steps; who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth; who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered, threatened not, but gave Himself up to him that judgeth unrighteously.”[1 Peter 2:21-23] Also Paul to the Philippians: “Who, being appointed in the figure of God, thought it not robbery that He was equal with God; but emptied Himself, taking the form of a servant, He was made in the likeness of man, and was found in fashion as a man. He humbled Himself, becoming obedient even unto death, and the death of the cross. For which ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 293, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Catechising of the Uninstructed. (HTML)
Of the Attainment of Cheerfulness in the Duty of Catechising, and of Various Causes Producing Weariness in the Catechumen. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1394 (In-Text, Margin)
... and have anxiously to consider how that which we ourselves take in with a most rapid draught of mental apprehension is to be given forth by the mouth of flesh in the long and perplexed intricacies of its method of enunciation; and if the great dissimilarity thus felt (between our utterance and our thought) makes it distasteful to us to speak, and a pleasure to us to keep silence, then let us ponder what has been set before us by Him who has “showed us an example that we should follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21] For however much our articulate speech may differ from the vivacity of our intelligence, much greater is the difference of the flesh of mortality from the equality of God. And, neverless, “although He was in the same form, He emptied Himself, taking ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 426, footnote 11 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
Of Holy Virginity. (HTML)
Section 27 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2080 (In-Text, Margin)
... of such as are not virgins, although of Christ. For there are to different persons different joys, but to none such. Go (enter) into these, follow the Lamb, because the Flesh of the Lamb also is assuredly virgin. For this He retained in Himself when grown up, which He took not away from His Mother by His conception and birth. Follow Him, as ye deserve, in virginity of heart and flesh, wheresoever He shall have gone. For what is it to follow, but to imitate? Because “Christ hath suffered for us,”[1 Peter 2:21] leaving us an example, as saith the Apostle Peter, “that we should follow His steps.” Him each one follows in that, wherein he imitates Him: not so far forth as He is the only Son of God, by Whom all things were made; but so far forth as, the Son of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 427, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
Of Holy Virginity. (HTML)
Section 28 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2089 (In-Text, Margin)
... Who came to the help of him who was wounded by robbers, and who lay in the way half-dead and despaired of. “Blessed are the pure in heart;” imitate Him, “Who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth.” “Blessed are the peace-makers;” imitate Him, Who said on behalf of His persecutors, “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” “Blessed are they, who suffer persecution for righteousness sake;” imitate Him, Who “suffered for you, leaving you an example, that ye follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21] These things, whoso imitate, in these they follow the Lamb. But surely even married persons may go in those steps, although not setting their foot perfectly in the same print, yet walking in the same paths.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 424, 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, Luke x. 2, ‘The harvest truly is plenteous,’ etc. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3284 (In-Text, Margin)
6. Let us give heed to our Lord, our True Example and Succour. Let us prove that He is our Succour; “Without Me ye can do nothing.” Let us prove that He is our Example; “Christ,” says Peter, “suffered for us, leaving us an example that we should follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21] Our Lord Himself had bags in the way, and these bags He entrusted to Judas. It is true He suffered from the thief; but I as desiring to learn of my Lord say, “O Lord, Thou didst suffer from the thief, whence hadst Thou that of which he could take away? Me, a wretched and infirm man Thou hast admonished not even to carry a purse; Thou didst carry bags, and hadst ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 453, 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, Luke xvii. 3, ‘If thy brother sin, rebuke him,’ etc., touching the remission of sins. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3523 (In-Text, Margin)
3. Thou art just on the point of saying to me, “But I am not God, I am a man, a sinner.” God be thanked that thou dost confess thou hast sins. Forgive then, that they may be forgiven thee. Yet the Lord Himself our God exhorteth us to imitate Him. In the first place God Himself, Christ, exhorteth us, of whom the Apostle Peter said, “Christ hath suffered for us, leaving you an example that ye should follow His steps, who did no sin, neither was guile, found in His mouth.”[1 Peter 2:21-22] He then verily had no sin, yet did He die for our sins, and shed His Blood for the remission of sins. He took upon Him for our sakes what was not His due, that He might deliver us from what was due to us. Death was not due to Him, nor life to us. Why? Because we ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 142, 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 V. 20–23. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 433 (In-Text, Margin)
... for thy wrongs, and judgeth for them. How is it to be understood here that “the Father judgeth not any man, but all judgment hath He given to the Son”? Let us ask Peter; let us hear him speaking in his epistle: “Christ suffered for us,” saith he, “leaving us an example that we should follow His steps; who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth; who, when He was reviled, reviled not again; when He suffered wrong, He threatened not, but committed Himself to Him that judgeth righteously.”[1 Peter 2:21-23] How is it true that “the Father judgeth not any man, but hath given all judgment to the Son”? We are here in perplexity, and being perplexed let us exert ourselves, that by exertion we may be purified. Let us endeavor as best we may, by His own ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 286, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies
Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John. (HTML)
Chapter XII. 12–26. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1041 (In-Text, Margin)
11. “If any man serve me, let him follow me.” What is that, “let him follow me,” but just, let him imitate me? “Because Christ suffered for us,” says the Apostle Peter, “leaving us an example that we should follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21] Here you have the meaning of the words, “If any man serve me, let him follow me.” But with what result? what wages? what reward? “And where I am,” He says, “there shall also my servant be.” Let Him be freely loved, that so the reward of the service done Him may be to be with Him. For where will one be well apart from Him, or when will one come to feel himself in an evil case in ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 350, 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 XV. 13. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1418 (In-Text, Margin)
... thereat, but to approach in humility? And what is it to consider intelligently what is set before thee, but worthily to reflect on the magnitude of the favor? And what is it, so to put to thy hand, as knowing that thou art bound to make similar preparations, but as I have already said, that, as Christ laid down His life for us, so we also ought to lay down our lives for the brethren? For as the Apostle Peter also says, “Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21] This is to make similar preparations. This it was that the blessed martyrs did in their burning love; and if we celebrate their memories in no mere empty form, and, in the banquet whereat they themselves were filled to the full, approach the table ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 356, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies
Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John. (HTML)
Chapter XV. 20, 21. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1462 (In-Text, Margin)
1. Lord, in exhorting His servants to endure with patience the hatred of the world, proposes to them no greater and better example than His own; seeing that, as the Apostle Peter says, “Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His steps.”[1 Peter 2:21] And if we really do so, we do it by His assistance, who said, “Without me ye can do nothing.” But further, to those to whom He had already said, “If the world hate you, know that it hated me before [it hated] you,” He now also says in the word you have just been hearing, when the Gospel was read, “Remember my word that I said unto you, The servant is not greater ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 397, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Homilies on the Gospel of John, Homilies on the First Epistle of John, Soliloquies
Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel According to St. John. (HTML)
Chapter XVII. 1–5. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1703 (In-Text, Margin)
... it has not received? Did it not receive this, that it should do no evil, but all good things, when it was assumed into the unity of His person by the Word, by whom all things were made? But how has He finished the work which was committed unto Him to do, when there still remains the trial of the passion wherein He especially furnished His martyrs with the example they were to follow, whereof, says the apostle Peter, “Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His steps:”[1 Peter 2:21] but just that He says He has finished, what He knew with perfect certainty that He would finish? Just as long before, in prophecy, He used words in the past tense, when what He said was to take place very many years afterwards: “They pierced,” He ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 450, footnote 6 (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 XXI. 19–25. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1981 (In-Text, Margin)
... as the Rock, Peter as the Church. This Church, accordingly, which Peter represented, so long as it lives amidst evil, by loving and following Christ is delivered from evil. But its following is the closer in those who contend even unto death for the truth. But to the universality [of the Church] is it said, “Follow me,” even as it was for the same universality that Christ suffered: of whom this same Peter saith, “Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His footsteps.”[1 Peter 2:21] This, then, you see is why it was said to him, “Follow me.” But there is another, an immortal life, that is not in the midst of evil: there we shall see face to face what is seen here through a glass and in a riddle, even when much progress is made ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 424, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXXXVIII (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4073 (In-Text, Margin)
... meaning of the titles Psalmus Cantici and Canticum Psalmi: and the words, “sons of Core,” are constantly repeated, and have often been explained: so also “to the end;” but what comes next in this title is peculiar. For “Melech” we may translate into Latin “for the chorus,” for chorus is the sense of the Hebrew word Melech. …The Passion of our Lord is here prophesied. Now the Apostle Peter saith, “Christ also suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow His steps;”[1 Peter 2:21] this is the meaning of “to respond.” The Apostle John also saith, “As Christ laid down His life for us, so ought we also to lay down our lives for the brethren;” this also is to respond. But the choir signifies concord, which consists in charity: ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 3, page 31, footnote 4 (Image)
Theodoret, Jerome and Gennadius, Rufinus and Jerome
The Ecclesiastical History, Dialogues, and Letters of Theodoret. (HTML)
Counter-statements of Theodoret. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 231 (In-Text, Margin)
Against XII. —Passion is proper to the passible; the impassible is above passions. It was then the form of the servant that suffered, the form of God of course dwelling with it, and permitting it to suffer on account of the salvation brought forth of the sufferings, and making the sufferings its own on account of the union. Therefore it was not the Christ[1 Peter 2:21] who suffered, but the man assumed of us by God. Wherefore also the blessed Isaiah exclaims in his prophecy, “A man of sorrows and acquainted with grief.” And the Lord Christ Himself said to the Jews, “Why seek ye to kill me, a man that hath told you the truth?” But what is threatened with death is not the very life, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 511, footnote 16 (Image)
Athanasius: Select Writings and Letters
Letters of Athanasius with Two Ancient Chronicles of His Life. (HTML)
The Festal Letters, and their Index. (HTML)
Festal Letters. (HTML)
For 330. Easter-day xxiv Pharmuthi; xiii Kal. Mai; Æra Dioclet. 46; Coss. Gallicianus, Valerius Symmachus; Præfect, Magninianus; Indict. iii. (HTML)
... my brethren, how shall we admire the loving-kindness of the Saviour? With what power, and with what a trumpet should a man cry out, exalting these His benefits! That not only should we bear His image, but should receive from Him an example and pattern of heavenly conversation; that as He hath begun, we should go on, that suffering, we should not threaten, being reviled, we should not revile again, but should bless them that curse, and in everything commit ourselves to God who judgeth righteously[1 Peter 2:21-23]. For those who are thus disposed, and fashion themselves according to the Gospel, will be partakers of Christ, and imitators of apostolic conversation, on account of which they shall be deemed worthy of that praise from him, with which he praised ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 266, footnote 20 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
The Letters of St. Jerome. (HTML)
To Demetrius. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3705 (In-Text, Margin)
... paradise because she had eaten of the forbidden fruit. Elijah on the other hand after forty days of fasting was carried in a fiery chariot into heaven. For forty days and forty nights Moses lived by the intimate converse which he had with God, thus proving in his own case the complete truth of the saying, “man doth not live by bread only but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord.” The Saviour of the world, who in His virtues and His mode of life has left us an example to follow,[1 Peter 2:21] was, immediately after His baptism, taken up by the spirit that He might contend with the devil, and after crushing him and overthrowing him might deliver him to his disciples to trample under foot. For what says the apostle? “God shall bruise Satan ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 325, footnote 9 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Mysteries. (HTML)
Chapter IX. In order that no one through observing the outward part should waver in faith, many instances are brought forward wherein the outward nature has been changed, and so it is proved that bread is made the true body of Christ. The treatise then is brought to a termination with certain remarks as to the effects of the sacrament, the disposition of the recipients, and such like. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2907 (In-Text, Margin)
... Lord is good, blessed is the man that hopeth in Him.” In that sacrament is Christ, because it is the Body of Christ, it is therefore not bodily food but spiritual. Whence the Apostle says of its type: “Our fathers ate spiritual food and drank spiritual drink,” for the Body of God is a spiritual body; the Body of Christ is the Body of the Divine Spirit, for the Spirit is Christ, as we read: “The Spirit before our face is Christ the Lord.” And in the Epistle of Peter we read: “Christ died for us.”[1 Peter 2:21] Lastly, that food strengthens our heart, and that drink “maketh glad the heart of man,” as the prophet has recorded.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 12, page 176, footnote 7 (Image)
Leo the Great, Gregory the Great
The Letters and Sermons of Leo the Great. (HTML)
Sermons. (HTML)
On the Passion, XII.: preached on Wednesday. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1052 (In-Text, Margin)
... example, that they might apprehend the one by being born again, and follow the other by imitation. For the blessed Apostle Peter teaches this, saying, “Christ suffered for us, leaving you an example that ye should follow His steps. Who did no sin, neither was guile found in His mouth. Who when He was reviled, reviled not: when He suffered, threatened not, but gave Himself up to His unjust judge. Who Himself bare our sins in His body on the tree, that being dead to sins, we may live to righteousness[1 Peter 2:21-24].”