Early Church Fathers Scripture Index : Texts
1 John 1
There are 140 footnotes for this reference.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 2, page 386, footnote 5 (Image)
Hermas, Tatian, Athenagoras, Theophilus, Clement of Alexandria
Clement of Alexandria (HTML)
The Stromata, or Miscellanies (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2464 (In-Text, Margin)
... ostenderent. Jam vero et humanos legislatores, et divinam legera habent sibi infensam, cum inique et præter leges vivere instituerint. Is certe, qui scortatorein “confodit,” a Deo plus esse ostenditur in Numeris. “Et si dixerimus,” inquit Joannes in epistola, “quod societatem habemus cum eo,” nempe Deo, “et in tenebris ambulamus, mentitour, et veritatem non facimus. Si autem in luce ambulamus, sicut et ipse est in luce, societatem habemus cum ipso, et sanguis Jesu filii ejus emundat nos a peccato.”[1 John 1:6-7] Quomodo ergo sunt hi hujus mundi hominibus meliores, qui hæc faciunt, et vel pessimis hujus mundi sunt similes? sunt enim, ut arbitror, similes natura, qui sunt factis similes. Quibus autem se esse censent nobilitate superiores, eos debent etiam ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 197, footnote 11 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Apologetic. (HTML)
A Treatise on the Soul. (HTML)
The Fidelity of the Senses, Impugned by Plato, Vindicated by Christ Himself. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1619 (In-Text, Margin)
... that He was a phantom, denying to Him the reality of a perfect body. Now, not even to His apostles was His nature ever a matter of deception. He was truly both seen and heard upon the mount; true and real was the draught of that wine at the marriage of (Cana in) Galilee; true and real also was the touch of the then believing Thomas. Read the testimony of John: “That which we have seen, which we have heard, which we have looked upon with our eyes, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life.”[1 John 1:1] False, of course, and deceptive must have been that testimony, if the witness of our eyes, and ears, and hands be by nature a lie.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 532, footnote 19 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
On the Flesh of Christ. (HTML)
The True Functions of the Soul. Christ Assumed It in His Perfect Human Nature, Not to Reveal and Explain It, But to Save It. Its Resurrection with the Body Assured by Christ. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7117 (In-Text, Margin)
... Testimony of the Soul.” Besides, if the soul was ignorant of itself from the beginning, there is nothing it could have learnt of Christ except its own quality. It was not its own form that it learnt of Christ, but its salvation. For this cause did the Son of God descend and take on Him a soul, not that the soul might discover itself in Christ, but Christ in itself. For its salvation is endangered, not by its being ignorant of itself, but of the word of God. “The life,” says He, “was manifested,”[1 John 1:2] not the soul. And again, “I am come to save the soul.” He did not say, “to explain” it. We could not know, of course, that the soul, although an invisible essence, is born and dies, unless it were exhibited corporeally. We certainly were ignorant ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 610, footnote 11 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Praxeas. (HTML)
New Testament Passages Quoted. They Attest the Same Truth of the Son's Visibility Contrasted with the Father's Invisibility. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7941 (In-Text, Margin)
... personal distinction in the condition of both. There is a certain emphatic saying by John: “No man hath seen God at any time;” meaning, of course, at any previous time. But he has indeed taken away all question of time, by saying that God had never been seen. The apostle confirms this statement; for, speaking of God, he says, “Whom no man hath seen, nor can see;” because the man indeed would die who should see Him. But the very same apostles testify that they had both seen and “handled” Christ.[1 John 1:1] Now, if Christ is Himself both the Father and the Son, how can He be both the Visible and the Invisible? In order, however, to reconcile this diversity between the Visible and the Invisible, will not some one on the other side argue that the two ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 610, footnote 12 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Praxeas. (HTML)
New Testament Passages Quoted. They Attest the Same Truth of the Son's Visibility Contrasted with the Father's Invisibility. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 7942 (In-Text, Margin)
... it be that He is one, who anciently was visible only in mystery and enigma, and became more clearly visible by His incarnation, even the Word who was also made flesh; whilst He is another whom no man has seen at any time, being none else than the Father, even Him to whom the Word belongs? Let us, in short, examine who it is whom the apostles saw. “That,” says John, “which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life.”[1 John 1:1] Now the Word of life became flesh, and was heard, and was seen, and was handled, because He was flesh who, before He came in the flesh, was the “Word in the beginning with God” the Father, and not the Father with the Word. For although the ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 625, footnote 4 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Anti-Marcion. (HTML)
Against Praxeas. (HTML)
Christ Not the Father, as Praxeas Said. The Inconsistency of This Opinion, No Less Than Its Absurdity, Exposed. The True Doctrine of Jesus Christ According to St. Paul, Who Agrees with Other Sacred Writers. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 8165 (In-Text, Margin)
... Israel know assuredly that God hath made that same Jesus, whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ,” that is, Anointed. John, moreover, brands that man as “a liar” who “denieth that Jesus is the Christ;” whilst on the other hand he declares that “every one is born of God who believeth that Jesus is the Christ.” Wherefore he also exhorts us to believe in the name of His (the Father’s,) Son Jesus Christ, that “our fellowship may be with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.”[1 John 1:3] Paul, in like manner, everywhere speaks of “God the Father, and our Lord Jesus Christ.” When writing to the Romans, he gives thanks to God through our Lord Jesus Christ. To the Galatians he declares himself to be “an apostle not of men, neither by ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 661, footnote 10 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Ethical. (HTML)
On Repentance. (HTML)
Baptism Not to Be Presumptously Received. It Requires Preceding Repentance, Manifested by Amendment of Life. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 8472 (In-Text, Margin)
... attain that blessing. For who will grant to you, a man of so faithless repentance, one single sprinkling of any water whatever? To approach it by stealth, indeed, and to get the minister appointed over this business misled by your asseverations, is easy; but God takes foresight for His own treasure, and suffers not the unworthy to steal a march upon it. What, in fact, does He say? “Nothing hid which shall not be revealed.” Draw whatever (veil of) darkness you please over your deeds, “God is light.”[1 John 1:5] But some think as if God were under a necessity of bestowing even on the unworthy, what He has engaged (to give); and they turn His liberality into slavery. But if it is of necessity that God grants us the symbol of death, then He does so ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 3, page 708, footnote 5 (Image)
Tertullian (I, II, III)
Ethical. (HTML)
On Patience. (HTML)
Jesus Christ in His Incarnation and Work a More Imitable Example Thereof. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 9027 (In-Text, Margin)
And this species of the divine patience indeed being, as it were, at a distance, may perhaps be esteemed as among “things too high for us;” but what is that which, in a certain way, has been grasped by hand[1 John 1:1] among men openly on the earth? God suffers Himself to be conceived in a mother’s womb, and awaits the time for birth; and, when born, bears the delay of growing up; and, when grown up, is not eager to be recognised, but is furthermore contumelious to Himself, and is baptized by His own servant; and repels with words alone the assaults of the tempter; while from being “Lord” ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 41, footnote 8 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
To His Wife. (HTML)
I (HTML)
Of the Infirmity of the Flesh, and Similar Pleas. (HTML)
... necessity of a husband to the female sex, as a source of authority and of comfort, or to render it safe from evil rumours. To meet these its counsels, do you apply the examples of sisters of ours whose names are with the Lord, —who, when their husbands have preceded them (to glory), give to no opportunity of beauty or of age the precedence over holiness. They prefer to be wedded to God. To God their beauty, to God their youth (is dedicated). With Him they live; with Him they converse; Him they “handle”[1 John 1:1] by day and by night; to the Lord they assign their prayers as dowries; from Him, as oft as they desire it, they receive His approbation as dotal gifts. Thus they have laid hold for themselves of an eternal gift of the Lord; and while ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 80, footnote 13 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Modesty. (HTML)
Of the Parables of the Lost Ewe and the Lost Drachma. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 787 (In-Text, Margin)
Similarly, the parable of the drachma, as being called forth out of the same subject-matter, we equally interpret with reference to a heathen; albeit it had been “lost” in a house, as it were in the church; albeit “found” by aid of a “lamp,” as it were by aid of God’s word. Nay, but this whole world is the one house of all; in which world it is more the heathen, who is found in darkness, whom the grace of God enlightens, than the Christian, who is already in God’s light.[1 John 1:5-7] Finally, it is one “straying” which is ascribed to the ewe and the drachma: (and this is an evidence in my favour); for if the parables had been composed with a view to a Christian sinner, after the loss of his faith, a second loss and ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 96, footnote 3 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Modesty. (HTML)
Objections from the Revelation and the First Epistle of St. John Refuted. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 940 (In-Text, Margin)
From the Epistle also of John they forthwith cull (a proof). It is said: “The blood of His Son purifieth us utterly from every sin.”[1 John 1:7] Always then, and in every form, we will sin, if always and from every sin He utterly purifies us; or else, if not always, not again after believing; and if not from sin, not again from fornication. But what is the point whence (John) has started? He had predicated “God” to be “Light,” and that “darkness is not in Him,” and that “we lie if we say that we have communion with Him, and walk in darkness.” “If, however,” he ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 96, footnote 6 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Modesty. (HTML)
Objections from the Revelation and the First Epistle of St. John Refuted. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 943 (In-Text, Margin)
... laid down, but not being wittingly committed. For this is the virtue of the Lord’s blood, that such as it has already purified from sin, and thenceforward has set “in the light,” it renders thenceforward pure, if they shall continue to persevere walking in the light. “But he subjoins,” you say, “If we say that we have not sin, we are seducing ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, faithful and just is He to remit them to us, and utterly purify us from every unrighteousness.”[1 John 1:8-9] Does he say “from impurity?” (No): or else, if that is so, then (He “utterly purifies” us) from “idolatry” too. But there is a difference in the sense. For see yet again: “If we say,” he says, “that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 96, footnote 7 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Tertullian: Part Fourth. (HTML)
On Modesty. (HTML)
Objections from the Revelation and the First Epistle of St. John Refuted. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 944 (In-Text, Margin)
... “But he subjoins,” you say, “If we say that we have not sin, we are seducing ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, faithful and just is He to remit them to us, and utterly purify us from every unrighteousness.” Does he say “from impurity?” (No): or else, if that is so, then (He “utterly purifies” us) from “idolatry” too. But there is a difference in the sense. For see yet again: “If we say,” he says, “that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.”[1 John 1:9] All the more fully: “Little children, these things have I written to you, lest ye sin; and if ye shall have sinned, an Advocate we have with God the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; and, He is the propitiation for our sins.” “According to these ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 155, 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)
From death recovered body,[1 John 1:1-2] and partook
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 242, footnote 3 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen De Principiis. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
On God. (HTML)
... the writings of Moses they find it said, that “our God is a consuming fire;” and in the Gospel according to John, that “God is a Spirit, and they who worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” Fire and spirit, according to them, are to be regarded as nothing else than a body. Now, I should like to ask these persons what they have to say respecting that passage where it is declared that God is light; as John writes in his Epistle, “God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.”[1 John 1:5] Truly He is that light which illuminates the whole understanding of those who are capable of receiving truth, as is said in the thirty-sixth Psalm, “In Thy light we shall see light.” For what other light of God can be named, “in which any one sees ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 376, footnote 4 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen De Principiis. (HTML)
IV (HTML)
Sections 24-End translated from the Latin. (HTML)
... of things non-existent, i.e., beyond His own substance, so that there once was a time when He did not exist; but, putting away all corporeal conceptions, we say that the Word and Wisdom was begotten out of the invisible and incorporeal without any corporeal feeling, as if it were an act of the will proceeding from the understanding. Nor, seeing He is called the Son of (His) love, will it appear absurd if in this way He be called the Son of (His) will. Nay, John also indicates that “God is Light,”[1 John 1:5] and Paul also declares that the Son is the splendour of everlasting light. As light, accordingly, could never exist without splendour, so neither can the Son be understood to exist without the Father; for He is called the “express image of His ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 417, footnote 2 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen Against Celsus. (HTML)
I (HTML)
Chapter XLVIII (HTML)
... better than bodies, among which are ranked the cherubim and seraphim; and a faculty of hearing which can perceive voices which have not their being in the air; and a sense of taste which can make use of living bread that has come down from heaven, and that giveth life unto the world; and so also a sense of smelling, which scents such things as leads Paul to say that he is a sweet savour of Christ unto God; and a sense of touch, by which John says that he “handled with his hands of the Word of life;”[1 John 1:1] —the blessed prophets having discovered this divine perception, and seeing and hearing in this divine manner, and tasting likewise, and smelling, so to speak, with no sensible organs of perception, and laying hold on the Logos by faith, so that a ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 460, footnote 9 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen Against Celsus. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Chapter LXXI (HTML)
... sent Him, in the words, “None knoweth the Father but the Son;” and in these, “No man hath seen God at any time; the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him.” He, treating of Deity, stated to His true disciples the doctrine regarding God; and we, discovering traces of such teaching in the Scripture narratives, take occasion from such to aid our theological conceptions, hearing it declared in one passage, that “God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all;”[1 John 1:5] and in another, “God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in spirit and in truth.” But the purposes for which the Father sent Him are innumerable; and these any one may ascertain who chooses, partly from the prophets who ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 547, footnote 14 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen Against Celsus. (HTML)
Book V (HTML)
Chapter XI (HTML)
But even this rational light itself ought not to be worshipped by him who beholds and understands the true light, by sharing in which these also are enlightened; nor by him who beholds God, the Father of the true light,—of whom it has been said, “God is light, and in Him there is no darkness at all.”[1 John 1:5] Those, indeed, who worship sun, moon, and stars because their light is visible and celestial, would not bow down to a spark of fire or a lamp upon earth, because they see the incomparable superiority of those objects which are deemed worthy of homage to the light of sparks and lamps. So those who understand that God is light, and who have ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 4, page 625, footnote 12 (Image)
Tertullian (IV), Minucius Felix, Commodian, Origen
Origen. (HTML)
Origen Against Celsus. (HTML)
Book VII (HTML)
Chapter XXXIV (HTML)
... When our Saviour says, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear,” any one will understand that the ears spoken of are of a diviner kind. When it is said that the word of the Lord was “in the hand” of Jeremiah or of some other prophet; or when the expression is used, “the law by the hand of Moses,” or, “I sought the Lord with my hands, and was not deceived,” —no one is so foolish as not to see that the word “hands” is taken figuratively, as when John says, “Our hands have handled the Word of life.”[1 John 1:1] And if you wish further to learn from the sacred writings that there is a diviner sense than the senses of the body, you have only to hear what Solomon says, “Thou shalt find a divine sense.”
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 453, footnote 9 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
On the Lord's Prayer. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3360 (In-Text, Margin)
... for from God, the soul recalls its own consciousness of sin! Lest any one should flatter himself that he is innocent, and by exalting himself should more deeply perish, he is instructed and taught that he sins daily, in that he is bidden to entreat daily for his sins. Thus, moreover, John also in his epistle warns us, and says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us; but if we confess our sins, the Lord is faithful and just to forgive us our sins.”[1 John 1:8] In his epistle he has combined both, that we should entreat for our sins, and that we should obtain pardon when we ask. Therefore he said that the Lord was faithful to forgive sins, keeping the faith of His promise; because He who taught us to pray ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 476, footnote 9 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Cyprian. (HTML)
The Treatises of Cyprian. (HTML)
On Works and Alms. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3528 (In-Text, Margin)
... spiritual remedies for the cleansing and purging of our sins. Nor let any one so flatter himself with the notion of a pure and immaculate heart, as, in dependence on his own innocence, to think that the medicine needs not to be applied to his wounds; since it is written, “Who shall boast that he hath a clean heart, or who shall boast that he is pure from sins?” And again, in his epistle, John lays it down, and says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8-9] But if no one can be without sin, and whoever should say that he is without fault is either proud or foolish, how needful, how kind is the divine mercy, which, knowing that there are still found some wounds in those that have been healed, even after ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 547, footnote 19 (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 Job: “For who is pure from filth? Not one; even if his life be of one day on the earth.” Also in the fiftieth Psalm: “Behold, I was conceived in iniquities, and in sins hath my mother conceived me.” Also in the Epistle of John: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 5, page 603, footnote 10 (Image)
Hippolytus, Cyprian, Caius, Novatian, Appendix
Caius. (HTML)
Fragments of Caius. (HTML)
Canon Muratorianus. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4987 (In-Text, Margin)
... concern the Lord’s nativity, His passion, His resurrection, His conversation with His disciples, and His twofold advent,—the first in the humiliation of rejection, which is now past, and the second in the glory of royal power, which is yet in the future. What marvel is it, then, that John brings forward these several things so constantly in his epistles also, saying in his own person, “What we have seen with our eyes, and heard with our ears, and our hands have handled, that have we written.”[1 John 1:1] For thus he professes himself to be not only the eye-witness, but also the hearer; and besides that, the historian of all the wondrous facts concerning the Lord in their order.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 14, footnote 4 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Gregory Thaumaturgus. (HTML)
Acknowledged Writings. (HTML)
A Metaphrase of the Book of Ecclesiastes. (HTML)
Chapter VII. (HTML)
... not thou audacious and precipitate, lest an untimely death surprise thee. It is the greatest of all good to take hold of God, and by abiding in Him to sin in nothing. For to touch things undefiled with an impure hand is abomination. But he who in the fear of God submits himself, escapes all that is contrary. Wisdom availeth more in the way of help than a band of the most powerful men in a city, and it often also pardons righteously those who fail in duty. For there is not one that stumbleth not.[1 John 1:8] Also it becomes thee in no way to attend upon the words of the impious, that thou mayest not become an ear-witness of words spoken against thyself, such as the foolish talk of a wicked servant, and being thus stung in heart, have recourse afterwards ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 83, footnote 4 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Dionysius. (HTML)
Extant Fragments. (HTML)
Containing Various Sections of the Works. (HTML)
From the Two Books on the Promises. (HTML)
... Word of God, and of his testimony, and of all things that he saw.” And then he writes also an epistle, in which he says: “John to the seven churches which are in Asia, grace be unto you, and peace.” The evangelist, on the other hand, has not prefixed his name even to the catholic epistle; but without any circumlocution, he has commenced at once with the mystery of the divine revelation itself in these terms: “That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes.”[1 John 1:1] And on the ground of such a revelation as that the Lord pronounced Peter blessed, when He said: “Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona; for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.” And again in the second ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 84, footnote 3 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Dionysius. (HTML)
Extant Fragments. (HTML)
Containing Various Sections of the Works. (HTML)
From the Two Books on the Promises. (HTML)
... the same way. For the one opens thus, “In the beginning was the Word;” while the other opens thus, “That which was from the beginning.” The one says: “And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us; and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father.” The other says the same things, with a slight alteration: “That which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life: and the life was manifested.”[1 John 1:1-2] For these things are introduced by way of prelude, and in opposition, as he has shown in the subsequent parts, to those who deny that the Lord is come in the flesh. For which reason he has also been careful to add these words: “And that which we ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 84, footnote 4 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Dionysius. (HTML)
Extant Fragments. (HTML)
Containing Various Sections of the Works. (HTML)
From the Two Books on the Promises. (HTML)
... upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life: and the life was manifested.” For these things are introduced by way of prelude, and in opposition, as he has shown in the subsequent parts, to those who deny that the Lord is come in the flesh. For which reason he has also been careful to add these words: “And that which we have seen we testify, and show unto you that eternal life which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us: that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you.”[1 John 1:2-3] Thus he keeps to himself, and does not diverge inconsistently from his subjects, but goes through them all under the same heads and in the same phraseologies, some of which we shall briefly mention. Thus the attentive reader will find the phrases, ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 6, page 268, footnote 6 (Image)
Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius the Great, Julius Africanus, Anatolius and Minor Writers, Methodius, Arnobius
Peter of Alexandria. (HTML)
The Genuine Acts of Peter. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2280 (In-Text, Margin)
... the land of promise. David also, full of prophetic inspiration, when he had heard the words of the deceitful youth, although it was by the inscrutable and just judgment of God, yet acted very differently from what the true nature of the case required. What also can be more sublime than the apostles, who have not removed themselves from our infirmity? For one of them writes, “In many things we offend all;” and another, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] But when we repent of these, so much the more readily do we obtain pardon, when we have sinned not willingly, but through ignorance or frailty. And certainly offences of this sort come not of prevarication, but of the indulgence of compassion. But I ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 7, page 242, footnote 8 (Image)
Lactantius, Venantius, Asterius, Victorinus, Dionysius, Apostolic Teaching and Constitutions, 2 Clement, Early Liturgies
Lactantius (HTML)
The Divine Institutes (HTML)
The Epitome of the Divine Institutes (HTML)
Chap. XLIX.—That God is one only (HTML)
... that so close a relationship cannot be separated, so that they should be said to be two in whom there is but one substance, and will, and faith. Therefore the Son is through the Father, and the Father through the Son. One honour is to be given to both, as to one God, and is to be so divided through the worship of the two, that the division itself may be bound by an inseparable bond of union. He will leave nothing to himself, who separates either the Father from the Son, or the Son from the Father.[1 John 1:22-23]
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 338, footnote 1 (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 II. (HTML)
Different Kinds of Light; And of Darkness. (HTML)
... yourselves the light of knowledge.” There is a further light of knowledge in addition to the commandments, and so we read, “Make light for yourselves,” not simply light, but what light?—the light of knowledge. For if any light that a man kindles for himself were a light of knowledge, then the added words, “Make light for yourselves, the light of knowledge,” would have no meaning. And again that darkness is brought upon men by their evil deeds, we learn from John himself, when he says in his epistle,[1 John 1:6] “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth,” and again, “He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now,” and again, “He that hateth his brother is in ...
Ante-Nicene Fathers, Volume 9, page 338, footnote 3 (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 II. (HTML)
Different Kinds of Light; And of Darkness. (HTML)
... and again, “He that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because darkness hath blinded his eyes.” Walking in darkness signifies evil conduct, and to hate one’s brother, is not that to fall away from that which is properly called knowledge? But he also who is ignorant of divine things walks in darkness, just because of that ignorance; as David says, “They knew not, they understood not, they walk in darkness.” Consider, however, this passage,[1 John 1:5] “God is light and in Him is no darkness,” and see if the reason for this saying is not that darkness is not one, being either two, because there are two kinds of it, or many, because it is taken distributively, individually with reference to the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 109, footnote 7 (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)
Divine Things are the More Clearly Manifested to Him Who Withdraws into the Recesses of His Heart. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 529 (In-Text, Margin)
16. And being thence warned to return to myself, I entered into my inward self, Thou leading me on; and I was able to do it, for Thou wert become my helper. And I entered, and with the eye of my soul (such as it was) saw above the same eye of my soul, above my mind, the Unchangeable Light.[1 John 1:5] Not this common light, which all flesh may look upon, nor, as it were, a greater one of the same kind, as though the brightness of this should be much more resplendent, and with its greatness fill up all things. Not like this was that light, but different, yea, very different from all these. Nor was it above my mind as oil is above water, nor as heaven ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 140, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
He speaks of his design of forsaking the profession of rhetoric; of the death of his friends, Nebridius and Verecundus; of having received baptism in the thirty-third year of his age; and of the virtues and death of his mother, Monica. (HTML)
He Entreats God for Her Sins, and Admonishes His Readers to Remember Her Piously. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 792 (In-Text, Margin)
34. But,—my heart being now healed of that wound, in so far as it could be convicted of a carnal affection,—I pour out unto Thee, O our God, on behalf of that Thine handmaid, tears of a far different sort, even that which flows from a spirit broken by the thoughts of the dangers of every soul that dieth in Adam. And although she, having been “made alive” in Christ even before she was freed from the flesh had so lived as to praise Thy name both by her faith and conversation, yet dare I not say[1 John 1:8] that from the time Thou didst regenerate her by baptism, no word went forth from her mouth against Thy precepts. And it hath been declared by Thy Son, the Truth, that “Whosoever shall say to his brother, Thou fool, shall be in danger of hell fire.” ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 160, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Prolegomena: St. Augustine's Life and Work, Confessions, Letters
The Confessions (HTML)
Having manifested what he was and what he is, he shows the great fruit of his confession; and being about to examine by what method God and the happy life may be found, he enlarges on the nature and power of memory. Then he examines his own acts, thoughts and affections, viewed under the threefold division of temptation; and commemorates the Lord, the one mediator of God and men. (HTML)
He is Forcibly Goaded on by the Love of Praise. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 962 (In-Text, Margin)
... brethren, who are to pray for me, what I find in myself weak. Once again let me more diligently examine myself. If, in mine own praise, I am moved with consideration for my neighbour, why am I less moved if some other man be unjustly dispraised than if it be myself? Why am I more irritated at that reproach which is cast upon myself, than at that which is with equal injustice cast upon another in my presence? Am I ignorant of this also? or does it remain that I deceive myself, and do not the “truth”[1 John 1:8] before Thee in my heart and tongue? Put such madness far from me, O Lord, lest my mouth be to me the oil of sinners, to anoint my head.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 1, page 198, footnote 22 (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)
All Men Should Become Lights in the Firmament of Heaven. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1335 (In-Text, Margin)
... moon, announce unto night the word of knowledge. The moon and the stars shine for the night, but the night obscureth them not, since they illumine it in its degree. For behold God (as it were) saying, “Let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven.” There came suddenly a sound from heaven, as it had been the rushing of a mighty wind, and there appeared cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And there were made lights in the firmament of heaven, having the word of life.[1 John 1:1] Run ye to and fro everywhere, ye holy fires, ye beautiful fires; for ye are the light of the world, nor are ye put under a bushel. He to whom ye cleave is exalted, and hath exalted you. Run ye to and fro, and be known unto all nations.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 269, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the punishment and results of man’s first sin, and of the propagation of man without lust. (HTML)
Of the Perturbations of the Soul Which Appear as Right Affections in the Life of the Righteous. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 692 (In-Text, Margin)
... saying that is written, Death is swallowed up in victory.” In like manner they fear to sin, they desire to persevere; they grieve in sin, they rejoice in good works. They fear to sin, because they hear that “because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold.” They desire to persevere, because they hear that it is written, “He that endureth to the end shall be saved.” They grieve for sin, hearing that “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] They rejoice in good works, because they hear that “the Lord loveth a cheerful giver.” In like manner, according as they are strong or weak, they fear or desire to be tempted, grieve or rejoice in temptation. They fear to be tempted, because they ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 270, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the punishment and results of man’s first sin, and of the propagation of man without lust. (HTML)
Of the Perturbations of the Soul Which Appear as Right Affections in the Life of the Righteous. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 716 (In-Text, Margin)
... “ impassibilitas,” if it be taken to mean an impassibility of spirit and not of body, or, in other words, a freedom from those emotions which are contrary to reason and disturb the mind, then it is obviously a good and most desirable quality, but it is not one which is attainable in this life. For the words of the apostle are the confession, not of the common herd, but of the eminently pious, just, and holy men: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] When there shall be no sin in a man, then there shall be this απάθεια. At present it is enough if we live without crime; and he who thinks he lives without sin puts aside not sin, but pardon. And if that is to be ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 436, footnote 13 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the last judgment, and the declarations regarding it in the Old and New Testaments. (HTML)
Of the Endless Glory of the Church. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1402 (In-Text, Margin)
... heaviness and continual sorrow of heart for his Israelitish brethren? But when shall there be no more death in that city, except when it shall be said, “O death, where is thy contention? O death, where is thy sting? The sting of death is sin.” Obviously there shall be no sin when it can be said, “Where is”—But as for the present it is not some poor weak citizen of this city, but this same Apostle John himself who says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] No doubt, though this book is called the Apocalypse, there are in it many obscure passages to exercise the mind of the reader, and there are few passages so plain as to assist us in the interpretation of the others, even though we take pains; and ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 2, page 446, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: The City of God, Christian Doctrine
City of God (HTML)
Of the last judgment, and the declarations regarding it in the Old and New Testaments. (HTML)
Of Malachi’s Prophecy, in Which He Speaks of the Last Judgment, and of a Cleansing Which Some are to Undergo by Purifying Punishments. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1460 (In-Text, Margin)
... complete and perfect righteousness; for what more acceptable offering can such persons make to God than themselves? But this question of purgatorial punishments we must defer to another time, to give it a more adequate treatment. By the sons of Levi and Judah and Jerusalem we ought to understand the Church herself, gathered not from the Hebrews only, but from other nations as well; nor such a Church as she now is, when “if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,”[1 John 1:8] but as she shall then be, purged by the last judgment as a threshing-floor by a winnowing wind, and those of her members who need it being cleansed by fire, so that there remains absolutely not one who offers sacrifice for his sins. For all who make ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 108, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On the Holy Trinity. (HTML)
He resolves the question he had deferred, and teaches us that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is one power and one wisdom, no otherwise than one God and one essence. And he then inquires how it is that, in speaking of God, the Latins say, One essence, three persons; but the Greeks, One essence, three substances or hypostases. (HTML)
Why the Son Chiefly is Intimated in the Scriptures by the Name of Wisdom, While Both the Father and the Holy Spirit are Wisdom. That the Holy Spirit, Together with the Father and the Son, is One Wisdom. (HTML)
... light, and the fountain of life with God the Father, who is Himself assuredly the fountain of life. For “with Thee,” He says, “is the fountain of life, and in Thy light shall we see light.” Because, “as the Father hath life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself:” and, “He was the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world:” and this light, “the Word,” was “with God;” but “the Word also was God;” and “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all:”[1 John 1:5] but a light that is not corporeal, but spiritual; yet not in such way spiritual, that it was wrought by illumination, as it was said to the apostles, “Ye are the light of the world,” but “the light which lighteth every man,” that very supreme wisdom ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 116, footnote 5 (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)
Every Corporeal Conception Must Be Rejected, in Order that It May Be Understood How God is Truth. (HTML)
... which they serve God; not even if all, and there are “thousands of thousands,” were brought together into one, and became one; neither is any such thing God. Neither if you were to think of the same spirits as without bodies—a thing indeed most difficult for carnal thought to do. Behold and see, if thou canst, O soul pressed down by the corruptible body, and weighed down by earthly thoughts, many and various; behold and see, if thou canst, that God is truth. For it is written that “God is light;”[1 John 1:5] not in such way as these eyes see, but in such way as the heart sees, when it is said, He is truth [reality]. Ask not what is truth [reality] for immediately the darkness of corporeal images and the clouds of phantasms will put themselves in the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 123, footnote 10 (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)
That He Who Loves His Brother, Loves God; Because He Loves Love Itself, Which is of God, and is God. (HTML)
... must needs love love, who loves his brother. And so a little after he says, “For he that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he love God whom he hath not seen”? because the reason that he does not see God is, that he does not love his brother. For he who does not love his brother, abideth not in love; and he who abideth not in love, abideth not in God, because God is love. Further, he who abideth not in God, abideth not in light; for “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.”[1 John 1:5] He therefore who abideth not in light, what wonder is it if he does not see light, that is, does not see God, because he is in darkness? But he sees his brother with human sight, with which God cannot be seen. But if he loved with spiritual love him ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 258, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Doctrinal Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
The Enchiridion. (HTML)
Pardon of Sin Extends Over the Whole Mortal Life of the Saints, Which, Though Free from Crime, is Not Free from Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1211 (In-Text, Margin)
... by their own spirit, weighted as it is by the corruptible body; and that, as the sons of men, under the influence of human affections, they fall back to their old level, and so sin. There is a difference, however. For although every crime is a sin, every sin is not a crime. And so we say that the life of holy men, as long as they remain in this mortal body, may be found without crime; but, as the Apostle John says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 390, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
On Continence. (HTML)
Section 25 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1904 (In-Text, Margin)
... it hath such members, is not yet without spot or wrinkle. To these are added those other sins also, for which the daily cry of the whole Church is, “Forgive us our debts:” and, that we should not think spiritual persons exempt from these, not any one soever of carnal persons, nor any one soever of spiritual persons themselves, but he, who lay on the breast of the Lord, and whom He loved before others, saith, “If we shall say that we have not sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] But in every sin, more in what is greater, less in what is less, there is an act of lust against righteousness. And of Christ it is written: “Who was made unto us by God, Wisdom, and Righteousness, and Sanctification, and Redemption.” In every sin ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 436, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
Of Holy Virginity. (HTML)
Section 49 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2206 (In-Text, Margin)
... lie:” let them remember in this also to be true, that they dare not say that they have not sin. Forsooth the same John, who saw that, hath said this, “If we shall have said that we have not sin, we deceive our own selves, and the truth is not in us; but if we shall have confessed our faults, He is faithful and just, so as to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. But if we shall have said that we have not sinned, we shall make Him a liar, and His word shall not be in us.”[1 John 1:8-10] This surely is not said unto these or those, but unto all Christians, wherein virgins also ought to recognize themselves. For thus they shall be without a lie, such as in the Apocalypse they appeared. And by this means so long as there is not as yet ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 3, page 500, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: On the Holy Trinity, Doctrinal Treatises, Moral Treatises
Moral Treatises of St. Augustin (HTML)
Against Lying. (HTML)
Section 40 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2471 (In-Text, Margin)
... watch against a lie, as he doth against sin. For indeed sometimes the name of lie is put for the name of sin: whence is that saying, “All men are liars.” For it is so said, as if it were said, “All men are sinners.” And that: “But if the truth of God hath abounded through my lie.” And therefore, when he lies as a man he sins as a man, and will be held by that sentence in which it is said, “All men are liars;” and, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] But when nothing false cometh forth of his mouth, according to that grace will it so be, of which is said: “He that is born of God, sinneth not.” For were this nativity by itself alone in us, no man would sin: and when it shall be alone, no man will ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 274, footnote 9 (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 794 (In-Text, Margin)
... we called the deep God, where there was darkness, because the light did not exist there before God made it by His word. From their not distinguishing between the light which is God, and the light which God made, they imagine that God must have been in darkness before He made light, because darkness was over the deep before God said, "Let there be light, and there was light." In the New Testament both these things are ascribed to God. For we read, "God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all;"[1 John 1:5] and again, "God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts." So also, in the Old Testament, the name "Brightness of eternal light" is given to the wisdom of God, which certainly was not created, for by it all things ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 593, footnote 3 (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 106 (HTML)
... apostle, which you would have not made for a bishop. Do you perceive of how devilish a nature your pride is? Prayer is made for an apostle, that he may make manifest the mystery of Christ as he ought to speak. Accordingly, if you had a pious people under you, you ought to have exhorted them to pray for you, that you might not give utterance as you ought not. Are you more righteous than the evangelist John, who says, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us?"[1 John 1:8] Finally, are you more righteous than Daniel, whom you yourself quoted in this very epistle, going so far as to say, "The most righteous king cast forth Daniel, as he supposed, to be devoured by wild beasts?"—a thing which he never did suppose, since ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 647, footnote 7 (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 9 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2543 (In-Text, Margin)
... "Forgive us our debts." For since all sins have been remitted in baptism, why does the Church make this petition, if already, even in this life, it has neither spot nor wrinkle, nor any such thing? They would also have a fight to despise the warning of the Apostle John, when he cries out in his epistle, "If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."[1 John 1:8-9] On account of this hope, the universal Church utters the petition, "Forgive us our debts," that when He sees that we are not vainglorious, but ready to confess our sins, He may cleanse us from all unrighteousness, and that so the Lord Jesus Christ ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 4, page 647, footnote 10 (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 9 (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2546 (In-Text, Margin)
... victory." Now, therefore, in so far as the life is flourishing within us that proceeds from our being born of God, living by faith, so far we are righteous; but in so far as we drag along with us the traces of our mortal nature as derived from Adam, so far we cannot be free from sin. For there is truth both in the statement that "whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin," and also in the former statement, that "if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us."[1 John 1:8] The Lord Jesus, therefore, is both righteous and able to justify; but we are justified freely by no other grace than His. For there is nothing that justifieth save His body, which is the Church; and therefore, if the body of Christ bears off the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 31, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
From the First Epistle of John. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 346 (In-Text, Margin)
Moreover, from John’s Epistle I meet with the following words, which seem indispensable to the solution of this question: “But if,” says he, “we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanseth us from all sin.”[1 John 1:7] To the like import he says, in another place: “If we receive the witness of men, the witness of God is greater: for this is the witness of God, which is greater because He hath testified of His Son. He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made Him a liar; because he believed not in the testimony ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 47, footnote 13 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
(2) Whether There is in This World a Man Without Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 486 (In-Text, Margin)
... which “exceedingly rejoiceth against judgment,” and which that man shall not obtain who does not show mercy. And whereas the prophet says, “I said, I will confess my transgressions unto the Lord, and Thou forgavest the iniquity of my heart,” he yet immediately adds, “For this shall every saint pray unto Thee in an acceptable time.” Not indeed every sinner, but “every saint;” for it is the voice of saints which says, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Accordingly we read, in the Apocalypse of the same Apostle, of “the hundred and forty and four thousand” saints, “which were not defiled with women; for they continued virgins: and in their mouth was found no guile; for they are without fault.” ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 47, footnote 15 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
(2) Whether There is in This World a Man Without Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 488 (In-Text, Margin)
... we read, in the Apocalypse of the same Apostle, of “the hundred and forty and four thousand” saints, “which were not defiled with women; for they continued virgins: and in their mouth was found no guile; for they are without fault.” “Without fault,” indeed, they no doubt are for this reason,—because they truly found fault with themselves; and for this reason, “in their mouth was discovered no guile,”—“because if they said they had no sin, they deceived themselves, and the truth was not in them.”[1 John 1:8] Of course, where the truth was not, there would be guile; and when a righteous man begins a statement by accusing himself, he verily utters no falsehood.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 48, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Perfection, When to Be Realized. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 498 (In-Text, Margin)
... We are therefore advancing in renewal and holiness of life,—and it is by this that we are children of God, and by this also we cannot commit sin;—until at last the whole of that by which we are kept as yet children of this world is changed into this;—for it is owing to this that we are as yet able to sin. Hence it comes to pass that “whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin;” and as well, “if we were to say that we have no sin, we should deceive ourselves, and the truth would not be in us.”[1 John 1:8] There shall be then an end put to that within us which keeps us children of the flesh and of the world; whilst that other shall be perfected which makes us the children of God, and renews us by His Spirit. Accordingly the same John says, “Beloved, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 49, footnote 2 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
He Reconciles Some Passages of Scripture. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 506 (In-Text, Margin)
The statement, therefore, “He that is born of God sinneth not,” is not contrary to the passage in which it is declared by those who are born of God, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] For however complete may be a man’s present hope, and however real may be his renewal by spiritual regeneration in that part of his nature, he still, for all that, carries about a body which is corrupt, and which presses down his soul; and so long as this is the case, one must distinguish even in the same individual the relation and source of each several action. Now, I suppose it ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 52, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
Perfect Human Righteousness is Imperfect. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 533 (In-Text, Margin)
There are then on earth righteous men, there are great men, brave, prudent, chaste, patient, pious, merciful, who endure all kinds of temporal evil with an even mind for righteousness’ sake. If, however, there is truth—nay, because there is truth—in these words, “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves,”[1 John 1:8] and in these, “In Thy sight shall no man living be justified,” they are not without sin; nor is there one among them so proud and foolish as not to think that the Lord’s Prayer is needful to him, by reason of his manifold sins.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 78, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins, and on the Baptism of Infants. (HTML)
Book III (HTML)
Epilogue. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 707 (In-Text, Margin)
... strive and worthily pray for this result, whatever sins remain in them are daily remitted because we sincerely pray, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Whosoever shall deny that this prayer is in this life necessary for every righteous man who knows and does the will of God, except the one Saint of saints, greatly errs, and is utterly incapable of pleasing Him whom he praises. Moreover, if he supposes himself to be such a character, “he deceives himself, and the truth is not in him,”[1 John 1:8] —for no other reason than that he thinks what is false. That Physician, then, who is not needed by the sound, but by the sick, knows how to heal us, and by healing to perfect us unto eternal life; and He does not in this world take away death, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 113, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Spirit and the Letter. (HTML)
In What Sense a Sinless Righteousness in This Life Can Be Asserted. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1105 (In-Text, Margin)
... pleasure were a lawful one, although known to be unlawful by the commandment,—for this amounts to a consent to sin, which would certainly be carried out in act, unless fear of punishment deterred.) Have such just men, while living by faith, no need to say: “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors?” And do they prove this to be wrong which is written, “In Thy sight shall no man living be justified?” and this: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us?”[1 John 1:8] and, “There is no man that sinneth not;” and again, “There is not on the earth a righteous man, who doeth good and sinneth not” (for both these statements are expressed in a general future sense,—“sinneth not,” “will not sin,”—not in the past time, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 125, footnote 8 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on Nature and Grace. (HTML)
Not Everything [of Doctrinal Truth] is Written in Scripture in So Many Words. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1159 (In-Text, Margin)
... sinful flesh; a likeness, indeed, which it would not have borne if it had not been in every other respect the same as sinful flesh. How, however, we are to understand this: “Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; neither can he sin, for his seed remaineth in him;” while the Apostle John himself, as if he had not been born of God, or else were addressing men who had not been born of God, lays down this position: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,”[1 John 1:8] —I have already explained, with such care as I was able, in those books which I wrote to Marcellinus on this very subject. It seems, moreover, to me to be an interpretation worthy of acceptance to regard the clause of the above quoted passage: ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 134, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on Nature and Grace. (HTML)
We Must Not Lie, Even for the Sake of Moderation. The Praise of Humility Must Not Be Placed to the Account of Falsehood. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1232 (In-Text, Margin)
... that if it is at all true, it must not on any account be called an arrogant statement; for with very great truth and acuteness he asks, “On what side must humility be placed? No doubt on the side of falsehood, if you prove arrogance to exist on the side of truth.” And so he decides, and rightly decides, that humility should rather be ranged on the side of truth, not of falsehood. Whence it follows that he who said, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us,”[1 John 1:8] must without hesitation be held to have spoken the truth, and not be thought to have spoken falsehood for the sake of humility. Therefore he added the words, “And the truth is not in us;” whereas it might perhaps have been enough if he merely said, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 135, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on Nature and Grace. (HTML)
The Blessed Virgin Mary May Have Lived Without Sin. None of the Saints Besides Her Without Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1236 (In-Text, Margin)
... together all the forementioned holy men and women, and ask them whether they lived without sin whilst they were in this life, what can we suppose would be their answer? Would it be in the language of our author, or in the words of the Apostle John? I put it to you, whether, on having such a question submitted to them, however excellent might have been their sanctity in this body, they would not have exclaimed with one voice: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us?”[1 John 1:8] But perhaps this their answer would have been more humble than true! Well, but our author has already determined, and rightly determined, “not to place the praise of humility on the side of falsehood.” If, therefore, they spoke the truth in giving ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 147, footnote 7 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on Nature and Grace. (HTML)
He Meets Pelagius with Another Passage from Hilary. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1318 (In-Text, Margin)
... is without sin; but it is those who turn away from Him, whom they call apostates, that He despises.” You observe his statement: it is not to the effect that no man was without sin, as if he spoke of the past; but no man is without sin; and on this point, as I have already remarked, I have no contention with him. But if one refuses to submit to the Apostle John,—who does not himself declare, “If we were to say we have had no sin,” but “If we say we have no sin,”[1 John 1:8] —how is he likely to show deference to Bishop Hilary? It is in defence of the grace of Christ that I lift up my voice, without which grace no man is justified,—just as if natural free will were sufficient. Nay, He Himself lifts up His own voice in ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 150, footnote 5 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on Nature and Grace. (HTML)
How to Exhort Men to Faith, Repentance, and Advancement. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1345 (In-Text, Margin)
... persistent prayer and ready works of mercy to obtain from Him facility. But provided they thus progress, I am not over-anxious as to the where and the when of their perfection in fulness of righteousness; only I solemnly assert, that wheresoever and whensoever they become perfect, it cannot be but by the grace of God through our Lord Jesus Christ. When, indeed, they have attained to the clear knowledge that they have no sin, let them not say they have sin, lest the truth be not in them;[1 John 1:8] even as the truth is not in those persons who, though they have sin, yet say that they have it not.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 169, footnote 14 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Concerning Man’s Perfection in Righteousness. (HTML)
'Every Man is a Liar,' Owing to Himself Alone; But 'Every Man is True,' By Help Only of the Grace of God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1497 (In-Text, Margin)
... the Lord,” —when he said, “Ye were darkness,” he did not add, “in the Lord;” but after saying, “Ye are now light,” he expressly added the phrase, “in the Lord,” for they could not possibly be “light” in themselves; in order that “he who glorieth may glory in the Lord.” The “faultless” ones, indeed, in the Apocalypse, are so called because “no guile was found in their mouth.” They did not say they had no sin: if they had said this, they would deceive themselves, and the truth would not be in them;[1 John 1:8] and if the truth were not in them, guile and untruth would be found in their mouth. If, however, to avoid envy, they said they were not without sin, although they were sinless, then this very insincerity would be a lie, and the character given of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 173, footnote 10 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Concerning Man’s Perfection in Righteousness. (HTML)
The Eighth Passage. In What Sense He is Said Not to Sin Who is Born of God. In What Way He Who Sins Shall Not See Nor Know God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1554 (In-Text, Margin)
“They also quote,” says he, “this passage, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] And this very clear testimony he has endeavoured to meet with apparently contradictory texts, saying thus: “The same St. John in this very epistle says, ‘This, however, brethren, I say, that ye sin not. Whosoever is born of God doth not commit sin; for his seed remaineth in him: and he cannot sin.’ Also elsewhere: ‘Whosoever is born of God sinneth not; because his being born of God preserveth him, and the evil one toucheth him not.’ ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 173, footnote 15 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Concerning Man’s Perfection in Righteousness. (HTML)
The Eighth Passage. In What Sense He is Said Not to Sin Who is Born of God. In What Way He Who Sins Shall Not See Nor Know God. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1559 (In-Text, Margin)
... again: ‘Beloved, now are we the sons of God; and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is. And every man that hath this hope towards Him purifieth himself, even as He is pure.’” And yet, notwithstanding the truth of all these passages, that also is true which he has adduced, without, however, offering any explanation of it: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Now it follows from the whole of this, that in so far as we are born of God we abide in Him who appeared to take away sins, that is, in Christ, and sin not,—which is simply that “the inward man is renewed day by day;” but in so far as we are born of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 176, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Concerning Man’s Perfection in Righteousness. (HTML)
Conclusion of the Work. In the Regenerate It is Not Concupiscence, But Consent, Which is Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1598 (In-Text, Margin)
... and salvation of the one Mediator Christ. Whereas He it is who has said: “They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick;” “I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” He, moreover, who says that any man, after he has received remission of sins, has ever lived in this body, or still is living, so righteously as to have no sin at all, he contradicts the Apostle John, who declares that “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Observe, the expression is not we had, but “ we have.” If, however, anybody contend that the apostle’s statement concerns the sin which dwells in our mortal flesh according to the defect which was caused by the will of the first man ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 195, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Work on the Proceedings of Pelagius. (HTML)
The Accusations in the Seventh Item, Which Pelagius Confessed. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1681 (In-Text, Margin)
... bring him. So he reduced the sentence to these harmless dimensions: “We again assert that before the coming of Christ there were persons who led holy and righteous lives.” Of course there were: who would deny it? But to say this is a very different thing from saying that they lived “without sin.” Because, indeed, those ancient worthies lived holy and righteous lives, they could for that very reason better confess: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] In the present day, also, many men live holy and righteous lives; but yet it is no untruth they utter when in their prayer they say: “Forgive us our debts, even as we forgive our debtors.” This avowal was accordingly acceptable to the judges, in the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 195, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Work on the Proceedings of Pelagius. (HTML)
The Eighth Item in the Accusation. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1683 (In-Text, Margin)
... threshing-floor. We might apply the same illustration in answer to our present opponents, unless indeed they would have the Church consist only of good men, whom they assert to be without any sin whatever, that so the Church might be without spot or wrinkle. If this be their meaning, then I repeat the same words as I quoted just now; for how can they be members of the Church, of whom the voice of a truthful humility declares, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us?”[1 John 1:8] or how could the Church offer up that prayer which the Lord taught her to use, “Forgive us our debts,” if in this world the Church is without a spot or blemish? In short, they must themselves submit to be strictly catechised respecting themselves: ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 392, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
The Heresies of the Manicheans and Pelagians are Mutually Opposed, and are Alike Reprobated by the Catholic Church. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2626 (In-Text, Margin)
... Pelagians say that the soul is upright, not indeed a particle, but a creature of God, and has not even in this corruptible life any sin. The catholic Church condemns both, saying to the Manicheans, “Either make the tree good and its fruit good, or make the tree evil and its fruit evil,” which would not be said to man who cannot make his own nature, unless because sin is not nature, but vice; and saying to the Pelagians, “If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] In these diseases, opposed as they are to one another, the Manicheans and the Pelagians are at issue, with dissimilar will but with similar vanity, separated by different opinions, but close together by a perverse mind.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 403, footnote 8 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Misrepresentation Concerning the Effect of Baptism. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2689 (In-Text, Margin)
... believers who until now and still hereafter continue to beget. And yet we cannot contradict the Lord when He says, “The children of this world marry and give in marriage.” Some, therefore, are children of this world, and yet are not children of the devil. For although the devil is the author and source of all sins, yet it is not every sin that makes children of the devil; for the children of God also sin, since if they say they have no sins they deceive themselves, and the truth is not in them.[1 John 1:8] But they sin in virtue of that condition by which they are still children of this world; but by that grace wherewith they are the children of God they certainly sin not, because every one that is born of God sinneth not. But unbelief makes children ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 403, footnote 14 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Misrepresentation Concerning the Effect of Baptism. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2695 (In-Text, Margin)
... either by human infirmity, or by ignorance, or by any evil will whatever. But those are the children of God who certainly, if they should “say that they have no sin, deceive themselves, and the truth is not in them, but immediately” (as it continues) “when they confess their sins” (which the children of the devil do not do, or do not do according to the faith which is peculiar to the children of God), “He is faithful and just to forgive them their sins, and to cleanse them from all unrighteousness.”[1 John 1:8] And in order that what we say may be more fully understood, let Jesus Himself be heard, who certainly was speaking to the children of God when He said: “And if ye, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more shall your ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 414, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
There are Three Principal Heads in the Pelagian Heresy. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2774 (In-Text, Margin)
... Baptist, or from the apostles themselves up to this time, and henceforth even to the end of the world, are to be praised in the Lord, not in themselves. Because the voice, even of those earlier ones, is, “In the Lord shall my soul be praised.” And the voice of the later ones is, “By the grace of God I am what I am.” And to all belongs, “That he that glorieth may glory in the Lord.” And it is the common confession of all, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 418, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
The Catholics Praise Nature, Marriage, Law, Free Will, and the Saints, in Such Wise as to Condemn as Well Pelagians as Manicheans. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2780 (In-Text, Margin)
... cannot breathe into a wholesome liberty save by God’s grace, which overturns the Pelagian heresy. He who so praises in God the holy men of God, not only after Christ manifested in the flesh and subsequently, but even those of the former times, whom the Manicheans dare to blaspheme, as yet to believe their own confessions concerning themselves, more than the lies of the Pelagians. For the word of the saints is, “If we should say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 424, footnote 6 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Of the Praise of the Saints. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2836 (In-Text, Margin)
... this in order that the Church may be believed after holy baptism—in which is accomplished the forgiveness of all sins—to have no further sin; when, in opposition to them, from the rising of the sun even to its setting, in all its members it cries to God, “Forgive us our debts.” But if they are interrogated regarding themselves in this matter, they find not what to answer. For if they should say that they have no sin, John answers them, that they deceive themselves, and the truth is not in them.[1 John 1:8] But if they confess their sins, since they wish themselves to be members of Christ’s body, how will that body, that is, the Church, be even in this time perfectly, as they think, without spot or wrinkle, if its members without falsehood confess ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 424, footnote 9 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
The Opinion of the Saints Themselves About Themselves. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2839 (In-Text, Margin)
... both evangelical and ancient, to whom God gives His witness, were righteous, not in comparison with the wicked, but by the rule of virtue,” is not doubtful. And this is opposed to the Manicheans, who blaspheme the patriarchs and prophets; but what is opposed to the Pelagians is, that all of these, when interrogated concerning themselves while they lived in the body, with one most accordant voice would answer, “If we should say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] “But in the future time,” it is not to be denied “that there will be a reward as well of good works as of evil, and that no one will be commanded to do the commandments there which here he has contemned,” but that a sufficiency of perfect ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 429, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Cyprian’s Testimonies Concerning the Imperfection of Our Own Righteousness. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2865 (In-Text, Margin)
... spiritual remedies for the cleansing and purging of our sins. Nor let any one so flatter himself with the notion of a pure and immaculate heart, as, in dependence on his own innocence, to think that the medicine needs not to be applied to his wounds; since it is written, ‘Who shall boast that he hath a clean heart, or who shall boast that he is pure from sins?’ And again, in his epistle, John lays it down and says, ‘If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.’[1 John 1:8] But if no one can be without sin, and whoever should say that he is without fault is either proud or foolish, how needful, how kind is the divine mercy, which, knowing that there are still found some wounds in those that have been healed, has given ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 430, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
Cyprian’s Testimonies Concerning the Imperfection of Our Own Righteousness. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2876 (In-Text, Margin)
... says, “No one is pure from filth, not one even if his life be of one day upon the earth,” or what is read in the Psalm, “Behold, I was conceived in iniquity; and in sins hath my mother nourished me in the womb.” To which testimonies, on account of those also who are already holy in mature age, since even they are not without filth and sin, he added also that word of the most blessed John, which he often mentions in many other places besides, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves;”[1 John 1:8] and other passages of the same sentiment, which are asserted by all catholics, by way of opposing those “who deceive themselves, and the truth is not in them.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 432, footnote 8 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise Against Two Letters of the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book IV (HTML)
The Testimonies of Ambrose on the Imperfection of Present Righteousness. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2902 (In-Text, Margin)
... expounding Isaiah the Prophet in reference to what is written, “I have begotten and brought up children, and they have despised me,” he undertook to dispute concerning the generations which are of God, and in that argument he quoted the testimony of John when he says, “He that is born of God sinneth not.” And, treating the same very difficult question, he says: “Since in this world there is none who is free from sin; since John himself says, ‘If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar.’[1 John 1:10] But if ‘they that are born of God sin not,’ and if these words refer to those of them who are in the world, it is necessary that we should regard them as those numberless people who have obtained God’s grace by the regeneration of the laver. But ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 5, page 529, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Anti-Pelagian Writings
A Treatise on the Predestination of the Saints. (HTML)
A Treatise on the Gift of Perseverance. (HTML)
The Fifth Petition. It is an Error of the Pelagians that the Righteous are Free from Sin. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3575 (In-Text, Margin)
... other things: “And how necessarily, how providently, and salutarily are we admonished that we are sinners, since we are compelled to entreat for our sins; and while pardon is asked for from God, the soul recalls its own consciousness. Lest any one should flatter himself that he is innocent, and by exalting himself should more deeply perish, he is instructed and taught that he sins daily, in that he is bidden daily to entreat for his sins. Thus, moreover, John also in his Epistle warns us, and says,[1 John 1:8] ‘If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.’” And the rest, which it would be long to insert in this place.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 277, 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 Lord’s Prayer in St. Matthew’s Gospel, Chap. vi. 9, etc. to the Competentes. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1990 (In-Text, Margin)
... need no explanation, that it is for ourselves that we pray. For we beg that our debts may be forgiven us. For debtors are we, not in money, but in sins. Thou art saying perchance at this moment, And you too. We answer, Yes, we too. What, ye Holy Bishops, are ye debtors? Yes, we are debtors too. What you! My Lord. Be it far from thee, do not thyself this wrong. I do myself no wrong, but I say the truth; we are debtors: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] We have been baptized, and yet are we debtors. Not that anything then remained, which was not remitted to us in Baptism, but because in our lives we are contracting ever what needs daily forgiveness. They who are baptized, and forthwith depart out ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 392, 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. xxii. 2, etc., about the marriage of the king’s son; against the Donatists, on charity. Delivered at Carthage in the Restituta. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2995 (In-Text, Margin)
... suppose of that number of whom it was said, “they invited good and bad,” that they should be reckoned among the number of the bad, who we have heard were shut out in his person who was found not to have a wedding garment. According to a certain respect, I repeat they were bad, who yet were good; and according to a certain respect they were good, who yet were bad. Hear John according to what respect they were bad: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Behold after what respect they were bad: because they had sin. According to what respect were they good? “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” If then we should say, on ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 392, 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)
On the words of the Gospel, Matt. xxii. 2, etc., about the marriage of the king’s son; against the Donatists, on charity. Delivered at Carthage in the Restituta. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2996 (In-Text, Margin)
... According to a certain respect, I repeat they were bad, who yet were good; and according to a certain respect they were good, who yet were bad. Hear John according to what respect they were bad: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Behold after what respect they were bad: because they had sin. According to what respect were they good? “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”[1 John 1:9] If then we should say, on the principle of this interpretation which ye have now heard me bring, as I think, out of the sacred Scriptures, viz. that the same men are both after a certain manner, good, and after a certain manner bad; if we should ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 394, 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. xxii. 2, etc., about the marriage of the king’s son; against the Donatists, on charity. Delivered at Carthage in the Restituta. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3012 (In-Text, Margin)
... have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.” This then is “the wedding garment.” Question yourselves; if ye have it, ye may be without fear in the Feast of the Lord. In one and the same man there exist two things, charity and desire. Let charity be born in thee, if it be yet unborn, and if it be born, be it nourished, fostered, increased. But as to that desire, though in this life it cannot be utterly extinguished; “for if we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us;”[1 John 1:8] but in so far as desire is in us, so far we are not without sin: let charity increase, desire decrease; that the one, that is, charity, may one day be perfected, and desire be consumed. Put on “the wedding garment:” you I address, who as yet have it ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 453, footnote 4 (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 3526 (In-Text, Margin)
4. This would I say even if thou hadst no sin which thou mightest desire to be forgiven thee. But as it is, whosoever thou art, thou art a man; though thou be righteous, thou art a man; be thou layman, or monk, or clerk, or Bishop, or Apostle, thou art a man. Hear the Apostle’s voice, “If we shall say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves.”[1 John 1:8] He, that famous John and an Evangelist, he whom the Lord Christ loved beyond all the rest, who lay on His breast, he says, “If we shall say.” He did not say, “If ye shall say that ye have no sin,” but “if we shall say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” He joined himself in the guilt, that ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 453, 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 xvii. 3, ‘If thy brother sin, rebuke him,’ etc., touching the remission of sins. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3527 (In-Text, Margin)
... “If we shall say.” He did not say, “If ye shall say that ye have no sin,” but “if we shall say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” He joined himself in the guilt, that he might be joined in the pardon also. “If we shall say.” Consider who it is that says, “If we shall say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we shall confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all iniquity.”[1 John 1:9] How does He cleanse? By forgiving, not as though He found nothing to punish, but as finding something to forgive. So then, Brethren, if we have sins, let us forgive them that ask us. Let us not retain enmities in our heart against another. For the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 514, footnote 8 (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 ix. 4 and 31, ‘We must work the works of him that sent me,’ etc. Against the Arians. And of that which the man who was born blind and received his sight said, ‘We know that God heareth not sinners.’ (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4044 (In-Text, Margin)
... cease to have sin? Tell us, I pray you. Let us hear, that sinners may not despair, that they may not leave off to pray to God, because they are not without sin. Tell us. One of them saith. And who? He whom the Lord loved the most, and who lay on the Lord’s Breast, and drank in the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven which he was to pour forth again. Him I ask; “Have ye sin or not?” He maketh answer and saith, “If we shall say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Now it is the same John who said, “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” See ye what heights he had passed, that he could reach to the Word! Such an one, and so great, who like an eagle soared above the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 6, page 514, footnote 10 (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 ix. 4 and 31, ‘We must work the works of him that sent me,’ etc. Against the Arians. And of that which the man who was born blind and received his sight said, ‘We know that God heareth not sinners.’ (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4046 (In-Text, Margin)
... Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” See ye what heights he had passed, that he could reach to the Word! Such an one, and so great, who like an eagle soared above the clouds, who in the serene clearness of his mind saw, “In the beginning was the Word;” he hath said, “If we shall say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. But if we shall confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”[1 John 1:9] Therefore pray ye.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 233, 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 VIII. 31–36. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 758 (In-Text, Margin)
... be free from crimes. Give heed, my brethren, give heed, that I may not by any means mislead your understanding as to the nature of that liberty at present, and what it will be. Sift any one soever of the highest integrity in this life, and however worthy he may already be of the name of upright, yet is he not without sin. Listen to Saint John himself, the author of the Gospel before us, when he says in his epistle, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] He alone could say this who was “free among the dead:” of Him only could it be said, who knew no sin. It could be said only of Him, for He also “was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.” He alone could say, “Behold, the prince of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 302, 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 XIII. 6–10. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1138 (In-Text, Margin)
... what think you of it, save that in holy baptism a man has all of him washed, not all save his feet, but every whit; and yet, while thereafter living in this human state, he cannot fail to tread on the ground with his feet. And thus our human feelings themselves, which are inseparable from our mortal life on earth, are like feet wherewith we are brought into sensible contact with human affairs; and are so in such a way, that if we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.[1 John 1:8] And every day, therefore, is He who intercedeth for us, washing our feet: and that we, too have daily need to be washing our feet, that is ordering aright the path of our spiritual footsteps, we acknowledge even in the Lord’s prayer, when we say, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 302, footnote 7 (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. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1141 (In-Text, Margin)
... not in us. And every day, therefore, is He who intercedeth for us, washing our feet: and that we, too have daily need to be washing our feet, that is ordering aright the path of our spiritual footsteps, we acknowledge even in the Lord’s prayer, when we say, “Forgive us our debts as we also forgive our debtors.” For “if,” as it is written, “we confess our sins,” then verily is He, who washed His disciples’ feet, “faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness,”[1 John 1:9] that is, even to our feet wherewith we walk on the earth.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 462, footnote 3 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1996 (In-Text, Margin)
2. “And we have seen and are witnesses.”[1 John 1:2] Perhaps some of the brethren who are not acquainted with the Greek do not know what the word “witnesses” is in Greek: and yet it is a term much used by all, and had in religious reverence; for what in our tongue we call “witnesses,” in Greek are “martyrs.” Now where is the man that has not heard of martyrs, or where the Christian in whose mouth the name of martyrs dwelleth not every day and would that it so dwelt in the heart also, that we should imitate the sufferings of ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 462, footnote 10 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2003 (In-Text, Margin)
3. “And we are witnesses, and show unto you that eternal life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us:” i.e., manifested among us: which might be more plainly expressed, manifested to us. “The things,” therefore, “which we have seen and heard, declare we unto you.”[1 John 1:3] Those saw the Lord Himself present in the flesh, and heard words from the mouth of the Lord, and told them to us. Consequently we also have heard, but have not seen. Are we then less happy than those who saw and heard? And how does he add, “That ye also may have fellowship with us”? Those saw, we have not seen, and yet we are fellows; because we hold ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 463, footnote 2 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2006 (In-Text, Margin)
... described, we designated. Then let the blessedness take place in us, of which the Lord predicted that it should take place; let us firmly hold that which we see not; because those tell us who have seen. “That ye also,” saith he, “may have fellowship with us.” And what great matter is it to have fellowship with men? Do not despise it; see what he adds: “and our fellowship may be with God the Father, and Jesus Christ His Son. And these things,” saith he, “we write unto you, that your joy may be full.”[1 John 1:4] Full joy he means in that fellowship, in that charity, in that unity.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 463, footnote 3 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2007 (In-Text, Margin)
4. “And this is the message which we have heard of Him, and declare unto you.”[1 John 1:5] What is this? Those same have seen, have handled with their hands, the Word of life: He “was from the beginning,” and for a time was made visible and palpable, the Only-begotten Son of God. For what thing did He come, or what new thing did He tell us? What was it His will to teach? Wherefore did He this which He did, that the Word should be made flesh, that “God over all things” should suffer indignities from men, that He should endure to be smitten upon ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 463, footnote 5 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2009 (In-Text, Margin)
... endure to be smitten upon the face by the hands which Himself had made? What would He teach? What would He show? What would He declare? Let us hear: for without the fruit of the precept the hearing of the story, how Christ was born, and how Christ suffered, is a mere pastime of the mind, not a strengthening of it. What great thing hearest thou? With what fruit thou hearest, see to that. What would He teach? What declare? Hear. That “God is light,” saith he, “and there is no darkness in Him at all.”[1 John 1:5] Hitherto, he hath named indeed the light, but the words are dark: good is it for us that the very light which he hath named should enlighten our hearts, and we should see what he hath said. This it is that we declare, that “God is light, and there ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 464, footnote 1 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2011 (In-Text, Margin)
... all.” And what said he above? “That ye may have fellowship with us, and our fellowship may be with God the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ.” But moreover, if “God be light, and in Him is no darkness at all, and we must have fellowship with Him,” then from us also must the darkness be driven away, that there may be light created in us, for darkness cannot have fellowship with light. To this end, see what follows: “If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie.”[1 John 1:6] Thou hast also the Apostle Paul saying, “Or what fellowship hath light with darkness?” Thou sayest thou hast fellowship with God, and thou walkest in darkness; “and God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all:” then how should there be fellowship ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 464, footnote 4 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2014 (In-Text, Margin)
... to himself, What shall I do? how shall I be light? I live in sins and iniquities. There steals upon him, as it were, a desperation and sadness. There is no salvation save in the fellowship of God. “God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all.” But sins are darkness, as the Apostle saith of the devil and his angels, that they are “rulers of this darkness.” He would not call them of darkness, save as rulers of sins, having lordship over the wicked. Then what are we to do, my brethren? Fellowship[1 John 1:3] with God must be had, other hope of life eternal is none; now “God is Light, and in Him is no darkness at all:” now iniquities are darkness; by iniquities we are pressed down, that we cannot have fellowship with God: what hope have we then? Did I ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 464, footnote 5 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2015 (In-Text, Margin)
... by the way. For we are running, and running to our own country; and if we despair of attaining, by that very despair we fail. But He whose will it is that we attain, that He may keep us safe in our own land, feedeth us in the way. Hear we then: “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie, and do not the truth.” Let us not say that we have fellowship with Him, if we walk in darkness. “If we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship one with another.”[1 John 1:7] Let us walk in the light, as He is in the light, that we may be able to have fellowship with Him. And what are we to do about our sins? Hear what follows, “And the blood of Jesus Christ His Son shall purge us from all sin.” Great assurance hath God ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 464, footnote 11 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2021 (In-Text, Margin)
6. For see what He saith; “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Consequently, if thou hast confessed thyself a sinner, the truth is in thee: for the Truth itself is light. Thy life hath not yet shone in perfect brightness, because there are sins in thee; but yet thou hast already begun to be enlightened, because there is in thee the confession of sins. For see what follows: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to purge us from all iniquity.” Not only the past, but ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 464, footnote 13 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2023 (In-Text, Margin)
... we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” Consequently, if thou hast confessed thyself a sinner, the truth is in thee: for the Truth itself is light. Thy life hath not yet shone in perfect brightness, because there are sins in thee; but yet thou hast already begun to be enlightened, because there is in thee the confession of sins. For see what follows: “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to purge us from all iniquity.”[1 John 1:9] Not only the past, but haply if we have contracted any from this life; because a man, so long as he bears the flesh, cannot but have some at any rate light sins. But these which we call light, do not thou make light of. If thou make light of them ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 465, footnote 3 (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 I. 1–II. 11. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2026 (In-Text, Margin)
... thou art, God condemneth what He shall find in thee. Wouldest thou not that He condemn thee? Condemn thou. Wouldest thou that He forgive? do thou acknowledge, that thou mayest be able to say unto God, “Turn Thy face from my sins.” Say also to Him those words in the same Psalm, “For I acknowledge mine iniquity.” “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to purge us from all iniquity. If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.”[1 John 1:9-10] If thou shalt say, I have not sinned, thou makest Him a liar, while thou wishest to make thyself true. How is it possible that God should be a liar, and man true, when the Scripture saith the contrary, “Every man a liar, God alone true”? ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 487, footnote 1 (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. 27–III. 8. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2236 (In-Text, Margin)
12. The rest I commend to your thoughts, my beloved, that I may not burden you. For the question we labor to solve is even this—that we call ourselves sinners: for if any man shall say that he is without sin, he is a liar. And in the Epistle of this same John we have found it written, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves.”[1 John 1:8] For ye should remember what went before: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” And yet, on the other hand, in what follows thou art told, “He that is begotten of God sinneth not: he that doeth sin hath not seen Him, neither known Him.—Every one that doeth sin is of the devil:” sin is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 487, footnote 3 (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 III. 9–18. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2238 (In-Text, Margin)
1. intently, I do beseech you, because it is no small matter that we have to cope withal: and I doubt not, because ye were intent upon it yesterday, that ye have with even greater intentness of purpose come together to-day. For it is no slight question, how he saith in this Epistle, “Whosoever is born of God, sinneth not,” and how in the same Epistle he hath said above, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] What shall the man do, who is pressed by both sayings out of the same Epistle? If he shall confess himself a sinner, he fears lest it be said to him, Then art thou not born of God; because it is written, “Whosoever is born of God, sinneth not.” But if he shall say that ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 7, page 495, footnote 8 (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 III. 19–IV. 3. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2308 (In-Text, Margin)
... come, they had not had sin,” what would He have to be understood, but a certain sin in particular? For there was a sin which the Jews would not have had. What sin? That they believed not on Him, that when he had come they despised Him. As then He there said “sin,” and it does not follow that we are to understand all sin, but a certain sin: so here also not all sin, lest it be contrary to that place where he saith, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us:”[1 John 1:8] but a certain sin in particular, that is, the violation of charity. But in this place he hath bound us more tightly: “If we shall ask,” he hath said, “if our heart accuse us not, and tell us in answer, in the sight of God, that true love is in us;” ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 116, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm XXXIX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1061 (In-Text, Margin)
14. “Deliver me from all my transgressions” (ver. 8). I have “over-leaped” a great deal of ground, a very great deal of ground already; but, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the Truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] I have “over-leaped” a great deal: but still do I “beat my breast,” and say, “Forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors.” Thou therefore art “my expectation!” my “End.” For “Christ is the end of the Law unto righteousness, unto every man that believeth.” From all mine offences: not only from those, that I may not relapse into those which I have already “over-leaped;” but from ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 436, footnote 1 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm LXXXIX (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4189 (In-Text, Margin)
... we not on that account to sin not without apprehension, and perversely to assure ourselves that we shall not perish, be our actions what they may. For there are certain sins and certain offences, to define and discourse of which it is either impossible for me, or if it were possible, it would be too tedious for the time we have at present. For no man can say that he is without sin; for if he says so, he will lie; “if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Each one therefore is needfully scourged for his own sins; but the mercy of God is not taken away from him, if he be a Christian. Certainly if thou committest such offences as to repel the hand of Him who chasteneth, the rod of Him who scourgeth ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 560, footnote 3 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXIX (HTML)
Aleph. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5130 (In-Text, Margin)
3. It is written, and is read, and is true, in this Psalm, that “They who do wickedness, walk not in His ways” (ver. 3). But we must endeavour, with the help of God, “in” whose “hand are both we and our words,” that what is rightly said, by not being rightly understood, may not confuse the reader or hearer. For we must beware, lest all the Saints, whose words these are, “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us;”[1 John 1:8-9] may either not be thought to walk in the ways of the Lord, since sin is wickedness, and “they who do wickedness, walk not in His ways;” or, because it is not doubtful that they walk in the ways of the Lord, may be thought to have no sin, which is beyond doubt false. For ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 1, Volume 8, page 560, footnote 4 (Image)
Augustine: Expositions on the Psalms
Expositions on the Book of Psalms. (HTML)
Psalm CXIX (HTML)
Aleph. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5131 (In-Text, Margin)
... have no sin, which is beyond doubt false. For it is not said merely for the sake of avoiding arrogance and pride. Otherwise it would not be added, “And the truth is not in us;” but it would be said, Humility is not in us: especially because the following words throw a clearer light on the meaning, and remove all the causes of doubt. For when the blessed John had said this, he added, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”[1 John 1:9] …
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 239, 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 V (HTML)
The Writings of Irenæus against the Schismatics at Rome. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1669 (In-Text, Margin)
... describe the very place in which the blessed Polycarp sat as he discoursed, and his goings out and his comings in, and the man ner of his life, and his physical appearance, and his discourses to the people, and the accounts which he gave of his intercourse with John and with the others who had seen the Lord. And as he remembered their words, and what he heard from them concerning the Lord, and concerning his miracles and his teaching, having received them from eyewitnesses of the ‘Word of life,’[1 John 1:1] Polycarp related all things in harmony with the Scriptures.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 310, footnote 4 (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 VII (HTML)
The Apocalypse of John. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2348 (In-Text, Margin)
10. Then he writes also an epistle: ‘John to the seven churches which are in Asia, grace be with you, and peace.’ But the evangelist did not prefix his name even to the Catholic Epistle; but without introduction he begins with the mystery of the divine revelation itself: ‘That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes.’[1 John 1:1] For because of such a revelation the Lord also blessed Peter, saying, ‘Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jonah, for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my heavenly Father.’
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 310, footnote 17 (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 VII (HTML)
The Apocalypse of John. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2361 (In-Text, Margin)
18. For the Gospel and Epistle agree with each other and begin in the same manner. The one says, ‘In the beginning was the Word’; the other, ‘That which was from the beginning.’[1 John 1:1] The one: ‘And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father’; the other says the same things slightly altered: ‘Which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes; which we have looked upon and our hands have handled of the Word of life,—and the life was manifested.’
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 310, footnote 19 (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 VII (HTML)
The Apocalypse of John. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2363 (In-Text, Margin)
... and Epistle agree with each other and begin in the same manner. The one says, ‘In the beginning was the Word’; the other, ‘That which was from the beginning.’ The one: ‘And the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father’; the other says the same things slightly altered: ‘Which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes; which we have looked upon and our hands have handled of the Word of life,—and the life was manifested.’[1 John 1:1-2]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 1, page 310, footnote 20 (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 VII (HTML)
The Apocalypse of John. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2364 (In-Text, Margin)
19. For he introduces these things at the beginning, maintaining them, as is evident from what follows, in opposition to those who said that the Lord had not come in the flesh. Wherefore also he carefully adds, ‘And we have seen and bear witness, and declare unto you the eternal life which was with the Father and was manifested unto us. That which we have seen and heard declare we unto you also.’[1 John 1:2-3]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 443, footnote 9 (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)
26. But that the Son has no beginning of being, but before He was made man was ever with the Father, John makes clear in his first Epistle, writing thus: ‘That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled of the Word of Life; and the Life was manifested, and we have seen it; and we bear witness and declare unto you that Eternal Life, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us[1 John 1:1-2].’ While he says here that ‘the Life,’ not ‘became,’ but ‘was with the Father,’ in the end of his Epistle he says the Son is the Life, writing, ‘And we are in Him that is True, even in His Son, Jesus Christ; this is the True God and Eternal Life.’ But if the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 4, page 447, footnote 9 (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)
... them, He took the remains and gave to them.’ See now, though not as Thomas was allowed, yet by another way, He afforded to them full assurance, in being touched by them; but if you would now see the scars, learn from Thomas. ‘Reach hither thy hand and thrust it into My side, and reach hither thy finger and behold My hands;’ so says God the Word, speaking of His own side and hands, and of Himself as whole man and God together, first affording to the Saints even perception of the Word through the body[1 John 1:1], as we may consider, by entering when the doors were shut; and next standing near them in the body and affording full assurance. So much may be conveniently said for confirmation of the faithful, and correction of the unbelieving.
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 387, footnote 5 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against Jovinianus. (HTML)
Book II (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4656 (In-Text, Margin)
2. This would be a real difficulty and one for ever incapable of solution were it not solved by the witness of John himself, who immediately goes on to say, “My little children, guard yourselves from idols.” If everyone that is born of God sinneth not, and cannot be tempted by the devil, how is it that he bids them beware of temptation? Again in the same Epistle we read:[1 John 1:8] “If we say that we have no sins, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say that we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” I suppose that John was ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 454, footnote 6 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5165 (In-Text, Margin)
A. I will requite like with like, and will show that, according to you, the little epistle of the Evangelist contradicts itself. For, if whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not because His seed abideth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is born of God, how is it that the writer says in the same place:[1 John 1:8] “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us?” You cannot explain. You hesitate and are confused. Listen to the same Evangelist telling us that “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” We are then righteous when we confess that we ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 454, footnote 7 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5166 (In-Text, Margin)
A. I will requite like with like, and will show that, according to you, the little epistle of the Evangelist contradicts itself. For, if whosoever is begotten of God sinneth not because His seed abideth in him, and he cannot sin, because he is born of God, how is it that the writer says in the same place: “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us?” You cannot explain. You hesitate and are confused. Listen to the same Evangelist telling us that[1 John 1:9] “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” We are then righteous when we confess that we are sinners, and our righteousness depends not upon our own merits, but on the mercy of God, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 6, page 464, footnote 10 (Image)
Jerome: Letters and Select Works
Treatises. (HTML)
Against the Pelagians. (HTML)
Book I (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 5246 (In-Text, Margin)
... wrote to Quirinus, he does not perceive that he has said just the opposite in the work under discussion. Cyprian, in the fifty-fourth heading of the third book, lays it down that no one is free from stain and without sin, and he immediately gives proofs, among them the passage in Job, “Who is cleansed from uncleanness? Not he who has lived but one day upon the earth.” And in the fifty-first Psalm, “Behold I was shapen in iniquity, and in sin did my mother conceive me.” And in the Epistle of John,[1 John 1:8] “If we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” You, on the other hand, maintain that “A man can be without sin,” and that you may give your words the semblance of truth, you immediately add, “And easily keep the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 155, footnote 11 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
The Catechetical Lectures of S. Cyril. (HTML)
On the Mysteries. V: On the Sacred Liturgy and Communion. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 2503 (In-Text, Margin)
16. And forgive us our debts as we also forgive our debtors. For we have many sins. For we offend both in word and in thought, and very many things we do worthy of condemnation; and if we say that we have no sin, we lie, as John says[1 John 1:8]. And we make a covenant with God, entreating Him to forgive us our sins, as we also forgive our neighbours their debts. Considering then what we receive and in return for what, let us not put off nor delay to forgive one another. The offences committed against us are slight and trivial, and easily settled; but those which we have committed against God are great, and need ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 269, footnote 3 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
On the Great Athanasius, Bishop of Alexandria. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 3273 (In-Text, Margin)
... praise virtue are identical, because he had, or, to speak more truly, has embraced virtue in its entirety. For all who have lived according to God still live unto God, though they have departed hence. For this reason, God is called the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, since He is the God, not of the dead, but of the living. Again, in praising virtue, I shall be praising God, who gives virtue to men and lifts them up, or lifts them up again, to Himself by the enlightenment which is akin to Himself.[1 John 1:5] For many and great as are our blessings—none can say how many and how great—which we have and shall have from God, this is the greatest and kindliest of all, our inclination and relationship to Him. For God is to intelligible things what the sun is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 361, footnote 1 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Oration on Holy Baptism. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4016 (In-Text, Margin)
V. God is Light:[1 John 1:5] the highest, the unapproachable, the ineffable, That can neither be conceived in the mind nor uttered with the lips, That giveth life to every reasoning creature. He is in the world of thought, what the sun is in the world of sense; presenting Himself to our minds in proportion as we are cleansed; and loved in proportion as He is presented to our mind; and again, conceived in proportion as we love Him; Himself contemplating and comprehending Himself, and pouring Himself out upon what is ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 7, page 432, footnote 6 (Image)
Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory Nazianzen
Select Orations of Saint Gregory Nazianzen. (HTML)
The Second Oration on Easter. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 4669 (In-Text, Margin)
... you and your sin, do you become law-abiding for His sake. Worship Him Who was hanged for you, even if you yourself are hanging; make some gain even from your wickedness; purchase salvation by your death; enter with Jesus into Paradise, so that you may learn from what you have fallen. Contemplate the glories that are there; let the murderer die outside with his blasphemies; and if you be a Joseph of Arimathæa, beg the Body from him that crucified Him, make thine own that which cleanses the world.[1 John 1:7] If you be a Nicodemus, the worshipper of God by night, bury Him with spices. If you be a Mary, or another Mary, or a Salome, or a Joanna, weep in the early morning. Be first to see the stone taken away, and perhaps you will see the Angels and Jesus ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 8, page 30, footnote 7 (Image)
Basil: Letters and Select Works
De Spiritu Sancto. (HTML)
Against those who assert that the Spirit ought not to be glorified. (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 1117 (In-Text, Margin)
... Son were not reckoned by our opponents as good for testimony of His rank? It is, at all events, possible for us to arrive to a certain extent at intelligent apprehension of the sublimity of His nature and of His unapproachable power, by looking at the meaning of His title, and at the magnitude of His operations, and by His good gifts bestowed on us or rather on all creation. He is called Spirit, as “God is a Spirit,” and “the breath of our nostrils, the anointed of the Lord.” He is called holy,[1 John 1:20] as the Father is holy, and the Son is holy, for to the creature holiness was brought in from without, but to the Spirit holiness is the fulfilment of nature, and it is for this reason that He is described not as being sanctified, but as sanctifying. ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 110, footnote 13 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book I. (HTML)
Chapter XII. The peace and grace of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit are one, so also is Their charity one, which showed itself chiefly in the redemption of man. Their communion with man is also one. (HTML)
131. And that there is communion between the Father and the Son is plain, for it is written: “And our communion is with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.”[1 John 1:3] And in another place: “The communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all.” If, then, the peace of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is one, the grace one, the love one, and the communion one, the working is certainly one, and where the working is one, certainly the power cannot be divided nor the substance separated. For, if so, how could the grace of the same working agree?
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 111, footnote 13 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book I. (HTML)
Chapter XIV. Each Person of the Trinity is said in the sacred writings to be Light. The Spirit is designated Fire by Isaiah, a figure of which Fire was seen in the bush by Moses, in the tongues of fire, and in Gideon's pitchers. And the Godhead of the same Spirit cannot be denied, since His operation is the same as that of the Father and of the Son, and He is also called the light and fire of the Lord's countenance. (HTML)
160. But why should I argue that as the Father is light, so, too, the Son is light, and the Holy Spirit is light? Which certainly pertains to the power of God. For God is Light, as John said: “For God is Light, and in Him is no darkness.”[1 John 1:5]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 113, footnote 1 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
On the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
Book I. (HTML)
Chapter XV. The Holy Spirit is Life equally with the Father and the Son, in truth whether the Father be mentioned, with Whom is the Fount of Life, or the Son, that Fount can be none other than the Holy Spirit. (HTML)
171. We have said that the Father is Light, the Son is Light, and the Holy Spirit is Light; let us also learn that the Father is Life, the Son Life, and the Holy Spirit Life. For John said: “That which was from the beginning, that which we have heard, and which we have seen, and have beheld with our eyes, and our hands have handled concerning the Word of Life; and the Life appeared, and we saw and testify, and declare to you of that Life which was with the Father.”[1 John 1:1-2] He said both Word of Life and Life that he might signify both the Father and the Son to be Life. For what is the Word of Life but the Word of God? And by this phrase both God and the Word of God are shown to be Life. And as it is said the Word of Life, ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 209, footnote 8 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book I. (HTML)
Chapter VIII. The likeness of the Son to the Father being proved, it is not hard to prove the Son's eternity, though, indeed, this may be established on the authority of the Prophet Isaiah and St. John the Evangelist, by which authority the heretical leaders are shown to be refuted. (HTML)
56. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God.” “Was,” mark you, “with God.” “Was”—see, we have “was” four times over. Where did the blasphemer find it written that He “was not.” Again, John, in another passage—in his Epistle—speaketh of “That which was in the beginning.”[1 John 1:1] The extension of the “was” is infinite. Conceive any length of time you will, yet still the Son “was.”
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 245, footnote 14 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book III. (HTML)
Chapter III. That the Father and the Son must not be divided is proved by the words of the Apostle, seeing that it is befitting to the Son that He should be blessed, only Potentate, and immortal, by nature, that is, and not by grace, as even the angels themselves are immortal, and that He should dwell in the unapproachable light. How it is that the Father and the Son are alike and equally said to be “alone.” (HTML)
22. And how is it that the Son dwelleth not in light unapproachable, if He is in the bosom of the Father, if the Father is Light, and the Son also is Light, because God is Light?[1 John 1:5] Or, if we suppose some other light, beside the Light of the Godhead, to be the unapproachable Light, is, then, this Light better than the Father, so that He is not in that Light, Who, as it is written, is both with the Father and in the Father? Let men, therefore, not exclude the thought of the Son, when they read only of “ God ”—and let them not exclude that of the Father, when they read of “the ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 282, footnote 4 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book IV. (HTML)
Chapter XI. The particular distinction which the Arians endeavoured to prove upon the Apostle's teaching that all things are “of” the Father and “through” the Son, is overthrown, it being shown that in the passage cited the same Omnipotence is ascribed both to Father and to Son, as is proved from various texts, especially from the words of St. Paul himself, in which heretics foolishly find a reference to the Father only, though indeed there is no diminution or inferiority of the Son's sovereignty proved, even by such a reference. Finally, the three phrases, “of Whom,” “through Whom,” “in Whom,” are shown to suppose or imply no difference (of power), and each and all to hold true of the Three Persons. (HTML)
152. See, then, how there is fellowship both through the Father and of the Son, and yet not a different fellowship, but one and the same. “And that our fellowship be with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ.”[1 John 1:3]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 10, page 282, footnote 5 (Image)
Ambrose: Select Works and Letters
Dogmatic Treatises, Ethical Works, and Sermons. (HTML)
Exposition of the Christian Faith. (HTML)
Book IV. (HTML)
Chapter XI. The particular distinction which the Arians endeavoured to prove upon the Apostle's teaching that all things are “of” the Father and “through” the Son, is overthrown, it being shown that in the passage cited the same Omnipotence is ascribed both to Father and to Son, as is proved from various texts, especially from the words of St. Paul himself, in which heretics foolishly find a reference to the Father only, though indeed there is no diminution or inferiority of the Son's sovereignty proved, even by such a reference. Finally, the three phrases, “of Whom,” “through Whom,” “in Whom,” are shown to suppose or imply no difference (of power), and each and all to hold true of the Three Persons. (HTML)
153. Observe, further, that Scripture speaks of our having one fellowship not only “of” the Father and the Son, but also “of” the Holy Spirit. “The grace of Our Lord Jesus Christ,” saith the Apostle, “and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you all.”[1 John 1:3]
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 419, footnote 7 (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 XI. The First Conference of Abbot Chæremon. On Perfection. (HTML)
Chapter IX. That love not only makes sons out of servants, but also bestows the image and likeness of God. (HTML)
... unto death, let him ask, and He will give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he should ask for it.” But of those which he says are not unto death, from which even those who serve Christ faithfully cannot, with whatever care they keep themselves, be free, of these he says: “If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us;” and again: “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] For it is an impossibility for any one of the saints not to fall into those trivial faults which are committed by word, and thought, and ignorance, and forgetfulness, and necessity, and will, and surprise: which though quite different from that sin ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 419, footnote 7 (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 XI. The First Conference of Abbot Chæremon. On Perfection. (HTML)
Chapter IX. That love not only makes sons out of servants, but also bestows the image and likeness of God. (HTML)
... unto death, let him ask, and He will give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he should ask for it.” But of those which he says are not unto death, from which even those who serve Christ faithfully cannot, with whatever care they keep themselves, be free, of these he says: “If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us;” and again: “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar, and His word is not in us.”[1 John 1:10] For it is an impossibility for any one of the saints not to fall into those trivial faults which are committed by word, and thought, and ignorance, and forgetfulness, and necessity, and will, and surprise: which though quite different from that sin ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 502, footnote 4 (Image)
Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian
The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)
The Conferences of John Cassian. Part III. Containing Conferences XVIII.-XXIV. (HTML)
Conference XX. Conference of Abbot Pinufius. On the End of Penitence and the Marks of Satisfaction. (HTML)
Chapter XII. Wherein we must do penance for a time only; and wherein it can have no end. (HTML)
... not, that I do.” For which also the same man exclaims with a sigh “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” For we slip into these so easily as it were by a law of nature, that however carefully and guardedly we are on the lookout against them, we cannot altogether avoid them. Since it was of these that one of the disciples, whom Jesus loved, declared and laid down absolutely saying: “If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves, and His word is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] Further for a man who is anxious to reach the heights of perfection it will not greatly help him to have arrived at the end of penitence, i.e., to restrain himself from unlawful acts, unless he has always urged himself forward in unwearied course to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 502, footnote 4 (Image)
Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian
The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)
The Conferences of John Cassian. Part III. Containing Conferences XVIII.-XXIV. (HTML)
Conference XX. Conference of Abbot Pinufius. On the End of Penitence and the Marks of Satisfaction. (HTML)
Chapter XII. Wherein we must do penance for a time only; and wherein it can have no end. (HTML)
... not, that I do.” For which also the same man exclaims with a sigh “O wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me from the body of this death?” For we slip into these so easily as it were by a law of nature, that however carefully and guardedly we are on the lookout against them, we cannot altogether avoid them. Since it was of these that one of the disciples, whom Jesus loved, declared and laid down absolutely saying: “If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves, and His word is not in us.”[1 John 1:10] Further for a man who is anxious to reach the heights of perfection it will not greatly help him to have arrived at the end of penitence, i.e., to restrain himself from unlawful acts, unless he has always urged himself forward in unwearied course to ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 531, footnote 1 (Image)
Sulpitius Severus, Vincent of Lerins, John Cassian
The Works of John Cassian. (HTML)
The Conferences of John Cassian. Part III. Containing Conferences XVIII.-XXIV. (HTML)
Conference XXIII. The Third Conference of Abbot Theonas. On Sinlessness. (HTML)
Chapter XIX. How even in the hour of prayer it is almost impossible to avoid sin. (HTML)
... stage to which he has advanced, and however much a man may be purified in mind, so much the more does he see himself to be foul, and find grounds for humiliation rather than for pride, and, however swiftly he may climb to greater heights, so much more does he see above him whither he is tending. Finally that chosen Apostle “whom Jesus loved,” who lay on His bosom, uttered this saying as if from the heart of the Lord: “If we say that we have no sin we deceive ourselves and the truth is not in us.”[1 John 1:8] And so if when we say that we have no sin, we have not the truth, that is Christ, in us, what good do we do except to prove ourselves by this very profession, criminals and wicked among sinners?
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 11, page 584, footnote 1 (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 VI. He illustrates the same doctrine by passages from the New Testament. (HTML)
“ That,” says the Apostle John, “which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the word of the life: for the life was manifested: and we have seen, and do bear witness, and declare unto you the life eternal which was with the Father, and hath appeared unto us.”[1 John 1:1-2] You see how the old testimonies are confirmed by fresh ones, and the support of the new preaching is given to the ancient prophecy. Isaiah said: “Cease ye from the man whose breath is in his nostrils for he is reputed high.” But John says: “That which was from the beginning, which we have seen with our ...
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, Series 2, Volume 12, page 42, footnote 10 (Image)
Leo the Great, Gregory the Great
The Letters and Sermons of Leo the Great. (HTML)
Letters. (HTML)
To Flavian commonly called “the Tome.” (HTML)
CCEL Footnote 301 (In-Text, Margin)
... sprinkling of Christ’s blood. And let him not read cursorily the same Apostle’s words when he says, “Knowing that not with corruptible things, such as silver and gold, have ye been redeemed from your vain manner of life which is part of your fathers’ tradition, but with the precious blood of Jesus Christ as of a lamb without spot and blemish.” Let him not resist too the witness of the blessed Apostle John, who says: “and the blood of Jesus the Son of God cleanseth us from all sin[1 John 1:7].” And again: “this is the victory which overcometh the world, our faith.” And “who is He that overcometh the world save He that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God. This is He that came by water and blood, Jesus Christ: ...