Testimonia — Early Christian Bible Commentary

1868 (English edition) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 22.

Editorial footnote · Against Heresies, Book 1 / Chap. xvi. — Absurd interpretations of the Marcosians., editorial note cite_note-209 · Original source

1869 (English edition) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Cf. Isa. xlviii. 16.

Editorial footnote · Against Celsus, The Writings of Origen, Vol. 1 of 2 / ORIGEN CONTRA CELSUM. / ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. BOOK I. / Chapter XLVI., editorial note f1193 · Original source

1871 (English edition) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 20.

Editorial footnote · The City of God, THE CITY OF GOD. / BOOK EIGHTEENTH. / ARGUMENT., editorial note Footnote_504_504 · Original source

1871 (English edition) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 12-16.

Editorial footnote · The City of God, THE CITY OF GOD. / BOOK TWENTIETH. / ARGUMENT., editorial note Footnote_836_836 · Original source

1885 (historical English edition; physical printing year uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 13.

Editorial footnote · Against Hermogenes, Chapter 45, editorial note cite_note-4 · Original source

1886 (historical English edition; transcription printing date uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 21.

Editorial footnote · The Epistles of Cyprian, Chapter uncertain; original source section: Part 62, editorial note cite_note-16 · Original source

1887 (historical English edition; transcription printing date uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 16

Editorial footnote · On the Holy Trinity, Chapter 5.—The Son and Holy Spirit are Not Therefore Less Because Sent. The Son is Sent Also by Himself. Of the Sending of the Holy Spirit.; original source section: Chapter 6, editorial note cite_note-11 · Original source

1897 (latest original copyright year; printing date uncertain) | Historical editor/translator (individual note author unspecified)

Isa. xlviii. 16.

Editorial footnote · Commentary on Matthew (surviving edition contents), Book 13, Chapter 18, editorial note cite_note-3 · Original source

Date uncertain | Augustine of Hippo

Perhaps our readers expect us to say something about this so great delusion wrought by the demons; and what shall we say but that men must fly out of the midst of Babylon? For this prophetic precept is to be understood spiritually in this sense, that by going forward in the living God, by the steps of faith, which worketh by love, we must flee out of the city of this world, which is altogether a society of ungodly angels and men. Yea, the greater we see the power of the demons to be in these depths, so much the more tenaciously must we cleave to the Mediator through whom we ascend from these lowest to the highest places. For if we should say these things are not to be credited, there are not wanting even now some who would affirm that they had either heard on the best authority, or even themselves experienced, something of that kind. Indeed we ourselves, when in Italy, heard such things about a certain region there, where landladies of inns, imbued with these wicked arts, were said to be in the habit of giving to such travellers as they chose, or could manage, something in a piece of cheese by which they were changed on the spot into beasts of burden, and carried whatever was necessary, and were restored to their own form when the work was done. Yet their mind did not become bestial, but remained rational and human, just as Apuleius, in the books he wrote with the title of The Golden Ass, has told, or feigned, that it happened to his own self that, on taking poison, he became an ass, while retaining his human mind.

Source passage · edition’s verse reference · The City of God, THE CITY OF GOD. / BOOK EIGHTEENTH. / ARGUMENT., source paragraph 390 · Original source

Date uncertain | Augustine of Hippo

There are many other passages of Scripture bearing on the last judgment of God,—so many, indeed, that to cite them all would swell this book to an unpardonable size. Suffice it to have proved that both Old and New Testament enounce the judgment. But in the Old it is not so definitely declared as in the New that the judgment shall be administered by Christ, that is, that Christ shall descend from heaven as the Judge; for when it is therein stated by the Lord God or His prophet that the Lord God shall come, we do not necessarily understand this of Christ. For both the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost are the Lord God. We must not, however, leave this without proof. And therefore we must first show how Jesus Christ speaks in the prophetical books under the title of the Lord God, while yet there can be no doubt that it is Jesus Christ who speaks; so that in other passages where this is not at once apparent, and where nevertheless it is said that the Lord God will come to that last judgment, we may understand that Jesus Christ is meant. There is a passage in the prophet Isaiah which illustrates what I mean. For God says by the prophet, "Hear me, Jacob and Israel, whom I call. I am the first, and I am for ever: and my hand has founded the earth, and my right hand has established the heaven. I will call them, and they shall stand together, and be gathered, and hear. Who has declared to them these things? In love of thee I have done thy pleasure upon Babylon, that I might take away the seed of the Chaldeans. I have spoken, and I have called: I have brought him, and have made his way prosperous. Come ye near unto me, and hear this. I have not spoken in secret from the beginning; when they were made, there was I. And now the Lord God and His Spirit hath sent me." It was Himself who was speaking as the Lord God; and yet we should not have understood that it was Jesus Christ had He not added, "And now the Lord God and His Spirit hath sent me." For He said this with reference to the form of a servant, speaking of a future event as if it were past, as in the same prophet we read, "He was led as a sheep to the slaughter," not "He shall be led;" but the past tense is used to express the future. And prophecy constantly speaks in this way.

Source passage · edition’s verse reference · The City of God, THE CITY OF GOD. / BOOK TWENTIETH. / ARGUMENT., source paragraph 643 · Original source

Date uncertain | Irenaeus of Lyons (historical collection attribution)

And John, the disciple of the Lord, has intensified their condemnation, when he desires us not even to address to them the salutation of “good-speed;” for, says he, “He that bids them be of good-speed is a partaker with their evil deeds;” and that with reason, “for there is no good-speed to the ungodly,” saith the Lord. Impious indeed, beyond all impiety, are these men, who assert that the Maker of heaven and earth, the only God Almighty, besides whom there is no God, was produced by means of a defect, which itself sprang from another defect, so that, according to them, He was the product of the third defect. Such an opinion we should detest and execrate, while we ought everywhere to flee far apart from those that hold it; and in proportion as they vehemently maintain and rejoice in their fictitious doctrines, so much the more should we be convinced that they are under the influence of the wicked spirits of the Ogdoad,—just as those persons who fall into a fit of frenzy, the more they laugh, and imagine themselves to be well, and do all things as if they were in good health [both of body and mind], yea, some things better than those who really are so, are only thus shown to be the more seriously diseased. In like manner do these men, the more they seem to excel others in wisdom, and waste their strength by drawing the bow too tightly, the greater fools do they show themselves. For when the unclean spirit of folly has gone forth, and when afterwards he finds them not waiting upon God, but occupied with mere worldly questions, then, “taking seven other spirits more wicked than himself,” and inflating the minds of these men with the notion of their being able to conceive of something beyond God, and having fitly prepared them for the reception of deceit, he implants within them the Ogdoad of the foolish spirits of wickedness.

Source passage · edition’s verse reference · Against Heresies: Book I, Chapter uncertain (transcription heading: Chapter XVI), source paragraph 105 · Original source

Date uncertain | John Chrysostom

But, one says, “the wisdom of the poor man is despised.” ( Eccles. ix. 16.) And again another says, “Give me neither riches nor poverty” ( Prov. xxx. 8 ), and, “Deliver me from the furnace of poverty.” (See Isa. xlviii. 10.) And again, if riches and poverty are from the Lord, how can either poverty or riches be an evil? Why then were these things said? They were said under the Old [Covenant], where there was much account made of wealth, where there was great contempt of poverty, where the one was a curse and the other a blessing. But now it is no longer so.

Source passage · edition’s verse reference · Homilies on the Epistle to the Hebrews, Homily 18, source paragraph 16 · Original source

Date uncertain | Origen

For the law and the prophets are full of marvels similar to those recorded of Jesus at His baptism, viz. regarding the dove and the voice from heaven. And I think the wonders wrought by Jesus are a proof of the Holy Spirit’s having then appeared in the form of a dove, although Celsus, from a desire to cast discredit upon them, alleges that He performed only what He had learned among the Egyptians. And I shall refer not only to His miracles, but, as is proper, to those also of the apostles of Jesus. For they could not without the help of miracles and wonders have prevailed on those who heard their new doctrines and new teachings to abandon their national usages, and to accept their instructions at the danger to themselves even of death. And there are still preserved among Christians traces of that Holy Spirit which appeared in the form of a dove. They expel evil spirits, and perform many cures, and foresee certain events, according to the will of the Logos. And although Celsus, or the Jew whom he has introduced, may treat with mockery what I am going to say, I shall say it nevertheless,—that many have been converted to Christianity as if against their will, some sort of spirit having suddenly transformed their minds from a hatred of the doctrine to a readiness to die in its defence, and having appeared to them either in a waking vision or a dream of the night. Many such instances have we known, which, if we were to commit to writing, although they were seen and witnessed by ourselves, we should afford great occasion for ridicule to unbelievers, who would imagine that we, like those whom they suppose to have invented such things, had ourselves also done the same. But God is witness of our conscientious desire, not by false statements, but by testimonies of different kinds, to establish the divinity of the doctrine of Jesus. And as it is a Jew who is perplexed about the account of the Holy Spirit having descended upon Jesus in the form of a dove, we would say to him, “Sir, who is it that says in Isaiah, ‘And now the Lord hath sent me and His Spirit?’” In which sentence, as the meaning is doubtful—viz. whether the Father and the Holy Spirit sent Jesus, or the Father sent both Christ and the Holy Spirit—the latter is correct. For, because the Saviour was sent, afterwards the Holy Spirit was sent also, that the prediction of the prophet might be fulfilled; and as it was necessary that the fulfilment of the prophecy should be known to posterity, the disciples of Jesus for that reason committed the result to writing.

Source passage · edition’s verse reference · Against Celsus, The Writings of Origen, Vol. 1 of 2 / ORIGEN CONTRA CELSUM. / ORIGEN AGAINST CELSUS. BOOK I. / Chapter XLVI., source paragraph 444 · Original source