Fathers

Hebrews 12

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Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. For consider him that endured such contradiction of sinners against himself, lest ye be wearied and faint in your minds. Ye have not yet resisted unto blood, striving against sin. And ye have forgotten the exhortation which speaketh unto you as unto children, My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord, nor faint when thou art rebuked of him: For whom the Lord loveth he chasteneth, and scourgeth every son whom he receiveth. If ye endure chastening, God dealeth with you as with sons; for what son is he whom the father chasteneth not? But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all are partakers, then are ye bastards, and not sons. Furthermore we have had fathers of our flesh which corrected us, and we gave them reverence: shall we not much rather be in subjection unto the Father of spirits, and live? For they verily for a few days chastened us after their own pleasure; but he for our profit, that we might be partakers of his holiness. Now no chastening for the present seemeth to be joyous, but grievous: nevertheless afterward it yieldeth the peaceable fruit of righteousness unto them which are exercised thereby. Wherefore lift up the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees; And make straight paths for your feet, lest that which is lame be turned out of the way; but let it rather be healed. Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: Looking diligently lest any man fail of the grace of God; lest any root of bitterness springing up trouble you, and thereby many be defiled; Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. For ye are not come unto the mount that might be touched, and that burned with fire, nor unto blackness, and darkness, and tempest, And the sound of a trumpet, and the voice of words; which voice they that heard intreated that the word should not be spoken to them any more: (For they could not endure that which was commanded, And if so much as a beast touch the mountain, it shall be stoned, or thrust through with a dart: And so terrible was the sight, that Moses said, I exceedingly fear and quake:) But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, And to Jesus the mediator of the new covenant, and to the blood of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of Abel. See that ye refuse not him that speaketh. For if they escaped not who refused him that spake on earth, much more shall not we escape, if we turn away from him that speaketh from heaven: Whose voice then shook the earth: but now he hath promised, saying, Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, Yet once more, signifieth the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore we receiving a kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, whereby we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear: For our God is a consuming fire.

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What the Fathers say

Hebrews 12:16

Eastern Fathers

John Chrysostom

"Lest there be any fornicator: or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright." And wherein was Esau a "fornicator"? He does not say that Esau was a fornicator. "Lest there be any fornicator," he says, then, "follow after holiness: lest there be any, as Esau, profane": that is, gluttonous, without self-control, worldly, selling away things spiritual. …

Homily on Hebrews 31 ↗

Theophylact of Ohrid

He does not say that Esau was a fornicator, but stop here: "lest there be any fornicator among you." For although he hints that some among them were vile, he does not wish to expose them, but feigns ignorance so that they might be corrected. Then again he said: "or profane person,... like Esau," that is, insatiable, worldly, one who defiles and tramples upon what is spiritual; for he gave away, and moreover for "one morsel of food," the privilege of the birthright given to him by God (Gen. 25). …

Commentary on Hebrews ↗

Oecumenius

"that no one is sexually immoral." He did not say sexually immoral, referring to Esau, but it is placed in opposition to what preceded, "Pursue holiness." The defiled is indeed placed as if it refers to Esau; however, he called him a glutton, because he had sold away God's gift, namely the birthright, for a single meal. For it is written in the book of Genesis: "And the boys grew; and Esau was a cunning hunter, a man of the field: but Jacob was a plain man, dwelling in tents. …

The Pseudo-Oecumenian Catena on Hebrews ↗

Western Saints

Thomas Aquinas

692. – Then when he says, Lest there be any one immoral [fornicator] or profane, as Esau, he warns them to avoid sins contrary to holiness, to which are specifically opposed carnal sins, such as gluttony and lust, which are completed in carnal delight, by which the mind is defiled. Therefore, they defile the mind and the flesh. …

Commentary on Hebrews ↗

Bonaventure

The tenth plague was the death of the firstborn, by which the carnal are struck, like Esau. For the Apostle says: "Lest anyone among you be a fornicator, like Esau, and lose his birthright." Carnal concupiscence took from us our noble generation, by which we would all be born innocent and heirs of paradise, and it makes us be born in death and guilt and the loss of the birthright.

Collationes de Decem Praeceptis, Collation 7 ↗