Fathers

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What the Fathers say

James 3:10

Eastern Fathers

Oecumenius

From out of the same mouth come blessing and cursing. My brothers, this should not be done. Does the fountain give forth out of one hole sweet and sour water? Can, my brethren, the fig tree yield grapes: or the vine, figs? So neither can the salt water yield sweet. "From out of the same mouth." This kind of sacred discipline has received nothing bitter to be emitted, nothing ungrateful.

Commentary on James ↗

Western Saints

Bede

Blessing and cursing proceed from the same mouth. My brothers, these things ought not to be so. Does a spring pour forth sweet and bitter water from the same opening? Just as sweet and bitter water cannot simultaneously bubble up from a single vein of the fountain, but if they are mixed in a vessel or a cistern, the sweet water immediately becomes bitter from the bitter water, but the bitter water cannot be changed into sweetness by the mixture of sweet water, so blessing and cursing cannot be in any way combined in one mouth; but …

Commentary on the Catholic Epistles ↗