Fathers

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What the Fathers say

Matthew 15:11

Western Saints

Augustine of Hippo

This declaration of the Lord, Not that which entereth into the mouth defileth a man, is not contrary to the Old Testament. As the Apostle also speaks, To the pure all things are pure; (Tit. 1:15.) and Every creature of God is good. Let the Manichæans understand, (1 Tim. …

Catena Aurea by Aquinas ↗

Jerome

It is not what enters into the mouth that defiles a person; but what proceeds out of the mouth, this defiles a person. The word, properly speaking, is communicated through Scripture and is not worn out in everyday conversation. The Jewish people, boasting to be a part of God, call common foods, which all humans use, 'unclean.' For example, pork, oysters, rabbits, and other animals that do not have split hooves, do not chew the cud, and are not scale-covered in fish. …

Commentary on Matthew ↗

Thomas Aquinas

Consequently he proposes the most exalted teaching, which is the perfection of the moral life. Hence it should be noted that something is changed by an external thing, as water is heated by fire; and something is changed by an internal thing, as a man is changed by sin. However much a man may be moved externally, it is not sin unless the man consents interiorly; Job 37:9: from the interior comes the tempest. Hence first he shows that defilement is not from external things; second, that it is from the interior. …

Commentary on Matthew ↗