Fathers

Loading…

What the Fathers say

1 Corinthians 15:22

Eastern Fathers

John Chrysostom

"For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive." What then? tell me; did all die in Adam the death of sin? How then was Noah righteous in his generation? and how Abraham? and how Job? and how all the rest? And what, I pray? shall all be made alive in Christ? Where then are those who are led away into hell fire? Thus, if this be said of the body, the doctrine stands: but if of righteousness and sin, it doth so no longer. …

Homily on 1 Corinthians 39 ↗

Irenaeus

Vain also are the Ebionites, who do not receive by faith into their soul the union of God and man, but who remain in the old leaven of [the natural] birth, and who do not choose to understand that the Holy Ghost came upon Mary, and the power of the Most High did overshadow her: wherefore also what was generated is a holy thing, and the Son of the Most High God the Father of all, who effected the incarnation of this being, and showed forth a new [kind of] generation; that as by the former generation we inherited death, so by this new …

Against Heresies Book V ↗

Methodius of Olympus

Adam, should "all be made alive.". he was changed into the nature of the latter, himself being neither the tree of life nor that of corruption; but having been shown forth as mortal, from his participation in and presence with corruption, and, again, as incorrupt and immortal by connection with and participation in life; as Paul also taught, saying, "Corruption shall not inherit in corruption, nor death life". …

Methodius Discourse III. Thaleia ↗

Western Saints

Augustine of Hippo

No human enters into death except through Adam and no one into eternal life except through Christ. This is the meaning of that repeated phrase all, because as all men belong to Adam through their first or carnal birth, so all men who belong to Christ come to the second or spiritual birth. Therefore he says "all" in both places because as all who die die only in Adam, so all who will be made alive will not be made alive except in Christ.

LETTER 167, To Jerome 21 ↗

Thomas Aquinas

932. – For as in Adam. Here he proves the same in special, saying that as in Adam we all die a bodily death, so too we are all made alive in Christ: "As sin came into the world through one man" (Rom 5:12). He does not say through Eve, which seems contrary to Sir (25:33): "Through her we all die." I answer that this is through Eve suggesting, but through Adam as cause. For if Eve alone had sinned, original sin would not have been passed on to their descendants. …

Commentary on 1 Corinthians ↗