Loading…
VRSZ
This sets the art on your cards and whose commentary you read on each verse. You can change it later in settings.
Translation
Loading…
What the Fathers say
Eastern Fathers
John Chrysostom
"For verily in this we groan, longing to be clothed upon with our habitation which is from heaven." What habitation? tell me. The incorruptible body. And why do we groan now? Because that is far better. And "from heaven" he calls it because of its incorruptibleness. For it is not surely that a body will come down to us from above: but by this expression he signifies the grace which is sent from thence. …
Theophylact of Ohrid
Into what dwelling? Into the incorruptible body. And he calls it heavenly not because it will descend from above, but because from there the grace of incorruption will be sent down. Therefore we should not grieve when certain bodily trials befall us; on the contrary, we should even groan over the fact that we have not been divested of the entire corruptible body, so as to be clothed in the incorruptible one. This body the apostle did not call a tent, but a "dwelling," because it abides forever.
Methodius of Olympus
For what the Lord then called "habitations," the apostle here calls "clothing." And what He there calls "friends" "of unrighteousness," the apostle here calls "houses" "dissolved." ... Whence also "we groan," "not for that we would be unclothed," as to the body, "but clothed upon" by it in the other life. For the "house in heaven," with which we desire to be "clothed," is immortality; with which, when we are clothed, every weakness and mortality will be entirely "swallowed up" in it, being consumed by endless life.
Western Saints
Thomas Aquinas
Thus, the reward of the saints is wonderful and desirable, because it is heavenly glory. Hence, he links the desire of the saints with this reward, saying: Here indeed we groan, and long to put on our heavenly dwelling. Here he does three things. First, he expresses the desire of grace for its reward; secondly, he shows that the desire of grace is retarded by the desire of nature (v. 4); thirdly, he shows that the desire of grace overcomes the desire of nature (v. 6). …
Translation