Fathers

Loading…

What the Fathers say

Mark 9:44

Eastern Fathers

Irenaeus

Since, therefore, He whom these men boast of as their Master, and of whom they affirm that He had a soul greatly better and more highly toned than others, did indeed, with much earnestness, command certain things to be done as being good and excellent, and certain things to be abstained from not only in their actual perpetration, but even in the thoughts which lead to their performance, as being wicked, pernicious, and abominable,-how then can they escape being put to confusion, when they affirm that such a Master was more highly …

Against Heresies (Book II, Chapter 32), Section 1 ↗

Western Saints

Bede

Where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched. By the worm he designates the rottenness of hell, just as by the fire he designates the burning, or by the worm he means the late repentance of crimes, which will never cease to sting the conscience of the afflicted in torments: so that the fire is the punishment raging externally, the worm the pain accusing internally.

On the Gospel of Mark ↗