Fathers

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What the Fathers say

Proverbs 9:17

Eastern Fathers

Clement of Alexandria

Scripture sets down bread and water in clear reference simply to the heresies that use bread and water in their offertory contrary to the rules of the church. There are some who actually celebrate the Eucharist with plain water. "Jump up; do not linger in her place." Scripture is using the ambiguous word place to designate the synagogue rather than the church. …

The Stromata Book 1 ↗

Western Saints

Augustine of Hippo

I came upon that brazen woman, empty of prudence, who, in Solomon's obscure parable, sits on a seat at the door outside her house and says, "Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant." This woman seduced me, because she found my soul outside its own door, dwelling externally in the eye of my flesh and ruminating within myself on such food as I had swallowed through my physical senses.

Confessions 3.6.11 ↗

Jerome

"The foolish and bold woman comes to want bread." What bread? Surely that bread which comes down from heaven. And he immediately adds, "The earth-born perish in her house, rush into the depths of hell." Who are the earth-born that perish in her house? They of course who follow the first Adam, who is of the earth, and not the second, who is from heaven.

Against Jovinianus 1.28 ↗

Gregory the Dialogist

What does water signify but human knowledge? This is in accord with Solomon's words implying the voice of heretics: "Stolen waters are sweeter." What does the Lamb's raw flesh indicate but his humanity that has been thoughtlessly and irreverently disregarded? Everything which we think of profoundly we cook, as it were, in our minds. The flesh of the Lamb was not to be eaten raw or boiled in water, because our Redeemer is not to be judged merely a human being, nor are we to use human science to explain how God could have been made man.

Forty Gospel Homilies 22 ↗