Passion and death of Christ in the early church

Ascension of Isaiah 3.13Anonymous · late 1st–2nd century
Ascension of Isaiah 9.14Anonymous · late 1st–2nd century
Ascension of Isaiah 11.19Anonymous · late 1st–2nd century
Epistle of Barnabas 5.2Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · Isaiah's suffering servant is Christ.
Epistle of Barnabas 5.5Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · Why did the Lord of the world, addressed at creation, suffer at human hands?
Epistle of Barnabas 5.13Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The Psalms foretold his suffering on a tree.
Epistle of Barnabas 5.14Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · Isaiah: the servant gave his back to scourging.
Epistle of Barnabas 6.6Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The Psalms foretold the crucifixion.
Epistle of Barnabas 7.2Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The Son of God suffered only for our sake.
Epistle of Barnabas 7.5Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The rite foreshadows the gall and vinegar given to Christ.
Epistle of Barnabas 8.1Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The red heifer rite is a type of the cross.
Epistle of Barnabas 8.2Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The calf is Jesus; those who offer it are those who killed him.
Epistle of Barnabas 8.5Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · The wool on the stick means Jesus reigns from the cross.
Epistle of Barnabas 12.1Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · A prophecy of the cross: blood dripping from a tree.
Epistle of Barnabas 12.2Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · Moses' outstretched arms in battle were a type of the cross.
Epistle of Barnabas 12.4Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · Isaiah: God stretched out his hands all day long.
Odes of Solomon 42Anonymous · ca. 100–200
2 Clement 1.2Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · Thinking little of Christ is itself a sin; remember what he suffered for us.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 6Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · The people drag the Lord off, mock him with purple and seat him on the judgement seat.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 8Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · One of them crowns the Lord with thorns.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 9Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · They spit on, strike, pierce and scourge the Lord in mockery.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 10Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · The Lord is crucified between two criminals, keeps silent, and his garments are divided.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 13Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · One criminal defends the Lord, and in anger they order that his legs not be broken so that he die in torment.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 16Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · They give the Lord gall with vinegar and so complete their sins.
Gospel of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 19Anonymous · ca. 100–200 · The Lord cries out to his power, is taken up, and the temple veil is torn.
To the Ephesians 18.1Ignatius of Antioch · ca. 110 (range ca. 105–135) · Ignatius gives himself for the cross, which is salvation to believers.
To the Smyrnaeans 2.1Ignatius of Antioch · ca. 110 (range ca. 105–135) · Christ truly suffered and truly rose, against those who say he only seemed to.
To the Trallians 10.1Ignatius of Antioch · ca. 110 (range ca. 105–135) · If Christ only seemed to suffer, Ignatius's martyrdom would be pointless.
To the Philippians 8.1Polycarp of Smyrna · ca. 110–135 · Christ, our hope, bore our sins on the cross without sin of his own and endured everything so that we might live in him.
Epistle of the Apostles 9Anonymous · ca. 140-170 · The apostles testify that Christ was crucified under Pilate and buried, and that three women found his tomb empty.
First Apology 35Justin Martyr · ca. 150–155 · Isaiah and the Psalms foretold Christ's crucifixion; Zechariah his entry into Jerusalem.
First Apology 50Justin Martyr · ca. 150–155 · Isaiah's suffering Servant (Isa 52–53) foretold Christ's passion; after his resurrection the apostles understood and preached.
Martyrdom of Andrew (first Greek martyrdom), chapter 14Anonymous · ca. 150-200 (the Acts); the Martyrdom text is later · Andrew greets the cross and its mystery, gives himself to the executioners, and hangs bound on it for four days without weakening.
Acts of John 96Anonymous · ca. 150–200 · The hymn ends; at the crucifixion the Lord appears to John in a cave on the Mount of Olives and shows him the cross of light.
Acts of John 101Anonymous · ca. 150–200 · The Lord teaches John that he did not suffer what the crowd supposed; John urges the brothers to worship him as God present with them in every trial.
Sibylline Oracles 8.281ff.Anonymous · 2nd-3rd cent. · The Sibyl describes Christ as the all-seeing Word, creator and healer, who will be handed over to the lawless, struck, spat upon, and scourged.
Sibylline Oracles 8.301ff.Anonymous · 2nd-3rd cent. · The Sibyl foretells the crucifixion: Christ's outstretched hands, the gall and vinegar, the torn veil, and the three hours of darkness.
Dialogue with Trypho 91.4Justin Martyr · ca. 155–160 · The bronze serpent prefigures the cross, which brings death to the serpent and salvation to believers.
Dialogue with Trypho 99.1Justin Martyr · ca. 155–160 · Christ spoke the first words of Psalm 22 on the cross.
Dialogue with Trypho 103.8Justin Martyr · ca. 155–160 · The Gospels record Christ's bloody sweat, proving he truly suffered.
Dialogue with Trypho 104.1Justin Martyr · ca. 155–160 · Ps 22:15–18 foretold his condemnation and crucifixion.
Dialogue with Trypho 104.2Justin Martyr · ca. 155–160 · The soldiers divided his garments.
Diatessaron, section 23Tatian · ca. 160-180
Diatessaron, section 44Tatian · ca. 160-180
Diatessaron, section 48Tatian · ca. 160-180
Diatessaron, section 49Tatian · ca. 160-180
Diatessaron, section 50Tatian · ca. 160-180
Diatessaron, section 51Tatian · ca. 160-180
Diatessaron, section 52Tatian · ca. 160-180
Apollinaris of Hierapolis, Fr. 4 (On the Passover)Claudius Apollinaris of Hierapolis · ca. 165-180 · Apollinaris calls the fourteenth of Nisan the Lord's true Passover and lists the events of Christ's passion and burial on that day.
Acts of Peter (Vercelli) 37Anonymous · ca. 180–200 · Peter speaks on the hidden mystery of the cross, asks to be crucified head downward, and explains it as an image of the first man's fall and of conversion.
The Instructor 1.5.23Clement of Alexandria · ca. 190–200 · The window is Christ's flesh; Isaac, carrying the wood but not slain, is a type of the Lord who bore the cross and rose again.
The Instructor 2.8.74Clement of Alexandria · ca. 190–200 · Those who crowned Jesus with thorns unwittingly witnessed to his kingship; the crown of thorns symbolizes his bearing our sins, and believers gather grapes from those thorns.
Against Heresies 1.24.4Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Basilides taught that Christ did not suffer, but Simon of Cyrene was crucified in his place while Jesus laughed, so that one should deny the crucified.
Against Heresies 2.20.3Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Christ's saving passion is the opposite of the Aeon's ruinous passion: it gave life, truth, and incorruption.
Against Heresies 3.16.1Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Against Gnostic theories that divide Jesus from Christ, Irenaeus will set out the apostles' teaching that Jesus Christ is one.
Against Heresies 3.16.5Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · The risen Lord, the Gospels, and John's letter teach one Christ who was born, suffered, and rose; those who divide him are antichrists.
Against Heresies 3.18.3Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Paul knows only one Christ, the one born, crucified, buried and risen; the very name Christ implies the Father who anoints, the Son anointed, and the Spirit who is the anointing.
Against Heresies 3.18.4Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · The one Peter confessed as Christ is the one who said he must suffer and be crucified, and who called his followers to take up the cross.
Against Heresies 3.18.5Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Christ’s call to take up the cross and his warnings of persecution show that he truly suffered; those who despise the martyrs will be put to shame, and Christ’s prayer for his killers shows his goodness.
Against Heresies 3.18.6Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · If Christ only seemed to suffer, he would be a deceiver urging us to endure what he never endured; in truth he fought as a man and conquered.
Against Heresies 4.34.3Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · The prophecies cannot have been about anyone else, because the signs of the passion and resurrection were fulfilled in no one but the Lord.
Against Heresies 5.23.2Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Adam died on the day he ate, in several senses: the sixth day, on which Christ also died to give man a second formation, or within the first thousand-year “day”.
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 34Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 56Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 68Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 69Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 72Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 74Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Demonstration of the Apostolic Preaching 79Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–200
Prophetic Extracts 59.2Clement of Alexandria · ca. 200 · Christ's own testimony, his suffering and resurrection, confirmed the church's faith.
Excerpts from Theodotus 61.3Clement of Alexandria · ca. 200 · The blood and water from Christ's side signify the saved substances freed from passion.
Excerpts from Theodotus 61.4Clement of Alexandria · ca. 200 · They read Christ's predictions of his passion as referring to another, the passible element.
Excerpts from Theodotus 61.6Clement of Alexandria · ca. 200 · They say Christ's body died when the Spirit from his baptism withdrew; otherwise death would have overpowered the Savior.
Miscellanies 1.18.88Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · Paul's “wise man” and “debater of this age” are the Greek philosophers; the cross is a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Greeks, but Christ's coming made believers wise; those who refused chose unbelief.
Octavius 9.4Minucius Felix · ca. 197–250 · Caecilius mocks Christians for worshipping a crucified criminal and repeats other obscene rumours.
Apology 21Tertullian · ca. 197 · Tertullian explains the relation of Christians to the Jews and sets out who Christ is: the Word and Son of God, God from God, born of a virgin, crucified, risen, and ascended.
Against the Jews 8Tertullian · ca. 197–207 · From Daniel's seventy weeks and a list of rulers the author calculates that Christ was born, suffered, and Jerusalem was destroyed at the times foretold, so that prophecy is now sealed.
Against the Jews 10Tertullian · ca. 197–207 · Against the objection that one hanged on a tree is cursed, the author argues that Christ's crucifixion was foretold and prefigured in Isaac, Joseph, Moses' outstretched hands, the bronze serpent, the Psalms, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Amos.
On Baptism 9Tertullian · ca. 198–206 · The crossing of the Red Sea, the sweetened water of Marah, and the water from the rock prefigure baptism, and water accompanies Christ throughout his life, even to the cross.
On Patience 3Tertullian · ca. 198–206 · Christ showed divine patience throughout his life, from his birth and baptism to his gentle ministry, his refusal of the sword at his arrest, and the insults of his passion.
Acts of Thomas 158Anonymous · ca. 200–250 · Thomas gives the Eucharist with a prayer that sets each detail of Christ's passion against a gift to the faithful, and a voice from heaven answers Amen.
Against Noetus 15Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 200–230 · The Word is rightly called Son because of the flesh he was to take; the impassible Word suffered in the flesh, and Word and flesh are one perfect Son.
Against Noetus 18Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 200–230 · Being God, Christ showed all the human weaknesses that were his own, from hunger to death, and through them wrought our salvation.
Arabic Pentateuch fragment IV (on Gen 8:1)Hippolytus of Rome · unknown (transmitted in a medieval Arabic catena) · Hippolytus and Jacob of Edessa trace the ark's voyage in the four directions, which the catena reads as a figure of the cross, and its rest on Mount Kardu as Christ's return to the Father.
Arabic Pentateuch fragment XVII (on Num 13)Hippolytus of Rome · unknown (transmitted in a medieval Arabic catena) · The catena lists the twelve spies and reads them as types of the apostles, the cluster carried between two men as Christ on the cross between the robbers, and the forty days as the mission of the seventy.
On the Passover (Syriac fragment IV)Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 200-235 · The paradoxes of the incarnation and passion are “new things,” a new mystery of salvation through the cross.
Against the Jews 4Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · The preacher contrasts the grief of creation at Christ's death with the people's unconcern, and Pilate's washing of his hands with the crowd's cry for his blood.
On Mount Sinai and Mount Zion 4Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · The name Adam is spelled from the Greek names of the four quarters of the world, and its numerical value, 46, points to Christ's passion and to the temple of his body.
On Mount Sinai and Mount Zion 7Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Zion's meaning, “temptation of provocation and watching,” points to the cross: Christ was tested by his enemies and watched from the cross over the two robbers, figures of the Jews and the Gentiles.
On Mount Sinai and Mount Zion 8Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · At the crucifixion some wept and others mocked, until the signs in heaven and earth turned the feast into mourning, fulfilling Amos.
On Mount Sinai and Mount Zion 9Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Mount Zion is the cross, Christ's royal throne: Pilate's title proclaimed him king, Psalm 24's innocent one ascends it, and from his pierced side the law of Christians and the church came forth.
Fragment 12 on Genesis (Gen, 49, θ4)Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 202-235 · The bull hamstrung in Jacob's blessing is Christ, killed by those he turned from evil desires and nailed to the cross.
Commentary on Daniel 2.35Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 202-204 · Why God rescued some martyrs and not others: he rescues or takes his servants as he wills, so that some may be examples of endurance, as with the Maccabean martyrs, Peter, Paul, Stephen, and Christ himself.
Commentary on Daniel 4.57-58Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 202-204 · On Daniel 12:5–7: the two men by the river are the law and the prophets, the man above the water is Christ; his outstretched hands show the Passion, the 'time, times and half a time' the Antichrist's three and a half years, and the 'scattering' the dispersion of the Jews before the end.
On the Flesh of Christ 5Tertullian · ca. 206–211 · A crucified, dead, and risen God is the “foolishness” of the faith: it is credible because absurd, certain because impossible; and it is only true if Christ had real flesh, as he showed after the resurrection.
On the Flesh of Christ 9Tertullian · ca. 206–211 · Christ's body showed every mark of earthly flesh; he was taken for an ordinary man, was hungry, thirsty, wept, feared death, was insulted and bled, which a heavenly flesh could not have done.
Against Marcion 3.18Tertullian · 207/208 (third edition, completed later) · The cross was foretold in figures: Isaac carrying the wood, the horns of Joseph's bull, the hamstrung bull of Genesis 49, Moses' outstretched arms, and the bronze serpent.
Against Marcion 3.19Tertullian · 207/208 (third edition, completed later) · Further prophecies of the cross: the Lord reigning from the tree, government on his shoulder, wood cast into his bread, pierced hands and feet, and Isaiah's words on his death, burial, and resurrection.
Against Marcion 4.40Tertullian · 207/208 (third edition, completed later) · Christ chose the Passover, was betrayed and sold as the prophets foretold, and at the Last Supper called the bread his body and the cup his blood, which shows that he had a real body of flesh and blood.
Against Marcion 4.42Tertullian · 207/208 (third edition, completed later) · Christ's trial before Pilate and Herod, his silence, his crucifixion between criminals, the darkening of the sun, and his death and burial all fulfill the psalms and prophets and prove that he had a real body.
Against Marcion 5.5Tertullian · 207/208 (third edition, completed later) · The greeting “grace and peace” and Paul's teaching that God made the world's wisdom foolish through the cross fit only the Creator, who was offended and foretold these things, and they require a Christ with real flesh who truly died.
On Flight in Persecution 8Tertullian · ca. 208–213 · Christ withdrew from danger only until his teaching was complete; then he faced his Passion, and in Gethsemane, though his flesh was weak, he submitted to the Father's will, as Christians should.
On Fasting 10Tertullian · ca. 210–220 · Against the claim that stations must end at the ninth hour, Tertullian argues from the hours of prayer in Acts, the Lord's death and burial, and Moses, Joshua, Saul, and Daniel for later stations.
Against Praxeas 29Tertullian · ca. 213 or later · Christ died in his human, not his divine, substance; the Monarchians blaspheme by making the Father suffer and be accursed, and even their claim that the Father “suffered with” the Son makes him passible.
Against Praxeas 30Tertullian · ca. 213 or later · Christ's cry “My God, why have you forsaken me?” shows that the Son, not the Father, suffered and died; the Son rose, ascended, sits at the Father's right hand, and poured out the Holy Spirit, the third person.
Fragments on Genesis, column 117Origen · ca. 220-254 · Catena notes on Gen 19–24: Lot's wife; Abimelech did not touch Sarah; Isaac carrying the wood as a type of Christ carrying the cross; the meanings of the names in Nahor's family.
Fragments on Luke, column 349Origen · ca. 220-254 · Christ was handed over by the Father in love, by Judas in malice and by the devil, and by his death destroyed death; the call to follow him comes when the "father", the devil, has died to us.
PG 12:1063Origen · ca. 220-254 · The titles “for those who will be changed” (Psalms 59, 68, 44, 79 LXX) as the change of the nations, of Christ in his passion, and of the former people; “for the hidden things” as Christ’s hidden war and victory.
PG 12:1101 (Ps 2 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · The speakers of Psalm 2 change at the diapsalma; the nations, peoples, kings and rulers who set upon Christ are both the human agents of the passion and the invisible powers, and war against Christ is impiety against the Father.
PG 12:1119 (Ps 3 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · David in Scripture often stands for Christ the judge; on Ps 3:1–2, those who afflict and rise up against David are Absalom’s followers in the history, those who opposed Christ in the passion, and, in a higher sense, the teachers of false doctrine, their disciples, and unbelievers.
PG 12:1311 (Ps 34 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Notes on Ps 34 LXX (35):3–13: the drawn sword, Christ who has conquered the world, the devil caught in the snare of the cross, and fasting that humbles the soul.
PG 12:1415 (Ps 41–42 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · End of Ps 41 LXX (42) (gloom in oppression; God in no place) and beginning of Ps 42 LXX (43): Christ asks to be judged, and the light and truth sent to lead to the holy mountain.
Refutation of All Heresies 6.47.3Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 222–235 · Christ's passion on the sixth day and at the sixth hour regenerated the first man.
Refutation of All Heresies 7.27.10Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 222–235 · At the passion each part of Jesus returned to its own level: body to the formless, soul to the Hebdomad, and higher parts to the great Archon and the boundary Spirit.
Refutation of All Heresies 7.27.12Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 222–235 · The passion served only to sort out the mixture; the whole Sonship must be sorted as Jesus was.
Refutation of All Heresies 10.33.17Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 222–235 · Christ endured weariness, hunger, thirst, sleep, suffering, and death, and rose as the first fruits, so that suffering humans may hope for the same resurrection.
Fragment 88 on John 12:31Origen · ca. 226-254 · On John 12:31: Christ's suffering on the cross, triumphing over the powers and reconciling all things, is the judgment of this world.
Fragment 89 on John 12:81Origen · ca. 226-254 · On John 12:31–34: the passion revealed those who will judge the world and cast out its ruler; the crowd, knowing only that the Christ remains for ever, did not understand his death and first coming.
Commentary on John 1.231Origen · ca. 230–248 · Christ's goodness, most like the Father's, is shown in his humbling himself to death on a cross.
Commentary on John 2.61Origen · ca. 230–248 · The Word's blood-stained garment recalls his passion, which believers never forget even at the height of contemplation.
Commentary on John 10.230Origen · ca. 230–248 · As Christ was crucified and raised, so his whole body, the saints, are crucified with him to the world.
Commentary on John 19.61Origen · ca. 230–248 · Christ kept silent before Pilate so that he could be crucified in weakness.
Commentary on John 19.98Origen · ca. 230–248 · Perhaps Jesus “killed himself” in a divine sense: while others' souls are demanded back by appointed powers, he laid his down himself.
Commentary on John 19.99Origen · ca. 230–248 · Christ alone says no one takes his life from him; he lays it down himself.
Commentary on John 19.101Origen · ca. 230–248 · Only Jesus could say he laid down his soul himself; all others' souls are taken from them.
Commentary on John 19.103Origen · ca. 230–248 · Jesus gave up his spirit like a king, and at once the signs of his power followed, so that the centurion confessed him Son of God.
Commentary on John 19.115Origen · ca. 230–248 · Jesus foretold his passion, speaking of being delivered and crucified.
Commentary on John 19.116Origen · ca. 230–248 · Those who cried “crucify him” are still guilty of killing him, though he gave up his spirit before the soldiers came.
Commentary on John 32.376Origen · ca. 230–248 · Literally, Jesus was soon to be arrested, tried, crucified, and buried.
Exhortation to Martyrdom 29Origen · 235 · Jesus' prayer “let this cup pass” was not cowardice; Origen suggests he declined only a particular form of death, while the martyr's death is “precious in the sight of the Lord.”
Homilies on Exodus 6.1Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The first song of Scripture is sung after victory with a timbrel, the crucified flesh, and “gloriously honoured” points to Christ, glorified humbly in his incarnation and cross but gloriously at his second coming.
Homilies on Exodus 6.6Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The earth still swallows the earthly-minded, as it swallowed those who cried “Crucify him,” yet one who is swallowed can be cast up again like Jonah, and Christ descended to lead us out of the depths.
Homilies on Exodus 6.8Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The nations that heard and trembled are the hostile powers, seized with fear when Christ despoiled them on the cross.
Homilies on Exodus 7.7Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The Lord known “in the evening” and his majesty seen “in the morning” point to Christ's passion and to the resurrection announced at dawn.
Homilies on Exodus 11.2Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The people thirst for water when they should thirst for God; the rock struck by Moses is Christ, struck on the cross, from whom the springs of the New Testament flow, and the elders with Moses are the prophets and patriarchs who also announce Christ.
Homilies on Ezekiel 1.4Origen · ca. 238–250 (Jerome's translation in the 380s) · Ezekiel, called “son of man” and seeing the heavens opened at thirty, is a type of Christ, whose true birth Origen defends against those who call it a phantom.
Homilies on Ezekiel 6.6Origen · ca. 238–250 (Jerome's translation in the 380s) · The reborn soul must be salted with grace and swaddled like the infant Christ; and Christ, and even the Father, suffer the passion of love in pity for humankind.
Homilies on Joshua 8.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The double tree on which the king of Ai was hanged is the twofold cross: Christ was crucified visibly in the flesh, and the devil and his powers invisibly.
Homilies on Leviticus 1.2Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Leviticus distinguishes who offers (man, soul, high priest, synagogue, ruler); the 'man' is the human race, and the calf without blemish is Christ, offered outside the door.
Homilies on Leviticus 1.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The blood poured at the altar by the door signifies Christ's death in Jerusalem and also his sacrifice for heavenly beings: a twofold victim through two veils.
Homilies on Leviticus 1.4Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Flaying and dividing the calf signify removing the veil of the letter and distributing teaching suited to beginners, the progressing, and the perfect; the washing of entrails and feet signifies baptism.
Homilies on Leviticus 2.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Even the high priest can sin, and God appointed priests who share human weakness; Christ, offered as a gift in heaven and for sin on earth, suffered 'outside the camp' of the heavenly angels.
Homilies on Leviticus 3.1Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Christ as high priest offered 'for sin' because he was made sin for us; he 'made the people sin' because his passion, life to believers, became an occasion of guilt to those who rejected him.
Homilies on Leviticus 3.5Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Every victim bears the image of Christ: the fat is his soul between divinity and flesh, the sevenfold sprinkling the Spirit, the four horns the Gospels, and the blood at the base the final salvation of Israel.
Homilies on Leviticus 7.1Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The law forbidding priests wine at the altar teaches sobriety, which the Gospel confirms; mystically, Christ the high priest drank wine with his disciples before his passion, but at the altar of the cross vowed not to drink until he drinks it new in the kingdom.
Homilies on Leviticus 8.10Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The leper's unsewn garments and bare head signify open confession of sin, his covered mouth the loss of authority to teach; the rite of the two birds, cedar, scarlet, hyssop, water, and blood signifies purification through Christ's cross and the water and blood from his side, also in penance.
Homilies on Numbers 9.7Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Aaron's rod bearing nuts figures Christ's cross and the threefold sense of Scripture (the bitter letter, the protective moral teaching, and the nourishing hidden mystery), and God, who promised only that the rod would sprout, gave more than he promised.
Homilies on Numbers 17.6Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The rest of the third oracle is read of Christ: called out of Egypt, ruling as the unicorn, consuming the nations by converting them, resting like a lion on the cross; those who curse him, including Christians whose conduct brings his name into blasphemy, are cursed.
Homilies on Jeremiah 10.2Origen · ca. 240 · The “wood put into his bread” is the cross added to Christ's teaching; far from spoiling it, the cross sweetened his word, like the wood that sweetened the bitter water, and spread it through the world.
Homilies on Jeremiah 10.3Origen · ca. 240 · Those who killed Christ hoped to blot out his name, but his death, like a grain of wheat, bore abundant fruit, and his resurrection will bear still more.
Homilies on Jeremiah 14.9Origen · ca. 240 · “My strength has failed” is Christ speaking: he was crucified in weakness, as Isaiah's suffering servant, having emptied himself to take the form of a servant.
Lines 357–380Commodian · 3rd century (disputed) · The crucifixion of the Creator seems folly, but God came thus by his own counsel, calling himself the Son, as the prophets foretold that God would appear on earth.
To Theopompus on the Impassibility and Passibility of God, section 7Gregory Thaumaturgus · if authentic, ca. 240-275 · Using the image of a physician who willingly humbles himself to serve the sick without losing his dignity, Gregory argues that God's willing entry into suffering defeats suffering itself.
To Theopompus on the Impassibility and Passibility of God, section 19Gregory Thaumaturgus · if authentic, ca. 240-275 · A God who chose idle rest would be inferior to the many famous pagans who died for their city or friends; but God, needing no praise, came willingly and fearlessly to death.
On the Trinity 25Novatian · ca. 240–250 · To the objection that if Christ is God then God died, Novatian answers that only the man in Christ died: as death cannot kill even the soul, much less can it touch the divinity of the Word.
Commentary on the Song of Songs 3.196Origen · ca. 240–245 (Rufinus's translation ca. 410) · Scripture uses human words for divine realities; the left hand is the incarnation and its riches and glory, faith in the passion; the right hand is the eternal Word.
Against Celsus 1.31Origen · ca. 248 · The apostles' readiness to die makes sense only if they saw Christ risen; his death, like that of heroes who died for their cities, defeated the ruler of demons for all humanity.
Against Celsus 1.54Origen · ca. 248 · Against Celsus's mockery of Christ's suffering, Origen quotes Isaiah's prophecy of the Servant who would suffer and die for others' sins.
Against Celsus 2.10Origen · ca. 248 · Jesus was not caught as a fugitive but gave himself up willingly, as John and Matthew record; the disciples' readiness to die shows they believed what they wrote.
Against Celsus 2.16Origen · ca. 248 · Origen answers Celsus that Jesus' death did not contradict his teaching, that his suffering and resurrection were real rather than apparent, and that he is immortal as the one risen from the dead.
Against Celsus 2.24Origen · ca. 248 · Origen accuses Celsus of quoting Jesus' prayer in Gethsemane selectively, omitting his submission to the Father's will, as the impious quote “I will kill” without “I will make alive.”
Against Celsus 2.25Origen · ca. 248 · Origen explains that in Gethsemane Jesus spoke as a man, showing both the weakness of the flesh and the eagerness of the spirit, and that his real suffering is an example to believers.
Against Celsus 2.42Origen · ca. 248 · Origen says no witness records anything blameworthy in Jesus, his fulfilled predictions confirm faith, and his sufferings are a noble example, not a disgrace, except to one who thinks pain the greatest evil.
Against Celsus 2.44Origen · ca. 248 · Origen rejects Celsus's comparison of Jesus with condemned sorcerers and robbers: Jesus was indeed crucified among robbers, as foretold, and his martyrs share his unjust condemnation.
Against Celsus 2.69Origen · ca. 248 · Origen explains that Jesus' death and burial carry symbolic meaning for believers, who die and are buried with him in baptism, that his new rock-hewn tomb signifies his purity, and that vanishing from the cross would only have drawn other objections.
Against Celsus 7.13Origen · ca. 248 · The prophets foretold Christ's sufferings with their purpose, but nothing shameful; the gall and vinegar offered him stand for the wickedness of those who oppose the truth.
Against Celsus 7.16Origen · ca. 248 · The prophets foretold the death of a man, not of God; what died was the man Jesus, not the divine Word, who is the Life and the Resurrection and cannot die.
Against Celsus 7.17Origen · ca. 248 · What the prophets foretold was worthy of God: the divine Word came with the human soul of Jesus, and his human death gave an example of dying for piety and began the defeat of the devil.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 74Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · God set the hour of Christ's passion, so he could suffer nothing until he had finished the words he meant to speak; “all these words” means those already spoken, since more remained before he was handed over.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 75Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · The day, month, and year of the passion were fixed: “the Passover takes place” means a new Passover replacing the old; the Father, Judas, Satan, and the priests all handed Christ over, but God from mercy and the others from avarice, envy, and fear.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 76Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · The council of the chief priests fulfils Psalm 2; Origen applies the prophets' words on Sodom and Gomorrah to the plotters, links the court of Caiaphas to the desolation of Jerusalem, and likens false doctrines to false priests plotting against the Word, who will rise again.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 90Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · Jesus only “began” to be sorrowful, according to his human nature and not his impassible divinity, to teach the disciples, especially self-confident Peter, that the flesh is weak; he kept the three at a set distance, since each must remain in the rank of his calling.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 92Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · Christ's prayer in Gethsemane belongs to his true human nature, which shrinks from suffering, and teaches submission to God's will; alternatively he grieved for the Jews and for Judas, who would perish through his passion, yet chose the salvation of all; the cup of salvation is martyrdom, and John omits the prayer because he writes of Christ's divinity.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 95Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · The cup of the passion was bound to pass from Christ, but only by his drinking it would it also pass from the human race; so he chose to drink it, as Jeremiah's cup of wrath is drunk for cleansing; his threefold prayer teaches perseverance.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 115Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · The disciples stumbled in the night and could be pardoned, but the chief priests took counsel in daylight, knowingly; they bound the one who looses all bonds, and, like Samson, he broke the bonds he willingly accepted.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 124Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · Pilate tried to shame the crowd, which demanded not only the murderer's release but the righteous man's crucifixion; he washed his hands, but they took the blood of Christ upon themselves and their children, which Origen applies to all later generations; Pilate then handed Jesus over to be crucified.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 125Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · The soldiers' mockery was the work of the invisible rulers of this age; the scarlet cloak recalls Rahab's cord and Tamar's son and signifies the world's blood taken on by Christ; the crown of thorns, consumed on his head, bore away our sins; the reed is the fragile sceptre of the evil one, exchanged for the rod of God's kingdom.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 126Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · John says Jesus carried his own cross, the others that Simon of Cyrene carried it; Origen weighs how both may be true, interprets Simon as obedience, and reports the tradition that Adam was buried at Golgotha, the place of the Skull, so that the head of the human race might rise with Christ.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 135Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · Christ's loud cry, “Why have you forsaken me?”, was not a lie nor a merely human complaint: he was forsaken in taking the form of a servant and enduring the cross, and his cry, uttered when darkness fell on Judea, expresses the forsaking of Israel for the salvation of the Gentiles and his grief at the sins of those for whom he suffered.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 140Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · The centurion's confession may have come from Jesus' dying so quickly, by prayer or by his own will, since he had not been struck to hasten death, as Pilate's surprise shows; morally, those who see the mysteries of the passion confess him Son of God; the women who watched from afar, especially Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and Salome, are blessed for following and ministering.
Commentary on Matthew 12.17Origen · ca. 246–248 · If the apostles had already proclaimed Jesus as the Christ, he now held back the fuller teaching—the crucified and risen Christ—for a fitting time, to spare new believers the offence of the cross.
Commentary on Matthew 12.18Origen · ca. 246–248 · Alternatively, Jesus kept the title Christ for the fuller, saving proclamation of the crucified and risen Christ, whose cross triumphed over the principalities and the ruler of this world.
Commentary on Matthew 12.21Origen · ca. 246–248 · Peter, not yet taught the necessity of the Passion, rebuked Jesus from ignorance; Jesus approved his intention but rebuked his ignorance, telling him to “get behind” him again and calling him “Satan,” that is, adversary.
Commentary on Matthew 16.6Origen · ca. 246–248 · The cup and the baptism both signify martyrdom: a cup in the enduring of pain, a baptism in the forgiveness of sins it brings; James and John drank it, James killed by Herod and John exiled to Patmos.
To Quirinus 2.15Cyprian of Carthage · ca. 248–250 (book 3 perhaps later) · Isaiah, Jeremiah, the Passover lamb, the Apocalypse, and John the Baptist show Christ as the lamb to be slain.
To Quirinus 2.20Cyprian of Carthage · ca. 248–250 (book 3 perhaps later) · The prophets and Psalms foretold the crucifixion: the outstretched hands, the pierced hands and feet, the divided garments, and the Son of Man lifted up like Moses' serpent.
Fragment E V (on Luke 22:42 ff.)Dionysius of Alexandria · ca. 248–265 · From a commentary on Luke 22:42–48: Christ asked that the cup pass, yet as the Father willed, the two wills being one in the divinity; his bloody sweat and the strengthening angel show his true humanity; ‘not entering temptation’ means not being overcome by it; and his gentle words to Judas teach forbearance.
In Praise of Martyrdom 6Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Christ first suffered in himself what he crowns in martyrs: he became mortal so that we might be immortal and turned death into a saving remedy.
In Praise of Martyrdom 29Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Christ suffered in the prophets and patriarchs and at last on the cross, amid cosmic signs; martyrs who imitate his passion surpass all others in glory.
On the Making of the World 9Victorinus of Pettau · late 3rd century · The saving events of Christ's life correspond to the days of creation, and his deeds show both his humanity and his lordship.
Against Porphyry, fragment 1Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Christ took flesh and was crucified so that, through the very human nature the demons had used to deceive, they might be overthrown; the cross is the sign of victory, seen in the standards, the ship's mast, the bird's wings, and the outstretched arms of man.
Against Porphyry, fragment 2Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Divine power can contract itself into a human body; and as fire and air cannot be cut, much more did the divine Wisdom remain impassible though united to the body that was struck and nailed.
Against Porphyry, fragment 3Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · God's standard of beauty is not human opinion: the cross, despised by men, frees souls, restores humanity to the tree of life, and makes Christ the death of death while he remains impassible and immortal.
Cib. 11Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · The red heifer is Christ's flesh; its burning with cedar, hyssop, and scarlet images the Trinity, and its ashes signify his real death and burial, into which believers are baptized.
Against the Nations 1.40Arnobius of Sicca · ca. 297–303 · Christ's death on the cross no more discredits his teaching than violent deaths discredited Pythagoras, Socrates, or Regulus.
Against the Nations 1.62Arnobius of Sicca · ca. 297–303 · Arnobius argues that the divine Christ did not die; the death was that of the man he had assumed, as a prophet's death is not the death of the god who speaks through him.
Against the Nations 1.63Arnobius of Sicca · ca. 297–303 · Christ, who could have prevented his death, freely allowed it in accordance with God's plan, and in his life taught virtue and healed with gentleness.
Against the Nations 1.65Arnobius of Sicca · ca. 297–303 · People would welcome a physician promising health, yet they persecute Christ, who brought salvation of souls and let his humanity die to confirm that hope.
Acta Archelai (Latin) 58Hegemonius · early to mid 4th century (Greek original) · Archelaus argues that denying Christ's birth from Mary destroys his passion, resurrection, the resurrection of the dead, and the judgment, and asks Manes on whom the Spirit descended at the baptism.
Fragment 5Peter of Alexandria · ca. 300–311 · From the work on the Passover: the Hebrews kept the fourteenth of the first month after the spring equinox until the fall of Jerusalem, and Christ, the true lamb, did not eat the Passover in the year of his death but was sacrificed on the day of preparation.
Recognitions 1.41Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · Peter tells how the Prophet, despite his miracles, was crucified, and how creation mourned at his death while his people remained unmoved.
Lines 1–15Anonymous · 4th-5th century · Christ on the cross addresses the passer-by, calling him to remember the innocent one who came as messenger of peace, took flesh from a virgin, and found no rest on earth.
Lines 33–46Anonymous · 4th-5th century · Christ asks the reader to recall the betrayer's kiss, the scourging, Pilate's judgment, and the carrying of the cross, and to look on his bloodied head, closed eyes, and gall-poisoned tongue.
Lines 47–63Anonymous · 4th-5th century · Christ shows his pierced hands, side, and feet, bids the reader kneel before the cross in tears, follow his footsteps, and use the memory of his passion as goad and shield.
Prophetic Extracts 2.5Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius reads the ninth psalm, with its title about the death of the son, as foretelling Christ's passion and resurrection and his appointment as lawgiver of the nations.
Prophetic Extracts 2.13Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius applies the psalm beginning “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” point by point to the crucifixion and to the church of the nations, citing Aquila and Symmachus, and closes with a note on “hosanna.”
Prophetic Extracts 2.17Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius reads the psalm's prayer from prison and “the righteous will wait for me” as Christ's passion and resurrection, awaited by the righteous of old.
Prophetic Extracts 3.26Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius applies Zechariah's thirty pieces of silver to Judas's betrayal and reads the broken staff as the end of the old covenant and its worship.
Prophetic Extracts 3.27Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius notes Zechariah's “strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered,” which the Gospel applies to the disciples' flight at the passion.
Prophetic Extracts 3.33Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius reads Jeremiah's “innocent lamb led to slaughter” and “let us put wood into his bread” as Christ's crucifixion, his body being the bread.
Prophetic Extracts 3.34Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius reads Jeremiah's “I have forsaken my house… I have given my beloved soul into the hands of her enemies” as Christ speaking of the temple, his passion, and the later desolation of Jerusalem.
Prophetic Extracts 3.46Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius quotes Julius Africanus's calculation of Daniel's seventy weeks from Artaxerxes' twentieth year to Christ, then offers his own reckoning from Cyrus through the high priests to Herod, using Josephus, and explains the final week as Christ's ministry and its aftermath.
Prophetic Extracts 4.25Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius applies the third Servant Song (Isa 50) to the Word, divine before the incarnation, who as man gave his back to scourges and his face to spitting, and reads the opening “bill of divorce” as God's rejection of the synagogue.
Prophetic Extracts 4.29Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius reads Isaiah's righteous one taken away, whose burial is in peace, as Christ's death and burial, with the righteous men as his apostles and martyrs.
Prophetic Extracts 4.33Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius applies Isaiah's signal for the nations to the apostles' preaching and the one coming from Edom in red garments to Christ, who bore our sins and alone trampled the hostile powers.
Prophetic Extracts 4.35Eusebius of Caesarea · before 325 (probably ca. 310–320) · Eusebius reads Isaiah's “I was found by those who did not seek me… I stretched out my hands to a disobedient people” as the calling of the nations, the rejection of Israel, and a figure of the cross, and closes the work.
Divine Institutes 4.10.18Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Christ was crucified in the fifteenth year of Tiberius, on 23 March.
Divine Institutes 4.16.1Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · He will show that Christ's passion, a reproach to pagans, contains virtue, truth and wisdom.
Divine Institutes 4.18.7Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · They scourged, mocked and crowned him with thorns, and gave him gall and vinegar.
Divine Institutes 4.18.9Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Silent, he was crucified between two robbers.
Divine Institutes 4.18.10Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · This crime surpasses the crucifixion of Gavius that Cicero lamented.
Divine Institutes 4.18.12Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · No eloquence can lament the cross on which God was hung.
Divine Institutes 4.18.28Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · The wood is the cross and the bread his body, the food of believers.
Divine Institutes 4.26.1Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · He turns to the meaning of the cross.
Divine Institutes 4.26.29Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Why did God choose the shameful death of the cross?
Divine Institutes 4.26.30Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · First, he died as the lowly die, so that all could imitate him.
Acts of Phileas and Philoromus 2.4Anonymous · ca. 306-311
Preparation for the Gospel 13.13.35Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · Clement: Plato’s scourged just man foretells Christ; Antisthenes, Xenophon, and the Sibyl teach that God is invisible.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 40.8Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · Pilate sent him to Herod and left him to his accusers, who scourged, mocked, and crucified him while he stayed silent.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 40.9Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · The executioners cast lots for his clothes and crucified him on the eve of Passover.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 40.10Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · At his death there was an earthquake and the sun was darkened.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 46.1Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · Why did Christ die the shameful death of the cross?
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 46.2Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · Christ humbled himself to open salvation to the lowly.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 46.3Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · He died as the lowly die, and his body stayed whole for the resurrection.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 46.4Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · The cross kept his body whole and lifted him up.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 46.5Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · On the cross Christ spread his arms like wings to gather all nations.
On the Deaths of the Persecutors 2.1Lactantius · ca. 314–315 · Christ was crucified late in Tiberius's reign, in the consulship of the two Gemini.
Demonstration of the Gospel 1.10.15Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Christ is the foretold victim, led like a sheep to slaughter.
Demonstration of the Gospel 1.10.16Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Isaiah describes the servant who bears our sins and heals us by his wounds.
Demonstration of the Gospel 1.10.24Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Christ bore all the punishments due to us, crowned by the cross.
Demonstration of the Gospel 3.2.53Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Isaiah foretold the Messiah’s humble, suffering appearance.
Demonstration of the Gospel 3.2.55Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Isaiah foretells the servant bearing our sins and healing us by his wounds.
Demonstration of the Gospel 3.4.27Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Jesus did not die like others; he gave up his spirit freely to the Father.
Demonstration of the Gospel 4.12.2Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · In death Christ acted as both man and God, to destroy the devil’s power over death.
Demonstration of the Gospel 4.16.15Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Psalm 28 is Christ’s prayer at the time of his passion.
Demonstration of the Gospel 5.3.24Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Psalm 110 hints at the passion: “He will drink from the brook.”
Demonstration of the Gospel 5.3.25Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The brook is the time of trial, and the drink is the cup of Christ’s passion.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.13.21Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Micah hints at the Lord’s passion and names Bethlehem as the birthplace of the eternal ruler.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.15.8Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Christ’s passion brought mercy to the world; “Teman” means “consummation,” so God came at the end of the age.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.18.41Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The torn temple veil and the earthquake at the Passion, then the temple's fall, fulfilled Amos's vision.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.18.44Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Symmachus's version points to the Passion: darkness from the sixth hour, and the cold night of Jesus' trial.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.18.45Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Mark and John record the fire and the cold on the night of Jesus' trial.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.23.2Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The same prophecy has the speaker give his back to scourges and his face to spitting.
Demonstration of the Gospel 6.23.4Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The prophecy is aimed at the Jewish people and foretells the scourging at the Passion.
Demonstration of the Gospel 8.1.65Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · “You slept” signifies Christ's death, which Scripture often calls sleep.
Demonstration of the Gospel, Book 10, preface 7Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Christ taught his disciples his divinity but called himself a man to outsiders; now Eusebius turns to the human sufferings of the Lamb.
Demonstration of the Gospel, Book 10, preface 8Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Eusebius begins the oracles about Judas’s plot and the passion.
Demonstration of the Gospel 10.1.13Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · As Asaph’s Psalms were fulfilled, so Psalm 41 (LXX 40) foretells the plot against Christ, the poor one who became poor for us.
Demonstration of the Gospel 10.2.12Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Christ’s sorrow in Gethsemane matches the Psalm’s fear and darkness, signifying the assaults of hostile powers.
Demonstration of the Gospel 10.2.18Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The beasts are evil powers that surrounded Christ in his passion but could not harm him.
Demonstration of the Gospel 10.6.5Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Amos’s noonday darkness was fulfilled at the crucifixion, from the sixth to the ninth hour.
Demonstration of the Gospel 10.8.11Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The piercing of hands and feet foretells the crucifixion; let anyone who applies the Psalm to another show how it fits.
Demonstration of the Gospel 10.8.79Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · The soldiers’ mockery, the nailing, and the division of his clothes fulfilled the Psalm.
Oration to the Assembly of the Saints 11.4Constantine the Great · ca. 325 (dated variously 317–325) · Constantine rebuts those who say Christ was justly condemned: God was not overcome by men; his forbearance is unmoved by insult.
Oration to the Assembly of the Saints 11.16Constantine the Great · ca. 325 (dated variously 317–325) · At the passion darkness covered the sun and men feared the end of the world, until Christ in his forbearance restored the light.
Against the Heathen 1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Athanasius explains that he writes for a Christian friend to show that faith in the crucified Christ is not irrational, first by refuting the errors of unbelievers.
On the Incarnation 1.2Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · The mockery of unbelievers only magnifies the Word's divinity, since by the cross he overthrows idols and wins over scoffers.
On the Incarnation 19.3Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · At the cross the darkened sun, the earthquake, and the split rocks confessed Christ as God and Savior.
On the Incarnation 19.4Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Athanasius turns to Christ's death, the chief point of the faith, which also shows him to be God.
On the Incarnation 21.3Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · An objector asks why Christ did not die privately and honorably rather than by the shameful cross.
On the Incarnation 25.1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · For believers who ask why the cross, Athanasius answers that it alone served our salvation.
On the Incarnation 25.2Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Christ bore our curse by dying the accursed death of the cross.
On the Incarnation 25.3Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · On the cross Christ stretched out his hands to draw both Jews and Gentiles to himself.
On the Incarnation 25.5Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Dying lifted up in the air, Christ cast down the devil, the ruler of the air, and opened the way to heaven.
On the Incarnation 26.1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · The cross was the fitting death; creation bore witness to Christ there, and he raised his body on the third day, incorruptible.
On the Incarnation 34.1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Scripture plainly foretells Christ's death, its purpose, and the plot against him.
On the Incarnation 35.1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Scripture also foretells the cross.
On the Incarnation 35.5Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · Only crucifixion fits these prophecies.
On the Incarnation 37.1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 318–325 · None of the patriarchs or prophets was pierced and hung on a tree for the salvation of all.
Theophany 3.42Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Theophany 3.43Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Theophany 3.45Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Theophany 3.55Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Theophany 3.60Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Theophany 3.61Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Book 4, lines 490–514Juvencus · ca. 330 · Jesus prays that the cup may pass but submits to the Father's will; the disciples sleep; Judas arrives with an armed crowd.
Book 4, lines 639–664Juvencus · ca. 330 · The prophecy of the thirty pieces; the soldiers mock Jesus; Simon of Cyrene carries the cross; the gall; the crucifixion; the seamless tunic.
Book 4, lines 665–689Juvencus · ca. 330 · The title on the cross; the mockery by passers-by, leaders and robbers; darkness at noon.
Book 4, lines 690–713Juvencus · ca. 330 · Jesus' cry to the Father; the sour wine; his death; the veil torn, the earthquake, the saints raised; the soldiers confess him Son of God.
Letter to Marcellinus 7Athanasius of Alexandria · uncertain, after 335 · The Psalms foretell Christ's sufferings—the plot of the rulers, the piercing of hands and feet, the dividing of his garments—borne for our sake.
Tricennial Oration (In Praise of Constantine) 15.3Eusebius of Caesarea · 335–336 · Only by meeting and conquering death could the Word complete his victory and fulfil his promises; letting his body simply perish would have contradicted his nature as life.
Against Marcellus 2.2.18Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 336–337 · Marcellus says the Father willed the passion while the Son asked to be spared.
Demonstration 5.22Aphrahat · 337-345
Demonstration 7.1Aphrahat · 337-345 · Christ alone is sinless; he took up sin and nailed it to the cross, but its sting still wounds many until the end.
Demonstration 12.6Aphrahat · 337-345 · Christ ate the Passover with his disciples and gave his Body and Blood; Aphrahat counts his three days and nights among the dead from the Supper and sets out the Christian Pascha as the fulfilment of Israel's.
Demonstration 12.12Aphrahat · 337-345 · Aphrahat explains how to date the Christian Pascha and counts the days of the Passion: Supper and trial on the fourteenth, burial on the fifteenth, resurrection on the sixteenth.
Demonstration 17.10Aphrahat · 337-345
Demonstration 21.9Aphrahat · 337-345
Oration II Against the Arians 81Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 339–346 · Wisdom harmonized her impress with creation so that the world might know God; when the world failed, the same Wisdom became flesh and died on the cross to reveal the Father more fully.
Oration III Against the Arians 32Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 339–346 · The Word was never outside his flesh: he healed with human gestures and divine power, and the sufferings of his body are rightly called his, so that salvation and worship are directed to the Son himself.
Oration III Against the Arians 34Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 339–346 · Following 1 Pet 4:1, every human weakness of Christ—hunger, ignorance, fear, asking that the cup pass—is to be said of him “for us in the flesh,” while the Word remains impassible and frees our flesh from these passions.
Oration III Against the Arians 54Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 339–346 · Christ's weeping, trouble, prayer about the cup, and cry of dereliction cannot mean that the Word feared death, since he gives courage to others, came to destroy death, and laid down his life freely.
Oration III Against the Arians 56Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 339–346 · Weeping, trouble, and the prayer about the cup belong to Christ's humanity, taken from mortal Mary; even his cry of abandonment was answered by signs showing that the Father was in him.
Oration III Against the Arians 58Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 339–346 · Christ's suffering should cause wonder that the Word let his body suffer to make the flesh immortal; the heretics, like the hydra, keep producing new objections.
Catechetical Lecture 4.10Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Christ was truly crucified, as Golgotha itself and the relics of the cross attest, and creation recognized him as God.
Catechetical Lecture 13.1Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · The cross is the Church's greatest boast, for unlike Christ's single miracles it brought light, freedom and redemption to the whole world.
Catechetical Lecture 13.4Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Christ's crucifixion was real, not a semblance, and Cyril confesses it without shame because the resurrection followed.
Catechetical Lecture 13.5Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Christ was crucified though sinless, and went to his passion willingly, regarding the cross as his glory.
Catechetical Lecture 13.7Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · The Jews' unbelief was foretold; Cyril promises scriptural testimonies for every detail of the passion and begins with the betrayal of Judas, foretold in the Psalms.
Catechetical Lecture 13.19Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · The garden, the tree and the evening of the passion answer to paradise lost; Jeremiah and Moses foretold the wood of the cross and the Life that hung on it.
Catechetical Lecture 13.23Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · The candidates must hold to the cross in persecution as in peace; the name Golgotha, “Place of a Skull,” points to Christ, the head of all things, who suffered there.
Catechetical Lecture 13.25Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Amos foretold the darkness at noon during the Passover feast, and the Psalms foretold the soldiers dividing Christ's garments and casting lots for his tunic.
Catechetical Lecture 13.31Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Christ swiftly pardoned the repentant robber and opened paradise to him; on the cross he fulfilled the mystery as high priest, tore the veil, and reconciled sinners to God, keeping both God's sentence and his love.
Catechetical Lecture 13.34Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Believers should make the sign of the cross in all things, answer Jews, pagans and Docetists, and build their faith on the cross, which a host of witnesses would confirm against any who deny it.
Catechetical Lecture 20.6Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Baptism not only forgives sins and gives adoption but is the antitype of Christ's sufferings: we share his death in likeness, while his death and burial were real.
Homily on the Paralytic 6Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350-387 · Christ heals by his word; the litter of the Song of Songs is read as a figure of the cross and passion, and the Song is to be heard chastely.
Long recension, Trallians 9Anonymous · later 4th century (probable) · Ignatius tells the Trallians to stop their ears to any teaching apart from Jesus Christ, truly born.
Long recension, Trallians 11Anonymous · later 4th century (probable) · Against docetism Ignatius affirms the reality of Christ's conception, birth, baptism, passion, death and resurrection, and warns against heresies as the devil's inventions.
Cento, lines 613–637Proba · ca. 360 · Christ is seized and fastened to a tree; he warns his executioners of judgment, and at his death darkness falls, the earth quakes, the dead come forth and the sun is darkened.
Commentary on Matthew 16Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 353–355 · Jesus refuses a sign except that of Jonah, warns against the Pharisees’ leaven, receives Peter’s confession (with Hilary’s statement of the Son’s eternal generation and incarnation and his praise of Peter as foundation and doorkeeper), rebukes the devil’s suggestion through Peter, and calls disciples to take up the cross.
Commentary on Matthew 31Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 353–355 · In Gethsemane, Hilary argues against those (who deny the Son’s eternity) who say Christ feared death: his sorrow “even to death” was for the disciples, lest they deny his divinity, and his prayer that the cup pass from him asks that his strength in suffering pass to them.
Commentary on Matthew 33Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 353–355 · Hilary expounds the passion and resurrection: Pilate’s wife as the believing nations, Barabbas as Antichrist, the mocking robes as martyrs and prophets, the cross at the center of the earth, the cry of dereliction as the voice of the body, the vinegar as Adam’s soured immortality, the burial as Christ entering the hearts of the nations, and the women as first witnesses of the resurrection.
On the Trinity 1.31Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Book 10 will answer the Arian use of Christ's sorrow, his prayer in Gethsemane, and his words on the cross.
On the Trinity 3.10Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The Son's glorification at the hour of the passion is shown in the darkened sun, the quaking earth, and the split rocks.
On the Trinity 3.25Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The cross seems foolish to Greeks and a stumbling block to Jews, yet God saves believers through it; what seems weak in God surpasses human wisdom.
On the Trinity 5.18Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The Arians cannot see God in Christ's birth and sufferings, yet only almighty God could become what he was not while remaining what he was.
On the Trinity 10.9Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The heretics cite Christ's sorrow, prayer about the cup, cry of desolation, and commending of his spirit to deny his divine impassibility.
On the Trinity 10.23Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Hilary holds that Christ truly suffered the blows of the passion, but his body, conceived of the Spirit and able to walk on water, did not have the nature to feel pain.
On the Trinity 10.26Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Before treating the sayings, Hilary will examine the events of the passion to see whether they show fear or bodily weakness in Christ.
On the Trinity 10.29Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Christ's sorrow cannot be fear of the passion, which he said would glorify him (John 13:31).
On the Trinity 10.30Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Christ, who said he would drink the cup the Father gave him (John 18:11), did not pray from fear to escape suffering.
On the Trinity 10.32Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The passion shows no fear, weakness, pain, or shame in Christ: he willed to suffer, overawed his captors, and healed the ear.
On the Trinity 10.37Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Christ's sorrow and prayer in Gethsemane were for his disciples, who would be offended and needed to watch and pray (Matt 26:31–41).
On the Trinity 10.45Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The three youths in the furnace (Dan 3) neither feared nor felt the fire; much less did Christ fear the cross.
On the Trinity 10.47Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Christ suffered our weaknesses by the power of his own nature, bearing our sins without sin (Isa 53:4–5; 2 Cor 5:20–21).
On the Trinity 10.48Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Paul presents Christ's death as a triumph (Col 2:13–15), and every event of the passion pairs suffering with divine power.
On the Trinity 10.49Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · The cry of desolation (Matt 27:46) cannot mean fear of death in one who hastened to the death that would glorify him.
On the Trinity 10.64Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Paul preaches the one crucified Christ as God's power and wisdom, and the Lord of glory as the one crucified (1 Cor 1:22–24; 2:2, 7–8).
On the Trinity 10.71Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 356–360 · Like his prayer at Lazarus's tomb and the voice from heaven, Christ's cry on the cross was for our instruction, not from weakness.
Against the Arians 18Phoebadius of Agen · ca. 357-358 · Phoebadius argues that the Son, as God, is neither visible, mortal, nor passible; the sufferings belonged to the human nature, to which the Son was united without leaving heaven.
Against the Arians 19Phoebadius of Agen · ca. 357-358 · Phoebadius warns that the Arians use “God from God, light from light” to make the Son a second, separate God, and rejects their claim that the Son “suffered with” the man he took, since as God he is impassible.
Against Arius 1.46Marius Victorinus · ca. 357–362 · Victorinus closes his treatment of the homoousion by listing questions still to be answered and stressing that the Scriptures speak above all of the incarnate Word crucified and risen.
Against Arius 4.31Marius Victorinus · ca. 357–362 · Victorinus explains that the Son, the Father's image and the Logos through which all things are made, acts both by the Father's power and by his own will, and, like a river from a fountain, suffers only in act and operation, not in substance.
Homilies on the Psalms 44.8Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · On Ps 45:7–8 Basil explains the anointing of Christ's flesh with the Holy Spirit, the oil of gladness given to him fully and not in part, his natural love of righteousness, which we too can learn, and the myrrh, stacte and cassia as signs of his burial.
Homilies on the Psalms 45.8Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · On Ps 46:10–11 Basil teaches that God can be known only by those free from worldly cares and passions, contrasting good leisure for God with the Athenians' idle curiosity and the empty house of the parable; “I will be exalted” foretells the cross, and the repeated refrain is the believer's triumph in Christ, our peace.
Letter 333Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · Gregory reports that Apollinarius denies Christ a human mind and makes the Godhead itself mortal, and urges Nectarius to persuade the emperor to withdraw the Apollinarians' right of assembly.
Treatise on the Mysteries 1.10.2Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · Lamech prefigures the high priest who, with Jews and Gentiles, had Christ crucified.
Treatise on the Mysteries 1.15.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · Noah's drunkenness from the vine prefigures the passion, caused by the vineyard Israel.
Treatise on the Mysteries 1.17.2Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · Isaac prefigures Christ and his passion in the sacrifice on the mountain.
Treatise on the Mysteries 1.34.3Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · The wood prefigures the cross, which sweetens the peoples.
Treatise on the Mysteries 1.35.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · Deuteronomy's "your life hanging" and Jeremiah's "wood in his bread" point to the cross.
Treatise on the Mysteries 1.36.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · The cross contains justification, judgment, and testing.
Treatise on the Mysteries 2.9.2Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–366 · The scarlet cord signifies Christ's royal robe and the blood of his passion.
Tractates on the Psalms 2.12Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · God's laughter is a bodily image for his judgment on those who plotted Christ's death, whose labour came to nothing because the crucified one is God.
Tractates on the Psalms 53.12Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The Son suffered voluntarily for human salvation; the suffering was real and penal, yet his divine nature did not feel pain.
Tractates on the Psalms 54.5Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ's "exercise" was the work of our salvation, prefigured by Isaac going out to meet Rebecca; he was troubled by insults and abuse in his passion.
Tractates on the Psalms 54.6Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ took on our fear and troubles so that they fell upon him rather than being in him; able not to die, he did not refuse our death.
Tractates on the Psalms 54.10Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · After the diapsalma Christ awaits salvation from the storm of his passion, as in Psalm 68 (69), and asks the Father for his former glory.
Tractates on the Psalms 54.13Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The complaint is against Judas, an intimate apostle, whose betrayal is worse than the insults of Gentiles who did not know the law.
Tractates on the Psalms 56.4Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · God sent his mercy and truth, Christ, from heaven and rescued his soul from the lions' whelps after the sleep of death; those who trampled him are put to shame.
Tractates on the Psalms 67.21Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The cross, folly to others, is God’s wisdom; Christ alone, the firstborn from the dead, has the “issues of death,” going out from death and raising our nature to glory.
Tractates on the Psalms 67.23Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Following Colossians 2, Hilary explains that by dying and rising Christ cancelled the decree of death and triumphed over the demonic powers who caused his death.
Tractates on the Psalms 67.25Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · “From Bashan into the depth of the sea” means Christ’s descent from the shame of the body into the storm of the world and the cross, where he crushed the enemy powers.
Tractates on the Psalms 68.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Psalm 68 (69) concerns “those who will be changed” and contains the mystery of Christ’s passion, in which he speaks with the weakness he assumed.
Tractates on the Psalms 68.18Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ sought one who would grieve with him in faith and found none; the gall and vinegar fulfilled the Scriptures, and he said “I thirst” so that all might be fulfilled.
Tractates on the Psalms 131.4Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ acted as one bound by an oath to suffer: he rebuked Peter, refused the sword, and said 'It is finished' when all was fulfilled.
Tractates on the Psalms 131.8Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ's death was a sleep like that of Jacob's fearless lion of Judah; the image shows both his impassible security in death and his oneness with, yet distinction from, the Father.
Tractates on the Psalms 138.5Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ, in his assumed humanity, was proved by humble obedience unto the cross and so exalted into the Father's glory.
Tractates on the Psalms 138.11Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ completed the measured course appointed by the Father, from finishing his work to drinking the cup and saying 'It is finished'.
Tractates on the Psalms 138.26Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ's death was not darkness to him but delight and light: he broke the gates of the underworld and redeemed humanity, the Father being always with him.
Tractates on the Psalms 139.11Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Fear and confident joy in the psalm fit Christ, God and man: protected in the battle of the cross, he conquered death and the devil, and Judas gained nothing.
Tractates on the Psalms 139.12Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ, willing what the Father wills, prays that his desire, the passion with all its prophesied details, be fulfilled exactly and not forestalled by the sinner.
Tractates on the Psalms 141.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The title 'a prayer of understanding' signals a spiritual sense: David praying in the cave prefigures Christ in his sufferings, true God and true man.
Tractates on the Psalms 141.4Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · At the passion none of his own accompanied Christ, none recognized God in him, and he gave himself up willingly rather than flee.
Tractates on the Psalms 143.4Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Christ's hands were trained for war on the cross, where he conquered the world, triumphed over the powers, and reconciled all things; his nailed fingers fixed the bond of sin to the cross.
Against the Manichees, Greek continuation of book 3, Lagarde p. 102Titus of Bostra · ca. 360s · Christ’s baptism, hunger, weariness, crucifixion and burial prove his real body; he came in a body to free our bodies, which God made.
Commentary on Ephesians 2.16Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Christ reconciled souls and spirit in one body to God, killing in his own flesh, on the cross, the enmities of flesh and world, so that almost nothing remains for us but to believe in him.
Commentary on Galatians 1.6Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · The one gospel is faith in Christ, the Son of God, whose death and resurrection forgive sins and conquer death, freely and without works, so the Galatians’ quick turn to Judaizing is cause for wonder.
Commentary on Galatians 6.14Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Paul glories only in the cross, where Christ, having a body that represents all humanity, crucified the world and all flesh with himself.
Commentary on Philippians 2.6Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Christ, the form of God, which for Victorinus is the life and understanding of the Father who is Being, equal with God, freely emptied himself, not by losing his power but by taking a true human body and a slave’s lowliness, obedient to the Father even to death on the cross.
Commentary on Philippians 3.19Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · With tears Paul warns of the enemies of the cross, whom Victorinus identifies with heretics who either take Christ as a mere man crucified, or deny that he was born in the flesh or crucified; all will end in destruction.
Commentary on 1 Corinthians 2:8Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · The 'rulers of this age' who crucified Christ are chiefly spiritual powers acting in ignorance of his divine sonship; the impassible Lord is said to die because the Word became flesh.
Commentary on 1 Corinthians 15:3Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Christ's death fulfilled prophecies such as Isa 53, spoken in the past tense because the future is present to God.
Commentary on Romans 5:5Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · The Holy Spirit, given with mighty works, is the pledge that our hope will not be shamed; Christ’s death for the ungodly, when few would die even for the righteous or the good, shows his love.
Commentary on Romans 7:4Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Through Christ’s body, unjustly killed by the devil, believers die to the law and belong to the risen Christ, bearing fruit to God.
On the Destruction of Jerusalem 2.5Anonymous · ca. 370 · Pilate massacres Samaritans and crucifies Christ, which the author makes the cause of Jerusalem's ruin; Herod Antipas kills John the Baptist over Herodias and is exiled; Gaius and Agrippa I.
On the Destruction of Jerusalem 2.12Anonymous · ca. 370 · The author ascribes the Jews' sufferings to their crucifixion of Jesus, cites Josephus's testimony to Jesus, tells how John the Baptist died for rebuking Herod's marriage to Herodias, and begins to show that the high priesthood had departed from its lawful succession from Aaron.
Question 65, section 1Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Mark’s “third hour” for the crucifixion makes the point that not Pilate, who found Jesus innocent, but the Jews passed sentence on him.
Question 65, section 2Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · The sentence was in effect passed by the crowd’s cry at the third hour, though carried out at the sixth, showing that Jesus died by the Jews’ malice, not a judge’s sentence.
Question 104, section 3Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Christ had swords brought so that his passion would be seen as foreknown and willed, not suffered from weakness, and by healing the servant’s ear he showed his power undiminished.
Question 105, section 1Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · The darkening of the sun at the crucifixion fulfilled Amos and prefigures the darkening of sun and moon at Christ’s second coming foretold by Christ and Joel.
Question 114, section 20Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · The same Scriptures that speak of the cross record the resurrection, which shows that the cross was a mystery of providence, not foolishness.
Letter to Epictetus 6Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 370 · Athanasius argues from Christ's burial and wounds that the body was the Word's own but not the Word himself, so that the impassible Word made the sufferings of his body his own for our salvation.
Letter to Maximus 1Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 371 · Athanasius tells Maximus that he answers reluctantly, and that those who mock the crucified must learn that he is the Lord of glory.
Letter 22.39Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome says that love for Christ, who humbled himself for our salvation, makes every hardship light, and that no saint was crowned without a contest.
Letter 46.3Jerome · ca. 370–419 · They add the tradition that Adam was buried at Calvary and interpret the city's three names as a movement from affliction to the vision of peace.
Letter 65.8Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome reconciles Christ's beauty in Psalm 45 with Isaiah 53's 'no form or beauty', referring the one to his virtue and the other to his passion.
Letter 78.37Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome interprets the thirty-fifth and thirty-sixth stations, Zalmonah ('little image') and Punon ('little mouth'), with the bronze serpent as a type of Christ's cross.
Letter 96.10Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Theophilus rejects the Origenist idea that Christ will suffer again for the demons, arguing that Christ suffered once, for human sins, according to the Scriptures.
Letter 96.11Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Theophilus argues that if Christ suffered for demons, they would share in the Eucharist, which Scripture forbids.
Letter 100.11Jerome · ca. 370–419 · The eternal festival is anticipated in praise of the incarnate Word, who took all our nature except sin, suffered in the flesh while impassible in his Godhead, and overthrew idolatry and, Theophilus adds, the Origenists.
Letter 120.8Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome explains the signs at Christ's death (the torn veil, earthquake, split rocks, opened tombs) literally and spiritually, and says Jerusalem lost the name of holy city after its destruction.
Letter 124.12Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome charges that Origen spoke of an eternal Gospel in heaven and of Christ suffering again in the heavenly places for the salvation of demons, and quotes the passage.
Ancoratus 34.6Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Christ foretold his passion and rebuked Peter.
Ancoratus 34.7Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Christ's prayer about the cup was not fear.
Ancoratus 34.8Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · The prayer drew the devil into bringing death upon him.
Ancoratus 34.9Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Christ died in the flesh; his Godhead remained impassible.
Ancoratus 36.1Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · The passions belong to his humanity, not to a diminished Godhead.
Ancoratus 36.5Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · His sufferings were bodily, yet willingly his.
Ancoratus 36.6Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Like a stain on a garment, the flesh's suffering is ascribed to the Godhead.
Ancoratus 37.3Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · The agony and sweat show a true human body.
Ancoratus 92.6Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Christ died once to destroy death.
Ancoratus 92.7Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Suffering is reckoned to the Word, who remains impassible.
Ancoratus 93.3Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · As high priest he took our flesh to suffer for us.
Ancoratus 93.4Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Suffering is ascribed to the impassible Word by his good pleasure.
Ancoratus 93.6Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Christ suffered in the flesh, as Peter says.
Ancoratus 93.7Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · The flesh's suffering is reckoned to the Godhead.
Ancoratus 93.8Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · Hence Paul can say the Lord of glory was crucified.
Ancoratus 94.1Epiphanius of Salamis · 374 · We worship the crucified and risen Lord.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 9.4.3Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · The law about touching the dead points to Christ's death.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 20.2.2Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Only Christ washed his robe in his own blood.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.3.1Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Basilides taught that Simon of Cyrene was crucified in place of Jesus.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.3.3Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Jesus and Simon exchanged forms.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.9.1Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Christ willingly took flesh and suffered.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.9.3Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Jesus foretold his own death.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.9.4Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Peter testifies that Christ suffered in the flesh.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.9.5Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · John, Paul, and Moses attest Christ's death in the flesh.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 24.10.1Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Christ could have escaped if he had not willed to die.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 26.18.5Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Answer the sect with the cross of Christ.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 31.22.4Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Only the psychic Christ suffered, as a type of the higher Christ.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 31.25.2Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · The Lord's passion at the end of time signifies the passion of the last aeon.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 44.2.7Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Apelles holds that Christ truly suffered, died and rose in that body.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 46.5.7Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · The water and blood from Christ's side sprinkled Adam's remains beneath the cross.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 56.2.7Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · Christ’s burial proves his death was real.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 56.2.9Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · The eternal Son suffered in the flesh and rose.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.1Anonymous · ca. 380 · The plot against the Lord began on Monday and was settled on Wednesday.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.5Anonymous · ca. 380 · Judas sold the Lord for thirty pieces of silver.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.8Anonymous · ca. 380 · Christ prayed three times in the garden while the disciples slept.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.9Anonymous · ca. 380 · Judas betrayed Christ with a kiss, and Caiaphas's council mocked and abused him.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.10Anonymous · ca. 380 · Christ was taken to Annas and to Pilate, who found no charge, and was then accused of treason.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.12Anonymous · ca. 380 · Christ's accusers made themselves his judges, fulfilling the prophecies.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.13Anonymous · ca. 380 · Pilate condemned himself by handing over to the cross a man he had declared innocent.
Apostolic Constitutions 5.14.14Anonymous · ca. 380 · The passion, burial, and resurrection are told, with the command to fast during Holy Week and on Wednesdays and Fridays.
On the Christian Faith 2.7Ambrose · ca. 378–380 · Ambrose explains that Christ’s will to avoid death, his sorrow, fear, and cry of dereliction belong to the human nature he took on for us, while the divinity cannot suffer; the Lord of majesty was crucified in his human nature.
On the Christian Faith 2.11Ambrose · ca. 378–380 · Ambrose turns to persuasion: Christ took on flesh, temptation, sorrow, and the curse for our healing, while his divinity shone even on the cross; his being “sent” to Israel did not bind his free will.
On the Christian Faith 5.14Ambrose · ca. 378–380 · Ambrose explains that Christ will be subject to the Father in the human nature he took, as he was subject to Mary and obedient unto death, and in his members, when all believers are subject to God and God is all in all.
Anathema 14Anonymous · ca. 378–382 (traditionally 382) · Anathema on whoever says that the divinity of the Son, and not his flesh with its soul, suffered the pain of the cross.
Theological Oration 3 (Or. 29), On the Son 20Gregory of Nazianzus · 380 · In a long series of contrasts Gregory shows Christ acting in the same events as man and as God, from his baptism to his return in judgment.
Chapter 5Nicetas, bishop of Remesiana · ca. 380–414 · Nicetas explains the passion: Christ suffered in the flesh, not in his divinity, for our sins, under Pontius Pilate, whose name fixes the time against heretics who speak of other christs.
Chapter 6Nicetas, bishop of Remesiana · ca. 380–414 · Nicetas shows that Christ’s hunger, sleep, tears, sorrow and death prove his true body, while the feeding of the five thousand, the stilling of the storm, the raising of Lazarus and his power over his own life prove his divinity.
Book of Heresies 92.1Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · Some say Christ's divinity suffered pain on the cross.
Book of Heresies 92.2Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · Christ suffered in the flesh, not in his divinity.
Book of Heresies 92.4Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · Christ suffered in his flesh while his divinity remained united to it.
Book of Heresies 92.6Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · In Christ's passion the united God-man defeated the enemy for us.
Book of Heresies 92.7Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · The divinity did not suffer; the passion fulfilled the prophesied mystery.
Canons on the Letters of Paul 34Priscillian · ca. 380–400 · The saints crucify the flesh and glory in Christ's cross.
Section 24Anonymous · 3 September 381 · Ambrose distinguishes Christ's death in the flesh from his immortal divinity; the bishops anathematize whoever denies the Son immortality.
Pilgrimage (Itinerarium) 34.1Egeria · ca. 381-395 · On Wednesday the betrayal by Judas is read amid the people's tears.
Pilgrimage (Itinerarium) 36.3Egeria · ca. 381-395 · At Gethsemane the arrest is read; at dawn they process to the Cross.
Pilgrimage (Itinerarium) 36.4Egeria · ca. 381-395 · Before the Cross the trial before Pilate is read.
Pilgrimage (Itinerarium) 37.5Egeria · ca. 381-395 · From the sixth to the ninth hour passages on the passion are read.
Pilgrimage (Itinerarium) 37.7Egeria · ca. 381-395 · The people weep; at the ninth hour John's account of Christ's death is read.
Pilgrimage (Itinerarium) 37.8Egeria · ca. 381-395 · The burial of Christ is read at the Anastasis.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.14Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · The darkness at the crucifixion is explained by the sun’s shortening the days so that Christ might rise sooner and still fulfill three days and nights.
On the Complaints of Job and David 4.2Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Christ is the true deer, who in simplicity joined those who plotted against him and came willingly into the nets of the passion without being bound.
On the Complaints of Job and David 4.11Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Christ too was troubled in soul, not from fear of a death he chose freely, but in longing for the grace it would accomplish.
On the Complaints of Job and David 4.29Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · David’s third remonstrance asks that his cause be separated from the wicked; some refer this to Christ, but David speaks foreseeing the passion.
Second Apology of David 58Ambrose · ca. 384-397 · The poor man’s lamb is Christ, led like a sheep to the slaughter, who found rest only with the poor.
Second Apology of David 59Ambrose · ca. 384-397 · The guest is sin, which drove the killing of Christ the lamb; as with Judas, the sacrifice only increased the sinner’s guilt.
Second Apology of David 65Ambrose · ca. 384-397 · The “multitude of compassions” are the sufferings Christ bore in the flesh, which drive away our many hardships.
Altercatio, chapter 2, speech 41Evagrius of Gaul · ca. 400 · Simon objects that one who hangs on a tree is cursed, citing Haman and Absalom, and that Jewish tradition knows nothing of Christ’s crucifixion.
Altercatio, chapter 2, speech 42Evagrius of Gaul · ca. 400 · Theophilus answers that the curse falls on sinners, while the sinless Christ suffered as the prophets foretold, citing many passages on the cross, and reads the grape cluster of Numbers as Christ on the tree.
Altercatio, chapter 2, speech 45Evagrius of Gaul · ca. 400 · Simon asks about the fig leaves; Theophilus reads the fig as both the old man and the spiritual life, then expounds Christ’s humility from Isaiah 53 and 50, the Passover lamb, the mark on the forehead in Ezekiel 9, Rahab’s scarlet cord, and Hosea’s wife.
Catechetical Oration 32Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 385–390 · Christ was born in order to die and so raise our whole nature with his own body; the four arms of the cross show that he holds all creation together; the resurrection appearances need no defence.
On the Life of Moses 365Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 385–395 · After the sea, the believer trusts God and obeys his priests; the bitter water of Marah sweetened by wood is the hard life of virtue sweetened by the cross; Elim’s twelve springs and seventy palms are the twelve apostles and the seventy.
On the Life of Moses 413Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 385–395 · The cluster of grapes carried on a pole figures Christ hung on the wood, whose blood is the drink of believers; repentance lets those who fell away find the rock again; the bronze serpent on the pole figures the cross, by looking to which we are healed of the poison of desire.
Exposition of Psalm 118 3.8.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The balsam tree of Engaddi, which gives its fragrance when pierced, figures Christ on the cross.
Exposition of Psalm 118 3.8.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · From Christ’s pierced side flowed blood and water, the fragrance of forgiveness and redemption.
Exposition of Psalm 118 3.8.4Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · In a series of paradoxes Ambrose sets the humility of the cross beside Christ’s divine power.
Exposition of Psalm 118 3.26.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ is the true temple, altar, priest, and Levite, whose sacrifice takes away the world’s sins.
Exposition of Psalm 118 5.4.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ took our weakness and died for us, so that our death might become precious.
Exposition of Psalm 118 5.9.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ on the cross is the fragrant apple hanging on the tree.
Exposition of Psalm 118 5.16.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The cross and burial of Christ are stations where the church is wounded with love.
Exposition of Psalm 118 5.16.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Preaching the crucified Christ wounds the church with love; the Manichee denies the cross, the Christian confesses it.
Exposition of Psalm 118 6.22.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ died for us yet remained free among the dead, with power to raise himself.
Exposition of Psalm 118 6.25.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Before Christ it was winter; by his passion he brought the spring and summer of grace.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.24.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The justice of the cross is that Christ nailed our debt to it and washed away the world’s sin.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.58.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · On verse 64: the earth is full of God’s mercy through Christ’s passion, which the prophet speaks of as already done.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.58.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ, the sun of righteousness, rose and suffered for all; unbelievers shut themselves off from his light.
Exposition of Psalm 118 18.22.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The bride loves Christ’s scarlet lips, which speak of his passion.
Exposition of Psalm 118 18.22.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The thread and scarlet signify persuasion and the passion; myrrh, the passion and resurrection.
Exposition of Psalm 118 18.42.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ submitted to death’s dominion to free us for eternal life.
Exposition of Psalm 118 21.21.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The cross is a stumbling block to unbelief, as the mockers at the cross showed.
Exposition of Psalm 118 21.21.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Where there is peace, the cross is salvation; Peter gloried in it.
Exposition of Psalm 118 21.21.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Peter was crucified upside down; to the faithful the cross is grace, redemption and resurrection.
Exposition of Psalm 118 22.3.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The shoulders bearing the sheep signify the cross, where Christ bore our weakness; the angels rejoice.
Letter 55.25Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine interprets the breadth, height, length, and depth of the cross as cheerfulness in good works, hope of reward, patience, and the hidden sacrament, and the burial and resurrection as held in faith.
Letter 93.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · The same act differs by motive: the Father, Christ and Judas all handed Christ over, and Paul himself handed men over to Satan for their correction.
Letter 121.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Paulinus asks whether Simeon's prophecy of a sword piercing Mary's soul refers to her grief at the cross, where Christ entrusted her to John.
Letter 140.13Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Christ was not commended by earthly prosperity but by suffering, so that the faithful would seek eternal rewards; Psalm 73 shows the man troubled by the prosperity of the wicked.
Letter 140.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · In his passion Christ took up the voice of our weakness in the cry 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?', the opening of Psalm 22.
Letter 140.15Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Christ cried out Psalm 22 in the voice of his body, the church, and of human weakness, which had to be denied the goods of the Old Testament so as to learn to hope for those of the New.
Letter 140.18Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Christ, as bridegroom one flesh with his bride the church, speaks in her voice on the cross, just as he spoke of the persecuted church as himself to Saul.
Letter 140.28Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · God delivered many fathers from earthly dangers but not Christ, so that his body, the church, might learn to be Christian not for this life but for eternal life.
Letter 140.33Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · 'Do not depart from me, for tribulation is near' means that when the body is tortured, suffering comes nearest to the soul, which must struggle and pray not to fail in patience.
Letter 140.36Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine expounds Psalm 22:12–14 of the passion: the bulls are the rulers, the scattered bones the apostles, and the melting heart either the fear and grief of Christ's weak members or the opening of the Scriptures.
Letter 140.39Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Psalm 22:16–17 describes the crucifixion: the dogs are his persecutors, the pierced hands and feet the nails, and those who looked on waited to see whether Elijah would save him.
Letter 140.64Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · The cross figures the four dimensions: the crossbeam is good works, the upright long-suffering, the top hope of heaven, and the hidden foot the depth of free grace.
Letter 169.8Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · By analogy with a philosopher who is beaten in body, it is rightly said that God was crucified, though he suffered in the flesh.
Homilies on Matthew 43.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The three days in the heart of the earth prove a real death against Marcion’s denial of the passion; the Ninevites will condemn this generation, for Christ is greater than Jonah in every respect.
Homilies on Matthew 54.3John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ forbids the disciples to proclaim him as the Christ until after the cross and resurrection, since the faith of the many would otherwise be shaken; Peter, though granted the revelation of the Son, does not yet understand the passion and tries to prevent it.
Homilies on Matthew 54.4John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ calls Peter Satan for opposing the passion, which is fitting to him; Chrysostom urges Christians never to be ashamed of the cross, present in baptism, Eucharist and ordination, to sign themselves with it in faith, since it routs demons and will shine at Christ’s coming.
Homilies on Matthew 56.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Moses and Elijah also show Christ’s lordship over the dead and the living, speak of his passion as glory, and model the boldness, poverty and self-sacrifice the apostles must surpass; Peter, still afraid of the passion, wishes to stay on the safe mountain.
Homilies on Matthew 56.3John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Peter’s offer of three tents shows his love for Christ but also his fear and confusion; the Father’s voice from the bright cloud singles out Christ alone as the beloved Son, equal to him and of one will, whom the disciples must obey even when he goes to the cross.
Homilies on Matthew 65.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Before going up to Jerusalem Christ again predicts his Passion privately to the Twelve; Chrysostom explains why he repeated it, why he told the crowds only obscurely, and how the disciples could both grieve and not understand.
Homilies on Matthew 81.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ kept the Passover to show that he did not oppose the law, sent the disciples to an unknown host as a sign of his power, and at the table disclosed the betrayal, first indefinitely to give Judas room for repentance, then by the sign of the dish.
Homilies on Matthew 83.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · In Gethsemane Christ prays apart, rebukes Peter and the sleeping disciples for their weakness, and by his sorrow, sweat and repeated prayer shows the truth of his humanity, while his “not as I will, but as you will” teaches us to follow God even when nature resists.
Homilies on Matthew 83.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ went to meet his betrayer to show that his passion was voluntary; Judas’s kiss, trading on his Master’s gentleness, shows the frenzy of covetousness, which tyrannizes even more than lust, while the money it hoards is neither enjoyed nor secure, and only poverty is beyond the reach of every plotter.
Homilies on Matthew 84.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ reminds his captors that he taught openly and could not have been taken unwilling; the Sanhedrin, forgoing even the Passover, stages a sham trial, and the high priest forces a verdict of blasphemy, while their public condemnation of him only made the truth of his death plainer; so too defeat borne nobly is the true victory.
Homilies on Matthew 85.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The mockery of Christ, struck and spat upon and challenged to prophesy, which the evangelists record without shame as his glory and ours; then Peter’s threefold denial before a servant girl, which Mark, Peter’s disciple, reports most exactly.
Homilies on Matthew 86.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Before Pilate Christ, accused of claiming to be king, acknowledges only a heavenly kingship and is otherwise silent; Pilate, impressed and warned by his wife’s dream, tries to release him under the feast-day custom, but is weak, while the chief priests persuade the crowd to ask for Barabbas.
Homilies on Matthew 86.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Pilate tries to save Christ by offering him under the feast-day custom, but the crowd, corrupted by the priests, prefers a notorious murderer and calls his blood on themselves and their children; yet Christ did not ratify that curse, but received those of them who repented, while Pilate, weak, scourged him and handed him over.
Homilies on Matthew 87.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The soldiers’ mockery shows the devil at work in them all; Christ was outraged in every part of his body, and the Jewish leaders took every part of his death on themselves; yet the church reads this account aloud to everyone at the Paschal vigil, and Christ is worshiped for stooping so low.
Homilies on Matthew 87.4John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The division of the garments, the vinegar and the taunts at the cross complete Christ’s humiliation, yet the robber confesses him; remembering this and sealing the breast with the cross quenches anger, since insult harms only the insulter, flattery is more dangerous than abuse, and only our own conscience can disgrace us.
Homilies on Matthew 88.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The darkness at midday, lasting three hours and so no eclipse, was the promised sign of Jonah and a sign of God’s wrath, given when the mockers had had their fill; Christ’s Hebrew cry from the Psalm shows his honor for the Father, and his loud cry at death shows that he laid down his life by his own authority.
On Fleeing the World 57Ambrose · ca. 387-391 · Christ the High Priest died for us, nailing our debts to the cross; renouncing the world, we bear his likeness and need not fear death.
On Joseph 14Ambrose · ca. 387-390 · Joseph sold by his brothers prefigures Christ betrayed by Judas; the differing prices of the sale signify Christ's differing worth to each believer.
On Joseph 15Ambrose · ca. 387-390 · Joseph's tunic stripped and bloodied signifies Christ's flesh, not his divinity, in the passion.
On the Blessings of the Patriarchs 8Ambrose · ca. 387-392 · Ambrose rejects the Jewish reading of Reuben's rebuke as about his sin with Bilhah and reads it instead as a prophecy against the people who would put Christ to death.
On the Blessings of the Patriarchs 9Ambrose · ca. 387-392 · Ambrose reads the defiling of the father's bed as the crucifixion and the cross as the bed on which the saints rest.
On the Blessings of the Patriarchs 13Ambrose · ca. 387-392 · Simeon and Levi signify the scribes and priests who plotted Christ's death; the hamstrung bull is Christ, whose horns lift up his people.
On the Blessings of the Patriarchs 24Ambrose · ca. 387-392 · Washing his robe in wine and the blood of the grape signifies Christ's baptism and his passion, in which water and blood from his side washed and redeemed us.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 35.3.4Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Unwittingly they spoke of the cross, the tree that restores paradise.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 35.3.5Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ joined flesh and the wood of the cross to end the ancient hunger.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 36.36.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Everything in Christ, even his death, is life for us.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.14.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The Passover lamb is Christ, slain for all; woe to those who rejected him, yet he offered them the remedy if they turned.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.15.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The one who wills what God wills is of the same divinity; so Christ went willingly to his passion.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.16.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ’s prayer in Gethsemane does not imply a divided will: he spoke there according to human feeling.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.16.4Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ’s cry of forsakenness expresses the feeling of men in danger, not a real abandonment by the Father.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 40.1.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Psalm 40 (Protestant 41) follows the coming of Psalm 39 with the passion; its number recalls Christ’s forty-day fast, which repaired Adam’s fall.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 40.4.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ suffered in our poverty, that is, in the flesh, not in the fullness of his Godhead.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 40.13.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ, wounded for our sins, turned his weakness into salvation through his passion and resurrection.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 40.13.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ turned the weakness of all men in his own body on the cross, like a wrestler who lets himself be pinned and then throws his opponent.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 40.13.3Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · In the contest of the passion Christ hid his divinity, and the devil, thinking him a mere man, struck at his side as he had at Adam’s rib.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 40.28.4Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ’s death, cross, burial and resurrection free, cleanse and heal the one who comes to believe in him.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.32.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ’s cry of forsakenness expresses human feeling in the contest of the passion, not real abandonment.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.70.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The confusion of the cross abolishes sin, and every shame endured for Christ’s name in persecution is glorious.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.72.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Unlike those who glory in their shame, Christ did not shrink from the shame of the cross, nor should we when mocked for it.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.78.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ took on real flesh and willingly humbled himself to death on a cross.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.88.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Cast off for us, Christ bore the reproach of the cross to clothe us with the glory of his resurrection.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 45.14.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ died at the world’s evening and brought back the light of innocence and grace.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 61.11.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Christ, the man the persecutors sought, gave himself up alone so that his companions might go free.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 61.14.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · “I ran in thirst”: Christ thirsted for us on the cross, when living water flowed from his side.
On Genesis against the Manichaeans 2.24Augustine of Hippo · ca. 388–390 · Read as prophecy, Adam signifies Christ, who 'left' his Father by becoming man and his mother the Synagogue, and cleaved to his wife the Church, formed from his side as he slept in his passion; the spring watering the earth is the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary.
On True Religion 16Augustine of Hippo · ca. 389–391 · Augustine describes the incarnation of the Son as God's greatest help to the human race, showing the dignity of human nature, and presents Christ's life, death and resurrection as a complete moral teaching.
Sermon 5.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ, who forgave his crucifiers and laid down his life freely, is our model and our price; the Church bears with the wicked among her until judgment separates them.
Sermon 8.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The second plague, the croaking frogs, opposes the second commandment: those who teach that Christ's death and wounds were feigned are frogs, while the Church speaks the truth to the perfect and to little ones alike.
Sermon 22.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · "Let sinners perish like smoke and wax" frightens every conscience; but the Psalms often foretell the future in the form of a wish or of a past event, as with Christ's passion and Judas.
Sermon 25.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The peace we must pursue is Christ, who passed through the human race, prayed for his enemies on the cross, and ascended; we follow him by lifting up our hearts.
Sermon 31.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ, who suffered by his own power, voiced sorrow before his death for the sake of his weaker members; the sowing in tears belongs especially to them, while Paul faced death exulting.
Sermon 37.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The Church was hard to find while she lay lost in her sins, but Christ, who went up on the cross and slept like a lion, found her, and now she is the city on a mountain, spread through the whole world.
Sermon 41.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The “neighbor” in his poverty is Christ, who became poor for us in his incarnation and passion; whoever keeps faith with him in this will share his riches.
Sermon 44.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The unsightly “man under the blow” bore the weakness even of those who crucified him, praying for their pardon; the more unsightly he appears, the dearer he is to his bride, the Church.
Sermon 44.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Isaiah foretells Christ’s silent suffering, his eternal and his virginal generation, his resurrection, and his death for his people’s sins, as Christ himself said the Scriptures foretold.
Sermon 51.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ himself was made a spectacle on the cross, as his martyrs were; those who chose church over the amphitheatre chose a better spectacle and conquered the devil.
Sermon 53.16Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The four dimensions fit Christ’s cross: crossbeam, upright, top, and buried foot signify good works, perseverance, hope, and hidden grace; through these we come to know Christ’s love and be filled with God.
Sermon 75.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The fourth watch signifies the end of the age, when Christ, once overwhelmed in his passion, is seen walking in honor over the world’s powers.
Sermon 80.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ the physician found all sick; those who knew their sickness came to him, while those who thought themselves healthy killed him, yet by his death he healed them.
Sermon 80.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ prayed for those who killed him, and his prayer was answered at Pentecost; he died in the flesh he took from us, so that we might live from what is his.
Sermon 88.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Sin wounds the inner eye, as it did Adam’s; Christ the physician came to us and drank first the bitter cup of insult, pain, and the cross, so that we would drink it and be healed.
Sermon 95.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ is the bridegroom both fairest in the form of God and disfigured in the form of a servant, as the two prophets agree; the guest without a wedding garment shows that lacking it is a grave fault.
Sermon 110.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The psalm’s “arise, Lord, let not man prevail” is fulfilled in Christ: human falsehood prevailed from the flood to the crucifixion, but Christ rose from the tomb and will come to judge the nations.
Sermon 125.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Only the first to enter the stirred water was healed; the water signifies the Jewish people within the law, and its troubling is Christ’s passion, provoked when he called himself Son of God and equal to God, the Angel of great counsel who is Lord of the angels.
Sermon 136.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · “Those who see” are those who claimed to see by the Law and so crucified its author; blindness came on Israel in part so that the Gentiles might come in, and the crucified Light enlightened the blind world.
Sermon 160.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Knowing Christ crucified is to hold a wrapped treasure of all wisdom; proud philosophers despise the humble wrapping and miss what eye has not seen, ear not heard, nor heart conceived.
Sermon 160.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Paul boasted in the cross rather than in Christ's wisdom or majesty, because humility is the way to the heights: where there is weakness and death, there is power and life.
Sermon 160.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ called the sons of Zebedee from the seats of glory to the cup of his passion; Christians boast in the cross and bear its sign on the forehead, the seat of shame.
Sermon 174.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Zacchaeus, small and hindered by the proud crowd, climbed the sycamore, the “foolish fig,” as the humble climb the cross that seems foolish to the world's wise, and so see Jesus.
Sermon 175.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Those who thought themselves healthy were delirious like fevered men who laugh while the sane weep; in their madness they beat and killed the Physician, who went on healing them as they did.
Sermon 175.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ prayed for his killers and was heard, making his blood their medicine; at Pentecost the apostles' speech in all languages, a sign of the Church's unity, humbled the hearers from mountains into valleys that receive grace.
Sermon 210.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · We fast because the bridegroom has been taken from us; the two kinds of fasting, humbling the soul and feasting the mind, are both found in Christ's answer about his disciples.
Sermon 213.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The only Son of God was crucified and buried according to his flesh, as an injury to one's tunic is an injury to oneself; we worship the one clothed in that flesh.
Sermon 214.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · What Christ suffered in soul, man, or flesh is said of the whole person, the only Son of God, as we say that Peter lies in his tomb though he rejoices with Christ.
Sermon 215.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ's death for his enemies shows a love greater than any; believers should not be ashamed of the cross, and faith in his resurrection is what sets Christians apart.
Sermon 218.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · On Good Friday Augustine introduces the meanings of the details of the passion, which Christ suffered by his will and not by necessity.
Sermon 220.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ died and rose once, as truth declares; the yearly feast does not repeat but commemorates the event, as the “remnants of thought” in Psalm 76 keep festival.
Sermon 232.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The eternal Word took death from us to give us his life, dying by his own power; yet the disciples, who had heard him foretell it, lost the hope that the thief on the cross held.
Sermon 232.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The repentant thief, told of only in Luke, believed in Christ's kingdom while he hung on the cross, when the disciples had lost hope; Christ rewarded his faith with paradise that very day.
Sermon 254.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Lent signifies the present time of mourning, the Easter season the praise to come; the passion’s foulness, like dung in a field, gave birth to the beauty of the resurrection.
Sermon 264.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ, equal to God by nature, not by robbery as Adam sought, emptied himself and chose the worst death, the cross, to free believers from all shame; strong to make all things, weak to remake them.
Sermon 279.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ shows himself both “gentle and humble of heart” and the God who is “not silent nor gentle”; his gentleness appears above all on the cross, where he prayed for those who killed him, as a physician for the delirious sick.
Sermon 284.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ on the cross gave the example of patience and healed his persecutors with his blood; Peter, failing through presumption, was restored by grace, and we can imitate fellow servants like Stephen, Marian and James.
Sermon 285.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The cause, not the punishment, makes a martyr, as the three crosses show: the penitent thief changed his cause and was promised paradise, while Christ’s cross became a tribunal.
Sermon 289.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · John, the greatest of men, humbled himself so that Christ might be known as more than man; John and the apostles are lamps that shine from the fountain of Christ’s fullness, set on the lampstand of the cross, and must keep humility.
Sermon 300.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · At the cross, when all the prophecies were fulfilled, the veil was torn and the hidden Christ was revealed; the Maccabees died for Christ veiled in the law as later martyrs for Christ revealed, so Christians rightly keep their feast and should imitate them and their mother.
Sermon 305.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ, the first grain, teaches us not to love our lives in this world; though he had power to lay down and take up his life, he said ‘my soul is troubled’ because he took our weakness into himself as head of his body, the Church.
Sermon 305.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ laid down his life by his own power and took it up again, as the psalm ‘I slept and I rose’ shows; on the cross he used his persecutors’ madness for our salvation, making his shed blood their medicine.
Sermon 315.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Stephen's passion resembled Christ's: false witnesses twisted the Lord's words about the temple and accused Stephen in like terms, and, like Caiaphas, they unknowingly prophesied the truth they hated.
Sermon 317.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · God the Father and the incarnate Son gave the example of loving enemies: Christ found only enemies, shed his blood for them to make them friends, and prayed on the cross for those blinded who crucified him.
Against Adimantus, a Disciple of Mani 21Augustine of Hippo · ca. 394 · Augustine answers the use of Deut 21:23 against Christ's call to take up the cross: the curse falls on the death and mortality Christ took on, as Paul teaches in Gal 3:13, prefigured by the bronze serpent.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 21Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · Christ suffered freely, out of mercy, to give an example of patience, unlike Mani's god, who suffered by necessity.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 26Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · Christ took a true humanity and suffered, died and rose by his own will and power, not by necessity.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 28Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · Mani's Fundamental Epistle says the prince of darkness, not Christ, was crucified, so the Manichees' objection about the Jews does not fit their own teaching.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 29Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · The Manichees' objection does not fit their own view of the passion.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 30Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · Christ suffered when he willed, though those who sought his death were guilty by their will.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 31Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · Christ suffered in the humanity he took and is now held by no one, while Mani's god was devoured in his own substance.
On the Faith against the Manichaeans 33Evodius of Uzalis · ca. 400-424 · Mani, unable to accept either a phantasm or a suffering divine substance, ascribed the passion to the prince of darkness.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 12.43Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine lists plain prophecies of Christ needing no interpreter: Isaiah 53, Psalm 22, Psalm 57, Psalm 2, and Baruch 3.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 14.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Faustus rejects Moses for cursing everyone who hangs on a tree, which he says curses Christ and the martyrs, and for cursing those who raise no offspring.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 14.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine says Moses wrote “everyone” to forestall heretics who would deny Christ's true death by exempting him from the curse.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 14.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine argues that Moses' word “cursed” affirms Christ's true death, which the bronze serpent also prefigured, and that the Manichaeans, refusing to look at it, are not healed.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 16.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine reads Moses' doubt at the rock as a figure of the people under the law who doubted Christ crucified, and his death on the mountain as the death of fleshly unbelief in the exalted Christ.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 16.22Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine defends Deuteronomy 28:66 as a prophecy of Christ, the life of men hung before unbelieving Jews, noting that prophetic curses are foreknowledge, not ill wishes.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 26.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Faustus argues that Jesus’ death no more proves him a man than Elijah’s escape from death proves Elijah was not one, and holds that Jesus only appeared to die.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 26.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine answers that God’s unchangeable nature cannot die, though Christ died in the flesh he took, and that Catholics believe Elijah’s translation and Christ’s real birth and death because Scripture testifies to them.
Tractates 12Gaudentius of Brescia · ca. 397-410 · On John 12:31 ('Now is the judgment of this world'): the 'judgment' is the world's judging of Christ in his passion, by which the devil, prince of the world by usurpation, is cast out, and Christ draws all things to himself from the cross.
On Catechizing the Uninstructed 22Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–405 · The narration reaches the sixth age, begun by Christ's coming, in which grace is revealed to all nations; Christ, born of a virgin in humble circumstances, despised earthly goods, endured earthly evils, died, and rose never to die.
On the Trinity 4.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–419 · Augustine shows that Christ's three days in the tomb were partial days, counts forty hours from his death to the resurrection and thirty-six from his burial, and relates these numbers to perfection and to the ratio of one to two, while allowing that others may find better explanations.
The Harmony of the Gospels 1.47Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · Isaiah 52:13–54:5, quoted in full, foretells Christ's humility and passion and the church from all nations, whose God is called God of the whole earth.
The Harmony of the Gospels 1.48Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · Even pagans who accept Christ's passion must see that Isaiah's prophecy of the suffering servant is now fulfilled in his exaltation among the nations.
The Harmony of the Gospels 3.36Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · Matthew's scarlet cloak and Mark's purple are the same mock royal robe; Matthew and Mark tell the mockery by recapitulation, since John places it before Pilate's sentence.
The Harmony of the Gospels 3.37Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · Jesus carried his cross at first, as John says, and Simon of Cyrene was then compelled to carry it, as the other three relate.
The Harmony of the Gospels 3.40Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · Mark's 'third hour' for the crucifixion seems to conflict with John's 'about the sixth hour' for Pilate's sentence.
The Harmony of the Gospels 3.42Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · Mark's 'third hour, and they crucified him' refers to the hour when the crowd cried 'Crucify,' showing that their tongues rather than the soldiers' hands killed Christ.
The Harmony of the Gospels 3.54Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · The darkness, the cry of dereliction, and the vinegar agree across the Gospels; Luke's plural 'soldiers' offering vinegar means one of them.
The Harmony of the Gospels 3.55Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–400 · The loud cry in Matthew and Mark was 'Father, into your hands I commend my spirit,' as Luke gives it; John's 'It is finished' came just before.
Questions and Answers to the Orthodox 65–66Anonymous · 5th century (disputed) · Christ was betrayed on Thursday night, not Wednesday, since he was tried that night and crucified the next day; and “Son of man” does not imply a human father, for Luke says he was only supposed to be Joseph's son, and as Joseph was Heli's son by law, so Christ was Joseph's son without marital union.
Questions and Answers to the Orthodox 140–141Anonymous · 5th century (disputed) · The Jews knew Jesus as the heir in the sense of the parable (a man above all men by his works) but did not know God would raise him and make him heir of all, so their ignorance was willing; and those called blameless under the law were cleansed by sacrifice and confession, whereas Christ alone was sinless.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 4.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · Augustine sets God's rest on the seventh day beside Christ's words “My Father is working until now,” and reads the Sabbath as a shadow fulfilled in Christ's rest in the tomb.
Commentary on the Apostles' Creed 14Rufinus of Aquileia · ca. 404 · The cross, with its height, breadth and depth, was chosen as the form of Christ's death because it was a triumph over the powers of heaven, earth and hell.
Commentary on the Apostles' Creed 19Rufinus of Aquileia · ca. 404 · The cross is a stumbling block to Jews, folly to Gentiles, and the power of God to believers, as the prophets foretold the faith passing to the Gentiles.
Commentary on the Apostles' Creed 21Rufinus of Aquileia · ca. 404 · The prophets foretold that the Lord would be judged, scourged, spat upon, and sent bound as a 'gift' between Pilate and Herod.
Commentary on the Apostles' Creed 22Rufinus of Aquileia · ca. 404 · The prophets foretold the crowd's cry, Christ's silence, the crown of thorns which undid the curse on the ground, and his hanging on the wood.
Commentary on the Apostles' Creed 23Rufinus of Aquileia · ca. 404 · The water and blood from Christ's side signify cleansing and condemnation, the two baptisms of water and martyrdom, and the new Eve from the second Adam's side.
Against Felix the Manichaean 2.9Augustine of Hippo · December 404 · Augustine explains that the Son, unable to suffer in his divine nature, took flesh in order to suffer for us out of mercy, whereas the Manichaean part of God descends to be bound and polluted.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 2.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The Word is unchangeable Being, which no changeable mind can reach by its own strength; it is seen as a far-off homeland across the sea of this world, which can be crossed only on the wood of Christ's cross.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 2.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christians must cling to Christ's humanity and cross; it is better to hold to the cross without seeing God than to see and despise it, and best to do both, as John did.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 2.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Some philosophers glimpsed through creation that all things were made through the Word, but in pride despised the humility of the cross, the only 'wood' by which the sea of this world can be crossed.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 3.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The physician is the crucified Christ, who did not come down from the cross though he could, because the cross was an example of patience, and by his death he killed death.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 4.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ, who came hidden and silent to be judged and crucified, paying the price of our redemption, will come again manifest and speaking as judge.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 8.12Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · 'My hour' means the opportune time Christ himself chose to suffer, after calling disciples and showing his divinity and humanity, an hour not of necessity but of will and power.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 11.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Though many believed in Jesus' name, he did not entrust himself to them, not from fear, for he suffered only by his own will, but because he knew what was in man.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 12.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The bronze serpent lifted up in the desert figures Christ's death on the cross, by which those who look in faith are healed from sin for eternal life.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 13.13Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Heretics' virgins keep their virginity for Donatus, not Christ, who bought the whole world with his blood; even his persecutors did not divide his seamless tunic, the figure of unity.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 17.15Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · God's rest on the seventh day signified Christ, who completed his work on the cross on the sixth day and rested in the tomb on the Sabbath; through him, the Word, the Father both made and rules the world.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 28.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · “My time has not yet come” means the time of Christ's glory, which must be reached by the lowly way of his passion.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 31.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The manner of Christ's death, waiting until all was fulfilled and then dying while the robbers still lived, showed that he died by power, not necessity.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 36.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · “I judge no one” means either not yet, since Christ came first in mercy, even to the death of the cross, or not according to the flesh.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 37.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ's hour was not fated but chosen: he waited until all the prophecies were fulfilled and then gave up his spirit by his own power.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 37.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ did not come down from the cross, deferring his power to teach patience; that hidden power will be manifest at the judgment, for he is one Christ, God and man.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 40.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · “When you have lifted up the Son of man” refers to the cross: some of those who would crucify him were foreknown to believe afterward, so that no one need despair of forgiveness.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 41.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ alone was “free among the dead,” having no sin for the devil to find; he died by doing his Father's will, not by necessity.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 47.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ lays down his life by his own will and power, so the Jews cannot boast; he also raised himself, as the temple saying shows, though he gives the glory to the Father.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 47.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · In Christ's death the soul was separated from the body but never from the Word; so neither the Word nor the soul itself is properly what lays the soul down.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 47.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · To lay down the soul is to die; the flesh lays down the soul by breathing it out, and in Christ this happened when the Word willed, by the Word's power.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 47.13Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Even Christ's dead flesh in the tomb is called Christ, as the creed confesses; so when the flesh laid down and took up the soul by the Word's power, Christ did so.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 51.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ is the grain of wheat that must die to bear much fruit among the nations.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 52.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · "All things" that Christ draws when lifted up on the cross are the whole human person, or the predestined, or every kind of person, joined to him as head.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 55.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The foot-washing figures the incarnation and passion: Christ emptied himself, washed us with his blood, and taught humility by example.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 60.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Jesus was not troubled by new knowledge of the betrayal, which he had long foretold, but by his approaching passion, as when his soul was troubled before.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 98.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ crucified is the same teaching for all, milk to the carnal who believe it and solid food to the spiritual who understand it.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 98.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · There is no need for secret doctrines: the carnal and the spiritual hear the same Christ crucified, and grasp it in different measure.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 112.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · At Christ's word 'I am he' the armed band falls back, showing that he is arrested only because he wills it.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 114.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The accusers' claim that they may not put anyone to death does not clear them, for by their demand they killed Christ through Pilate.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 114.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The fulfilled saying about Christ's death refers to his being handed over by the Jews to the Gentiles, not specifically to crucifixion.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 115.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Pilate asks 'What is truth?' and offers to release Jesus, but the crowd chooses Barabbas; through this the true Passover is fulfilled.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 116.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Jesus's silence before his judges fulfils the prophecy of the silent lamb, showing him innocent and sacrificed for others' sins.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 116.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Pilate hands Jesus over 'to be crucified' by his own authority, yet the evangelist rightly holds the accusers implicated in the deed.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 117.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Augustine reconciles Mark's 'third hour' with John's 'sixth hour': Christ was crucified by the accusers' tongues at the third hour and by the soldiers' hands at the sixth.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 117.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Augustine offers a second solution: John's 'sixth hour' counts from the start of the 'preparation' of Christ's sacrifice in the night, not from daybreak.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 117.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ carries his cross, a mockery to the ungodly but a mystery to the godly, and is crucified between two robbers as prophesied.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 118.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The soldiers divide Christ's garments; Augustine holds that the accusers, by their plotting and shouting, are more truly the ones who crucified him.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 118.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · John alone explains that the soldiers divided the other garments into four equal parts and cast lots only for the seamless tunic, as the psalm foretold.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 118.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Things done by evil men can signify good, as the cross does: its four dimensions figure love, perseverance, hope, and grace, and its sign is used in all the sacraments.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 119.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ arranges even his sufferings, saying 'I thirst' to fulfil Scripture; the vinegar, sponge, and hyssop are given figurative meanings.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 119.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Having fulfilled all that was foretold, Christ dies by his own will, showing a power that makes his coming judgment to be hoped for or feared.
On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins 2.16Augustine of Hippo · 411–412 · Though Scripture says Job did not sin with his lips, God later rebuked him; seeing Christ's sinless righteousness, Job despised himself, as Paul counted his own legal righteousness as dung.
On the Merits and Forgiveness of Sins 2.48Augustine of Hippo · 411–412 · Jesus, whose name means Savior, saves infants as well as adults; though he took the likeness of sinful flesh and passed through infancy, he did not share infants' ignorance and went freely to a death he did not owe.
City of God 15.26Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · The ark, with its human proportions, its side door, and its three stories, is a figure of Christ and of the Church saved through the wood of the cross.
City of God 16.2Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine reads Noah's drunkenness and nakedness as a figure of Christ's passion: Shem and Japheth (Jews and Gentiles in the Church) honor it, while Ham figures heretics and bad Christians.
City of God 16.39Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Jacob's wrestling with the angel figures Christ's passion; blessed and lame, he represents Israel's believers and unbelievers.
City of God 16.41Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Jacob's blessing of Judah (Gen 49:8–12) foretells Christ from the tribe of Judah: his death as a lion's sleep, his resurrection by his own power, and the Church washed in his blood.
City of God 17.17Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Psalm 110 proclaims Christ's eternal priesthood after Melchizedek, and Psalm 22 foretells his crucifixion and the conversion of the nations.
City of God 18.23Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine gives a Latin version of the Erythraean Sibyl's acrostic poem on the judgment, whose Greek initials spell “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour” and form the word ichthys (“fish”), and gathers the Sibylline prophecies of Christ's passion quoted by Lactantius.
On Faith and Works 15Augustine of Hippo · ca. 413 · Preaching “Christ crucified” includes the crucifixion of the old self and its desires, so it cannot permit professed adultery.
On the Good of Widowhood 23Augustine of Hippo · ca. 414 · The unmarried woman should turn all the care a wife gives to pleasing a husband into pleasing Christ, whose beauty is inward.
Commentary on Jeremiah 2.110Jerome · ca. 414-419 · Jerome, with the consensus of the churches, reads the lamb led to slaughter and the wood put into his bread as Christ and his cross, against those who apply it only to Jeremiah.
Commentary on Jeremiah 3.6Jerome · ca. 414-419 · Even Judah's kin, Edom, Moab and Ammon, will turn against it; so Christ's own people cried out for his crucifixion.
Commentary on Jeremiah 3.7Jerome · ca. 414-419 · God abandons his inheritance, which roared against him like a lion; Jerome reads this of Christ's passion and his rejection by his people.
Commentary on Jeremiah 6.15Jerome · ca. 414-419 · The remnant gathered from the north at Passover is the church born from Christ's passion, including the spiritually blind and lame; they return weeping and rejoicing on the straight way of faith, and Ephraim, who took Manasseh's birthright under Jacob's crossed hands, figures the Gentile church (Jer 31:8–9).
Apologetic Book 28.7Orosius · ca. 415–416 · Christ drinks the cup.
Seven Books of History against the Pagans 7.4.13Orosius · ca. 417–418 · An earthquake at the crucifixion.
Seven Books of History against the Pagans 7.4.14Orosius · ca. 417–418 · The sun is darkened at the crucifixion.
The Institutes 3.3John Cassian · ca. 419–426 · The day offices at the third, sixth, and ninth hours commemorate Pentecost, the crucifixion, Peter's vision, the descent to hell, and Cornelius; morning and evening prayer also have scriptural grounds.
Carmina 3.31–59Orientius of Auch · 5th-6th century(?) · Christ, eternal judge and mediator of two natures, suffered on the cross, was mocked and given gall and vinegar, and rose and ascended to the Father's throne, from which he will return.
Carmina 3.60–89Orientius of Auch · 5th-6th century(?) · The cross is Christ's trophy; its four arms signify his rule over the world, its shape the hands of one praying, and its Greek letters, the rho, the iota, alpha and omega, Christ himself; blood and water from his side signify martyrdom and baptism.
Enchiridion (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love) 53Augustine of Hippo · ca. 421–423 · Christ's cross, burial, resurrection, ascension, and session are patterns for the Christian life.
Cyril, Twelve Anathemas, Anathema XIIAnonymous · 430–433 · Twelfth anathema: the Word of God suffered, was crucified, and died in the flesh, and is the firstborn from the dead.
Part 7Eutherius of Tyana · ca. 431-440 · The author ridicules the formula 'God the Word suffered impassibly', arguing that it makes Christ's passion, endurance, and death a mere appearance and voids the new testament.
Part 8Eutherius of Tyana · ca. 431-440 · The author rejects the formula 'God suffered as he willed', arguing that will cannot overturn nature and that Scripture nowhere says the impassible God suffered by his will.
Part 10Eutherius of Tyana · ca. 431-440 · The author rejects the formula 'God the Word suffered in the flesh' as unscriptural, insisting that Scripture and Nicaea say 'Christ suffered', a name that signifies both natures.
Part 11Eutherius of Tyana · ca. 431-440 · The author answers the argument that the Jews' guilt requires that God was killed, insisting that the Godhead is impassible and that the insult to the united manhood reaches God, so that the Jews are still culpable.
Part 12Eutherius of Tyana · ca. 431-440 · The author turns back the charge that those who deny that God was crucified are Jews, arguing that calling the Godhead passible is worse than Judaism, close to Manichaeism, and bolder than the devil.
Objection and reply 9Prosper of Aquitaine · ca. 431-432 · Christ died for the whole world in that he took the nature of all, yet his death profits only those reborn and joined to him in baptism, the children of the promise from Jews and Gentiles.
Theodotus, ACO I.1.2, homily 72.11Theodotus of Ancyra · 431 · God restored man's lost honour by uniting his image to himself; he made human passions and death his own in order to destroy passion and death.
Theodotus, ACO I.1.2, homily 72.12Theodotus of Ancyra · 431 · One who tears up an imperial letter is punished for tearing the emperor's word, though the word itself cannot be torn: so the impassible Word received the passion of the flesh he united to himself.
Theodotus, ACO I.1.2, homily 72.14Theodotus of Ancyra · 431 · Applying the example: those who crucified the flesh outraged God the Word himself, who made its sufferings his own; the homily closes with a doxology.
Theodotus, ACO I.1.2, homily 73.3Theodotus of Ancyra · 431 · The cross is foolishness to the Greeks because they judge God's wonders by nature; if a mere man had been crucified, no one would have found it foolish.
Theodotus, ACO I.1.2, homily 73.4Theodotus of Ancyra · 431 · To deny that God made human passions his own is to deny that the cross saved us, destroyed death, and nailed our sin to the wood.
Theodotus, ACO I.1.2, homily 73.13Theodotus of Ancyra · 431 · The manger has become the eucharistic table, and Christ's lowliness, sufferings, and death have brought the world salvation; the virgin's body, made good by God, was no unworthy dwelling.
Tome to the Armenians 21Proclus of Constantinople · ca. 435-437 · The Trinity is impassible in its Godhead; the one of the Trinity became flesh so that in his flesh he might abolish the passions and death while his Godhead remained impassible.
Chapter 16Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 437-450 · The Sibyl is called as a third Gentile witness: her acrostic verses on the judgment spell “Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior,” and other verses foretell his passion and resurrection.
Chapter 17Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 437-450 · Heaven, sea, earth, and the underworld all bore witness to Christ, and creation itself trembled at his death, yet the Jews who killed him refused to believe.
Part 1, chapter 17Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The sacrifice of Isaac figures Christ’s passion: the only son, the three days’ journey, the wood he carried, the silent victim, and the ram crowned with thorns.
Part 1, chapter 26Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · Joseph sent to his brothers, hated, stripped of his coat, thrown into a pit, and sold figures Christ sent to Israel, rejected, stripped of the seamless tunic, and sold for thirty pieces.
Part 1, chapter 28Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · Joseph imprisoned with the two eunuchs, one condemned and one freed, figures Christ counted among the wicked and crucified between two thieves.
Part 2, chapter 21Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · Jephthah’s rash vow and sacrifice of his virgin daughter, explained as a punishment for testing God, figure Christ’s offering of his own virgin flesh; Christian heroes surpass the Roman exemplars Torquatus, Mucius, and Curtius.
Part 2, chapter 23Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · Samson’s victory with the jawbone, Delilah’s three tests and betrayal for silver, his blinding, and his death bringing down the temple figure Christ’s answers to the testing questions (the adulteress, tribute to Caesar, the levirate wife), his betrayal, passion, and victory over idolatry in death.