Suffering and affliction in the early church

Why the righteous suffer, and how to bear sickness, loss, and calamity. Part of The Christian life.

Epistle of Barnabas 7.11Anonymous · ca. 70–135 (often ca. 130) · To gain the kingdom one must pass through thorns and suffering.
Shepherd of Hermas, Similitude 6.3.4 (63.4)Hermas · ca. 100–150 · The punishments are the troubles of this life: loss, want, sickness, insult.
2 Clement 19.3Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · The obedient may suffer briefly but will reap the fruit of the resurrection.
2 Clement 19.4Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · The godly who suffer now will live again and rejoice forever.
2 Clement 20.1Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · Do not be troubled that the wicked prosper and God's servants suffer.
2 Clement 20.2Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · This life is training; the crown comes in the life to come.
Diatessaron, section 36Tatian · ca. 160-180
Fragment 44 (Exhortation to Endurance, or To the Newly Baptized (Clement's precepts))Clement of Alexandria · late 2nd-early 3rd century · A set of precepts for a newly baptized Christian on quiet conduct, speech, prayer, temperance, trust in God, and endurance in illness.
Against Heresies 5.3.1Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Paul’s thorn in the flesh shows that God’s power is perfected in weakness, so that man learns by experience his own mortality and God’s power.
Prophetic Extracts 9.3Clement of Alexandria · ca. 200 · A believer's illness may be God's correction for past sin, protection from future sin, or a permitted attack for his good or as an example to others.
Miscellanies 4.12.81Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · Basilides taught that martyrs suffer for hidden sins, mercifully under the name of Christians; even the apparently sinless suffer, as infants do, not by a hostile power.
Miscellanies 4.12.82Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · Basilides argues that even infants and the seemingly perfect suffer because they have the capacity to sin, as one who wills adultery is an adulterer; he would say anything rather than call providence evil.
Miscellanies 4.12.87Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · God does not cause afflictions but permits them and turns them to good as training, for others because of their sins, for the Lord and the apostles because of ours; God's will is our sanctification, for which the Lord was not prevented from suffering.
Miscellanies 4.21.131Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · The perfect Christian relies on God's power, enduring affliction and persecution without despair, commending himself to God by patience, purity, knowledge, and love, cleansing himself and perfecting holiness; godly grief leads to repentance and salvation.
Miscellanies 7.11.65Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · The one who knows fears nothing but evil; death, disease, poverty, and disgrace are not truly evils, and he plays well whatever part God gives him in the drama of life.
Octavius 36.9Minucius Felix · ca. 197–250 · God allows suffering to test and prove his people, as gold is tested by fire.
Apology 41Tertullian · ca. 197 · The pagans, not the Christians, bring disasters on the world; God sends good and ill on all alike until the final judgment, as admonition to Christians and punishment to others.
To the Martyrs 3Tertullian · ca. 197 · Like soldiers and athletes in training, the imprisoned martyrs are being prepared by hardship for a contest whose prize is an eternal crown.
On Patience 11Tertullian · ca. 198–206 · Whatever the source of our troubles, the devil, ourselves, or God's discipline, we must bear them patiently; the Beatitudes promise happiness to the patient.
On Patience 14Tertullian · ca. 198–206 · Isaiah, Stephen, and above all Job are models of patience; Job, stripped of everything, only thanked God and was restored double.
Didascalia 5.5Anonymous · first half of the third century
6 Ezra 16.20Anonymous · 3rd century
Antidote for the Scorpion's Sting 5Tertullian · ca. 211–213 · God is good, so his will is good; martyrdom is good because it frees from idolatry, as painful surgery is good because it heals, and God heals the death brought by Adam's disobedience with remedies that resemble the disease.
Antidote for the Scorpion's Sting 12Tertullian · ca. 211–213 · The apostles, who knew Christ's meaning best, taught martyrdom: Peter bids Christians rejoice in suffering, John says perfect love casts out fear, and the Apocalypse promises its rewards to victors who shed their blood, while the fearful go to the lake of fire.
Antidote for the Scorpion's Sting 13Tertullian · ca. 211–213 · Paul, once a persecutor, commends suffering for Christ throughout his letters: to the Thessalonians, Romans, Corinthians, and Philippians, and above all to Timothy as his own martyrdom approaches.
On the Resurrection of the Flesh 40Tertullian · ca. 208–212 · Paul's “outer man” that is being corrupted means the flesh worn down by persecution in this life, not flesh destined to perish; flesh and soul that suffer together will be glorified together.
On First Principles 3.1.12Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · The prophets' “why have you hardened our heart?” means that God's sparing let sin grow; God corrects those he receives as sons and leaves others for a later cure, so that no one may think his goodness his own.
On First Principles 3.2.6Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · The demons' warfare is spiritual: misfortunes like Job's are allowed by God and aim to drive us to anger, despair or complaint against God.
Fragments on Job, column 63Origen · ca. 220-254 · Job's trials came all at once and without the usual consolations, and his three friends came only after a long delay.
Fragments on Job, column 67Origen · ca. 220-254 · Job suffered both in body and in his fear that God's name was slandered through him, yet he never blasphemed, and when he opened his mouth he spoke mysteries.
PG 12:1121 (Ps 3 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Every sinner afflicts the Son of God as a wicked son grieves his father; affliction yields the righteous a weight of glory; on Ps 3:3 Christ is exalted by the Father, and the saint’s glory is God himself, as with Moses and Elijah.
PG 12:1135 (Ps 4 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · God hears the saint while he is still calling; “calling upon the Lord” belongs only to the righteous, like Samuel, whose works say “Lord”; Christ is “the righteousness” of the righteous; Scripture calls the trials of the saints “affliction,” those of sinners “scourges.”
PG 12:1137 (Ps 4 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Afflictions of the righteous and scourges of sinners; giving way under affliction is “being crushed,” but the saints are enlarged by God, who gives greatness of soul; on “sons of men,” the name “man” is blame when the saints are called gods and praise when sinners are called beasts.
PG 12:1155 (Ps 4 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · The case for bodily and external goods from the Gospels’ healings and from eternal punishment; Origen answers with the prophets who kept the law yet lived in poverty and suffering — Elijah, Elisha, Isaiah, Jeremiah, John the Baptist — so that the promises need a higher sense.
PG 12:1157 (Ps 4 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Afflictions cannot be evils, since the Apostle boasts in them and the righteous are always afflicted, as Job’s trials show; the literal blessings of the law (lending to nations, health, wealth) do not fit the saints, and true health and wealth belong to the soul.
PG 12:1231 (Ps 17 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Notes on Ps 17 LXX (18):17–24: rescue from mighty enemies, the broad place of affliction, and cleanness of hands.
PG 12:1245 (Ps 18–19 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · End of Ps 18 LXX (19):10–15 (pure fear, hidden faults, the meditation of the heart) and beginning of Ps 19 LXX (20): the afflicted are heard.
PG 12:1261 (Ps 22 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Notes on Ps 22 LXX (23):4–5: the rod and staff as God’s merciful punishment, and the table prepared for each affliction.
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.
Exhortation to Martyrdom 42Origen · 235 · Those who share Christ's sufferings share his comfort and triumph; the martyr's departure is the true day of salvation, and ministers must commend themselves by endurance.
Homilies on Ezekiel 1.2Origen · ca. 238–250 (Jerome's translation in the 380s) · God’s anger is a remedial discipline, like a father’s or a physician’s, and those punished in this life may thereby be spared in the future.
Homilies on Ezekiel 12.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Jerome's translation in the 380s) · The sinner falls under the devil’s covenant of curse; but punishment accepted patiently, like the handing over to Satan in 1 Cor 5:5, saves the spirit, while seeking escape through “Egypt” brings ruin.
Homilies on Numbers 27.10Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The crossing of the Red Sea is the frightening temptation through which the law of God brings the believer safely, and the bitter waters that follow are the healing bitterness of discipline, which yields the sweetness of salvation.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 4.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Since the righteous often suffer hunger and want, “young” and “old” refer to the ages of the inner man, “forsaken” to spiritual abandonment, and the righteous man’s “seed” to his disciples, begotten by the word of God; the “seed of the ungodly” is their false teaching.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 7.5Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The penitent sinner asks to be scourged in this life by sickness, loss, or bereavement rather than be reserved for eternal punishment, for God scourges every son he receives.
Homilies on Jeremiah 14.14Origen · ca. 240 · To pray for a share with the prophets and apostles is to ask to suffer as they did for rebuking sin; Origen alludes to a recent case of church discipline and warns his hearers not to listen to the slanders of the excommunicated.
Against Celsus 2.23Origen · ca. 248 · Origen replies that Jesus, having truly taken a human body, truly felt pain, even though he freely chose to suffer for the benefit of all.
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 6.20Origen · ca. 248 · Paul, longing for unseen eternal things, found all affliction light, and Christians hope through Jesus, the high priest who passed through the heavens, to contemplate God face to face.
Against Celsus 6.56Origen · ca. 248 · When God sends suffering, it is like a parent's discipline or a surgeon's knife, meant to correct and heal those who would not learn otherwise.
Against Celsus 8.56Origen · ca. 248 · Christians will live in God's world by his laws, may marry and have children, and will bear hardships as trials; but they will not honour the demons, since they worship God alone, as Christ did, and cannot serve God and mammon.
Commentary on Romans 4.9Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Through Christ we boast even in tribulations, which are truly good because they produce patience, proof, hope, and love, unlike indifferent things such as wealth or strength; the tribulations of the righteous include self-discipline, while the sufferings of the wicked are 'scourges'; the love of God poured out by the Spirit is the greatest gift; and Christ's death for the ungodly moves martyrs to die boldly for him, refuting those who separate the 'just' God of the law from the 'good' Father of Christ.
Commentary on Romans 7.2Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Origen contrasts the spirit of servitude, a pedagogue for beginners, with the Spirit of adoption by which the perfect cry “Abba, Father,” and explains being heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ through suffering with him.
Commentary on Romans 7.3Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Origen explains why present sufferings cannot compare with the glory to come and interprets the creation subjected to vanity as rational creatures, including the soul bound to the body and the heavenly bodies and angels, who groan in sympathy and await the revelation of God’s sons.
To Quirinus 3.6Cyprian of Carthage · ca. 248–250 (book 3 perhaps later) · The righteous suffer more than others, but must endure, since trials prove them, as Job, Paul, and the Psalms show.
Letter 6.2Cyprian of Carthage · 249/250–258 · Cyprian urges the confessors to think only of immortality, quoting Scripture that the righteous suffer but will judge and reign with Christ, whose sufferings they share.
Letter 58.2Cyprian of Carthage · 249/250–258 · Christ and Peter foretold the persecutions of the last times; they test believers, and Christ promises a great reward to those who suffer for him.
Letter 58.6Cyprian of Carthage · 249/250–258 · The Maccabean martyrs, prophets, apostles, and the Holy Innocents show the way; since Christ, sinless, suffered and was hated by the world first, his servants should not refuse to suffer.
Letter 76.2Cyprian of Carthage · 249/250–258 · Cyprian turns the confessors' beatings, chains, filth, hunger, and shorn heads into marks of glory that Christ will repay.
In Praise of Martyrdom 16Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · God tests believers like gold in the furnace, to purify them for his kingdom, as Sirach and Wisdom say.
In Praise of Martyrdom 18Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Abraham's readiness to sacrifice Isaac, and Christ who suffered first and makes martyrs coheirs of his kingdom, show that any suffering is small beside the promised glory.
To Demetrian 18Cyprian of Carthage · 252–253 · Christians share in public disasters but do not suffer from them as pagans do, for their hope is in the future and their troubles only strengthen them.
To Demetrian 19Cyprian of Carthage · 252–253 · Christians share bodily hardships with pagans in this world, but bear them patiently, so what punishes pagans is not a punishment to them.
On Mortality 10Cyprian of Carthage · 252–253 · Job and Tobit were proved, not defeated, by their sufferings, blessing God in adversity and refusing their wives' temptations.
To Fortunatus 9Cyprian of Carthage · 253 or 257 · Scripture teaches that afflictions and persecutions are sent to test and prove believers.
Life of Cyprian 3Anonymous · ca. 258–265 · Cyprian, though a recent convert, was quickly made a presbyter and urged others to imitate the deeds for which the saints, especially Job, had pleased God.
Symposium 8.4Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd century · Thecla urges the virgins to endure trials like the moon behind passing clouds, and introduces the vision of the woman and the dragon in Revelation 12.
Cib. 1Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Trials, whether from demons or other causes, test and purify believers, as Scripture and the fate of Israel in the desert show.
Cib. 3Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Suffering must come before honor, as the examples of farmers, helmsmen, runners, Joseph, David, Daniel, Moses, the prophets, and the apostles show.
Cib. 4Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Methodius tells Kilonia that true wisdom accepts afflictions, which lead by the narrow way to the crown of life, since this life is short.
Cib. 5Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Self-control and patience in trials are health for the soul, as Job on the dunghill shows; affliction is God's discipline, like dung that makes a plant fruitful.
Vit. 2Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Hardship strengthens body and soul and leads to lasting goods, as with the sick, children at school, and athletes; only treasure stored in heaven escapes life's changes.
Fragment on Job, no. 9Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · Job confesses that God's judgments are beyond human grasp, against friends who think they know why he suffers.
Against the Nations 2.76Arnobius of Sicca · ca. 297–303 · The pagan gods do not protect their worshipers from misfortune either; Christians were promised nothing for this life and regard suffering and death as a release.
Church History 7.22.1Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 300–325 · Plague followed the war, and Dionysius wrote an Easter letter about it.
Church History 7.22.6Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 300–325 · The plague terrified the pagans but was a test for Christians, though it struck them too.
Homilies 12.29Anonymous · 4th century (reworking earlier material) · Peter quotes the true Prophet's saying that good and evil must come, with blessing and woe on those through whom they come, and explains that the righteous are tested by the wicked.
Recognitions 4.11Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · God sent toil and affliction as a remedy, so that hardship restored the worship of God that prosperity had destroyed.
Recognitions 5.3Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · Suffering comes from unbelief, which ignores the coming judgment, while faith keeps from sin and gives power over demons.
Recognitions 5.34Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · True worshipers of God keep his law and are free from sufferings, while sinful believers are chastised in this life to pay their debt of sin before the judgment.
Divine Institutes 3.17.8Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Epicurus saw the good suffer, the wicked prosper, and death strike at random.
Divine Institutes 4.26.18Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · The gall and vinegar foretold hardships for followers of truth.
Divine Institutes 5.21.7Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Objection: why does God let his worshippers suffer?
Divine Institutes 5.22.13Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Christians thank God for correcting them through suffering.
Divine Institutes 6.17.28Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Seneca praises the man who asks how well, not what, he suffers.
Preparation for the Gospel 8.14.22Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · The sufferings of the good are due to wicked men, not to nature.
Preparation for the Gospel 9.25.3Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · Job's trials.
Preparation for the Gospel 12.10.1Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · Hebrew righteous men endured suffering; Plato describes the same.
Preparation for the Gospel 12.10.4Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · The just man will be scourged, bound, blinded, and impaled.
Oration to the Assembly of the Saints 15.4Constantine the Great · ca. 325 (dated variously 317–325) · Heavenly wisdom is to suffer wrong rather than do it; trusting God, who rescued his people at sea and conquered through the passion, the believer is unconquerable.
Letter 3.4Antony the Great · before 356 · Antony fears that monks wear the habit of the saints without their power, and comforts the brothers with Christ's words that persecution is the lot of those who live according to the spirit.
Theophany 4.21Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Defence against the Arians 38Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 349–357 · The synod recalls the exposed charge that Athanasius murdered Arsenius and urges the Alexandrians to hold the right faith and endure persecution.
Defence against the Arians 42Athanasius of Alexandria · ca. 349–357 · In its letter to Egypt and Libya the synod repeats its account of the Arsenius charge and its exhortation to hold the faith and endure, adding that many other bishops have suffered likewise.
Long recension, Mary 2Anonymous · later 4th century (probable) · Ignatius describes his sufferings, which are nothing beside the coming glory.
That One Must Die for the Son of God 13Lucifer of Cagliari · ca. 356–361 · Lucifer asks Constantius, acclaimed by his bishops as bishop of bishops, why he persecutes those who die for the Son, and argues that suffering is God's painful medicine and that what matters in death is its cause, not its manner.
Letter 5Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil consoles Nectarius on the death of his only son, urging him to accept God's wise ordering, like Job, in the hope of reunion.
Letter 6Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil consoles Nectarius's wife on her son's death, pointing to providence, the mother of the Maccabees, the mortality of all things, and prayer.
Letter 101Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil consoles a bereaved person: trials test our love for God, and for Christians death is the beginning of true life.
Letter 123Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil, beset by troubles, begs the monk Urbicius to come to him and to pray that he may stay thankful to God in adversity.
Letter 139Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil encourages the orthodox of Alexandria, persecuted by the Arian party, with the hope of the martyrs' crowns and the coming of Christ.
Letter 206Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil hopes to meet Elpidius near Comana and consoles him on the death of a grandchild.
Letter 240Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil encourages the presbyters of Nicopolis, worshiping in the open air after their church was seized, to endure, and refuses to recognize the bishop installed by the Arian party.
Letter 300Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil consoles the father of a promising young student who has died, reminding him that all are mortal, that his son died free of sin and has been received into heaven, and pointing to Job's words.
Letter 302Basil of Caesarea · ca. 357–378 · Basil consoles the widow of the general Briso, reminding her that married people are one flesh, that death is God's ordinance, and that she should find comfort in her husband's memory, her children, and preparation for Christ's judgment.
Homilies on the Psalms 29.2Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · Basil explains that Scripture speaks of God sleeping, turning away or forgetting according to our own condition, and that God “upholds” us like a swimmer or a wrestler, so that afflictions do not give the enemy joy unless we give in, as Job did not.
Homilies on the Psalms 33.2Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · Basil expounds Ps 34:1–7: blessing God at all times, even in affliction; praise as the soul's continual thought of God; boasting only in the Lord; the meek magnifying God together in quiet contemplation; affliction proving the saints; enlightenment of those who come to Christ the true light; voluntary poverty, of which Christ is the model; and the angel who guards the God-fearing.
Homilies on the Psalms 33.12Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · On Ps 34:17–19 Basil teaches that the righteous cry in the heart for heavenly things; the Lord's nearness to the brokenhearted foretells his coming in the flesh; spiritual humility differs from the degradation of sin; and afflictions are the athlete's contest from which God delivers.
Homilies on the Psalms 45.2Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · God is the true helper of the righteous, like a general who brings help where the line is pressed; afflictions find the righteous who walk the narrow way, but they produce endurance and hope, and the one who trusts in God fears nothing even if the earth is overturned, while we panic at a man's anger or a dog.
Homilies on the Psalms 59.4Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · On Ps 60:8–12 Basil reads Moab, “the pot of washing,” as baptism, which admits even the excluded Moabite to the Church; the shoe cast over Edom is Christ's flesh, the fortified city the Church; and help from affliction is the Christian's true help, as with Paul, since affliction produces endurance and hope, and the sick, the poor and the dishonored are to rejoice and pray rather than trust human help.
Letter 67Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · Gregory consoles his sick friend Philagrius, urging him to treat his illness as a school of philosophy and to despise the body.
Letter 69Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · The end of a note about books lent to Philagrius; then Gregory praises Philagrius for bearing his illness as a philosopher, letting the body suffer while the soul stays with God.
Letter 71Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · Gregory urges Philagrius to bear his illness like the Stoics, Anaxarchus, Epictetus and Socrates, and like Job, making weakness the material of virtue.
Letter 75Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · Gregory recalls how, while he expounded the psalm about the prosperity of the wicked, the sick Philagrius rose and thanked God for his suffering.
Letter 77Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · Gregory, ill himself, says he rejoices to teach endurance by bearing illness with thanks; then he asks Philagrius, for the sake of their common fatherland, to help the rhetor Eudoxius.
Letter 273Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · The end of a letter urging a bishop to fight for the Trinity; then Gregory rebukes a grieving friend for mourning without philosophy, urging the middle way between insensibility and excess.
Letter 365Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 360–390 · Gregory consoles a grieving woman: remembering God turns pain to joy, and those who chose the ascetic life expected affliction, not prosperity.
Tractates on the Psalms 65.20Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · God tests believers like silver in fire, not to learn their faith but to purge them of vices so that they shine.
Tractates on the Psalms 118.9.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The ninth letter opens with thanks for God's kindness, which the psalmist gives even in adversity, as for a physician's or father's loving severity.
Tractates on the Psalms 118.9.4Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Suffering follows sin and corrects it; humbled after sinning, the psalmist now keeps God's word.
Tractates on the Psalms 118.10.14Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The psalmist does not ask to be spared suffering but to be encouraged in it by God's mercy, as promised to those handed over for his sake.
Tractates on the Psalms 137.15Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The righteous accept tribulation, which tests and strengthens faith, trusting God's right hand, Christ, to protect them against the devil's attacks.
Tractates on the Psalms 138.4Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Tribulation proves the saints, as with Abraham, Jacob, Moses, and Paul, whose patience was rewarded; the psalm now applies this to Christ.
Tractates on the Psalms 147.5Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Snow, frost, and ice signify the troubles and ignorance of this life along the narrow way; God's word and Spirit will melt them into the calm of eternal rest.
Titus of Bostra, Against the Manichees 2.17Titus of Bostra · ca. 360s · Sickness and health both serve virtue, and the escape of some criminals from punishment makes virtue a matter of hating evil rather than fearing penalties.
Titus of Bostra, Against the Manichees 2.24Titus of Bostra · ca. 360s · Natural disasters are God’s admonitions, like a father’s discipline or a physician’s surgery, rousing people whom prosperity makes forgetful of God.
Titus of Bostra, Against the Manichees 2.29Titus of Bostra · ca. 360s · That many remain sinful does not show calamities are useless, any more than fish in the sea show fishing is idle; fear converts some and restrains others.
Titus of Bostra, Against the Manichees 2.42Titus of Bostra · ca. 360s · God’s care uses fears, sickness, loss and even the deaths of children to turn people from sin, governing all by foreknowledge.
Commentary on Ephesians 1.3Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · God, the Father of Christ, has become our Father through Christ, and his blessing is spiritual and heavenly, so that earthly sufferings do not contradict it.
Commentary on Ephesians 3.15Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Paul’s sufferings, borne to keep the Ephesians from adding anything to Christ, are their glory, and all fatherhood, in heaven and on earth, derives from God the Father.
Commentary on Galatians 6.16Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Peace rests on all who follow the rule of hope in Christ alone and on the true Israel of the Lord; Paul, bearing Christ’s marks of suffering, asks to be troubled no more and blesses them with Christ’s grace.
Commentary on Philippians 1.29Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · It is God’s gift through Christ both to believe in him and to suffer for him, sharing the same contest Paul endured in chains and prison, which leads to the crown.
Commentary on Philippians 3.10Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Faith in Christ means knowing him, sharing his sufferings even to death, and so sharing the power of his resurrection, in which believers come to meet him.
Commentary on Philippians 3.12Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Paul is not yet perfected while he lives, but pursues Christ through sharing his sufferings to the end, so as to go out to meet him at the resurrection, laying hold of Christ as Christ laid hold of him through those sufferings.
Oration 14.9Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · Unlike other poor people, the lepers suffer poverty, a dreaded disease, and the loathing of others; Gregory weeps for them and calls on his hearers to share his grief.
Oration 14.11Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · Even parents drive away their leprous children; the sick are shunned more than criminals, barred from towns and even water, and so must beg at the church festivals.
Oration 14.30Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · It is not clear that the sufferings of the poor come from God; prosperity and affliction here may test or expose, God’s wisdom is unsearchable, and the true reward and punishment belong to the age to come.
Oration 16.5Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · Gregory asks his father to explain whether disasters such as the hailstorm come from chance or from Providence, and describes the ruined harvest as a mild warning compared with the wrath still in store for the unrepentant.
Oration 21.13Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · Gregory tells how Athanasius opposed Arianism at Nicaea, introduces George of Cappadocia, the usurper of Alexandria, and compares Athanasius’s sufferings with Job’s.
Tractates 2.17.1Zeno of Verona · ca. 362-380 · Zeno begins a sermon on Psalm 130, teaching that the cry 'out of the depths' is the heart's cry in affliction, as with Peter on the sea and Paul in his sufferings.
Homilies 4.2Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · To the objection that one cannot give thanks under torture or loss, Basil answers that the apostle speaks to those whose souls, united to God, are above the sufferings of the flesh, and who have abundant reasons for joy.
Homilies 5.6Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · Gratitude is lost by comparing ourselves with those above us; we should give thanks for God's countless gifts of creation and redemption, and weep only for what deserves tears.
Homilies 5.8Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · Those who visit mourners should share their sorrow with restraint and console them gently, rather than lamenting with them.
Homilies 8.4Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · True repentance would show itself in tears, hospitality and the cancelling of debts; drought tests rich and poor alike, and God, whose power and goodness have not failed, feeds those who trust him.
Homilies 12.5Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · The fear of God shuts out the profane; Basil then explains “instruction” as God's corrective discipline, which opens the ears of the careless.
Homilies 12.15Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · The “steering” of Prov 1:5 is the skill of crossing the changing sea of life and the storm of the passions without being elated or sunk.
Homilies 21.10Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · Those who lost their goods in the fire should imitate Job, who met each report of disaster, even the death of his children, with “The Lord gave, the Lord has taken away.”
Homilies 21.11Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · Struck in body and seated on the dunghill, Job resists even his wife's plea to curse God, answering that good and evil alike are to be received from the Lord.
Commentary on 2 Corinthians 1:4Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Paul distinguishes two kinds of consolation: for those persecuted for Christ and for those grieving over their sins.
Commentary on 2 Corinthians 7:5Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Paul recounts the beatings and imprisonment at Philippi; his fears were for the new believers, and he overcame them by hope.
Commentary on Colossians 1:23–24Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Christ's sufferings, continued in the persecution of his apostle, profit only those who remain in the faith; since all depends on Christ, no element, angel, or power is to be worshipped.
Commentary on Philippians 1:29–30Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Suffering for Christ is a gift granted by God only to those who love Christ.
Commentary on Philippians 2:19–24Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Paul will send Timothy, his like-minded son, and now sends Epaphroditus, whose near-fatal illness was a trial for his good; Paul's grief would have been for the loss of a helper, not hopeless mourning.
Commentary on Romans 8:17Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Sons of God inherit from a living Father; to be co-heirs with Christ, believers must suffer with him by enduring persecution and crucifying the flesh.
Question 118, section 6Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Job’s goodness had not yet been tested by suffering, so the tempter asked to try him with many afflictions, as torturers do to force a confession.
Question 118, section 9Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Job’s patience taught his wife and others to bear God’s will, so Satan’s attack doubled Job’s reward on earth and in heaven and turned to the devil’s own loss.
Question 119, section 3Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · God permits trials out of love, to increase our merit and reward, as Paul learned that power is perfected in weakness.
Question 119, section 5Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Tobit’s steadfastness, like the apostles’ joy under beatings, shows that unjust sufferings borne for God are signs of future reward.
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 22.40Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome urges Eustochium to endure hardships out of love for Christ, as Jacob served for Rachel and Paul suffered for the gospel.
Letter 39.2Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome confesses his own grief and wrestles, like the psalmist, with the death of the young, concluding that God's judgments are just and must be accepted.
Letter 68.1Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome thanks the blind Castrutius for trying to visit him and assures him that his blindness is not a punishment for sin.
Letter 108.19Jerome · ca. 370–419 · In sickness, loss of property, anxiety for her children, and slander that called her mad, Paula comforted herself with the Scriptures and armed herself with patience against envy.
Letter 118.2Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome lists Julian's bereavements and losses and compares them with Job's greater trials, which Job bore with worship and patience.
Letter 118.3Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome explains from Job 1–2 that Julian has so far lost only external goods, 'skin for skin', and has not yet been tried in his own body as Job was.
Letter 127.13Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Marcella, beaten by the Goths who sought her gold, protects Principia, rejoices in her poverty, and dies some months later.
Letter 131.16Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Augustine confesses that he cannot explain, on this view, why infants suffer sickness and afflictions in this life and condemnation without baptism.
Letter 131.18Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Augustine quotes his own earlier discussion in On Free Will of why infants suffer.
Letter 140.19Jerome · ca. 370–419 · On Ps 90:15 Jerome teaches that present afflictions will be rewarded with joy after the resurrection.
Apostolic Constitutions 7.8.7Anonymous · ca. 380 · Sufferings are to be accepted, for God rewards them as he did Job and Lazarus.
On the Soul and the Resurrection, Migne page 97Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 379–380 · Since the good is limitless, love has no end; God draws every soul, as his own, to himself; souls nailed to material things suffer as they are pulled free, like bodies dragged from earthquake ruins, but this pain is not God’s revenge, only the cost of being drawn to good.
Psalm 37Apollinaris of Laodicea · uncertain (fourth to sixth century) · A paraphrase of Psalm 37 of the Septuagint (Psalm 38): a sick man, suffering for his sin and deserted by friends, waits in silence for God’s help.
Psalm 68Apollinaris of Laodicea · uncertain (fourth to sixth century) · A paraphrase of Psalm 68 of the Septuagint (Psalm 69): sinking in deep waters, mocked and given cause to fast for reproaches, the sufferer prays for rescue and judgment on his enemies.
Liber Orsiesii 42Orsiesius · ca. 380-390 · The saints passed through this world in sorrow, but tribulation has its time and gives way to joy.
Liber Orsiesii 50Orsiesius · ca. 380-390 · The common life of the cenobia comes from God, as in the church of Acts, and leads through suffering with Christ to the fathers' fellowship.
Book of Heresies 79.7Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · Trials prove the righteous and correct or remove the sinner.
Canons on the Letters of Paul 81Priscillian · ca. 380–400 · Christians should rejoice in suffering for Christ, which brings eternal reward.
Section 1Anonymous · 382 · The bishops at Constantinople greet Damasus and the Western bishops at Rome and recall the sufferings they endured under the Arians.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.1Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Scripture shows that life’s troubles are outweighed by consolations and by the glory to come.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.2Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · No earthly life equals heavenly glory; Paul, Elijah, and Peter counted their sufferings as nothing beside it.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.4Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Job, bereaved and diseased, bore the Lord’s arrows like an athlete and asked not to be destroyed in the end.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.5Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Job laments that human life is a hireling’s trial, full of pain day and night.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.10Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Job’s friends tried to rob him of his innocence by describing the punishment of the wicked; he agreed about God’s power.
On the Complaints of Job and David 1.16Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Job laments that the mighty, the wicked, and the just all suffer, and that life passes like a ship’s wake; he longs for a mediator.
On the Complaints of Job and David 2.2Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Job’s three friends insisted that his suffering proved his sin, not seeing that God was training Christ’s athlete.
On the Complaints of Job and David 2.3Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Sitting on the dunghill, Job spoke more strongly than his healthy friends, for God’s power is made perfect in weakness.
On the Complaints of Job and David 3.3Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · God is good to the upright in heart, who see his goodness in eternal rewards even amid suffering, as Job, Peter, and Paul taught.
On the Complaints of Job and David 3.9Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · Job and David, chastened in this life, found firmness in their suffering; those not chastened here will be punished for ever.
On Jacob and the Happy Life 1.24Ambrose · ca. 386-390 · The happy life is proved, not diminished, by adversity, and the believer shares the groaning of all creation while awaiting redemption.
On Jacob and the Happy Life 1.36Ambrose · ca. 386-390 · Captivity and torture do not make the perfect man wretched, as Hezekiah, Jeremiah, Daniel, and the three young men show; he meets misfortune like a brave soldier and a helmsman.
On the Duties of the Clergy 1.36Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · True fortitude defends the wronged and conquers oneself, despising external goods for the sake of virtue, and the clergy above all must scorn worldly gain and trade.
On the Duties of the Clergy 1.38Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · The brave man prepares his mind beforehand against dangers and losses, foreseeing what may come, and bears adversity like Job.
On the Duties of the Clergy 1.39Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · Fortitude fights all vices, above all avarice, anger, and love of glory, and Job is its supreme example.
On the Duties of the Clergy 2.3Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · Scripture holds that only the honourable is good and that virtue is blessed in every state, even in suffering.
On the Duties of the Clergy 2.5Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · Riches and pleasures hinder blessedness, while virtue alone suffices for it, so that Naboth, the patriarchs, Joseph, David, and Job were blessed in their sufferings.
Exposition of Psalm 118 6.31.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Paul, afflicted but never straitened, shows what it is to walk in a broad place.
Exposition of Psalm 118 7.6.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · On verse 50: hope from God’s word comforts us in present troubles, as Paul says.
Exposition of Psalm 118 7.6.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Hope of glory makes every adversity bearable.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.7.5Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Paul’s sufferings show that he had no portion in this world.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.13.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Of all portions, God offers himself; choosing him means sharing Christ’s sufferings, as Paul, Jeremiah, and David show.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.54.4Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · We share Christ’s tribulations and, through baptism, his burial.
Exposition of Psalm 118 10.34.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Like a strong athlete, the psalmist asks not to be spared trials but to be strengthened in them.
Exposition of Psalm 118 10.36.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The greater the trial, the greater the consolation; we should ask for God’s exhortation, as Paul did.
Exposition of Psalm 118 10.36.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Consolation is given to those proved in tribulation, and only suffering for Christ merits Christ’s consolation.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.15.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · God chastens those he loves, as a father his son; such discipline is just.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.16.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · God allowed Job’s trials to prove his righteousness and enlarge his crown.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.16.4Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · What is just is not hard; Job blessed God in suffering.
Exposition of Psalm 118 18.6.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Most sufferers do not praise God’s justice; Jeremiah did even in the muddy pit.
Exposition of Psalm 118 18.40.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Tribulation, which works patience, finds those worthy of a crown.
Exposition of Psalm 118 18.43.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Whoever seeks Christ accepts tribulation, which makes us worthy to be heard by God.
Letter 78.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine reminds his people that Scripture foretold offences and the cooling of love before the end, so that they might persevere.
Letter 99.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine, writing to the widow Italica, regrets that she sent no news of the sufferings at Rome, since sharing tribulation is part of love.
Letter 99.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Sharing in others' sufferings lightens them through love, and God consoles those who fight in hope of the crown.
Letter 111.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine says the calamities were foretold, and answers pagan complaints that Christianity brought them with the parable of the servant who knew his master's will.
Letter 111.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine answers those who ask why God's servants suffer by quoting the confession of sins made by Azariah in the furnace.
Letter 111.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine explains that God delivered Daniel and the three men to convert their kings, but not the Maccabean martyrs, who also confessed that they suffered for their sins.
Letter 130.25Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · We do not know what to pray for as we ought because tribulations may benefit us, as Paul learned when his prayer to remove the thorn in the flesh was refused.
Letter 131.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine writes to Proba that the evils of this life, borne with patience and thanksgiving, are turned to good and lead the soul to seek its true rest.
Letter 140.26Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · James contrasts Job's endurance, rewarded with temporal goods, with 'the end of the Lord', teaching Christians to hope for eternal goods; the veil of the Old Testament is removed in Christ.
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 166.16Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine is at a loss to explain the sufferings of infants in this life, and their condemnation if unbaptized, if their souls are newly created and sinless.
Letter 166.18Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine quotes his own earlier answer in On Free Will: infants' sufferings may correct their parents, and God may compensate the infants, as with the Holy Innocents honored as martyrs.
Letter 203.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine urges Largus, after his worldly misfortunes, to despise the vanities of this world and turn to the hope of the godly.
Letter 244.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine writes to Chrisimus, who in grief over losses was rumored to have contemplated suicide, to remind him that earthly goods cannot compare with heavenly ones.
Letter 244.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine urges Chrisimus to take courage, since God uses losses to free us from love of fragile things, and mentions a letter to the count.
Letter 248.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine consoles Sebastianus, grieved by sinners who abandon God's law, saying such grief is the persecution of the godly and urging perseverance; Alypius adds a greeting.
Soliloquies 1.12Augustine of Hippo · 386–387 · Augustine admits that he wants his friends and his own life only for the sake of finding wisdom, and that he fears bodily pain because it hinders the search, citing Cornelius Celsus on the supreme good and evil.
Homilies on Matthew 9.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · No one is truly wronged: injustice suffered is reckoned for remission of sins or for reward, as with David and Lazarus; the innocents lost nothing and God would not have taken them had they been destined for greatness; Herod's dreadful death; Jer 31:15 shows God foreknew; God permits without causing, and works through opposites.
Homilies on Matthew 10.7John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Closing exhortation of Homily 10: persevere in prayer, for God delays and permits trials to draw us to himself, as parents frighten wandering children back to their arms; the saints shone in trials; bear afflictions with thanksgiving.
Homilies on Matthew 15.5John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Being ill spoken of is blessed only when it is false and for Christ’s sake; all the beatitudes lead to the kingdom; the disciples are consoled by the prophets’ example, and slander is shown to be harder to bear than danger.
Homilies on Matthew 15.6John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The beatitudes form a golden chain leading to endurance under slander, and the disciples are called the salt of the earth because the salvation of the whole world will depend on their virtue.
Homilies on Matthew 33.6John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christians must train in peace like athletes so as to be ready for persecution; Job, trained in contempt of wealth, care for his children and chastity, bore not only his visible losses but also harder unseen trials.
Homilies on Matthew 33.11John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Job, resisting even his wife’s pitiful pleading, was not less than the apostles, for he suffered without knowing that it was for God’s sake; Christians who live under grace should imitate his courage and gentleness.
Homilies on Matthew 50.1John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ withdraws to pray in solitude and leaves the disciples in the storm to train their endurance, then comes walking on the sea and lets the fervent Peter walk to him.
Homilies on Matthew 53.3John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Christ refuses heavenly signs to those who would not believe the lesser ones, rebukes the disciples’ anxiety over bread so as to free them from the food laws, and Chrysostom teaches that every life mixes grief and joy, and that only virtue and a good conscience give lasting joy, especially at death.
Homilies on Matthew 55.2John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Taking up the cross means being ready daily for a shameful death, and following Christ means suffering for his sake with every virtue; Christ demands this not from harshness but from love, as a father does not spare his son and a general does not keep his soldiers idle.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 1.32.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Isaiah's "drink this first" means: drink tribulation first.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.94.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The tribulations of the righteous are good, for in them they are enlarged, not crushed.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 43.96.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · In every tribulation we must remain in the Lord; if we withdraw from him, we strengthen our adversary.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 45.8.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The greater the tribulations, the greater God’s help; in harder contests, through tears and prayer, we are crowned.
On Free Choice of the Will 3.23Augustine of Hippo · ca. 387–395 · Augustine answers objections about infants who die or suffer (no one is created in vain; baptized infants are helped by the faith of those who present them; the Holy Innocents are honored as martyrs) and about animal pain, which shows the soul's desire for unity and points to the Creator's unity.
On the Catholic Way of Life and the Manichaean Way of Life 1.22Augustine of Hippo · ca. 387–389 · Fortitude is love bearing the loss of all things, including pain and death, which the soul fears because of its attachment to the body; if lovers of gold and pleasure endure so much, lovers of God should endure more.
On Genesis against the Manichaeans 2.20Augustine of Hippo · ca. 388–390 · No one, not even the rich, escapes the sentence on Adam: the labor and thorns are the toil of seeking truth in a corruptible body; the one who tills his inner field suffers it only in this life, while others face purifying fire or eternal punishment after it.
On Genesis against the Manichaeans 2.23Augustine of Hippo · ca. 388–390 · The Cherubim ('fullness of knowledge') and the flaming sword (temporal tribulations) guard the tree of life: all reach it through enduring trials, and through the fullness of knowledge, which is love.
Sermon 15.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The world is a furnace in which the wicked are chaff, the good are gold, and tribulation is the fire; trusting God's mercy, the righteous ask to be tested, for God gives a way out by enabling them to endure.
Sermon 19.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The psalmist of Psalm 73 nearly fell because he expected earthly happiness from God and saw the wicked prosper; but happiness has its own country, which even Christ did not find here, so earthly goods must be despised.
Sermon 22.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · God warns through Scripture and scourges through tribulation so that we may repent now; the repentance of the damned will be fruitless, but even the thief on the cross was allowed to change.
Sermon 31.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · All people go weeping on the road of life, from the newborn’s first cry onward; the just weep more, for they weep over those who weep and laugh at vain things.
Sermon 46.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The weak are strengthened by being warned that temptations will come, not by promises of worldly prosperity; their model is Christ’s sufferings.
Sermon 46.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Bad shepherds promise worldly happiness and so build on sand; God scourges every son he receives, as he scourged his sinless Son; the weak must be told to expect trials, and the frightened that God will not let them be tempted beyond their strength.
Sermon 55.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Earthly fathers discipline their sons for money that will pass away; God disciplines us so that we may inherit him, and it is better to be whipped and received than spared and abandoned.
Sermon 70.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The question: how can Christ’s yoke be easy when those who bear it, like Paul, suffer so much?
Sermon 70.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The Spirit made Paul’s sufferings light; people of the world endure far worse for passing goods.
Sermon 81.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Pressure is not a stumbling block but can yield oil like an olive press; Job’s wife, urging blasphemy, was the stumbling block, which Job, being meek, overcame.
Sermon 81.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The calamities of the age are not stumbling blocks; the stumbling block is the voice that blames “Christian times” so as to make us blaspheme Christ.
Sermon 105.13Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Rome’s fall was not caused by the loss of the idols: the pagan Radagaisus, who sacrificed daily, was defeated after the images were removed, and it was the idol-hating Goths who took the city; Christians who suffered there lost nothing eternal.
Sermon 108.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · People seek good days and long life on earth, where they cannot be found; but a long life is only a drop beside eternity, and to live long is only to run to the end.
Sermon 124.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · This life is a tribulation between fear and pain, and only the Word who became flesh without change gives hope; the pool signifies the Jewish people within the five porches of the law, its stirring Christ’s passion, which the proud refuse; Christ took our birth and death to give us resurrection, so we should live as strangers in a short and passing life.
Sermon 279.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ was “not silent” when he called Saul and “not gentle” when he struck him down and promised to show him what he must suffer, a merciful severity like a surgeon’s knife; and Paul himself judged present sufferings unworthy of comparison with the glory to come.
Sermon 286.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · God does not heal everyone through the martyrs but promises immortality to all who imitate them; like a physician or a father who scourges, he refuses some requests for our good.
Sermon 296.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Rather than murmur, praise God who corrects his children; the apostles’ tombs were not meant to preserve Rome’s theaters, and the prosperity of the unpunished wicked is a sign of God’s greater anger.
On the Christian Struggle 8Augustine of Hippo · ca. 396–397 · The sufferings of the righteous do them no real harm, while the wicked, like a fish that swallows the hook, are destroyed by the goods they love; even evil men and angels serve providence unknowingly.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 22.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine shows that a pagan could attack the New Testament on the same grounds Faustus attacks the Old, citing Christ's words and deeds that resemble each accusation.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 22.20Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine explains God's not sparing righteous or sinner as the pruning of the vine: the righteous are corrected by suffering, as Paul was by Satan's angel, while the wicked are punished.
Tractates 0Gaudentius of Brescia · ca. 397-410 · Gaudentius's preface to Benivolus, who had missed the Easter sermons through illness, explains why he writes them down and argues that illness and suffering come to believers for correction, purgation, or proving, not always as punishment for sin.
Letters 1.7Sulpicius Severus · ca. 397–406 · Scripture records the apostles’ perils so that we may learn that the righteous endure and overcome dangers.
Questions and Answers to the Orthodox 15Anonymous · 5th century (disputed) · Job's curse on the day of his birth was a wish that he had not been born, spoken in extreme affliction and not meant to be fulfilled; once relieved, he no longer held that view.
Letter 7, chapter 1Innocent I, bishop of Rome · 401–417 · Innocent consoles the Constantinopolitan clergy loyal to John, praising the patience their own letter already showed.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 7.12Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Better to lay the Gospel on an aching head than to run to amulets, and better still to let it heal the heart; health and sickness are in God's hands, and like Paul with his thorn we should trust the physician's knife.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 10.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Augustine urges his hearers to bear tribulation in hope and to pray to the God who hears within the heart, not on mountains or toward the stars.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 28.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The upright in heart blame themselves and praise God; like their head, Christ's members say to the world's lovers that their time has not yet come.
City of God 1.8Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine explains that temporal goods and evils fall on good and bad alike, but the same suffering purifies the good and destroys the wicked.
City of God 1.9Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine gives reasons why good Christians suffered with the wicked: their own lesser sins, their failure to rebuke sinners out of attachment to temporal things, and the testing of their love for God.
City of God 1.10Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine argues that Christians who lost property, were tortured, or starved in the sack lost nothing essential, and that those who had stored their treasure in heaven were not harmed.
City of God 1.29Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine gives the Christian answer to the taunt “Where is your God?”: God is everywhere, and uses adversity to test or correct his people.
City of God 18.51Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine argues that heretics and bad Christians, like outward persecutors, serve to exercise the church's patience, wisdom, and love, which runs its course between the world's persecutions and God's consolations from Abel to the end.
City of God 19.4Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine answers that eternal life is the supreme good and eternal death the supreme evil, and argues that the miseries of this life, the constant war of virtue against vice, and even the Stoic defence of suicide show that happiness here can only be held in hope.
City of God 20.3Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Ecclesiastes laments that the same things befall good and bad in this life, and ends by pointing to God's judgment of every work.
City of God 21.14Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · The whole of human life is a trial and punishment, from the infant's first cry and the child's schooling onward; even baptized infants suffer, though this does not harm them if they die.
City of God 22.22Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · The countless evils of this life, from ignorance and vice to accidents, diseases, demons, and famine, show that the human race is condemned through the first sin, and only the grace of Christ frees from it.
Commentary on Jeremiah 2.13Jerome · ca. 414-419 · God's scourges are meant to instruct and correct Jerusalem, a consolation for all who suffer frequent distress.
Commentary on Jeremiah 3.56Jerome · ca. 414-419 · Judah's wealth goes to the enemy because of its sins; the prophet, eating God's words and bearing reproach for him, sits alone apart from the merrymakers and trusts that his sorrows will pass like flowing water.
Seven Books of History against the Pagans 4.6.40Orosius · ca. 417–418 · God's discipline, with Christian hope, should be borne gladly.
Enchiridion (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love) 68Augustine of Hippo · ca. 421–423 · The wood, hay, and straw of 1 Cor 3 are lawful worldly attachments whose loss brings grief; whoever keeps Christ as foundation is saved through the fire of such trials.
The Conferences 6.1John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Troubled by the massacre of holy monks near Tekoa by Saracen raiders, Cassian and Germanus ask Abba Theodore of the Cells why God allowed it.
The Conferences 6.3John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Only virtue is truly good and only sin truly evil; riches, power, health, life, death, poverty, and injuries are indifferent, good or bad according to their use.
The Conferences 6.6John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Scripture calls afflictions “evils” loosely, as a patient calls surgery an evil; the killing of a holy man is not an evil for him but an indifferent thing that brings rest and reward.
The Conferences 6.9John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · The outcome does not excuse the intent, as with Judas; for those who love God all things, prosperity and adversity alike, become weapons of righteousness, and prosperity is the more dangerous.
The Conferences 6.10John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · The perfect are “ambidextrous” like Ehud, using both prosperity and adversity as a right hand, as Job, Joseph, and Paul did; the bride of the Song holds the left hand beneath her head and longs for the embrace of the right.
The Conferences 6.11John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Temptations come for testing, for purification, for punishment of sins, or to reveal God's glory; some sinners are beyond correction and are abandoned, and some are punished in this life as a warning to others.
The Conferences 7.31John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · The truly wretched are sinners who suffer no chastisement in this life, for they are storing up wrath; the Psalms, Jeremiah, and Isaiah lament such incurable prosperity.
The Conferences 9.29John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Isaac distinguishes kinds of tears: of repentance, of longing for heaven, of fear of judgment, of grief for others’ sins, and of the righteous oppressed by the hardships of this life.
The Conferences 24.23John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Christ’s yoke is easy for one who has renounced all possessions and his own will, for then no loss, want, command, or persecution can trouble him.
Sermon on the Life of Honoratus 31Hilary of Arles · ca. 430 · Honoratus rebuked Hilary's weeping and said that great men suffer much to teach others to suffer.
Letter to Valerian, paragraph 4Eucherius of Lyon · ca. 432 · Even a good earthly life would be worth little beside eternal life because it is short, and in fact it is full of hardship; as men provide most for the places where they will stay longest, we should provide most for eternity.
Chapter 15Prosper of Aquitaine · ca. 432-433 · Prosper argues against Cassian that Job endured his sufferings by the help of God's Spirit, citing Job's own confession of his Redeemer, and links Cassian's view to the thesis condemned by the Council of Carthage.
Sermon on the Barbarian Time 3Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 437-450 · The good suffer with the wicked because none is perfectly good but God; their trials are a refining, while parents who love their children more than Christ and tolerate blasphemy and the shows share the blame.
Part 2, chapter 26Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · David, king over all Israel, who mourned Saul, figures Christ who loves his enemies; his adultery and murder, his penance, and the troubles of his house warn that prosperity is more dangerous than adversity.