{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-356","native_reference":{"book_number":530,"chapter_from":5,"chapter_to":5,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":7,"verse_to":7},"public_import_allowed":false,"record_kind":"verse-keyed-module-record","review_required":["English edition and exact text","author/work attribution","dating","verse mapping and citation kind","reuse and attribution","split author quotations and deduplicate"],"review_status":"unreviewed","source_html":"<p><b>Ambrosiaster</b>: The old leaven has a double meaning here. On the one hand, it refers to false teaching, just as Jesus warned his disciples to beware the leaven of the Pharisees. On the other hand, it also refers to the sin of fornication being dealt with here. Paul teaches that the passover is the sacrifice, and not the exodus, as some people think. The sacrifice comes first, and then it is possible to make the transition from the old life to the new. For this reason it is the cross that is the saving reality signified by the passover in the Old Testament.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON PAUL'S EPISTLES</i></p><p><b>Clement of Alexandria</b>: Wherefore also Plato says, in the second book of the Republic, \"It is those that sacrifice not a sow, but some great and difficult sacrifice,\" who ought to inquire respecting God. And the apostle writes, \"Christ our passover was sacrificed for us;\"-a sacrifice hard to procure, in truth, the Son of God consecrated for us.<br/><i>— The Stromata Book 5</i></p><p><b>Cosmas Indicopleustes</b>: He therefore calls the Law the shadow of these things while the image and its characteristics are the mysteries celebrated by the Christians, as for instance, the lamb offered in sacrifice—a type of the Passion of Christ, in accordance with what the Apostle Paul says: For Christ our Passover was sacrificed; and John the Baptist thus speaks: Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world. Then after this, for the Israelites of that time there was their deliverance from the destroying angel and from the bondage to Pharaoh; for us, our deliverance from the devil and from our bondage to the very burdensome law. Then for them, their passage through the sea and their sojourning in the wilderness, and the giving of the law and the setting up of the Tabernacle; for us, our passage through baptism and our sojourning in the Church, and the gift of the Holy Spirit. For them, a copious supply of water from the rock to sustain their life; for us, the life-giving mysteries; for them, the land of promise as a place of rest; for us, heaven not made with hands as our place of rest; for them, temporal life; for us, life eternal and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption and blessedness.<br/><i>— The Christian Topography, Book 5</i></p><p><b>Cyprian</b>: The voice of the warning apostle is, \"Purge out the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened; for even Christ our passover is sacrificed. Therefore let us keep the feast, not with old leaven, neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.\" But are sincerity and truth preserved, when what is sincere is polluted by adulterous colours, and what is true is changed into a lie by the deceitful dyes of medicaments? Your Lord says, \"Thou canst not make one hair white or black; \" and you, in order to overcome the word of your Lord, will be more mighty than He, and stain your hair with a daring endeavour and with profane contempt. With evil presage of the future, you make a beginning to yourself already of flame-coloured hair; and sin (oh, wickedness!) with your head-that is, with the nobler part of your body! And although it is written of the Lord, \"His head and His hair were white like wool or snow,\" you curse that whiteness and hate that hoariness which is like to the Lord's head.<br/><i>— Treatise II On the Dress of Virgins</i></p><p><b>Cyprian</b>: That he who has attained to trust, having put off the former man, ought to regard only celestial and spiritual things, and to give no heed to the world which he has already renounced...</p><p>Also in the same place: \"Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man loveth the world, the love of the Father is not in him. Because everything which is in the world is lust of the flesh, and lust of the eyes, and the ambition of this world, which is not of the Father, but of the lust of this world. And the world shall pass away with its lust. But he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever, even as God abideth for ever.\" Also in the first Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians: \"Purge out the old leaven, that ye may be a new dough, as ye are unleavened. For also Christ our passover is sacrificed. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not in the old leaven, nor in the leaven of malice and wickedness, but in the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.\"<br/><i>— Treatise XII. Three Books of Testimonies Against the Jews.</i></p><p><b>Gregory the Dialogist</b>: Let its name be inquired into more carefully. Let the excellent preacher be consulted. Let us see what he declares concerning the estimation of Him. For he says: \"For Christ our Passover has been sacrificed.\" If therefore Christ is the Passover, we must consider what the law says about the Passover, so that we may investigate more carefully whether these things seem to have been said about Christ.<br/><i>— Forty Gospel Homilies, Homily 22</i></p><p><b>Hippolytus of Rome</b>: And for this reason three seasons of the year prefigured the Saviour Himself, so that He should fulfil the mysteries prophesied of Him. In the Passover season, so as to exhibit Himself as one destined to be sacrificed like a sheep, and to prove Himself the true Paschal-lamb, even as the apostle says, \"Even Christ,\" who is God, \"our passover was sacrificed for us.\" And at Pentecost so as to presignify the kingdom of heaven as He Himself first ascended to heaven and brought man as a gift to God.<br/><i>— Fragments - Dogmatical and Historical</i></p><p><b>Ignatius of Antioch</b>: Let us not, therefore, be insensible to His kindness. For were He to reward us according to our works, we should cease to be. For \"if Thou, Lord, shalt mark iniquities, O Lord, who shall stand?\" Let us therefore prove ourselves worthy of that name which we have received. For whosoever is called by any other name besides this, he is not of God; for he has not received the prophecy which speaks thus concerning us: \"The people shall be called by a new name, which the Lord shall name them, and shall be a holy people.\" This was first fulfilled in Syria; for \"the disciples were called Christians at Antioch,\" when Paul and Peter were laying the foundations of the Church. Lay aside, therefore, the evil, the old, the corrupt leaven, and be ye changed into the new leaven of grace. Abide in Christ, that the stranger may not have dominion over you. It is absurd to speak of Jesus Christ with the tongue, and to cherish in the mind a Judaism which has now come to an end. For where there is Christianity there cannot be Judaism. For Christ is one, in whom every nation that believes, and every tongue that confesses, is gathered unto God.<br/><i>— Epistle of Ignatius to the Magnesians</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: \"Purge out the old leaven,\" that is, this evil one. Not that he speaketh concerning this one only; rather he glances at others with him. For, \"the old leaven\" is not fornication only, but also sin of every kind. And he said not, \"purge,\" but \"purge out;\" \"cleanse with accuracy so that there be not so much as a remnant nor a shadow of that sort.\" In saying then, \"purge out,\" he signifies that there was still iniquity among them. But in saying, \"that ye may be a new lump, even as ye are unleavened,\" he affirms and declares that not over very many was the wickedness prevailing. But though he saith, \"as ye are unleavened,\" he means it not as a fact that all were clean, but as to what sort of people you ought to be.</p><p>\"For our Passover also hath been sacrificed for us, even Christ; wherefore let us keep the feast: not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.\" So also Christ called His doctrine Leaven. And further he himself dwells upon the metaphor, reminding them of an ancient history, and of the Passover and unleavened bread, and of their blessings both then and now, and their punishments and their plagues.</p><p>It is festival, therefore, the whole time in which we live. For though he said, \"Let us keep the feast,\" not with a view to the presence of the Passover or of Pentecost did he say it; but as pointing out that the whole of time is a festival unto Christians, because of the excellency of the good things which have been given. For what hath not come to pass that is good? The Son of God was made man for thee; He freed thee from death; and called thee to a kingdom. Thou therefore who hast obtained and art still obtaining such things, how can it be less than thy duty to \"keep the feast\" all thy life? Let no one then be downcast about poverty, and disease, and craft of enemies. For it is a festival, even the whole of our time.</p><p>So that by means of this example also he mightily drives the fornicator out of the Church. For, saith he, so far from his presence profiting, he even doth harm, injuring the common estate of the body. For one knows not whence is the evil savor while the corrupt part is concealed, and so one imputes it to the whole. Wherefore he urges upon them strongly to \"purge out the leaven, that ye may be,\" saith he, \"a new lump, even as ye are unleavened.\"</p><p>\"For our Passover hath been sacrificed for us even Christ.\" He said not, hath died, but more in point to the subject in hand, \"hath been sacrificed.\" Seek not then unleavened bread of this kind, since neither hast thou a lamb of the same kind. Seek not leaven of this description, seeing that thine unleavened bread is not such as this.</p><p>Thus, in the case of material leaven, the unleavened might become leavened, but never the reverse; whereas here there is a chance of the direct contrary occurring. This however he has not plainly declared: and observe his good sense. In the former Epistle he gives the fornicator no hope of return, but orders that his whole life should be spent in repentance, lest he should make him less energetic through the promise. For he said not, \"Deliver him up to Satan,\" that having repented he might be commended again unto the Church. But what saith he? \"That he may be saved in the last day.\" For he conducts him on unto that time in order to make him full of anxiety. And what favors he intended him after the repentance, he reveals not, imitating his own Master. For as God saith, \"Yet three days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown,\" and added not, \"but if she repent she shall be saved:\" so also he did not say here, \"But if he repent worthily, we will 'confirm our love towards him.'\" But he waits for him to do the work that so he may then receive the favor. For if he had said this at the beginning he might have set him free from the fear. Wherefore he not only does not so, but by the instance of leaven allows him not even a hope of return, but reserves him unto that day: \"Purge out (so he says) the old leaven;\" and, \"let us not keep the feast with old leaven.\" But as soon as he had repented, he brought him in again with all earnestness.</p><p>But why does he call it \"old?\" Either because our former life was of this sort, or because that which is old is \"ready to vanish away,\" and is unsavory and foul; which is the nature of sin.<br/><i>— Homily on 1 Corinthians 15</i></p><p><b>Tertullian</b>: Which prediction was thus also fulfilled, that \"on the first day of unleavened bread\" you slew Christ; and (that the prophecies might be fulfilled) the day hasted to make an \"eventide,\"-that is, to cause darkness, which was made at mid-day; and thus \"your festive days God converted into grief, and your canticles into lamentation.<br/><i>— An Answer to the Jews</i></p><p><b>Tertullian</b>: It does not matter that he also said, \"For the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord,\" since both in the destruction of the flesh and in the saving of the spirit there is, on His part, judicial process; and when he bade \"the wicked person be put away from the midst of them,\" he only mentioned what is a very frequently recurring sentence of the Creator. \"Purge out the old leaven, that ye may be a new lump, as ye are unleavened.\" The unleavened bread was therefore, in the Creator's ordinance, a figure of us (Christians).<br/><i>— Against Marcion Book V</i></p><p><b>Tertullian</b>: The unleavened bread was therefore, in the Creator's ordinance, a figure of us (Christians). \"For even Christ our passover is sacrificed for us.\" But why is Christ our passover, if the passover be not a type of Christ, in the similitude of the blood which saves, and of the Lamb, which is Christ? Why does (the apostle) clothe us and Christ with symbols of the Creator's solemn rites, unless they had relation to ourselves? When, again, he warns us against fornication, he reveals the resurrection of the flesh.<br/><i>— Against Marcion Book V</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"703c75f4f16c414a53ab6e11401ea38af674afa299602b53bbcbf6c664be5c7c","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":356,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"c57d53e78c2bbeac100696f81a02e2f5ef424b171dd23e29016d271e0fe7fe9f","translator":null,"work":null}