{"author":null,"canonical_references":[],"database_sha256":"8cfbe7284c6936871d57c02dc6aa63ebbdfd4722422d539dd9f716e46e91112e","date_end":null,"date_start":null,"edition_year":null,"id":"sermonindex-ecf-1703","native_reference":{"book_number":610,"chapter_from":6,"chapter_to":6,"system":"MyBible module coordinates (mapping unverified)","verse_from":9,"verse_to":9},"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>Augustine of Hippo</b>: He did not say: Those who are rich. He said: Those who seek to become rich.… The name of riches is, as it were, sweet-sounding to the ear. But, \"many vain and harmful desires\"—does that sound sweet? To be \"involved in many troubles\"—does that sound sweet? Do not be so misled by one false good that you will thereby cling to many real evils.<br/><i>— SERMONS 11.3</i></p><p><b>Augustine of Hippo</b>: See what a fight we have with our dead sins, as that active soldier of Christ and faithful teacher of the church shows. For how is sin dead when it works many things in us while we struggle against it? What are these many things except foolish and harmful desires which plunge into death and destruction those who consent to them? And to bear them patiently and not to consent to them is a struggle, a conflict, a battle.<br/><i>— AGAINST JULIAN 2.9.32</i></p><p><b>Cyprian</b>: But how can they follow Christ, who are held back by the chain of their wealth? Or how can they seek heaven, and climb to sublime and lofty heights, who are weighed down by earthly desires? They think that they possess, when they are rather possessed; as slaves of their profit, and not lords with respect to their own money, but rather the bond-slaves of their money. These times and these men are indicated by the apostle, when he says, \"But they that will be rich, fall into temptation, and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and in perdition. For the root of all evil is the love of money, which, while some have coveted, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.\" But with what rewards does the Lord invite us to contempt of worldly wealth? With what compensations does He atone for the small and trifling losses of this present time? \"There is no man,\" saith He, \"that leaves house, or land, or parents, or brethren, or wife, or children, for the kingdom of God's sake, but he shall receive seven fold even in this time, but in the world to come life everlasting.\" If we know these things, and have found them out from the truth of the Lord who promises, not only is not loss of this kind to be feared, but even to be desired; as the Lord Himself again announces and warns us, \"Blessed are ye when men shall persecute you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall cast you out, and shall speak of your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake! Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy; for, behold, your reward is great in heaven.\"<br/><i>— Treatise III. On the Lapsed.</i></p><p><b>Cyprian</b>: You are afraid that your wealth may fail. You may have begun to do some good generously from it, yet you do not know, in your wretchedness, that your life itself may fail, and your salvation as well. While you are anxious lest any of your possessions be diminished, you do not take notice that you yourself, a lover of mammon rather than of your soul, are being diminished. While you are afraid lest for your own sake you lose your estate, you yourself are perishing for the sake of your estate.<br/><i>— Treatise VIII. On Works and Alms 10</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: Seest thou the skill of physicians, who besides health, are supplying thee also with riches? Sit down therefore by them, and learn of them the nature of thy disease. For instance, dost thou love wealth, and greedy gain, like as the fevered love water? Listen at any rate to their admonitions. For like as the physician saith to thee, If thou wilt gratify thy desire, thou wilt perish, and undergo this or that; even so also Paul: \"They that will be rich, fall into temptation, and a snare of the devil, and into foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.\"<br/><i>— Homily on Matthew 74</i></p><p><b>John Chrysostom</b>: \"But they that will be rich\"; not those that are rich, but those who wish to be. For a man may have money and make a good use of it, not overvaluing it, but bestowing it upon the poor. Such therefore he does not blame, but the covetous.</p><p>\"They that will be rich fall into temptation and a snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in destruction and perdition.\"</p><p>He has justly said, \"they drown men,\" since they cannot be raised from that depth. \"In destruction and perdition.\"</p><p>But what is the \"temptation and snare,\" which he says, those that would be rich fall into? It causes them to err from the faith, it involves them in dangers, it renders them less intrepid. \"Foolish desires,\" he says. And is it not a foolish desire, when men like to keep idiots and dwarfs, not from benevolent motives, but for their pleasure, when they have receptacles for fishes in their halls, when they bring up wild beasts, when they give their time to dogs, and dress up horses, and are as fond of them as of their children? All these things are foolish and superfluous, nowise necessary, nowise useful.</p><p>\"Foolish and hurtful lusts!\" What are hurtful lusts? When men live unlawfully, when they desire what is their neighbor's, when they do their utmost in luxury, when they long for drunkenness, when they desire the murder and destruction of others. From these desires many have aimed at tyranny, and perished. Surely to labor with such views is both foolish and hurtful.<br/><i>— Homily on 1 Timothy 17</i></p><p><b>Oecumenius</b>: But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires, some of which plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is the root of all evils; by craving it, some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pains.</p><p>Paul does not speak of those who use wealth well, but of those who desire it. And the desirer would not share it with another, so that the things of desire would not be diminished for him.</p><p>who desire to be rich. For wealth flows abundantly, and having power, it leads to unreasonable desires.</p><p>some of which plunge people. To the point of no recovery anymore.</p><p>some have wandered away. For desire darkens the eye of the soul and does not allow it to walk straight.</p><p>and pierced themselves. For greed, like a thorn, causes the hands of the one who touches to bleed.</p><p>with many pains. Not only, Paul says, does the desire to be rich obstruct matters concerning God, but it also physically weakens the lovers, surrounding them with cares, sleeplessness, and fears.<br/><i>— COMMENTARY ON 1 TIMOTHY</i></p><p><b>Valerian of Cimiez</b>: Therefore, dearly beloved, the rust is that worm which alone possesses the recesses of the human heart: the worm of envy and of avarice. But the thief is the devil. Believe this. To lay his plots against good deeds, he flatters us with the pomp of the world. To keep a man from sharing in the heavenly kingdom, he puts gold in his hands, silver before his eyes, gems about his neck. In this way he nourishes pride and by the goad of covetousness enkindles the desires of the flesh.<br/><i>— HOMILIES 7.3</i></p>","source_html_sha256":"3b6a4d5724644fa09ced0633c4e4e4412a76a81a218a14b481bc473cf3db8f79","source_module":"ECF","source_row_id":1703,"source_url":"https://www.sermonindex.net/commentary/ecf/","text_sha256":"5004aefc109672bb56f737942cb8e18c46fcb93de6aad88ef88c6e806592e246","translator":null,"work":null}