Lessons from the Ancients

Loyalty

AD 202

Rome

As I write in these chains . . .

Romans 12:2

Do not conform to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God’s will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

Modesty

Clement of Alexandria – c. AD 195

By no manner of means should women…uncover and exhibit any part of their person. Otherwise, both may fall—the men by being excited to look; the women, by drawing to themselves the yes of the men.

Let [married women] be fully clothed: by garments on the outside and by modesty on the inside.

Cyprian – c. AD 250

Pierce your breast with modest feelings…Wear the necessary clothes that the cold or the heat (or too much sun) demand, and so you may be approved as modest…Flee from the adornment of vanity. Such attire is fitting for women who haunt the brothels.

But self-control and modesty do not consist only in purity of the flesh, but also in seemliness and in modesty of dress and adornment.

Tertullian – c. AD 198

Salvation consists in the exhibition principally of modesty. I say this not only of women, but likewise of men. For we are all the “temple of God”.

Tertullian – c. AD 198

Most women…have the boldness to walk as if modesty consisted only in the bare integrity of the flesh and in turning away from actual fornication…They wear in their gait the same appearance as do the women of the nations, from whom the sense of true modesty is absent…In short, how many women are there who do not earnestly desire to look pleasing even to strangers? Who does not on that very account take care to have herself painted out, yet denying that she has ever been an object of carnal appetite?

Clement of Alexandria – c. AD 195

Neither are we to provide for ourselves costly clothing

Luxurious clothing that cannot conceal the shape of the body is not more a covering [than being naked]. For such clothing, falling close to the body, takes its form more easily. Clinging to the body as though it were the flesh, it receives its shape and outlines the woman’s figure. As a result, the whole make of the body is visible to spectators, although they cannot see the body itself…It is most suitable to use white and simple garments.

Buying as they do, a single dress at the price of ten thousand talents, they prove themselves to be of less use and less value than cloth.

Tertullian – c. AD 198

First, then, blessed sisters, take heed that you do not admit to your use flashy and sluttish garbs and clothing.

Theonas of Alexandria – c. AD 300

All of you should also be elegant and tidy in person and dress. At the same time, your dress should not in any way attract attention because of extravagance or artificiality. Otherwise, Christian modesty may be scandalized.

Apostolic Constitutions – c. AD 390

Do not adorn yourself in such a manner that you might entice another woman to you…Do not further enhace the beauty that God and nature has bestowed on you. Rather, modestly diminish it before others. Therefore, do not permit the hair of your head to grow too long. Rather cut it short…Do not wear overly fine garments either…Nor should you put a gold ring on your fingers.

Unbelievers

Love for Enemies

Aristides – c. AD 125

They comfort their oppressors and make them their friends. They do good to their enemies.

Athengoras – c. AD 175

We have learned not to return blow for blow, nor to go to law with those who plunder and rob us. Not only that, but to those who strike us on one side of the face, we have learned to offer the other side also.

Clement of Alexandria – c. AD 195

Christians are not allowed to use violence to correct the delinquencies of sins.

Tertullian – c. AD 197

We willingly yield ourselves to the sword. So what wars would we not be both fit and eager to participate in (even against unequal forces), if in our religion it were not counted better to be slain than to slay?

Tertullian – c. AD 197

Christ plainly teaches a new kind of long-suffering, when He actually prohibits the reprisals that the Creator permitted in requiring “an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.”

Tertullian – c. AD 211

I think we must first inquire whether warfare is proper at all for Christians. What point is there in discussing the merely incidental, when that on which it rests is to be condemned? ... Is it lawful to make an occupation of the sword, when the Lord proclaims that he who uses the sword will perish by the sword? Will the son of peace take part in the battle when it does not become him even to sue at law? Will he who is not the avenger even of his own wrongs, apply the chain, the prison, the torture, and the punishment?

Origen – c. AD 248

…when others are engaged in battle—Christians engage as the priests and ministers of God, keeping their hands pure. . . They pray that whatever is opposed to those who act righteously may be destroyed.

Commodianus – c. AD 240

Do not willingly use force and do not return force when it is used against you.

Lactantius – c. AD 304

The Christian does injury to no one. He does not desire the property of others. In fact, he does not even defend his own property if it is taken from him by violence. For he knows how to patiently bear an injury inflicted upon him.

Disputation of Archelaus and Manes – c. AD 320

“An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” That is the expression of justice. However, His injunction that a man who is struck on the one cheek should offer the other also—that is the expression of goodness. Now, are justice and goodness opposed to each other? Far from it! Rather, there has only been advancement from simple justice to positive goodness.