Sophia Scriptura

The Instructor 1.6.44

Clement of Alexandria · The Instructor · ca. 190–200 · Alexandria · Read in context

Summary: Peter calls believers newborns who long for the milk of the Word; and physiology shows milk and blood, and so milk and solid food, to be the same substance.

Greek text · Stählin 1:116

μακάριοι μόνοι, ὅσοι τοῦτον θηλάζουσι τὸν μαστόν. διὰ τοῦτό φησι καὶ ὁ Πέτρος· »ἀποθέμενοι οὖν πᾶσαν κακίαν καὶ πάντα δόλον καὶ τὴν ὑπόκρισιν καὶ φθόνον καὶ καταλαλιάν, ὡς ἀρτιγέννητα βρέφη τὸ λογικὸν γάλα ἐπιποθήσατε, ἵνα ἐν αὐτῷ αὐξηθῆτε εἰς σωτηρίαν, εἰ ἐγεύσασθε ὅτι χρηστὸς ὁ κύριος.« εἰ δὲ καὶ συνενδῴη τις αὐτοῖς ἄλλο τι εἶναι τὸ βρῶμα παρὰ τὸ γάλα, εἶτα πῶς οὐ περιπαρήσονται σφίσιν αὐτοῖς, οὐ κατανενοηκότες τὴν φύσιν; ἡ γάρ τοι τροφὴ χειμῶνος μὲν πυκνοῦντος τοῦ περιέχοντος καὶ πάροδον οὐ διδόντος ἐντὸς κατακλειομένῳ τῷ θερμῷ, ἑψομένη καὶ πεπτομένη, εἰς τὰς φλέβας ἐξαιματουμένη ἐκχωρεῖ· αἳ δὲ διαπνοῆς οὐ τυγχάνουσαι πεπληρωμέναι μάλιστα συντείνονται καὶ σφύζουσι· διὸ καὶ αἱ τίτθαι περιπληθεῖς τότε μάλιστα γίνονται τῷ γάλακτι. ἀποδέδεικται δὲ ἡμῖν μικρῷ πρόσθεν τὸ αἷμα εἰς γάλα ταῖς κυούσαις κατὰ μεταβολήν, οὐ κατʼ οὐσίαν χωρεῖν, ὥσπερ ἀμέλει καὶ αἱ τρίχες αἱ ξανθαὶ τοῖς γηρῶσιν εἰς πολιὰς μεταβάλλουσιν. θέρους δὲ ἔμπαλιν ἀραιότερον ὂν τὸ σῶμα τὴν τροφὴν εὐδιαφορητοτέραν παρέχει, καὶ ἥκιστα πλεονάζει τὸ γάλα, ἐπεὶ μηδὲ τὸ αἷμα· οὐδὲ γὰρ πᾶσα κατέχεται ἡ τροφή.

English · Claude translation

blessed are those alone who suck this breast. That is why Peter says: “Putting away, then, all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and slander, like newborn babes long for the rational milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation, if you have tasted that the Lord is good.” And even if one were to grant them that solid food is something other than milk, how will they not be impaled on their own arguments, not having understood nature? For in winter, when the surrounding air is dense and gives no passage to the heat shut up inside, food is cooked and digested and passes into the veins as blood; and they, getting no outlet, become very full, and are distended and throb. That is why nurses are then especially full of milk. We showed a little earlier that in women who have given birth blood passes into milk by change, not in substance, just as the fair hair of the aged turns gray. In summer, on the other hand, the body, being more porous, lets the food pass off more easily, and there is least milk, since there is least blood; for not all the food is retained.

About this passage

Source
Stählin 1:116 · Otto Stählin, ed., Clemens Alexandrinus, vol. 1, Protrepticus und Paedagogus, GCS 12 (Leipzig: Hinrichs, 1905) · Greek text: Otto Stählin, Clemens Alexandrinus 1: Protrepticus und Paedagogus (GCS 12, 1905), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Stählin, GCS 12. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.
Translation
Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-26 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Stählin (1905); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 2 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)
Scripture

Notes

Translation notes

  • The quotation is 1 Pet 2:1–3, where “rational milk” (λογικὸν γάλα) can also mean “milk of the Word.”

Cite this passage

Clement of Alexandria, Paed. 1.6.44 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-paedagogus/1/6/44/).

Plain text
Clement of Alexandria, Paed. 1.6.44 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/clement-paedagogus/1/6/44/).

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