On the Unity of the Catholic Church 12
Summary: Christ's promise to be with 'two or three' applies only to those praying in unity within the church, not to schismatics.
Latin text · CSEL 3.1:220–221
Nec se quidam uana interpretatione decipiant, quod dixerit Dominus: ubicumque fuerint duo aut tres collecti in nomine meo, ego cum eis sum. corruptores euangelii adque interpretes falsi extrema ponunt et superiora praetereunt, partis memores et partem subdole conprimentes: ut ipsi ab ecclesia scissi sunt, ita capituli unius sententiam scindunt. Dominus enim cum discipulis suis unanimitatem suaderet et pacem: dico, inquit, uobis quoniam si duobus ex uobis conuenerit in terra, de omni re, quamcumque petieritis, continget uobis a patre meo qui in caelis est. ubicumque enim fuerint duo aut tres collecti in nomine meo, ego cum eis sum, ostendens non multitudini sed unanimitati deprecantium plurimum tribui. si duobus, inquit, ex uobis conuenerit in terra: unanimitatem prius posuit, concordiam pacis ante praemisit: ut conueniat nobis, fideliter et firmiter docuit. quomodo autem potest ei cum aliquo conuenire, cui cum corpore ipsius ecclesiae et cum uniuersa fraternitate non conuenit? quomodo possunt duo aut tres in nomine Christi colligi quos constet a Christo et ab eius euangelio separari? non enim nos ab illis, sed illi a nobis recesserunt et cum haereses et schismata postmodum nata sint, dum conuenticula sibi diuersa constituunt, ueritatis caput adque originem reliquerunt. Dominus autem de ecclesia sua loquitur et ad hos qui sunt in ecclesia loquitur, ut si ipsi concordes fuerint, si secundum quod mandauit et monuit duo aut tres licet collecti unanimiter orauerint, duo aut tres licet sint, inpetrare possint de Dei maiestate quod postulant. ubicumque fuerint duo aut tres, ego, inquit, cum eis sum, cum simplicibus scilicet adque pacatis, cum Deum timentibus et Dei praecepta seruantibus. cum his duobus uel tribus licet esse se dixit, quomodo et cum tribus pueris in camino ignis fuit et quia in Deum simplices adque inter se unanimes permanebant, flammis ambientibus medios spiritu roris animauit, quomodo apostolis duobus in custodia. clausis, quia simplices, quia unanimes erant, ipse adfuit, ipse resolutis carceris claustris, ut uerbum quod fideliter praedicabant multitudini traderent, ad forum rursus inposuit. quando ergo in praeceptis suis ponit et dicit: ubi fuerint duo aut tres, ego cum eis sum, non homines ab ecclesia diuidit qui instituit et fecit ecclesiam, sed exprobrans discordiam perfidis et fidelibus pacem sua uoce commendans ostendit magis esse se cum duobus aut tribus unanimiter orantibus quam cum dissidentibus plurimis plusque inpetrari posse paucorum concordi prece quam discordiosa oratione multorum.
English · Claude translation
Nor let some deceive themselves by an empty interpretation, because the Lord said: "Wherever two or three are gathered in my name, I am with them." Corrupters of the gospel and false interpreters set down the last words and pass over the earlier ones, remembering part and craftily suppressing part: as they themselves are cut off from the church, so they cut up the sense of a single passage. For the Lord, when he was urging unanimity and peace on his disciples, said: "I say to you that if two of you agree on earth about anything, whatever you ask, it will be done for you by my Father who is in heaven. For wherever two or three are gathered in my name, I am with them"; showing that most is granted not to the multitude but to the unanimity of those who pray. "If two of you," he says, "agree on earth": he put unanimity first, he set the concord of peace before, he taught faithfully and firmly that we should agree. But how can he agree with anyone who does not agree with the body of the church itself and with the whole brotherhood? How can two or three be gathered in the name of Christ who, it is plain, are separated from Christ and from his gospel? For it is not we who have withdrawn from them, but they from us; and since heresies and schisms were born later, when they set up different conventicles for themselves, they have left the head and source of truth. But the Lord speaks of his church and speaks to those who are in the church, that if they are in concord, if, according to what he commanded and warned, two or three, though gathered, pray with one mind, though they be two or three, they can obtain from the majesty of God what they ask. "Wherever two or three are," he says, "I am with them": that is, with the simple and peaceable, with those who fear God and keep God's precepts. With these, though two or three, he said that he is present, as he was with the three youths in the furnace of fire, and, because they remained simple toward God and of one mind among themselves, he refreshed them with the breath of dew in the midst of the surrounding flames; as he was present himself with the two apostles shut up in prison, because they were simple, because they were of one mind, and, loosing the bars of the prison himself, he set them again in the marketplace, that they might hand on to the multitude the word which they were faithfully preaching. When, therefore, he lays down in his precepts and says, "Where two or three are, I am with them," he who instituted and made the church does not divide men from the church, but, reproaching the faithless for their discord and commending peace to the faithful by his own voice, he shows that he is with two or three praying with one mind rather than with very many who disagree, and that more can be obtained by the concordant prayer of a few than by the discordant petition of many.
About this passage
Notes
Translation notes
- The quotations are Matt 18:19–20. The three youths are Dan 3 (the "breath of dew" is in the Greek additions to Daniel 3, Pr Azar 27); the apostles freed from prison are in Acts 5:18–21 (cf. Acts 4:1–3, Peter and John).
Notes on the original text
- Digital text corrected (OCR: "n" for "u" (Matt 18:19, "for you").; OCR: "n" for "u" (Matt 18:19, "to you").; OCR: words run together.): dico, inquit, nobis → dico, inquit, uobis; continget nobis a patre → continget uobis a patre; siduobus → si duobus.
Cite this passage
Cyprian, Unit. eccl. 12 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/cyprian-unitate/12/).
Plain text
Cyprian, Unit. eccl. 12 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/cyprian-unitate/12/).
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