Sophia Scriptura

Church History 10.4.68

Eusebius of Caesarea · Church History · ca. 300–325 · Caesarea · Read in context

Summary: The true altar is the pure soul of the priest; Christ the High Priest receives the people's prayers as bloodless sacrifices and offers them to the Father.

Greek text · Dindorf 4:471

σεμνὸν δὲ καὶ μέγα καὶ μονογενὲς θυσιαστήριον ποῖον ἂν εἴη ἢ τῆς τοῦ κοινοῦ πάντων ἱερέως τῆς ψυχῆς τὸ εἰλικρινὲς καὶ ἁγίων ἅγιον; ᾧ παρεστὼς ἐπὶ δεξιᾷ ὁ μέγας τῶν ὅλων ἀρχιερεὺς αὐτὸς Ἰησοῦς, ὁ μονογενὴς τοῦ θεοῦ, τὸ παρὰ πάντων εὐῶδες θυμίαμα καὶ τὰς διʼ εὐχῶν ἀναίμους καὶ ἀύλους θυσίας φαιδρῷ τῷ βλέμματι καὶ ὑπτίαις ὑποδεχόμενος χερσὶ, τῷ κατʼ οὐρανὸν πατρὶ καὶ θεῷ τῶν ὅλων παραπέμπεται, πρῶτος αὐτὸς προσκυνῶν, καὶ μόνος τῷ πατρὶ τὸ κατʼ ἀξίαν ἀπονέμων σέβας, εἶτα δὲ καὶ πᾶσιν ἡμῖν εὐμενῆ διαμένειν καὶ δεξιὸν εἰς ἀεὶ παραιτούμενος.

English · Claude translation

And what would the majestic, great, and unique altar be but the pure holy of holies of the soul of the common priest of all? Standing at its right hand, the great High Priest of all, Jesus himself, the only-begotten of God, receives with bright gaze and upturned hands the sweet-smelling incense from all and the bloodless and immaterial sacrifices offered through prayers, and sends them on to the heavenly Father and God of the universe, himself first worshiping and alone rendering to the Father the reverence due to him, and then asking that he remain always kind and favorable to us all.

About this passage

Source
Dindorf 4:471 · Wilhelm Dindorf, ed., Eusebii Caesariensis Opera, vol. 4: Historiae ecclesiasticae libri I–X (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871) · Greek text: W. Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Leipzig: Teubner, 1871), digitized by the First Thousand Years of Greek project (Open Greek and Latin), CC BY-SA 4.0
Text
As printed in Dindorf, Eusebii Opera 4. 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), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Greek text of Dindorf, Eusebii Caesariensis Opera 4 (Teubner, 1871); made independently of existing English translations.
Compare
Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 1 (1890) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)
Scripture
Topics
Christology, Prayer

Notes

Translation notes

  • The allusions are Heb 4:14, Rom 8:34, and Rev 8:3–4.

Cite this passage

Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 10.4.68 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/10/4/68/).

Plain text
Eusebius, Hist. eccl. 10.4.68 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/eusebius-historia/10/4/68/).

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