Conscience in the early church

Conscience and its role in moral judgment. Part of Ethics.

Dialogue with Trypho 93.1Justin Martyr · ca. 155–160 · All peoples know naturally that adultery, fornication, and murder are wrong.
The Instructor 2.1.10Clement of Alexandria · ca. 190–200 · Christians may accept invitations and eat what is set before them, giving thanks, but should avoid gluttony, refrain for the sake of the weak, and not eat with a brother who lives immorally.
Against Heresies 4.18.3Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · God accepted Abel’s offering and not Cain’s because sacrifice does not sanctify; a pure conscience sanctifies the sacrifice.
Miscellanies 4.15.98Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · Paul, free, made himself a slave to all; the knowing Christian abstains for the weaker brother's conscience, not his own, and does everything to God's glory within the rule of faith.
Miscellanies 6.14.113Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · A good conscience keeps the soul holy toward God and just toward others; such a soul, empowered by the Lord, practices being godlike, gives thanks in reading, prayer, offering, and song, and is never separated from God.
Book of the Laws of Countries 17Anonymous · ca. 196–235
On Idolatry 23Tertullian · ca. 196–211 · Signing a written oath by the gods to secure a loan is a real denial even if nothing is spoken, since the soul dictates what the hand writes, as Zechariah “spoke” in writing.
On First Principles 1.3.6Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · All beings share in God the Father's existence and all rational beings in Christ the Word, who makes them answerable for sin once reason distinguishes good from evil.
On First Principles 2.10.4Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · Each sinner kindles his own fire, fed by his sins as fever by bad food; the punishment is conscience recalling all its crimes and becoming its own accuser.
PG 12:1143 (Ps 4 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · The anger that is an involuntary first movement is not sin, and Aquila’s “be agitated” confirms the reading; Ps 4:4 teaches an examination of conscience at bedtime; “compunction” in Scripture means being stung by sin, as with Ahab.
Commentary on John 2.109Origen · ca. 230–248 · Reason in us is an inseparable teacher; when we misuse it, it judges us.
Commentary on John 20.279Origen · ca. 230–248 · Imitating Christ, we should aim to have a clean conscience since our conversion, even if not since childhood.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 9.7Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · God’s scourges are outward afflictions and the inward scourges of conscience, which are a sign that conversion is near; yet even these must have measure, lest the sinner be overwhelmed by sorrow.
Homilies on Jeremiah 6.2Origen · ca. 240 · God's rebukes scourge the conscience; blessed are those who feel the pain, for insensibility is a sign of a deadened soul, and those who reject God's instruction waste all he has done for them.
On the Shows 3Novatian · mid-3rd cent. (disputed) · Scripture's images of athletes and music do not license the shows; Scripture forbids some things by modestly leaving them unsaid, and conscience should do the rest.
Commentary on Matthew 11.12Origen · ca. 246–248 · Foods are indifferent in themselves; what defiles is evil speech and thought, greed, gluttony, or eating with a doubting conscience what is offered to demons, while the food laws are a shadow of spiritual nourishment.
Commentary on Romans 2.8Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Origen asks which law Paul means (Moses, Christ, human laws, or natural law), argues that Christians are judged by the spiritual sense of the law, and notes that Scripture never says God destroys anyone: people perish by their own doing, and Christ came to seek the lost.
Commentary on Romans 2.9Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · The law written on Gentile hearts is the moral law of natural equity (like the Golden Rule), not the ceremonial law; the heart means the soul's rational power, and conscience is the spirit joined to the soul as its tutor, which may be separated from a disobedient soul after death.
Commentary on Romans 2.10Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · At the judgment the marks that our present thoughts leave on the heart will accuse or defend us before Christ, which refutes Marcion and others who make salvation a matter of the soul's nature.
Commentary on Romans 3.2Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Paul confirms from Scripture that Jews and Gentiles are all under sin, which Origen explains through the natural law that comes with the age of discernment; no one is righteous in God's sight except Christ, and Christians should fear being shamed by virtuous Gentiles.
Commentary on Romans 4.4Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · The inheritance promised to Abraham comes through faith, not through the law of Moses or natural law; against heretics who say the law causes transgression, Origen argues that law reveals but does not cause sin, that the law which 'works wrath' may be the law of sin in our members, and that one who keeps from sin by conscience is better than one restrained only by the law's threat.
Commentary on Romans 6.8Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Origen explains Romans 7:7–13: the law that makes sin known is the natural law in the conscience; the commandment is good, but sin, taking occasion from it, deceived and killed the soul.
Commentary on Romans 7.13Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Origen explains Paul’s wish to be anathema for Israel as Christlike self-offering that was heard (all Israel will be saved), lists Israel’s privileges, and argues from Rom 9:5 that Christ is God over all and that the Trinity is one in nature and substance.
Commentary on Romans 7.18Origen · ca. 244–246 (Rufinus's translation ca. 405–406) · Origen explains why God makes his wrath known but hides his kindness, that vessels of mercy are those who purge themselves, that Israel lost the grace it did not keep and the Gentiles must fear the same, and that God says “not my people” and “sons of the living God” in the conscience.
Fragment on Job, no. 10Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd cent. (disputed) · The “divine spirit” of Job 27:3 is read as the conscience God gives to all.
Church History 5.1.34Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 300–325 · The confessors were upheld by joy and the Spirit; the deniers were tormented by conscience.
Acta Archelai (Latin) 32Hegemonius · early to mid 4th century (Greek original) · Manes retorts that the same complaint would hold for all who lived before Christ; Archelaus answers that the righteous before Moses kept the law written in their hearts, and that the written law was given in mercy.
Divine Institutes 5.19.32Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Christian worship demands a clean conscience before God who sees the heart.
Divine Institutes 6.24.17Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Conscience is a witness one cannot escape.
Acts of Phileas and Philoromus 1.9Anonymous · ca. 306-311
On the Anger of God 8.8Lactantius · ca. 313–314 · Without religion life fills with crime; conscience restrains us when we believe God sees our deeds and hears our thoughts.
Demonstration 15.2Aphrahat · 337-345 · Paul teaches that God's creatures are good and sanctified by the word of God and prayer, so scruples about Gentile food are a weak conscience.
Catechetical Lecture 15.24Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · All humanity, with the countless angels, will stand before the Father, Son and Spirit at the judgment, where each will be convicted by his own conscience.
Moral Rules (Moralia) 18Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-370 · Basil's eighteenth rule: God's commandments must be done in the way the Lord directed, for God's glory, with a good conscience, faithfully in small things, with insatiable desire, and so that others are enlightened.
Tractates on the Psalms 118.15.11Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · All sinners are transgressors, because a natural law, written on every heart, forbids injury, theft, perjury, and adultery.
Tractates on the Psalms 128.11Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The hand signifies works and the bosom the will and conscience, which counts for more, as the widow's coins show; the impious fill neither.
Oration 36.7Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · Gregory answers those who say he is badly thought of: he cares for what he is before God, who sees the heart, not for public opinion, and his people need not be ashamed of insults to him.
Tractates 2.16.1Zeno of Verona · ca. 362-380 · Zeno takes Susanna, condemned by false witnesses and saved by Daniel, as an example that God is with the just.
Hexaemeron 9.3Basil of Caesarea · ca. 370 · Each animal has its own nature and an untaught instinct for self-preservation and foresight, as the ant shows; humans too have a natural law of good and evil.
Commentary on 1 Corinthians 4:4Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Though Paul's conscience is clear, only Christ's judgment can reveal faults hidden even from a holy man.
Commentary on 1 Corinthians 8:7Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Some believers still ate sacrificial meat as if the idol had divine power, defiling their weak conscience.
Commentary on 1 Corinthians 8:12Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Wounding a brother's conscience is sinning 'in Christ', within what belongs to him, though not denying him.
Commentary on 1 Timothy 1:18–20Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Timothy, ordained a bishop according to prophecy, must keep faith and a good conscience; Hymenaeus and Alexander, who blasphemed, were sentenced by Paul and handed to Satan to be punished in body so as to be corrected.
Commentary on Romans 2:16Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Ambrosiaster explains the accusing and defending thoughts as conscience at the judgment, applying them especially to heretics and schismatics who knew the catholic teaching was true and did not follow it, while one who sincerely erred will have a lighter case.
Commentary on Romans 14:22Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · One who eats against his own conviction is condemned, since whatever is not from faith is sin; the strong should keep their faith to themselves and keep peace, leaving the weak to their conscience.
Letter 121.8Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome expounds Rom 7:7-25: the law reveals sin, several kinds of 'law' appear in Scripture including the natural law, and Paul speaks in the person of the repentant sinner.
Letter 148.23Jerome · ca. 370–419 · The writer urges Celantia to guard her reputation as well as her conscience, giving no occasion for slander.
On Cain and Abel 2.18Ambrose · ca. 375-378 · God's word to Cain, "if you offer rightly but do not divide rightly", shows that God looks at the disposition of the offerer; Cain's sadness betrayed his conscience.
On Paradise 68Ambrose · ca. 375-378 · God's walking in the evening is his presence in the Scriptures, heard by the sinner who comes late to shame and tries to hide in his conscience from the God who searches hearts.
On the Lord's Prayer 1141Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 380–394 · To call God “Father” while living in sin is to make him the cause of one’s evils and so to insult him; the sinner’s father is the devil, the father of lies; Christ’s command to say “Father” is a command to live as God’s children.
Apology of the Prophet David 47Ambrose · ca. 384-390 · The wise man keeps his sin always before him, accusing himself; feeling the wound of sin is a sign of life and the way to healing.
Apology of the Prophet David 48Ambrose · ca. 384-390 · A guilty conscience torments, as with Adam, Eve, and Cain; shame at past sin keeps one from repeating it.
On the Life of Moses 389Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 385–395 · The bells and pomegranates are faith and good conscience: faith must ring out in proclaiming the Trinity, while the austere life, like a pomegranate, is bitter outside and sweet within; the tassels are voluntary virtues beyond the commandment, as Paul preached without pay.
Exposition of Psalm 118 1.10.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The secret sinner is like a blind man who thinks he is alone; his own conscience accuses him.
Exposition of Psalm 118 7.13.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · God’s law forbids even hidden doubts about his justice, which conscience will expose at the judgment.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.7.5Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Keep the lamp anointed; conscience is the eye and lamp of the body.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.7.6Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · A clean conscience makes the whole person bright; a dark one darkens the body.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.40.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · God calls creation, men and conscience as witnesses to his commandments.
Exposition of Psalm 118 14.40.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Conscience will force confession before Christ, who knows all.
Exposition of Psalm 118 17.14.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Sinners only seem at peace; a guilty conscience has no quiet.
Letter 47.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine answers the questions on food offered to idols, temple produce and wells, and on acting with an uncertain conscience.
Letter 96.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine renews the request of Bishop Boniface of Cataqua that the emperor grant his church small estates which his predecessor Paul had bought fraudulently while in debt to the treasury.
Letter 140.74Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · The soul cannot be good by its own will but only by God's free mercy; the wise virgins carry the oil of a good conscience, while the foolish depend on the praise of flatterers.
Letter 140.75Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · The wise virgins' reply is humble; their lamps are good works done for God's glory and fed by the oil of a good conscience, while the foolish virgins' lamps fail when human praise is withdrawn.
Homilies on Matthew 42.3John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · When David wronged Uriah he became weak, and Joab’s just vengeance brought him only evils; Chrysostom forbids speaking evil of others even truthfully, and urges each to judge his own soul daily before the tribunal of conscience.
Homilies on Matthew 42.4John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · Each night, alone on his bed, a Christian should judge his own thoughts and deeds; instead we let evil thoughts defile the soul like adulterers, though even the easy parts of virtue, such as not speaking evil, cost no toil.
On Fleeing the World 15Ambrose · ca. 387-391 · Natural and written law show what is good and evil but cannot convert the mind; the final refuge is the death of the High Priest.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 1.52.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The opened books are our consciences, laid bare before Christ.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 35.7.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Abel was just; Cain, the unjust, was tormented by his own conscience.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 35.8.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · A guilty conscience is the heaviest punishment and a self-chosen slavery.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 35.9.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Innocence is sweet; iniquity weighs the conscience down like lead.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 36.14.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Open your conscience to the light, as plants need the sun.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 37.28.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · Our own guilt is the heaviest adversary.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 38.13.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · David kept silent, for a good conscience needs no defense in words.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.22.3Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The womb of the inner man is the heart, where the natural law is kept and done.
On the Catholic Way of Life and the Manichaean Way of Life 2.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 387–389 · Augustine sets out the whole of Romans 14 and 1 Corinthians 8 and 10 to show that Paul's counsel to abstain from meat and wine was for self-restraint, to avoid idol food, and out of love for the weak, not because meat is unclean.
Tractates on Matthew 15.3Chromatius of Aquileia · ca. 388–407 · Chromatius interprets anointing the head as mercy to the poor, done to Christ the head, and washing the face as purity of conscience.
Sermon 12.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Scripture does not say the devil saw God, only that he came into God's sight and heard him, as a blind man can speak with one he cannot see; God is present to every conscience, to the good as father, to the wicked as judge.
Sermon 12.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · God speaks in many ways, through Scripture, signs, lots, prophets, angels, voices, dreams, ecstasy, understanding and conscience; so he could speak to the devil without being seen by him.
Sermon 13.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Whoever seeks judicial power, even by purchase, must first judge himself in the court of his conscience, punishing his sins by repentance, and then judge his neighbor in the same way.
Sermon 47.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · A good conscience is not enough if careless conduct leads a weak brother, who cannot see into one’s conscience, to do wrong.
Sermon 47.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · We must keep both a good conscience and good conduct, so that weak brothers are not misled.
Sermon 47.23Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The evil beasts are the enemies of Scripture; the desert where the sheep dwell in hope is the good conscience, refreshed by streams of remembered Scripture.
Sermon 62.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christians called to the heavenly banquet must not recline at feasts in idol temples, for this leads the weak to idolatry; Paul, the least apostle, is the fringe of Christ’s garment that heals those who touch it.
Sermon 62.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christians who feast in idol temples become stumbling stones to pagans and wound the weak, sinning against Christ, who is God; at such tables they learn to doubt his divinity.
Sermon 93.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The foolish virgins’ oil was human praise; it kept their lamps lit in this life, but at the resurrection, when everyone is taken up with his own case, there is no one to praise them and their lamps go out.
Sermon 93.13Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The wise virgins’ “perhaps there will not be enough” expresses humility: even a good conscience, still needing daily forgiveness, trembles before God’s judgment.
Sermon 106.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ, who heard the Pharisee’s thoughts, rebuked outward washing; even baptism cleanses through faith, which is within, as Acts and 1 Peter show.
Sermon 137.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Augustine refuses requests for dishonest counsel and leaves judgment of his conscience to God; like Ezekiel’s watchman and the servant entrusted with money, the preacher must warn and give, and God will exact the return.
Sermon 149.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The Jewish food laws were shadows of things to come; for Christians cleanness lies in the conscience, as Paul’s rules about meat sacrificed to idols show.
Against Adimantus, a Disciple of Mani 14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 394 · Augustine answers the claim that Deuteronomy's permission to eat meat contradicts the New Testament: the law permits moderate eating, Paul's “good not to eat meat” concerns not offending the weak, and Manichaean abstention from meat as unclean is what 1 Tim 4:3 condemns.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 32.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The inner man's belly is the conscience; it becomes a fountain flowing to others through benevolence toward one's neighbor.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 74.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The Spirit remains with the disciples by being in them, and is known inwardly, as one's own conscience is.
Homilies on the First Epistle of John 6.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 407 · Giving to the poor and even dying can be done without love, as by schismatics seeking glory; the true test is the witness of one's own conscience before God.
Homilies on the First Epistle of John 6.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 407 · We must do good before God, who sees the heart, and not for men's praise; there is no hiding from God, so we should flee to him by confession.
City of God 5.12Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine describes the Romans' love of liberty, domination, and glory, from Sallust and Virgil, and argues that true virtue seeks the testimony of conscience, not human praise.
On the Good of Widowhood 27Augustine of Hippo · ca. 414 · Those living in continence must guard their reputation as well as their conscience, for others' sake, and bear unjust suspicion with joy.
On Man's Perfection in Righteousness 28Augustine of Hippo · ca. 415 · Job's clear conscience means that his faith rejects the sin that still dwells in him; he does good in resisting it, but cannot accomplish perfect good until desire is gone, and he confesses his sins.
Seven Books of History against the Pagans 7.41.1Orosius · ca. 417–418 · Conscience speaks to each.
The Conferences 8.23John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · God implanted the knowledge of the law in human nature from creation; the written law was given later as a help when it had been corrupted, and the patriarchs kept its commands before it was written.
The Conferences 21.22John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Theonas answers that conscience, weighing body and soul fairly, will prevent the festive relaxation from harming chastity, and warns against unjust weights: excessive rigor, stinting God, and demanding more of others or showing more to them than one practices.
Chapter 10Prosper of Aquitaine · ca. 432-433 · Prosper answers Cassian's appeal to Rom 2:14 by arguing that Paul means gentiles renewed by grace, and that the natural wisdom of pagans serves earthly life but cannot justify.