Heaven and eternal reward in the early church

1 Clement 34.8Clement of Rome · ca. 95–97 (range ca. 70–100) · God has prepared unimaginable things for those who wait for him.
Ascension of Isaiah 9.9Anonymous · late 1st–2nd century
Odes of Solomon 11Anonymous · ca. 100–200
2 Clement 11.7Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · The righteous will receive promises beyond imagining.
Apocalypse of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 15Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · The Lord shows Peter the radiant land of the righteous.
Apocalypse of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 19Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · The righteous praise God together in equal glory.
Apocalypse of Peter (Akhmim fragment) 20Anonymous · ca. 100–150 · The Lord names it the place of the righteous.
Epistle of the Apostles 19Anonymous · ca. 140-170 · Christ promises the apostles a rest without food, grief, or decay, and says he put on their flesh and rose in it, as David foretold.
Martyrdom of Justin, Chariton and Companions (Acts of Justin, recension B) 5Anonymous · ca. 165 · Justin hopes for heavenly reward; all refuse to sacrifice and are condemned.
Against Heresies 5.36.1Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · Creation is not annihilated but renewed; in the new heaven and earth the saved will dwell in heaven, in paradise, or in the city, according to their worth, and everywhere see God.
Against Heresies 5.36.2Irenaeus of Lyons · ca. 180–190 · The elders teach that the saved receive different dwellings according to their fruitfulness and ascend through the Spirit to the Son and through the Son to the Father, until God is all in all.
Miscellanies 4.6.36Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · The meek are those who have ended the war of anger and desire within; there are many rewards and dwelling places according to one's life; the laborers in the vineyard show both differing merit and equal salvation.
Miscellanies 4.6.37Clement of Alexandria · ca. 198–203 · The saved will serve in dwelling places proportioned to their merit; Plato describes the purified dwelling above; “blessed are those who mourn” refers to repentance, whether from fear or from conscience, here or hereafter.
Acts of Thomas 23Anonymous · ca. 200–250 · Gad, restored to life, makes the king swear to grant him a request and asks to buy the palace Thomas built for him in heaven.
Acts of Thomas 36Anonymous · ca. 200–250 · Thomas tells the youth that God promises unseen goods beyond wealth and luxury, urges the crowd to lift themselves above earthly things to see Christ, and assures the repentant that sins of ignorance are overlooked.
Pistis Sophia 135Anonymous · 3rd century
The Passion of Perpetua and Felicity 5Anonymous · 203 · Saturus's own record of his vision: carried by angels to a heavenly garden and to the throne of God, the martyrs are asked by their quarreling bishop and presbyter to reconcile them.
Against Marcion 3.24Tertullian · 207/208 (third edition, completed later) · Tertullian describes the thousand-year kingdom in a heavenly Jerusalem after the resurrection, then the heavenly kingdom, and shows that the Creator promised both earthly and heavenly blessings.
On the Soul 55Tertullian · ca. 210 · All souls go to the underworld to await the resurrection, as Christ himself descended there; only martyrs enter paradise at once.
On the Resurrection of the Flesh 58Tertullian · ca. 208–212 · Scripture promises the end of pain and death, and its examples of preserved garments and bodies (Israel in the desert, the three young men, Jonah, Enoch and Elijah) foreshadow the flesh made whole.
On the Crown 15Tertullian · 211 · Christians should keep their heads for the crown God gives the faithful, seen in the visions of Revelation; even initiates of Mithras refuse a crown for their god's sake, to the shame of crowned Christians.
On First Principles 2.3.6Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · “World” has many meanings in Scripture; Christ speaks of another, more glorious world, perhaps a higher sphere enclosing all others, the “good land” promised to the meek, which is not corruptible.
On First Principles 2.3.7Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · Origen leaves the reader to choose among three views of the end: an incorporeal life, bodies transformed into an ethereal state, or a higher “good land” and heaven where the purified dwell and progress.
On First Principles 2.11.6Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · The departed saints are first taught in paradise, a school of souls, and the pure in heart then ascend through the spheres of heaven, learning what is done there and why, following Christ.
On First Principles 2.11.7Origen · ca. 220–230 (Rufinus's translation 398) · In the heavens the saints will learn the nature of the stars and of invisible things, and the rational nature, growing in mind, will come to perfect knowledge, seeing the causes of things face to face.
PG 12:1599 (Ps 118 LXX)Origen · ca. 220-254 · Notes on Psalm 119:85–91 (LXX 118): who interprets Scripture well, life asked as a help toward eternal life, the word that remains in heaven, and God as master of all.
Refutation of All Heresies 10.34.3Hippolytus of Rome · ca. 222–235 · Those who know God will receive an immortal body and soul, the kingdom of heaven, and a share as co-heirs with Christ.
Fragment 10 on John 1:15Origen · ca. 226-254 · On John 1:15–16: Jesus came after John in birth and baptism but was before him as God and maker; all the saints receive only a part from his fullness, and will see God more fully hereafter, as far as creatures can.
Commentary on John 32.397Origen · ca. 230–248 · “Today” promises the thief a place with Christ within the present age.
Exhortation to Martyrdom 13Origen · 235 · Martyrs will pass through the heavens behind Christ and know face to face things greater than Paul heard in paradise and greater than the angels have seen.
On the Witch of Endor 10Origen · ca. 240 · Since Christ has opened the way, Christians who die well no longer go down to Hades to wait, as the ancients did, but pass through the flaming sword into paradise, receiving their wages first though they came last.
Homilies on Joshua 17.1Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The division of the land was a shadow of the heavenly inheritance; when the truth came in Christ, Jerusalem, the temple, and the earthly inheritance were taken away so that the Jews might seek the heavenly Jerusalem and its high priest.
Homilies on Joshua 23.4Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The division of the land by lot foreshadows the heavenly inheritance: the earthly Jerusalem given to Benjamin is a figure of the heavenly city, and the names of places, like the names of angels and patriarchs, are not chance; these mysteries were seen by Paul but are not uttered.
Homilies on Leviticus 7.2Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Christ does not yet drink the wine of gladness because, as our advocate at the heavenly altar, he mourns our sins; he, the apostles, and the saints await the perfection of the whole body, when all are subject to God and the new wine is drunk in the kingdom.
Homilies on Numbers 3.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The Levites camped around the tabernacle point to the heavenly orders of Hebrews 12, and Origen urges his hearers to climb as high among them as they can.
Homilies on Numbers 7.5Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The spies' report of giants in the promised land is read as the Christian's struggle against the spiritual powers who hold the heavenly inheritance, which believers win by faith in Jesus.
Homilies on Numbers 9.8Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The rod's sprout, leaves, blossoms, and nuts figure the fourfold glory of the resurrection body and show that God's promised goods surpass all that can be seen or imagined.
Homilies on Numbers 21.1Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The second census, made for the generation that would inherit, signifies the Gentile people who receive the inheritance from Jesus, not Moses; the Levites, whose inheritance is the Lord, signify those devoted wholly to God’s wisdom, while others receive the higher “land of the living.”
Homilies on Numbers 21.2Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · In the heavenly inheritance the “few” are the more blessed, as the narrowing ark shows; the priests receive God alone as their inheritance; alternatively, one righteous man counts as many and the wicked, however numerous, as few.
Homilies on Numbers 21.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Since some received their inheritance outside the lot, Origen infers that in the kingdom of heaven Christ will give outstanding saints a special share beyond the common lot, as he promised his disciples.
Homilies on Numbers 23.11Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · God keeps the feast of Tabernacles over the soul that lives as a stranger on earth, hastening to its true homeland; in this life all festivals are kept only “in part,” and the perfect festival awaits the world to come, with Christ as its bridegroom.
Homilies on Numbers 28.2Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · As the earthly land had named places, so the heavenly Jerusalem has regions in which the saints will receive their inheritance through Jesus according to their merits; the priests’ lands and the cities of refuge for involuntary sins will also have their heavenly counterparts.
Homilies on Numbers 28.3Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Just as earthly lands differ greatly in fertility, climate, and civilization by God’s hidden judgment, so in the heavens Christ will assign each one a dwelling according to merit, including “cities of refuge.”
Homilies on Numbers 28.4Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · As the nations were distributed at the beginning according to the angels or sons of Israel, so at the end Christ, the last Adam, will distribute his own according to merit; Origen longs for the highest lot, to keep the true festivals in the heavenly Jerusalem and to reign with Christ.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 3.9Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The Lord “knows” only what is good; the days of the spotless are the days of truth, love, and righteousness that each makes for himself, and ultimately the eternal days lit by the sun of righteousness.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 5.4Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The sinner watches the righteous to kill them, as was done to Christ and the martyrs and as the devil does daily, but the Lord will not abandon them; those who wait for him will be exalted to inherit the land above, the “earth” of the higher heaven.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 8.8Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · The prophet asks to know his “end,” the goal of human life (completed with God in heaven), and the number of his days, which are not years of this life but the days of a soul’s journey and the days made in the heart by Christ, the sun of righteousness.
Homilies on Psalms 36-38 8.10Origen · ca. 238–250 (Rufinus's translation ca. 400–410) · Human substance, created from nothing, is nothing before God, though not in comparison with other creatures; “every man living” is vanity in this present life, even for Moses and the prophets, who know only in part, so we should hasten in mind toward the true life of heaven.
Homilies on Jeremiah 8.2Origen · ca. 240 · Christ is God's understanding, as he is God's wisdom, power, and righteousness, one subject with many aspects; the righteous who bear the heavenly image are themselves a heaven, and their good works lead them to heaven.
Homilies on Jeremiah 17.4Origen · ca. 240 · At the end of time the devil's worldly wisdom will be shown to be folly; Christ is the exalted “throne of glory,” our sanctification and endurance, and whoever sins forsakes him, “written on the earth” instead of in heaven.
Homilies on Jeremiah 20.6Origen · ca. 240 · Laughter is a promise for those who weep now, as Isaac's name shows; a preacher's bitter words, which move sinners to weep for their sins, end in the laughter of the blessed.
Metaphrase of Ecclesiastes 12Gregory Thaumaturgus · 3rd century · Paraphrase of Ecclesiastes 12: remember God before the fearful day of judgment; the conclusion is to fear God and keep his commandments.
Against Celsus 3.81Origen · ca. 248 · The blessed life belongs to those who worship God through Jesus, and nothing is better than to entrust oneself to God through his living Word; so ends the third book.
Against Celsus 6.19Origen · ca. 248 · Christians did not borrow the idea of a realm above the heavens from Plato; David, Paul, and the prophets spoke of it first, and Plato may even have learned it from the Hebrews.
Against Celsus 6.20Origen · ca. 248 · Paul, longing for unseen eternal things, found all affliction light, and Christians hope through Jesus, the high priest who passed through the heavens, to contemplate God face to face.
Against Celsus 7.28Origen · ca. 248 · Celsus claims Christians borrowed their hope of a better land from Homer's Elysian plain and Plato's pure earth, but Origen answers that Moses, older than all Greek writing, promised a good land that is not earthly Judaea.
Against Celsus 7.29Origen · ca. 248 · The good land promised by Moses is not earthly Judaea, which shares in the curse on the earth, but the heavenly Jerusalem that the Psalms promise to the meek and righteous.
Against Celsus 7.30Origen · ca. 248 · Plato's picture of precious stones in the higher earth probably came from Isaiah's description of God's jewelled city; Christians did not borrow from Plato, and Haggai distinguishes “the earth” from the “dry land” we live on.
Commentary on Matthew, Latin Series 62Origen · ca. 244–249 (Latin translation, 4th–5th century) · Faithful stewards will share Christ's rule over all his possessions, each over a part, while bad stewards who abuse fellow servants under pretext of church service will be “cut in two,” their spirit returning to God and soul and body punished.
Fragment Z IV (on Rev 22:3)Dionysius of Alexandria · ca. 248–265 · On Rev 22:4: the blessed will see God face to face, as the apostles did, according to Dionysius.
In Praise of Martyrdom 9Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Christians, detached from this life, must not hesitate to die for Christ, since heaven opens to martyrs' blood and their crown is the most complete.
In Praise of Martyrdom 18Anonymous · 3rd cent. (disputed) · Abraham's readiness to sacrifice Isaac, and Christ who suffered first and makes martyrs coheirs of his kingdom, show that any suffering is small beside the promised glory.
On Mortality 5Cyprian of Carthage · 252–253 · Rather than cling to a life of daily struggle, Christians should long for the joy of seeing Christ, which he promised no one could take away.
On Mortality 26Cyprian of Carthage · 252–253 · Christians are strangers here whose homeland is paradise, where loved ones, apostles, prophets, martyrs, virgins, and the merciful await them; they should long to go there.
To Fortunatus 12Cyprian of Carthage · 253 or 257 · Scripture promises the righteous and the martyrs immortality, vindication, and a share in Christ's reign, and the same reward awaits those who stayed faithful without being killed.
To Fortunatus 13Cyprian of Carthage · 253 or 257 · The glory to come far outweighs present suffering, and even those who die in peace with a faith prepared for martyrdom will be rewarded.
Acts of Fructuosus, Augurius and Eulogius 5Anonymous · 259 (21 January) · Two Christian slaves of the governor see the martyrs ascend crowned into heaven and show them to his daughter, but the governor is not worthy to see them.
Acts of Fructuosus, Augurius and Eulogius 7Anonymous · 259 (21 January) · The martyrs appear in glory to the governor who condemned them, and the account closes with praise of the martyrs and a doxology.
Passion of Marian and James 8Anonymous · 259 · Aemilian's vision: his pagan brother questions him about the martyrs' rewards.
Symposium 4.5Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd century · The virgins, who set their hopes on heaven, are the heavenly Jerusalem that God promises to set first at the beginning of joy after the resurrection.
Symposium 7.3Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd century · All believers will be rewarded in ranks, but the virgins, whose lifelong contest is like martyrdom, are the first rank, the one chosen dove of the Song among queens and concubines.
Symposium 8.2Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd century · Virgins, winged by their longing for the heavenly meadows, despise earthly goods and even torture, and at death angels escort them first to their reward.
Symposium 8.3Methodius of Olympus · late 3rd century · In heaven the virgins behold and eat from the living trees of the virtues themselves, as Adam once did in paradise.
Church History 10.4.70Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 300–325 · No mortal can worthily praise the heavenly Jerusalem where angels and the firstborn worship God, for it surpasses all human sight and thought.
Recognitions 1.51Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · Peter teaches that Christ came at the end of the world to invite the righteous to the heavenly Jerusalem, while the wicked will be punished.
Recognitions 1.52Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · Peter explains that Christ was present to the righteous of every generation; some were translated to paradise, and the souls of others await the resurrection in happy regions.
Recognitions 2.68Anonymous · Greek original 3rd–4th century; Rufinus's Latin translation before 407 · Peter teaches that above the visible firmament is an eternal higher heaven, which will appear to the saints when the visible one passes away.
Divine Institutes 4.25.10Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · God showed the way to overcome the flesh, rewarding victors with immortality.
Divine Institutes 5.17.16Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Without eternal reward, virtue would be folly.
Divine Institutes 6.4.1Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · The way of virtue leads to heaven, the left way to Tartarus.
Divine Institutes 7.27.2Lactantius · ca. 303–311 · Heaven's reward far outweighs present sufferings.
Preparation for the Gospel 11.38.6Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · The holy rise to a pure dwelling, the philosophers to still fairer ones.
Preparation for the Gospel 11.38.7Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · Plato’s indescribable dwellings echo 1 Cor 2:9.
Preparation for the Gospel 11.38.9Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · Plato’s eternal punishment and blessedness match Scripture.
Preparation for the Gospel 12.6.16Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 313–324 · The pious philosopher’s soul is sent to the Islands of the Blessed.
Epitome of the Divine Institutes 54.3Lactantius · ca. 314–320 · The two ways of life and death are in this life, leading to heaven or eternal punishment.
Demonstration of the Gospel 3.2.10Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 314–324 · Moses promised the holy land; Christ promised a heavenly land, the kingdom of heaven.
Theophany 1.73Eusebius of Caesarea · ca. 325–337
Tricennial Oration (In Praise of Constantine) 6.18Eusebius of Caesarea · 335–336 · Constantine's thirtieth year foreshadows the good things of the heavenly kingdom, full of lights brighter than the sun.
Tricennial Oration (In Praise of Constantine) 6.19Eusebius of Caesarea · 335–336 · In heaven life is endless and free of grief, lit not by sun or moon but by the Word himself.
Demonstration 14.22Aphrahat · 337-345 · Desire led Adam to sin though all paradise was his; the righteous will rest in paradise and the land of life when this earth and firmament pass away.
Demonstration 20.12Aphrahat · 337-345 · Abraham's bosom is the kingdom of heaven; the great abyss means no repentance after death, and Israel's refusal of Moses and the risen Jesus is foreshadowed.
Demonstration 22.12Aphrahat · 337-345
Demonstration 22.13Aphrahat · 337-345
Demonstration 22.19Aphrahat · 337-345
Demonstration 22.24Aphrahat · 337-345
Catechetical Lecture 18.30Cyril of Jerusalem · ca. 350 · Eternal life comes from the Father through the Son in the Spirit; Cyril closes the Lenten lectures and announces the lectures on the mysteries to be given in Easter week.
That One Must Die for the Son of God 2Lucifer of Cagliari · ca. 356–361 · Lucifer declares that the martyrs Constantius has killed in Alexandria and elsewhere are in paradise, that the bishops have resolved to die rather than deny the Son, and that Christ, who protected the youths in the furnace, makes his martyrs stronger under torture.
That One Must Die for the Son of God 15Lucifer of Cagliari · ca. 356–361 · Closing his work, Lucifer says that those who love God gladly endure brief evils for eternal rewards, that the bishops' power to bind condemns the emperor rather than he them, and that Constantius's repentance after death will be in vain.
Homilies on the Psalms 14.1Basil of Caesarea · ca. 360-378 · Basil expounds Ps 15:1–3: the sojourner treats the flesh as a lodging and life as exile; the holy mountain is the heavenly Zion; blamelessness and working righteousness, truth in the heart and guileless speech, and doing no harm or reproach to one's neighbor mark the perfect man.
Tractates on the Psalms 60.5Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The inheritance is eternal life for all who fear God; the king's reign until his enemies are subdued spans the generations up to the regeneration, while he himself remains eternally before God.
Tractates on the Psalms 64.5Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Many are called but few chosen, the chosen being those in the wedding garment of baptism; there are many mansions of differing glory, and all the worthy share heavenly honour.
Tractates on the Psalms 91.10Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The true Sabbath is eternal rest, prepared for now by prayer, reading, fasting, humility, good works, chastity, and patience, as the Jews prepare on the eve of the Sabbath.
Tractates on the Psalms 118.8.8Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · As people long to see kings, the psalmist burns to see God, whose sight will transform the saints from glory to glory.
Tractates on the Psalms 119.17Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Truly to value heaven is to long for it, so the psalmist grieves that his sojourning on earth is prolonged.
Tractates on the Psalms 119.18Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Like Paul and the saints, the psalmist longs to leave the body and dwell with God, praying for the coming of the kingdom.
Tractates on the Psalms 121.1Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Hilary begins Psalm 121 [122]: whoever hopes for the heavenly Jerusalem, built of living stones, rejoices at what was said to him.
Tractates on the Psalms 121.2Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The joy is that we shall go into the Lord's house, the free and heavenly Jerusalem, not the earthly city.
Tractates on the Psalms 126.2Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · Because the return from Babylon was followed by worse ruin, the psalm must speak of eternal hopes: the heavenly Jerusalem and the Lord's kingdom.
Tractates on the Psalms 127.11Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · The full goods of Zion and Jerusalem await the age to come, when we shall see face to face and enjoy peace after the devil's defeat.
Tractates on the Psalms 147.6Hilary of Poitiers · ca. 360–367 · In the eternal kingdom there will be no grief or change, but good things beyond sight, hearing, and thought, when God's Spirit melts all the winter of this world.
Commentary on Ephesians 1.3Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · God, the Father of Christ, has become our Father through Christ, and his blessing is spiritual and heavenly, so that earthly sufferings do not contradict it.
Commentary on Ephesians 4.10Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Christ who descended to the depths ascended above all the heavens, of which Victorinus holds there are three, and by his passion, resurrection, and ascension filled and perfected all things.
Commentary on Philippians 3.20Marius Victorinus · ca. 360–363 · Unlike those who mind earthly things, believers have their citizenship in heaven, from which Christ came in the flesh and from which they await him as Savior and Judge.
Oration 16.9Gregory of Nazianzus · ca. 362–383 · At the last judgment there will be no advocate or second chance; the righteous will see the Trinity, which Gregory calls the kingdom of heaven, and the wicked will suffer separation from God and endless shame.
Homilies 19.4Basil of Caesarea · ca. 363-378 · Each of the forty answers only “I am a Christian”; they reject the governor's flattery and bribes, preferring the crown of righteousness and fearing only Gehenna.
Commentary on 2 Corinthians 12:2Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Paul's rapture to the third heaven took him beyond the visible heavens into the spiritual heavens, whether in or out of the body.
Commentary on 2 Corinthians 12:3–5Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Paul was caught up a second time into the heavenly paradise; like John, he speaks of himself indirectly and boasts only in his weaknesses.
Commentary on Colossians 1:11–13Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Believers should grow in knowledge and patience, giving thanks to God, who rescued them from the darkness of the underworld into his Son's kingdom; since Christ's victory, the faithful who die are led to heaven.
Commentary on Philippians 1:22–26Ambrosiaster · ca. 366–384 · Though Paul longs to depart and be with Christ, he chooses, out of love, to remain for the Philippians' progress.
Question 3, section 2Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Moses’ order of creation shows that nothing is coeternal with God: earlier things are weaker, stronger things later; the first heaven is the spiritual one and the earth is matter.
Question 105, section 5Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Those who leave everything for Christ receive sevenfold now and greater glory in the resurrection, shining like the sun and moon of Isaiah, with differences of glory among the saints remaining.
Question 111, section 7Ambrosiaster · ca. 370–384 · Those innocent in deed and pure in faith ascend to heaven at death and return with the heavenly Jerusalem at the judgment, while the ungodly and sinners cannot bear the sight of the Lord in glory.
Letter 22.41Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome closes by picturing the heavenly welcome of the virgin by Mary, Thecla, and Christ the Bridegroom, with the virgins who follow the Lamb.
Letter 39.7Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome imagines Blesilla speaking from heaven, urging her mother not to grieve but to please Christ.
Letter 118.6Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome urges Julian not to be half monk and half worldling, reminding him that life is short and that Lazarus, not the rich man, was comforted after death.
Letter 124.11Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome reports Origen’s view in book 4 that souls descend from the heavenly Jerusalem as if dying into lower worlds, so that hell and heaven are relative, and that the saints will fight hostile powers at the end.
Letter 129.1Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Answering Dardanus, Jerome argues that the true land of promise is the “land of the living” of the Psalms and the Beatitudes, not the land of Judaea that David already ruled.
Letter 129.2Jerome · ca. 370–419 · Jerome identifies the land of the living with paradise, opened by Christ's blood, and supports a spiritual reading from Malachi, Isaiah, the Psalms, Ezekiel, and Proverbs.
Panarion (Adversus Haereses), Haer. 1-64 31.30.8Epiphanius of Salamis · 374-377 · The righteous and the repentant will receive life, incorruption and glory.
On Paradise 1Ambrose · ca. 375-378 · Paradise, which Paul saw and could not describe, is beyond our power to explain, and we should leave it as Paul's secret.
On Paradise 2Ambrose · ca. 375-378 · God himself planted paradise, as Genesis says; the good planting is that of angels and saints.
On Paradise 4Ambrose · ca. 375-378 · Eden means delight; its river is the Spirit watering the saints in the heavenly Jerusalem.
On Paradise 53Ambrose · ca. 375-378 · Placed opposite paradise to keep its memory, man may be caught up to it, as Paul was, by ascending from the bodily to the spiritual, as the penitent thief entered it with Christ.
To a Young Widow, section 7John Chrysostom · ca. 380-386 · Chrysostom urges the widow to store her wealth in heaven, reminds her that her husband's hoped-for prefecture was uncertain and dangerous, and promises that by imitating his life she will be joined to him again in a union better than marriage.
On the Beatitudes 1209Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 380–394 · The earth promised after the kingdom of heaven is not this earth but the land above the heavens; Christ uses familiar words like “kingdom” and “earth” because the goods beyond sense cannot be named in their own terms.
On the Beatitudes 1211Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 380–394 · David, the meekest of men, spoke of “the land of the living,” the heavenly earth free of death and sin; but since speed and vigour are praised elsewhere, as in Paul’s running and boxing, Gregory asks what kind of meekness is blessed.
Book of Heresies 150.7Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · Rewards differ according to faith and labour.
Book of Heresies 150.9Philastrius of Brescia · ca. 380s · There are degrees of future reward.
Canons on the Letters of Paul 90Priscillian · ca. 380–400 · The righteous will reign for ever with God and Christ in incorruptible bodies.
On the Complaints of Job and David 3.3Ambrose · ca. 383-390 · God is good to the upright in heart, who see his goodness in eternal rewards even amid suffering, as Job, Peter, and Paul taught.
On the Life of Moses 407Gregory of Nyssa · ca. 385–395 · The hole in the rock is the heavenly house prepared for those who finish the race; the rock is Christ, in whom all good is found, and God’s hand is the only-begotten Son; to see God’s back is to follow behind God, as the Psalms and Christ’s call “Follow me” teach.
On the Duties of the Clergy 1.15Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · The parable of the rich man and Lazarus and Paul’s crown show that rewards and punishments are given after death, after the contest of this life.
On the Duties of the Clergy 1.16Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · Rewards come after the contest, as the Beatitudes promise; the prosperity of the wicked only removes their excuse at the judgment, as with Judas.
On the Duties of the Clergy 2.1Ambrose · ca. 386–390 · Book 2 opens: the blessed life, which Scripture calls eternal life, lies in the honourable and in seeking reward from God alone, not from human glory.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.11.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · God gives himself at once as reward, as Christ promised the thief paradise “today.”
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.12.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Christ promises paradise to all who confess him, but “today” to the martyr.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.12.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · When the believer is freed from this body of death, Christ will say to him too, “Today you will be with me in paradise.”
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.22.3Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · To see God, cleanse the heart; God shows himself to the pure when they have put off the body.
Exposition of Psalm 118 8.59.2Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · The heaven of heaven is pure; the lower, airy heaven between sky and earth holds the evil spirits.
Exposition of Psalm 118 11.27.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · On verse 88: the psalmist asks for eternal life, which cannot be found in this body.
Exposition of Psalm 118 22.25.1Ambrose · ca. 386-397 · Full praise belongs to the life to come, when we are conformed to Christ’s glorious body.
Letter 55.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine explains the sabbath as a figure of eternal rest, which is active and untroubled, and the Lord's day, the eighth and first, as the restored, eternal life.
Letter 92.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine explains that in the resurrection hearts will be open to one another in the light of God, who is seen by purified minds, not bodily eyes.
Letter 92.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine refutes those who claim that God will be seen with bodily eyes, even by the wicked, arguing from Scripture that only the pure in heart will see God, and that with the inner man.
Letter 103.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Nectarius welcomes Augustine's call to the heavenly city but argues that the earthly fatherland must not be deserted, since those who serve it are rewarded in heaven.
Letter 130.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · In this dark life the Christian soul should count itself desolate and keep praying, looking to Scripture until it sees God in the true life to come, where prayer will give way to contemplation.
Letter 130.27Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · The one thing, eternal contemplation of God, may be asked with certainty, yet even it surpasses understanding, so we know only what it is not.
Letter 138.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · God sent the cross of Christ as help against moral corruption; Rome's civic virtues built an earthly city, but true religion makes people citizens of the city whose king is truth and whose law is love.
Letter 147.20Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · The godly long to see God not in the forms he assumes but in his own substance, as Moses asked; this is promised for the next life, when we shall see him as he is.
Letter 147.22Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · If angels see God as he is, we shall too when made equal to them; Ambrose's 'form is seen, power is declared' points to an ineffable vision of the mind.
Letter 147.23Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Ambrose's 'we lack the grace of seeing God' refers to this age, when God appeared only to a few; in the age to come all who inherit the kingdom will see him.
Letter 147.27Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Only God can make the mind grasp an invisible reality seen by the pure heart; this vision belongs to the righteous in eternal life, which is to know the one true God.
Letter 147.37Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Augustine summarizes: God is invisible by nature but appears in chosen forms; his children will see him as he is, as the angels do, with the eyes of the heart.
Letter 155.12Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · Civic virtues become true when referred to the worship of God, and in eternal life the four virtues will be one: clinging to God.
Letter 189.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 386–430 · By love the saints and martyrs pleased God, and believers advance toward the vision of God, which surpasses all created beauty.
Homilies on Matthew 12.3John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The Spirit appeared as a dove for gentleness and to recall the dove of the flood, bringing adoption instead of an olive leaf; it took a form, not a nature, so is not inferior to Christ; Christian baptism, unlike John's, gives the Spirit and makes us sons of God, so we must live as citizens of heaven and store our treasure there.
Homilies on Matthew 54.6John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · God’s commands to the merciful are easy, and the prize of Isaiah’s promised “early light” unfolds into all the joys of heaven and deliverance from Gehenna, so no sacrifice should keep us from showing mercy.
Homilies on Matthew 76.4John Chrysostom · ca. 390 · The angels gather the risen saints and the clouds catch them up; Chrysostom laments that the parables that follow threaten us with the loss of heaven for want of a little effort, and urges his hearers to give to Christ what they must lose anyway, since he repays more than any borrower.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 36.20.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The land promised is the heavenly land of the living.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 36.20.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The heavenly land, like paradise, endures for those who keep God's word.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 36.45.1Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The land the just possess is the heavenly land flowing with milk and honey.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 36.45.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The honey of that land is the end of sorrow; its milk is the light of God.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 38.17.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The number of days is that of the many mansions in the Father's house.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 38.17.4Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The saints ascend by stages through the heavens.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.19.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · In paradise with Christ there is no fear of falling as Adam fell.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 39.19.3Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The redeemed will be where Christ is, safe from Satan, who is cast down and bound.
Explanation of Twelve Psalms 47.23.2Ambrose · ca. 387-397 · The “steps” are the many dwellings of heaven, assigned by order of merit.
Sermon on the Eight Beatitudes 1Chromatius of Aquileia · ca. 388-407 · Preaching on a market day, Chromatius offers the beatitudes as pearls for sale and as steps of precious stone leading to the kingdom of heaven.
Tractates on Matthew 3.6Chromatius of Aquileia · ca. 388–407 · Chromatius explains the blessings of the merciful, who will receive mercy, and of the pure in heart, who will see God face to face in the kingdom.
On True Religion 53Augustine of Hippo · ca. 389–391 · Those who love the true ends of knowledge, action, and bodily life, namely truth, peace, and health, receive a foretaste of them now and their perfection after the resurrection.
Sermon 16.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · "Who is the man who wants life and to see good days?" refers to eternal life; the commands of the Psalm lead to the peace the world does not have, while this present life, however long, slips away even as it comes.
Sermon 16.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · People love their estates to be good more than their lives; a good life should be preferred to a long one, for eternal life follows, and here we must redeem the time, even at temporal cost.
Sermon 19.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Recovering, the psalmist asks what he has in heaven and what he wanted on earth: earthly riches are worthless beside heaven, whose reward is God himself, more beautiful than all creation.
Sermon 21.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The righteous rejoice in the Lord even now in hope, before they see him; unlike earthly loves, which disappoint when obtained, God when seen will surpass all that hope imagined.
Sermon 23.16Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · We shall see God as he is, not in a passing appearance as at Mamre or Sinai, and this by grace, not merit.
Sermon 37.32Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · When the Church’s labors are over, works of mercy will cease, for there will be no misery; her whole activity will be to see and praise God.
Sermon 45.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Obscure passages of Scripture must be read by clear ones; the promised land is the land of the living, sown here by alms to the poor, whose bread is Christ.
Sermon 45.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Our flesh, though it is grass, will be changed into gold, made like the angels; then there will be no more labor or groaning, only praise, which we now possess in hope.
Sermon 53.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Only the clean of heart are promised the vision of God, the end that perfects all our desire; the heart’s eyes, enlightened now by faith, will then see God face to face.
Sermon 53.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · All the blessed are the same people and all will see God, but the vision belongs to the clean heart, as seeing belongs to the eyes among the body’s members.
Sermon 53.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · God cannot both sit on heaven and measure it with his palm if he has a body; “heaven” means the saints, whose hearts are lifted up and who are God’s seat.
Sermon 60.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · As the world is falling, God counsels us to move our treasure to heaven by giving to the poor, as a friend would counsel moving grain from damp ground to higher ground.
Sermon 60.8Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Those who lost their wealth to invaders regret not having sent it ahead; the poor are our porters, carrying what we give to heaven, for Christ receives it.
Sermon 87.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The denarius is eternal life, equal for all, though the saints will shine with different degrees of glory.
Sermon 103.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · In the homeland there will be no one to serve, only the feast Mary chose, where Christ, having passed over through his Passion, will make his servants recline and will serve them.
Sermon 104.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ did not blame Martha’s work but distinguished the offices: works of mercy answer needs that will cease in the world to come, while Mary chose the one thing, God himself, which remains forever.
Sermon 111.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The three measures of meal are the human race descended from Noah’s three sons; the saved are few compared with the lost, but many in themselves, a heap of grain that will fill the barn of heaven, a multitude no one can number.
Sermon 127.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Even life without sickness and pain would be worth buying with oneself, but eternal life is more than can be said; Christ, through whom all times were made, is the Son always begotten and always with the Father.
Sermon 169.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Martha's good service of the saints will pass away, but Mary chose the better part, contemplation of the Word, the one thing that will not be taken away and that Paul had not yet attained.
Sermon 170.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Perfect righteousness comes only when we see God's face, whose sweetness overcomes all desire; until then believers must wait patiently, for little time remains compared with the ages that have passed.
Sermon 179.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Mary's part does not pass, for she was fed on truth, receiving crumbs of the full feast to come; indeed she was eating Christ himself, the truth and the bread from heaven.
Sermon 179.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Bodily service will pass, but the food of truth grows into the full banquet of the kingdom, where Christ will serve his saints; the hearers' present delight in truth, though they see no bodily form, foreshadows that sweeter joy.
Sermon 194.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The riches hidden in Christ's poverty will be revealed when we see God; then we shall be like him and fully satisfied.
Sermon 231.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Happiness is not found on earth, as Christ, who found only our misery here, showed; he invites us to his heavenly table and gives his death as a pledge of his life.
Sermon 236.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Christ, recognized as a guest in the breaking of bread, is received in every needy Christian; in heaven all need will end, and our whole business will be the praise of God.
Sermon 243.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · In the resurrection thoughts will be open to all, for no one will think evil; the saints will know one another, even those never seen, by a knowledge like the prophets’.
Sermon 252.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The 153 fish signify the future Church in the heavenly Jerusalem, where hearts will lie open and no bad person can enter.
Sermon 255.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Martha’s life of necessity stretches us apart, Mary’s one thing stretches us out toward God; in the end that one thing, God himself, will be all things to us, and the ungodly will not see his glory.
Sermon 255.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The carnal soul fears a heaven without food or marriage, but such desires are like a sick man’s cravings, which health removes; immortality will remove them all, and God will be all in all.
Sermon 294.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · There is no middle place between the kingdom on the right and eternal fire on the left at the judgment; since the kingdom is eternal life, an infant excluded from the kingdom cannot have eternal life.
Sermon 297.8Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · If we love life, let us choose a good one now and a happy one later; we want everything good except ourselves, and those who sin, even kill or remarry adulterously, to preserve this wretched life lose eternal life.
Sermon 298.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Paul rejoiced to be ‘sacrificed’, longing to be dissolved and be with Christ; he passed through narrow sufferings to the place of breadth, and the crown owed to him follows the grace, not owed, that made the persecutor an apostle.
Sermon 301.8Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · What awaits the righteous in heaven cannot be explained; so believers should not envy the wicked or count worldly riches happiness, which is a burden and a danger, but pass beyond everything changeable to the unchangeable God.
Sermon 303.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Heavenly rewards are promised not only to martyrs but to all who follow Christ in faith and love; meditating on the glory of reigning with Christ makes the mind unconquerable, and faith ready for martyrdom is crowned even in peace.
Sermon 306.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · The rich young man asked for eternal life, thinking he already had a happy one, but Christ answered ‘if you want to come to life’, since only a life that is both eternal and happy deserves the name.
Sermon 306.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 391-430 · Life and health that might end are not true life, for fear torments; true life is both eternal and happy, certain to last, in God’s just and everlasting kingdom, which the good seek confidently by keeping the commandments.
Against Jovinianus 2.20Jerome · 393 · Jovinian's argument continues: the stars of 1 Cor 15, the members of the body, the prodigal son, and the laborers in the vineyard show equal reward.
Against Jovinianus 2.27Jerome · 393 · Jerome argues from the indwelling of Christ, the least and greatest in the kingdom, and Jacob's ladder that there are degrees among the saved and that one can fall.
Against Jovinianus 2.28Jerome · 393 · Jerome rejects Jovinian's reading of the "many dwellings" as churches and argues from the priesthood, Ezekiel, and the angelic orders that there are ranks in heaven.
Against Jovinianus 2.32Jerome · 393 · Jerome interprets the denarius paid to all the laborers as the one deliverance through baptism, after which rewards differ by works.
Confessions 9.23Augustine of Hippo · ca. 397–401 · At Ostia, Augustine and Monica talk together at a window about the eternal life of the saints.
Against Faustus the Manichaean 15.11Augustine of Hippo · ca. 398–400 · Augustine says the church trusts God's final promise of eternal praise because his earlier promises, such as the blessing of all nations and Psalm 45's bride, are fulfilled, and calls the Manichaeans to return.
Letters 2.8Sulpicius Severus · ca. 397–406 · Martin is now among the apostles, prophets, and martyrs who follow the Lamb.
Letters 2.17Sulpicius Severus · ca. 397–406 · The vision shows that heaven is open to Martin’s followers, but Sulpicius fears his sins will keep him from following.
On Catechizing the Uninstructed 17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–405 · The model address continues: true Christians seek eternal rest and come to love God more than they fear hell; God's seventh-day rest signifies the saints' rest in him after six ages, made possible by Christ who became man.
On Catechizing the Uninstructed 25Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–405 · The model address ends with the resurrection of the body, eternal punishment and the eternal vision of the Trinity, and warnings against temptations from pagans, heretics, Jews, and especially bad Christians within the Church, urging the candidate to join the good and hope in God alone.
On the Trinity 1.8Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–419 · Augustine explains that the Son's being 'subjected' to the Father and 'handing over the kingdom' (1 Cor 15) mean that Christ will bring believers to the contemplation of God, in which Father, Son and Spirit are seen together, since none of them can be shown or enjoyed apart from the others.
On the Trinity 1.10Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–419 · Augustine explains that when Christ hands over the kingdom, believers will pass from faith to the contemplation of the whole Trinity, prefigured by Mary of Bethany, and Christ as priest will no longer need to intercede for them.
On the Trinity 1.13Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–419 · Augustine argues that at the judgment Christ will appear to good and wicked alike in the form of the Son of Man, while the vision of his divine form, the highest good and eternal life, is reserved for the pure in heart; this explains 'the Father judges no one' and 'no one is good but God alone.'
On the Trinity 13.7Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–419 · In this life faith is needed, for only in the life to come will the good live as they will; the philosophers' boast of living as they will is pitiable, and happiness requires immortality.
On the Trinity 14.9Augustine of Hippo · ca. 399–419 · With Cicero's Hortensius Augustine asks whether the four virtues continue in the life to come, holding that justice and in some form the others remain, though their present works will pass.
Christian Questions to the Greeks 5Anonymous · 5th century (disputed) · The Christian asks how God can dwell in an unbegotten heaven that is not his; the Greek answers that God does not dwell in heaven at all, explaining Homer's language as a figure; the Christian replies that the heaven is called God's house and throne to mark it as his creature, imperishable now by his will until the renewal of all things.
Questions and Answers to the Orthodox 93–94Anonymous · 5th century (disputed) · The waters above the firmament protect it from the luminaries' heat, steady it, and temper the air; at the end the present heaven and earth will pass away for a new creation, as Scripture's images of the rolled-up scroll and worn-out garment show, refuting those who call the heaven eternal.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.1Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · Augustine opens Book 12 with the question of Paul's rapture to the third heaven and paradise (2 Cor 12), noting that Paul himself did not know whether he was in the body.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · Augustine distinguishes bodies, images of bodies, and incorporeal realities seen by the mind, and insists that Paul knew for certain he was caught up to the third heaven, doubting only whether in the body.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.4Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · What Paul saw was truly the third heaven, not a bodily sign or a dream image, for he carefully distinguishes what he knows from what he does not know.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · Paul saw the third heaven itself, not an image; what he did not know was whether his soul remained in his living body or left it as in death during the vision.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.26Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · Beyond spiritual visions, the soul may be raised to intellectual vision, where truth is seen without images, virtue is simply to love what one sees, and God's glory is seen “mouth to mouth,” as with Moses.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.28Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · If the third heaven is intellectual vision, there God's glory is seen face to face by the pure in heart; Paul may have been shown the eternal life to come, which may also be called paradise.
Literal Commentary on Genesis 12.34Augustine of Hippo · ca. 401–415 · Paradise may mean any place where souls fare well—a good conscience, the church, Abraham's bosom; the underworld is pictured as “below” because it is the place of sorrow; the third heaven, the vision of God by the mind, may be the paradise of paradises.
On Holy Virginity 26Augustine of Hippo · 401 · The equal denarius of the parable is eternal life, common to all the saints, while the many mansions mark their different glories.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 19.18Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · At the bodily resurrection the good and the wicked will be openly separated, and after judging in the form of a servant Christ will show the form of God to those who love him.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 21.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · At the judgment all will see Christ's human form; the form of God, equal to the Father, is kept for the righteous who go into eternal life.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 21.15Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Christ promised to show himself, in the form of God, to those who love him; eternal life is to know the one true God and Jesus Christ.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 48.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The pasture of Christ's sheep is eternal life, entered by faith and reached by dying as believers.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 53.12Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Isaiah saw Christ's glory only in a figure; the Son is invisible in the form of God and became visible in the form of a servant; the pure in heart will see God as he is.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 67.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The many dwelling places are different degrees of glory within the one eternal life, shared by all through love without envy.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 101.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · The joy no one will take away is the eternal vision of God, the fruit of contemplation to which all action is directed, which the church now travails to bring forth.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 105.3Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · Eternal life is knowing the one true God, the Trinity; the Son glorifies the Father by making him known, and God's highest glorification will be the full knowledge of him in eternal life.
Tractates on the Gospel of John 111.2Augustine of Hippo · ca. 406–420 · To be with Christ means to be in heaven with the risen Christ and, beyond all bodily images, to see him as God, which the blessed alone enjoy.
Homilies on the First Epistle of John 4.5Augustine of Hippo · ca. 407 · We are already God's children, but what we shall be is not yet seen; the pure in heart will see Christ as God, while the wicked will see only the form of a servant at the judgment.
Homilies on the First Epistle of John 10.6Augustine of Hippo · ca. 407 · All things short of God are stopping-places on the way; the end is seeing God, and the 'broad commandment' is love, which no one can take away and which delights more than worldly pleasures.
City of God 5.17Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine argues that Roman conquest brought the conquered little real harm or benefit, and that Christians should not boast of sacrifices for a far greater city.
City of God 19.11Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine explains that the end of the city of God may be called peace as well as eternal life, and best “peace in eternal life” or “eternal life in peace,” since Jerusalem means “vision of peace.”
City of God 20.16Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · After the judgment the present world will be transformed by fire into a new heaven and earth fitted to immortal bodies; the vanished sea may figure the stormy life of this world.
City of God 20.17Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · The new Jerusalem without tears or death belongs to the world to come, not to the present reign of the church, whose saints still weep and sin.
City of God 20.22Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · The saints will “go out” to see the punishment of the wicked not by moving bodily but by knowledge; Augustine notes different views on the fire and the worm and defers the question.
City of God 22.29Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine discusses how the saints will see God: certainly with the spirit, and perhaps also through their spiritual bodies, which may see God present in all things as we now see life in living bodies.
City of God 22.30Augustine of Hippo · 413–426 · Augustine concludes the work with the eternal happiness of the city of God: the praise of God who is all in all, a freedom that can no longer sin, and the final seventh-day Sabbath and eternal eighth day of rest, vision, love, and praise.
On the Soul and Its Origin 2.14Augustine of Hippo · ca. 419–420 · Victor separates paradise and the Father’s mansions from the kingdom of heaven to give unbaptized infants a blessed place, citing the thief and Dinocrates.
On the Soul and Its Origin 2.16Augustine of Hippo · ca. 419–420 · Victor goes further, allowing unbaptized souls the kingdom of heaven after the resurrection while admitting that Christ’s words in John 3:5 oppose it.
On the Soul and Its Origin 3.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 419–420 · Christ’s words to Nicodemus exclude the unreborn from the kingdom of God itself, so no mansion of God’s house is open to them.
Against Two Letters of the Pelagians 3.17Augustine of Hippo · ca. 420–421 · Augustine explains that sinlessness and perfect wisdom after the resurrection are not new commandments to be fulfilled but the reward for keeping the commandments now.
Commonitorium 2.301–330Orientius of Auch · ca. 420-450 · The wicked are punished even before the judgment, and idolaters most of all, with undying worms and smoke; the gentle and charitable will shine like the sun in white robes, above all those who kept their baptism chaste.
Enchiridion (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love) 63Augustine of Hippo · ca. 421–423 · The peace of heaven, which surpasses all understanding, will be known to us when we are equal to the angels; but God's own peace surpasses even the angels' understanding.
Enchiridion (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love) 105Augustine of Hippo · ca. 421–423 · Man was first made able to will good or evil; in the life to come he will be unable to will evil and so be freer, as the lesser immortality of being able not to die gives way to being unable to die.
Enchiridion (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love) 111Augustine of Hippo · ca. 421–423 · After the judgment the two cities, of Christ and of the devil, will last forever, with degrees of happiness in the one and of misery in the other.
The Conferences 1.13John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Constant contemplation is impossible in the flesh, but the mind must keep returning to God; the kingdom of God is within, as righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit.
The Conferences 10.7John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Perfection is the fulfilment of Christ’s prayer in John 17, when all a person’s love, thought, and life become God and the whole of life becomes one continual prayer, a foretaste of heaven.
The Conferences 11.12John Cassian · ca. 426–429 · Chaeremon answers that Scripture calls people to different degrees of perfection; fear and hope are good and lead to blessedness, but love, which surpasses even the spiritual gifts and martyrdom, makes the perfect more perfect.
In Praise of the Desert 16Eucherius of Lyon · ca. 427-428 · As Israel reached the promised land through the desert, so the way to the heavenly homeland lies through the desert.
Verses on the Birthday of the Maccabees 211–240Hilary of Arles · ca. 430-449 · The mother tells the king that his victims live in glory; the furious king orders the remaining sons to the flames.
Letter to Valerian, paragraph 4Eucherius of Lyon · ca. 432 · Even a good earthly life would be worth little beside eternal life because it is short, and in fact it is full of hardship; as men provide most for the places where they will stay longest, we should provide most for eternity.
Letter to Valerian, paragraph 6Eucherius of Lyon · ca. 432 · Love of this life should lead to love of the eternal life, to which this one is a passage; whether this life is despised or loved, the greater life deserves more love.
Chapter 20Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 437-450 · True faith and salvation are found only in the Catholic Church; the heretic will rise to damnation, while (chapter 21) the faithful will enter a life of truth, peace, and joy without fear.
Part 5, chapter 1Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The new heaven and new earth promised in the Apocalypse and by Peter are the land of the living, which the impious will not see.
Part 5, chapter 3Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The new Jerusalem, our mother above, will have no night, death, or pain; the impious will not see its glory.
Part 5, chapter 4Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The just will shine like the sun, equal to the angels, a glory the impious will not see.
Part 5, chapter 5Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · As stars differ in glory, so the saints will shine with different honors, martyrs, virgins, widows, and the married, without envy.
Part 5, chapter 7Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · What God has prepared for those who love him, beyond eye and ear and heart, the impious will not see.
Part 5, chapter 8Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The saints will see God the Trinity face to face, which the impious will not see.
Part 5, chapter 11Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The saints’ unending Alleluia the impious will neither hear nor see.
Part 5, chapter 12Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · The renewal of all things and the saints’ food from the tree of life and drink from Christ the fountain the impious will not see.
Part 5, chapter 13Quodvultdeus of Carthage · ca. 445-450 · When God is all in all, the saints alone will enjoy the heavenly Jerusalem, reigning with Christ in a kingdom without end.