Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume IX/The Epistles of Clement/The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians/Chapter 31

by Various

Chapter XXXI.—Let Us See by What Means We May Obtain the Divine Blessing.

Let us cleave then to His blessing, and consider what are the means^[1] of possessing it.  Let us think^[2] over the things which have taken place from the beginning.  For what reason was our father Abraham blessed?  Was it not because he wrought righteousness and truth through faith?  Isaac,^[3] with perfect confidence, as if knowing what was to happen,^[4] cheerfully yielded himself as a sacrifice.^[5]  Jacob, through reason^[6] of his brother, went forth with humility from his own land, and came to Laban and served him; and there was given to him the sceptre of the twelve tribes of Israel.

Footnotes

1. Literally, “what are the ways of His blessing.”
2. Literally, “unroll.”
3. Comp. James ii. 21.
4. Some translate, “knowing what was to come.”
5. Gen. xxii. 6–10.
6. So Jacobson:  Wotton reads, “fleeing from his brother.”