Asking, Seeking and Knocking

HERMAS: “How, then,” he continued, “can such a one ask and obtain anything from the Lord, if he does not serve Him? They who serve Him shall obtain their requests, but they who do not serve Him shall receive nothing.”

TATIAN: Ask, and you shall be given to; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened to you. Every one that asks receives, and he that seeks finds, and he that knocks, it shall be opened to him. What father of you, if his son asks for bread—will he give him a stone? And if he asks of him a fish, will he instead of the fish give him a serpent? And if he ask him for an egg, will he extend to him a scorpion? If you then, although being evil, know the gifts which are good, and give them to your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him? Whatsoever you would that men should do to you, do you even so to them: this is the law and the prophets.

Clement of Alexandria: For he whose it is to desire nothing that is not in our power, and to obtain by asking from God what he piously desires, does he not possess much, rather all, having God as his everlasting treasure? “To him that asks,” it is said, “will be given, and to him that knocks it will be opened.”

Clement of Alexandria: The Word does not wish him who has believed to be idle. For He says, “Seek, and you shall find.” But seeking ends in finding, driving out the empty trifling, and approving of the contemplation which confirms our faith.

Clement of Alexandria: “Ask, and it shall be given you,” it is said to those who are able of themselves to choose what is best. And how we say that the powers of the devil, and the unclean spirits, sow into the sinner’s soul, requires no more words from me, on adducing as a witness the apostolic Barnabas (and he was one of the seventy, and a fellow-worker of Paul), who speaks in these words: “Before we believed in God, the dwelling-place of our heart was unstable, truly a temple built with hands. For it was full of idolatry, and was a house of demons, through doing what was opposed to God.”

Clement of Alexandria: “Seek, and you shall find,” holding on by the truly royal road, and not deviating.

Clement of Alexandria: Faith must not be inert and alone, but accompanied with investigation. For I do not say that we are not to inquire at all. For “Search, and you shall find,”

Clement of Alexandria: The righteous man will seek the discovery that flows from love, to which if he hastens he prospers. For it is said, “To him that knocks, it shall be opened: ask, and it shall be given to you.” “For the violent that storm the kingdom” are not so in argumentative speeches; but by continuance in a right life and unceasing prayers, are said “to take it by force,” wiping away the blots left by their previous sins.

Clement of Alexandria: Now thanksgiving and request for the conversion of our neighbors is the function of the Christian; as also the Lord prayed, giving thanks for the accomplishment of His ministry, praying that as many as possible might attain to knowledge; that in the saved, by salvation, through knowledge, God might be glorified, and He who is alone good and alone Savior might be acknowledged through the Son from age to age.

Clement of Alexandria: His whole life is prayer and conversation with God. And if he is pure from sins, he will by all means obtain what he wishes. For God says to the righteous man, “Ask, and I will give to you; think, and I will do.” If beneficial, he will receive it at once; and if injurious, he will never ask it, and therefore he will not receive it. So it shall be as he wishes. But if one says to us that some sinners even obtain according to their requests, we should say that this rarely takes place, by reason of the righteous goodness of God. And it is granted to those who are capable of doing others good. As a consequence the gift is not made for the sake of him that asked it; but the divine dispensation, foreseeing that one would be saved by his means, renders the favor again righteous. And to those who are worthy, things which are really good are given, even without their asking. Whenever, then, one is righteous, not from necessity or out of fear or hope, but from free choice, this is called the royal road, which the royal race travel. But the byways are slippery and precipitous. If, then, one take away fear and honor, I do not know if the illustrious among the philosophers, who use such freedom of speech, will any longer endure afflictions.

Clement of Alexandria: The human ideal of self-restraint, I mean that which is set forth by Greek philosophers, teaches that one should fight desire and not be subservient to it so as to bring it to practical effect. But our ideal is not to experience desire at all. Our aim is not that while a man feels desire he should get the better of it, but that he should be continent even respecting desire itself. This chastity cannot be attained in any other way except by God's grace. That was why he said “Ask and it shall be given you.” This grace was received even by Moses, though clothed in his needy body, so that for forty days he felt neither thirst nor hunger. Just as it is better to be in good health than for a sick man to talk about health, so to be light is better than to discuss light, and true chastity is better than that taught by the philosophers. Where there is light there is no darkness. But where there is inward desire, even if it goes no further than desire and is inactive so far as bodily action is concerned, union takes place in thought with the object of desire, although that object is not present.

TERTULLIAN: I come now to the point which is urged both by our own brothers and sisters and by the heretics. Our brothers and sisters adduce it as a pretext for entering on curious inquiries, and the heretics insist on it for importing the scrupulosity of their unbelief. It is written, they say, “Seek, and you shall find.” Let us remember at what time the Lord said this. I think it was at the very outset of His teaching, when there was still a doubt felt by all whether He were the Christ, and when even Peter had not yet declared Him to be the Son of God, and John the Baptist had actually ceased to feel assurance about Him. With good reason, therefore, was it then said, “Seek, and you shall find,” when inquiry was still to be made of Him who was not yet become known. Besides, this was said in respect of the Jews. For it is to them that the whole matter of this reproof pertains, seeing that they had a revelation where they might seek Christ. “They have,” He says, “Moses and Elijah,” in other words, the law and the prophets, which preach Christ; as also in another place He says plainly, “Search the Scriptures, in which you expect to find salvation; for they testify of me;” which will be the meaning of “Seek, and you shall find.” For it is clear that the next words also apply to the Jews: “Knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” The Jews had formerly been in covenant with God; but being afterwards cast off on account of their sins, they began to be without God. The Gentiles, on the contrary, had never been in covenant with God; they were only as “a drop from a bucket,” and “as dust from the threshing floor,” and were ever outside the door. Now, how shall he who was always outside knock at the place where he never was? What door does he know of, when he has passed through none, either by entrance or ejection? Is it not rather he who is aware that he once lived within and was thrust out, that probably found the door and knocked there? In like manner, “Ask, and you shall receive,” is suitably said to one who was aware from whom he ought to ask, by whom also some promise had been given; that is to say, “the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob.” Now, the Gentiles knew nothing either of Him, or of any of His promises. Therefore it was to Israel that he spoke when He said, “I am not sent but to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” Not yet had He “cast to the dogs the children’s bread;” not yet did He charge them to “go into the way of the Gentiles.” It is only at the last that He instructs them to “go and teach all nations, and baptize them,” when they were so soon to receive “the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, who should guide them into all the truth.” And this, too, makes towards the same conclusion. If the apostles, who were ordained to be teachers to the Gentiles, were themselves to have the Comforter for their teacher, far more needless was it to say to us, “Seek, and you shall find,” to whom was to come, without research, our instruction by the apostles, and to the apostles themselves by the Holy Ghost. All the Lord’s sayings, indeed, are set forth for all men; through the ears of the Jews have they passed on to us. Still most of them were addressed to Jewish persons; they therefore did not constitute instruction properly designed for ourselves, but rather an example.

TERTULLIAN: Since, however, the Lord, the Foreseer of human necessities, said separately, after delivering His Rule of Prayer, “Ask, and you will receive;” and since there are petitions which are made according to the circumstances of each individual; our additional wants have the right—after beginning with the legitimate and customary prayers as a foundation, as it were—of rearing an outer superstructure of petitions, yet with remembrance of the Master’s precepts.

ORIGEN: Now you will connect with the man seeking goodly pearls the saying, “Seek and you shall find,” and this—“Every one that seeks finds.” For what do you seek? Or what does every one that seeks find? I venture to answer, pearls and the pearl which he possesses, who has given up all things, and counted them as loss; “for which,” Paul says, “I have counted all things but loss that I may win Christ;” by “all things” meaning the goodly pearls, “that I may win Christ,” the one very precious pearl.

ORIGEN: “If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them.” . . . But if whenever two of us agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of the Father of Jesus who is in heaven, plainly when this is not done for them of the Father in heaven as touching anything that they shall ask, there the two have not been in agreement on earth; and this is the cause why we are not heard when we pray, that we do not agree with one another on earth, neither in opinions nor in life.

ORIGEN: Do you, then, my lord and my son, chiefly give heed to the reading of the Divine Scriptures; do give heed. For we need great attention when we read the Divine writings, that we may not speak or form notions about them rashly. And as you give heed to reading the Divine volume with a faithful anticipation well pleasing to God, knock at its closed doors and it shall be opened to you by the porter, of whom Jesus said, “To him the porter opens.” And as you give heed to the Divine reading, seek, in the right way and with an unfaltering faith in God, the meaning of the Divine writings, which is hidden from the many. However, do not be content with knocking and seeking; for prayer is the most necessary qualification for the understanding of Divine things, and the Savior urged us to this when He said, not only, “Knock and it shall be opened, seek and you shall find,” but also, “Ask and it shall be given to you.”

ANONYMOUS: Let us then arouse ourselves as much as we can, beloved brothers and sisters; and breaking away from the slumber of indolence and security, let us be watchful for the observance of the Lord’s precepts. Let us with all our hearts seek for what we have lost, that we may be able to find; because “to him that seeks,” says the Scripture, “it shall be given, and to him that knocks it shall be opened.” Cyprian: Let us ask, and we will receive; and if there is delay and tardiness in our receiving, since we have grievously offended, let us knock, because “to him that knocks also it will be opened,” if only our prayers, our groanings, and our tears, knock at the door; and with these we must be urgent and persevering, even although prayer be offered with one mind. For,—which the more induced and constrained me to write this letter to you,—you ought to know (since the Lord has condescended to show and to reveal it) that it was said in a vision, “Ask, and you will obtain.” Then, afterwards, that the attending people were bidden to pray for certain persons pointed out to them, but that in their petitions there were dissonant voices, and wills disagreeing, and that this excessively displeased Him who had said, “Ask, and you will obtain,” because the disagreement of the people was out of harmony, and there was not a consent of the brothers and sisters one and simple, and a united concord; since it is written, “God who makes men to be of one mind in a house;” and we read in the Acts of the Apostles, “And the multitude of them that believed were of one heart and of one soul.” And the Lord has bidden us with His own voice, saying, “This is my command, that you love one another.” And again, “I say to you, that if two of you will agree on earth as touching anything that you ask, it will be done for you of my Father which is in heaven.” But if two of one mind can do so much, what might be effected if the unanimity prevailed among all? But if, according to the peace which our Lord gave us, there were agreement among all brothers and sisters, we should before this have obtained from the divine mercy what we seek; nor should we be wavering so long in this peril of our salvation and our faith. Yes, truly, and these evils would not have come upon the brothers and sisters, if the brotherhood had been animated with one spirit. For there also was shown that there sat the father of a family, a young man also being seated at his right hand, who, anxious and somewhat sad with a kind of indignation, holding his chin in his right hand, occupied his place with a sorrowful look. But another standing on the left hand, bore a net, which he threatened to throw, in order to catch the people standing round. And when he who saw marveled what this could be, it was told him that the youth who was thus sitting on the right hand was saddened and grieved because his commandments were not observed; but that he on the left was exultant because an opportunity was afforded him of receiving from the father of the family the power of destroying. This was shown long before the tempest of this devastation arose. And we have seen that which had been shown fulfilled; that while we despise the commandments of the Lord, while we do not keep the salutary ordinances of the law that He has given, the enemy was receiving a power of doing mischief, and was overwhelming, by the cast of his net, those who were imperfectly armed and too careless to resist. Let us urgently pray and groan with continual petitions. For know, beloved brothers and sisters, that I was not long ago reproached with this also in a vision, that we were sleepy in our prayers, and did not pray with watchfulness. Tertullian: Him, therefore, whom you call the Creator recognize also as “Father.” It is even He who knows what His children require. For when they asked for bread, He gave them manna from heaven; and when they wanted flesh, He sent them abundance of quails—not a serpent for a fish, nor for an egg a scorpion. Against Marcion.

CYPRIAN: The Lord also in His Gospel, setting forth the love of God the Father, says, “What man is there of you, whom, if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to them that ask Him?” The Lord is here comparing the father after the flesh, and the eternal and liberal love of God the Father. But if that evil father upon earth, deeply offended by a sinful and evil son, yet if he should see the same son afterwards reformed, and, the sins of his former life being put away, restored to sobriety and morality and to the discipline of innocence by the sorrow of his repentance, both rejoices and gives thanks, and with the eagerness of a father’s exultation, embraces the restored one, whom before he had cast out; how much more does that one and true Father, good, merciful, and loving—Himself Goodness and Mercy and Love—rejoice in the repentance of His own sons! Nor does He threaten punishment to those who are now repenting, or mourning and lamenting, but rather promises pardon and clemency. Thus, the Lord in the Gospel calls those that mourn, blessed; because he who mourns calls forth mercy. He who is stubborn and haughty heaps up wrath against himself, and the punishment of the coming judgment. And therefore, dearest brother, we have decided that those who do not repent, nor give evidence of sorrow for their sins with their whole heart, and with manifest profession of their lamentation, are to be absolutely restrained from the hope of communion and peace if they begin to beg for them in the midst of sickness and peril; because it is not repentance for sin, but the warning of urgent death, that drives them to ask; and he is not worthy to receive consolation in death who has not reflected that he was about to die. The Didache: The way of life, then, is this: First, you shall love God who made you; second, your neighbor as yourself; and all things whatsoever you would not want to occur to you, you also do not do to another.

Justin Martyr: Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ spoke well when He summed up all righteousness and piety in two commandments. They are these: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your strength, and your neighbor as yourself.” For the man who loves God with all the heart, and with all the strength, being filled with a God-fearing mind, will reverence no other god; and since God wishes it, he would reverence that angel who is beloved by the same Lord and God. And the man who loves his neighbor as himself will wish for him the same good things that he wishes for himself, and no man will wish evil things for himself. Accordingly, he who loves his neighbor would pray and labor that his neighbor may be possessed of the same benefits as himself.

ARISTIDES: Christians love their neighbors; they judge justly, and they never do to others what they would not wish to happen to themselves.

Clement of Alexandria: Here is then a comprehensive precept, and an exhortation of life, all-embracing: “As you would that men should do to you, do likewise to them.” We may comprehend the commandments in two, as the Lord says, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength; and your neighbor as yourself.” Then from these He infers, “on this hang the law and the prophets.” Further, to him, the rich young ruler, that asked, “What good thing shall I do, that I may inherit eternal life?” He answered, “You know the commandments?” And on him replying, “Yes,” Jesus said, “This do, and you shall be saved.” Especially conspicuous is the love of the Instructor set forth in various health-giving commandments, in order that the discovery may be readier, from the abundance and arrangement of the Scriptures. We have the Decalogue given by Moses, which, indicating by an elementary principle, simple and of one kind, defines the designation of sins in a way conducive to salvation: “You shall not commit adultery. You shall not worship idols. You shall not corrupt boys. You shall not steal. You shall not bear false witness. Honor your father and your mother.” And so on. These things are to be observed, and whatever else is commanded in reading the Bible.

ATHENAGORAS: For our account does not lie with human laws, which a bad man can evade, but we have a law which makes the measure of righteousness to consist in dealing with our neighbor as ourselves.

BARDESANES: For men have not been commanded to do anything but that which they are able to do. For the commandments set before us are only two, and they are such as are compatible with freedom and consistent with equity: one, that we refrain from everything which is wrong, and which we should not like to have done to ourselves; and the other, that we should do that which is right, and which we love and are pleased to have done to us likewise. Who, then, is the man that is too weak to avoid stealing, or to avoid lying, or to avoid acts of licentiousness, or to avoid hatred and deception? All these things are under the control of the mind of man; and are not dependent on the strength of the body, but on the will of the soul. For even if a man be poor, and sick, and old, and disabled in his limbs, he is able to avoid doing all these things. And, as he is able to avoid doing these things, so is he able to love, and to bless, and to speak the truth, and to pray for what is good for every one with whom he is acquainted; and if he be in health, and capable of working, he is able also to give of that which he has; moreover, to support with strength of body him that is sick and enfeebled—this also he can do.

TERTULLIAN: “And as you would that men should do to you, do also to them likewise.” In this command is no doubt implied its counterpart: “And as you would that men should not do to you, so should you also not do to them likewise.”

CYPRIAN: When He taught what is life eternal, He embraced the sacrament of life in a large and divine brevity, saying, “And this is life eternal, that they might know You, the only and true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You have sent.” Also, when He would gather from the law and the prophets the first and greatest commandments, He said, “Hear, O Israel; the Lord your God is one God: and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your mind, and with all your strength. This is the first commandment. And the second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” “On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.” And again: “Whatsoever good things you would that men should do to you, do even so to them. For this is the law and the prophets.”

ARCHELAUS: And that is quite in accordance with the truth which we have learned now, that if one prevails in the keeping of the two commandments, he fulfills the whole law and the prophets.