Ante-Nicene Fathers/Volume VIII/Pseudo-Clementine Literature/The Clementine Homilies/Homily X/Chapter 7

by Anonymous

Chapter VII.—Unprofitableness of Idols.

“Begin,^[1] then, to divest yourselves of the injurious fear of vain idols, that you may escape unrighteous bondage.  For they have become your masters, who even as servants are unprofitable to you.  I speak of the material of the lifeless images, which are of no use to you as far as service is concerned.  For they neither hear nor see nor feel, nor can they be moved.  For is there any one of you who would like to see as they see, and to hear as they hear, and to feel as they feel, and to be moved as they are?  God forbid that such a wrong should be done to any man bearing the image of God, though he have lost His likeness.

Footnotes

1. [Recognitions, v. 14, is parallel to this chapter, and the resemblance is close throughout some of the succeeding chapters.—R.]