Luke 6:24 — Community Reflections

LUKE 6:24 — KING JAMES VERSION 0

“But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation.”

But woe to you who are rich, for you have already received your comfort — the Woes are unique to Luke's version of the Beatitudes, creating a prophetic balance of blessing and warning. Woe to you who are rich: the rich have already received their comfort (apechete, you have received in full, the word used for receipts). The present comfort exhausts the claim on future blessing — those who have their reward now will not receive it then.

Church Fathers on Luke 6:24

Having said before that poverty for God’s sake is the cause of every good thing, and that hunger and weeping will not be without the reward of the saints, he goes on to denounce the opposite to these as the source of condemnation and punishment. But woe to you rich, for you have your consolation.
Cyril of Alexandria · 5th century

For this expression, woe, is always said in the Scriptures to those who cannot escape from future punishment.
Chrysostom · 4th century

But although in the abundance of wealth many are the allurements to crime, yet many also are the incitements to virtue. Although virtue requires no support, and the offering of the poor man is more commendable than the liberality of the rich, still it is not those who possess riches, but those who know not how to use them, that are condemned by the authority of the heavenly sentence. For as that poor man is more praiseworthy who gives without grudging, so is the rich man more…
Ambrose · 4th century

Read all 12 entries in the readerCatena Aurea · St. Thomas Aquinas, tr. J. H. Newman · public domain

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