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| Where There is Only One Woman, the Father Does Not Make a Stay; How Carefully Stumbling-Blocks Must Be Avoided. PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP
Chapter V.—Where There is Only One Woman, the Father Does
Not Make a Stay; How Carefully Stumbling-Blocks Must Be
Avoided.
But if, moreover, we chance upon a place, and find
there one believing woman only, and no other person be there but she
only, we do not stop there, nor pray there, nor read the Scriptures
there, but we flee as from before the face of a serpent, and as from
before the face of sin. Not that we disdain the believing
woman—far be it from us to be so minded towards our brethren in
Christ!—but, because she is alone, we are afraid lest any one
should make insinuations against us in words of falsehood. For
the hearts of men are firmly set453
453 Or “are set and
fixed.” | on
evil. And, that we may not give a pretext to those who desire to
get a pretext against us and to speak evil of us, and that we may not
be a stumbling-block to any one, on this account we cut off the pretext
of those who desire to get a pretext against us; on this account we
must be “on our guard that we be to no one a stumbling-block,
neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor yet to the Church of God;
and we must not seek that which is profitable to ourselves only, but
that which is for the profit of many, so that they may be
saved.”454 For this does
not profit us, that another stumble because of us. Let us,
therefore, be studiously on our guard at all times, that we do not
smite our brethren and give them to drink of a disquieting conscience
through our being to them a stumbling-block. For “if for
the sake of meat our brother be made sad, or shocked, or made weak, or
caused to stumble, we are not walking in the love of God. For the
sake of meat thou causest him to perish for whose sake Christ
died.”455 For, in
“thus sinning against your brethren and wounding their sickly
consciences, ye sin against Christ Himself. For, if for the sake
of meat my brother is made to stumble,” let us who are
believers say, “Never will we eat flesh, that we may not make our
brother to stumble.”456 These things,
moreover, does ever one who truly loves God, who truly takes up his
cross, and puts on Christ, and loves his neighbour; the man who watches
over himself that he be not a stumbling-block to any one, that no one
be caused to stumble because of him and die because he is constantly
with maidens and lives in the same house with them—a thing which
is not right—to the overthrow of those who see and hear.
Evil conduct like this is fraught with stumbling and peril, and
is akin457 to death.
But blessed is that man who is circumspect and fearful in everything
for the sake of purity!
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