The Hidden Love of Jesus For the Animals
Animals - The Defenseless Victims
The Church Fathers Also Warned Against Eating Meat
The church fathers or church writers still knew the sources and earliest handwritten texts and quoted from them. At that time many of them lived as vegetarians or vegans and abstained from alcohol, or recommended this. From this one we gain knowledge about the eating habits of the first Christians.
John Chrysostomus - About a group of exemplary Christians (354-407)
"No streams of blood flowed at their place; no flesh was slaughtered and cut to pieces ... One does not smell there the awful vapor of meals of meat ... one hears no racket and terrible noise. They eat only bread, which they earn through their work, and water that a pure spring offers them. When they want a lavish meal, then indulgence consists of fruits, and they find thereby higher enjoyment than at the royal tables."
Homil. 69
Clemens of Alexandria
"For within a moderate simplicity is there not a diversity of healthy foods: vegetables, roots, olives, herbs, milk, cheese, fruit and many kinds of dried foods? – Among the foods one should favor those that can be directly eaten without the use of fire, for they are always ready for us and are the simplest. – Accordingly, the apostle Matthew lived from seeds, hard-shelled fruits and vegetables, and ate no meat. And John, who practiced modesty to the utmost degree ate the buds of leaves and wild honey. – I think that the bloody sacrifices were invented solely by those people who sought an excuse for eating meat, which they also could have had without such idolatry."
Clemens of Alexandria, Paidagogos II
Quintus Septimus Tertullianus (ca. 160-221)
Tertullianus appeared several times for the defense of the Christians when they were accused of making human sacrifices. "How shall I describe it, that you believe we are thirsty for human blood, for you do know that we loathe the blood of animals."
Apol. Chap. 9; quoted from Robert Springer, p. 292
Gregory of Nazianz - Church father from Kappadozien
"But the seed of a good house father is the good wheat, from which he bakes bread ... The indulgence in meat dishes is a disgraceful wrong and I desire that you may strive to offer your soul nourishment that lasts eternally."
Robert Springer 1884
Hieronymus
"It is better that you eat no meat and drink no wine. For drinking wine started with eating meat, after the great flood."
"Innocent foods are foods acquired without letting blood."
"Consuming meat, drinking wine and overfilling the stomach are the cradles of greed."
Hieronymus, Adversus Jovinanum 1:30
Aurelius Augustinus (354-430)
"Church father and greatest Latin church teacher of antiquity, Augustinus also lived solely from plant foods. He attributed the ruinous passions of man to the eating of meat. In one of his works, he quoted Paul (Rom. 14:21), where Paul recommended that one eat no meat and drink no wine."
De vera Religione II, 161, 168
Basilius the Great
"The body that is burdened with meat foods is plagued by illnesses; a moderate style of life makes it healthier and stronger and cuts off the root of evil. The vapors of meat foods darken the light of the spirit. It is hard for one to love virtue when one is gladdened by meat dishes and festive meals."
Basilius the Great, Enkarpa, 1884
"Meat is a contradiction to food and it belongs to the world of the past."
Clementine Homilies III, 45
"The Christians abstained from every kind of meat."
Plinius in a letter to Trajan, Ep. Lib. X. 96
"In the earthly paradise, there was no wine, no one sacrificed animals and no one ate meat."
From the epistles of Basilius the Great (329-379)
"As long as one lives frugally the luck of the house will increase; the animals will be safe; no blood will be shed, and no animal will be killed. The cook’s knife will be useless; the table will only be set with fruits which nature offers to us, and one will be satisfied with that."
From the epistles of Basilius the Great (329-379)
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