Ephrem the Syrian
4th century · AD 373 · Syriac & Oriental · 790 passages
A deacon and poet who taught Scripture in hymns, rich with imagery drawn from paradise, light, and the Eucharist.
Background on Ephrem the Syrian
In his own words on Numbers
- Numbers 21:9
The serpent struck Adam in paradise and killed him. [It also struck] Israel in the camp and annihilated them. "Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, the Son of Man will be lifted up." Just as those who looked with bodily eyes at the sign which Moses fastened on the cross lived bodily, so too those who look with spiritual eyes at the body of the Messiah nailed and suspended on the cross and believe in him will live [spiritually]. Thus it was revealed through this brazen [serpent], which by nature cannot suffer, that he who was to suffer on the cross is one who by nature cannot die.
COMMENTARY ON TATIAN'S DIATESSARON 16:15
Quoted verbatim from public-domain English translations of the fathers — Aquinas's Catena Aurea, the Ante-Nicene and Nicene & Post-Nicene Fathers, and related editions. Each quotation links to its source.