Ephesians 6:4Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

It is the duty of every Christian, and especially of those living in the world, since they need greater help while living amid the tumult of life.

It is also necessary for you that your children hear Scripture. From it they can learn: “Honor your father and your mother.”

Then, do you raise your son on pagan writings, from which all the worst things are learned, and will you not nourish him with the word of God?

And you, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the instruction and life of the Lord.

Disobedience to parents is a sin on the part of children. Yet since parents may demand something corrupt, the Apostle added that they must obey in the Lord.

The sin of parents is to provoke to anger little children and those nourished with milk, or to command youths and those of more mature age to do what is burdensome.

Thus, just as a reward is indicated for the obedience and subjection of children, so moderate rule is commanded to parents. They must know that they preside not over slaves, but over children.

Yet the Apostle did not limit himself to this conclusion of the commandment. He also added: Bring them up in the instruction and life of the Lord.

We find this upbringing better expressed in Greek by the word nouthesia, that is, chiefly admonition and upbringing, rather than severity.

Let bishops and presbyters read this, who teach their children secular studies, make them read comedies, and make them sing the shameful compositions of actors, while their upbringing may perhaps be paid for from Church funds.

Thus what a maiden, or a widow, or some poor man has brought into the treasury of the Church for his sin, exhausting all his possessions, the teacher of grammar and rhetoric turns to his own household expenses.

He does this as a New Year’s gift, or as a basket during the days of Saturnalia, or as Minerva’s fee, the payment for lessons. He spends it on the support of a pagan temple, or on filthy deeds in houses of impurity.

Eli the priest was himself holy. But because he did not bring up his children in every instruction and severity, he fell backward and died (1 Kgs 4:18).

He could not stretch himself forward, but fell backward. Struck by the disorders of his spine, he looked like the wife of Lot.

Yet there is no doubt that he admonished his children, saying: Why do you do such evil things, as I hear about you from all the people? Do not do so, my children, for the report that I hear about you is not good (1 Kgs 2:23-24).

Concerning fathers of this kind, Isaiah also cries out with weeping: And children of strangers were born to them (Is 2:6).

Therefore, if he gave such a command to the Ephesians and to many who, as usually happens among the people, were occupied with the affairs of this life, that they should bring up their children in every order and admonition of the Lord, what must be thought of priests?

Concerning their manner of life he writes to Timothy: One who has his children in subjection with all reverence (1 Tim 3:4).

He repeats the same thing with insistence: Having faithful children, not accused of riot or disobedience (Tit 1:6).

Then, adding a causal conjunction, as though the vices of children are imputed to parents, he says: For a bishop must be blameless, as a steward of God (Tit 1:7).

Therefore a bishop cannot be without blame if his son is disobedient and is accused of incontinence.

It is also written in the Proverbs of Solomon: “He who spares his rod hates his son, but he who loves him disciplines him diligently” (Prov 13:25).

Many teach their children worldly etiquette. Others teach them foreign languages, to speak French, German, and Italian, and spend considerable sums on this. Others strive to train them in commerce and other arts. Scarcely anyone teaches children to live as Christians.

Without this, every science is nothing, and every wisdom is folly. What benefit is it for a Christian to speak Italian, French, and German, but to live impiously? What benefit is there in being skilled in commerce and arts, but not having the fear of God?

Such artists and wise men are worse than unskilled simpletons. A young heart, being inclined to evil, rushes toward every evil if it is not restrained by the fear of God and the bridle of discipline.

This is especially true of those who sharpen their minds through sciences and arts, but do not correct their wills. They become skilled in every evil, and they themselves provide examples of this.

Therefore, Christian, let your first care be to teach your children to live as Christians. Without this, all your teaching and instruction are nothing.

God will not require of you whether you taught your children worldly etiquette and foreign languages. He will require whether you taught them to live as Christians and instructed them in piety.

Woe to young children who have evil fathers! What can they learn from them except evil? For how can an evil man teach good? It does happen that an evil father chastises his children for self-will, yet by his temptations he teaches them self-will.

The young learn more from deeds than from words and discipline. Hence it happens that if the fathers are bad, the children become worse, and the grandchildren worse still.

So a poor man, having learned evil and grown used to it, is filled with impiety as with bread. He falls from evil into evil, and from lawlessness into lawlessness. He rushes toward perdition like a stone sent down from the summit of a mountain.

It sometimes happens that some of such people recognize their misery and ruin, tremble, are horrified, and begin to repent. Yet, drawn by habit as by a rope, they return to impiety. This evil comes from evil upbringing.

Woe to young children. Yet worse woe belongs to fathers who not only do not teach their children good, but by their temptations give occasion for every evil.

Such fathers kill not bodies, but Christian souls, for whom Christ died. They deprive them not of temporal life, but of eternal life.

They will know this terrible misery of theirs there, where everything will be made manifest, and each one’s deeds will be set before his eyes.

Therefore fathers in whom there is a spark of piety must strive in every way to teach their children to live as Christians. They must pour the milk of piety into their young hearts, “that by it you may grow unto salvation” (1 Pet 2:2).

It is useful to teach sciences and arts, but it is necessary to teach Christian living. Every science and art without Christian life is nothing.

Take heed to this, parents, lest you become murderers of the children whom you brought into the world. The true father is not the one who begets, but the one who has brought up and taught well.

The one who begot gave only life. The one who brought up and taught well gave good life. Pagans also live in the world, remaining in darkness and idolatry, worse than the beasts themselves. But Christians alone live well.

Therefore we are indebted to the fathers who begot us. Yet we are even more indebted to the fathers who brought us up well and instructed us in piety.

The fathers who begot us begot us for temporal life. The fathers who brought us up well and taught us piety beget us for eternal life.

Blessed is he who does good and teaches good (cf. Mt 5:19). Blessed is the parent who has regenerated his children both for temporal life and for eternal life.

Wretched is the parent who has begotten children for temporal life, but has shut the doors of eternal life against them. He shut them either by neglect of good upbringing or by his own temptations.

It is better for a man not to be born than to be born and to be in eternal perdition.

“Everything among us must be secondary in comparison with care for children and with raising them in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

“Do not sharpen the tongue, but purify the soul. I say this not to forbid secular education, but so that people may not be attached to it exclusively.”

What, then, shall I say after this? Shall I praise and be silent? I do not think my obligation would be fulfilled by that.

A good intention is a good foundation for a good work. But when a good foundation has been laid, not everything has yet been built. Care for the faithful fulfillment of the intention must follow the good intention. Care must prompt reflection.

In our time the importance of upbringing for the whole of later life is understood and recognized more than in other times. The number of schools, as instruments of upbringing, and the number of pupils grows from day to day.

This happens under the protection of an enlightened government and through the emulation of private persons. Many teachers are joined together for the united multitude being raised. Often many teachers are summoned even for one pupil.

The most pious Autocrat, with foresight, directs special attention to moral upbringing and, as its foundation, to pious upbringing. But do all follow this direction with sufficient faithfulness?

Scholarly upbringing, practical upbringing, and refined upbringing attract the cares of some educators and pupils too strongly. They do this by prospects of outward advantages, benefits, glory, and pleasure.

Therefore I think it is not needless to remind parents and educators of children of the apostolic instruction: "Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

That is, guide children by word and deed to a pious and honorable life according to the teaching of Christ.

Let us pay the debt of respect to knowledge and learning. Let us say, if you wish, that people who possess deep knowledge concerning nature, mankind, and human society are the eyes of the people.

Yet just as not every member of the body needs to be an eye, so not every member of society needs to be learned. But intense reproaches against ignorance and praise of enlightenment understood vaguely have sown one-sided thoughts in some people.

They think that upbringing worthy of the name is only scholarly upbringing. They think that to educate means to teach the sciences, and that a person must be considered educated if he has passed through several courses of lessons.

This means educating the head more than the heart and the whole person. Happy is the pupil if the teacher in the doctrine of faith succeeds in sowing the seed of spiritual teaching more deeply in him than other teachers sow the seeds of worldly teachings.

Happy is he also if the spiritual seed is nourished by domestic and ecclesial exercises of piety, under the influence of good guidance and example. Divine teaching will purify, establish, and sanctify human teachings.

It will make them useful for private and public benefit. For "piety," as the Apostle says, "is profitable for all things, having the promise of the present life and of that which is to come" (1 Tim 4:8).

But if piety, though spoken of in regulations, is not laid in the pupil's soul as the foundation of worldly teachings, then they will not be truly well-founded. Teachings without a foundation do not order life well.

Meanwhile, they usually puff up. One who is puffed up by supposed knowledge and education most often sets himself above his condition. Thus people arise who are not reconciled to poverty, cannot live with mediocrity, and do not preserve moderation in abundance.

They hunger for elevation, brilliance, and pleasures. They are disillusioned by satiety just as much as by not finding food for their passions. They are always dissatisfied. They love changes, not constancy. Pursuing dreams, they disorder present and future reality.

Scholars themselves have recognized that scholarly upbringing is not always fittingly and usefully applied, especially to the middle and lower states of society. They distinguished practical upbringing from it and tried to arrange it separately for these states.

This means upbringing adapted to the work of these states: agriculture, crafts, arts, industry, and trade. The thought is practical when its execution is practical. However, it is not my task to discuss this.

My duty is to remind you, and I say remind because I think proof is unnecessary, that practical upbringing can form a farmer, craftsman, manufacturer, or merchant only with the help of pious and moral upbringing.

Only then will they be industrious, honest, capable of ordering their own well-being, and proper members of society.

What shall I say about refined upbringing, about forming children through the pleasant arts? Fortunately, I can now say something in favor of this branch of upbringing from immediate experience.

Here we heard the children being educated take part in church singing. This is an application of a pleasant art to upbringing that is worthy of praise and encouragement.

Exercise in church singing, and in hymns close to it with spiritual and moral content, leads to benefit by the path of pleasure. It softens the heart, but does not make it effeminate, as some kinds of singing do.

It awakens and nourishes exalted feelings, not passions. By occupying an innocent soul, it not only does not diminish its innocence, but sanctifies it.

We will not conceal our desire, without stopping to consider whether it can be fulfilled, that this pure delight should pass from upbringing into life through habit.

Then Christians, as once happened, would not only in church but also at home, according to the Apostle's instruction, "speak to themselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in their hearts to the Lord" (Eph 5:19).

The custom of the age does not desire this. It uses pleasant arts in upbringing so that, let us express ourselves as modestly as possible, they appear as flowers that bear no fruit, and with which a thorn is joined that wounds pleasantly.

On this subject, pious feeling, pure moral feeling, and experienced prudence must carefully be summoned to counsel. They must decide in what form and measure the pleasant may be admitted, lest the harmful creep in under its cover.

The harmful things are softness, distraction, and attachment to sensual pleasures.

The world imagines amusements to be almost as necessary for life as labor, food, and rest. It thinks it can live while playing. No, brethren, life is not a game, but a serious work.

Earthly life was given to man so that from it, by the hand of free will and the power of God's grace, he might work out eternal blessedness. Whoever has understood this work and has undertaken it as he should will hardly find much time for games and amusements.

Therefore the Apostle commands with foresight and beneficent care that this work be taught and learned as early as possible, from youth, from childhood. "Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord."

Parents and children, educators and pupils, think and do not forget that human teachings prepare for temporal life, but they cannot make even that life happy without the help of the Lord's teaching.

The teaching of the Lord prepares for eternal blessed life. May God grant all of us to be counted worthy to reach it by a short or long path, but one that is right and faithful. Amen.

Before Christianity, fathers displayed too much authority over their children. This had become customary. To cut off this excess, the Apostle writes thus, so that what was customary among the pagans would not be repeated among Christians.

Having obliged them not to provoke, and thereby, one may say, having forbidden every action toward children that does not accord with the spirit of Christianity, he obliges them to educate them. Yet the Apostle insists less on compelling parents to educate, since this is done everywhere by the law of nature, than on educating them as they ought.

The Apostle defines this in two words: in discipline and instruction, paideia and nouthesia. If one considers the manner of education, the first suggests pedagogical strictness, and the second heartfelt maternal admonitions and persuasions. Hence, one must educate with strictness, together with meekness and tenderness.

If one considers the subjects or aspects of education, the first points to the formation of character, and the second to implanting sound notions about all things in the mind. The norm for both is the spirit of Christianity, so that both discipline and instruction may be of the Lord.

Thus the Apostle requires parents, while measuring strictness with meekness, to teach their children both to live in a Christian manner and to look at everything with Christian eyes. In other words, they must judge everything with a Christian mind.

Saint Chrysostom says on this passage: “He did not say, Love them. Nature itself draws them to this, even if they do not wish it. Therefore it was superfluous to lay down a law concerning this matter.

But what does he say? Do not provoke your children, as many parents do, depriving their children of inheritance, leaving them without care, and treating them harshly, as slaves. Therefore he says, Do not provoke your children.

Then, what is especially important, he shows how to make them obedient. He says that this depends upon the head and ruler. Just as he placed the cause of the wife’s obedience in the husband, and therefore speaks much to him, beseeching him, among other things, to draw his wife to himself by the power of love, so here also he places in him the cause of the children’s obedience.

He does this when he says, Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Do you see that when spiritual good is present, bodily good will follow it?

Do you wish your son to be obedient? From childhood bring him up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Do not think that hearing the Divine Scriptures is unnecessary for him. There he will hear: Honor your father and your mother. These words are directed to your benefit.

Do not say, ‘This hearing of the Scriptures is the work of monks. Am I to make him a monk? There is no need for him to be a monk!’ What sort of fear is this in you? You fear what is filled with many benefits.

Make him a Christian. For laymen too have great need to attend to the teaching contained in Scripture, and especially children, since at that age they still know little.

Yet, though they do not know divine truths, they nevertheless know something from pagan writings. In them they study the lives of heroes admired according to pagan notions, who served the passions and offer nothing good for example and imitation.

Therefore your son needs this saving guidance, in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Is it not unreasonable to teach children skills, send them to school, and spare nothing for such education, yet not care for their upbringing in the discipline and instruction of the Lord?

For this very reason we ourselves are the first to reap the fruits of such upbringing of our children. We see them insolent, incontinent, disobedient, and corrupt.

Let us not act this way. Let us listen to the exhortation of blessed Paul. Let us bring up our children in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Let us give them an example of piety. Let us make them practice reading the Scriptures from an early age.

Ah! I say this constantly. Yet it seems to me that I may be spending my words in vain. Nevertheless, I shall not cease speaking about this. This is my duty.

How long shall we remain fleshly men? How long shall we crawl upon the earth? Everything with us must be secondary in comparison with care for children and with bringing them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

Whoever first learns to be philosophical thereby acquires wealth surpassing all wealth, and the greatest glory. It is not so useful to educate a son by teaching him sciences and external knowledge, through which he will acquire money, as it is to teach him the art of despising money.

If you wish to make him rich, act in this way. The rich man is not the one who cares for great acquisition of property and possesses much. Rather, he is the one who has need of nothing.

Instill this in your son. Teach him this. In this lies the greatest wealth. Do not care to make him renowned through external learning and to procure glory for him. Rather, strive to teach him to despise the glory of the present life.

Through this he will be more glorious and more renowned. This can be done by both rich and poor. One learns this not from secular teachers and not with the help of sciences, but from the Divine Scriptures.

Do not care that your son should live long here, but that there he may be counted worthy of boundless and unending life. Give him great things, not small ones.

Attend to the words of the Apostle Paul: Bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord. Do not strive to make him an orator, but teach him philosophy.

If he is not an orator, no harm will come from this. But where philosophy is lacking, the most abundant oratory will bring no benefit. Good conduct is needed, not cleverness. Morality is needed, not power of speech. Deeds are needed, not words.

This procures the Kingdom. This also grants true blessings. Do not sharpen the tongue, but cleanse the soul.

I say this not in order to forbid secular education, but so that people may not be attached to it exclusively.”