Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series I/Volume V/On the Soul and its Origin/Book IV/Chapter 24

Chapter 24.—Abraham&#8217;s Bosom—What It Means.

As to your supposing that “the Abraham&#8217;s bosom referred to is corporeal,” and your further assertion, that “by it is meant his whole body,” I fear that you must be regarded (even in such a subject) as trying to joke and raise a laugh, instead of acting gravely and seriously. For you could not else be so foolish as to think that the material bosom of one person could receive so many souls; nay, to use your own words, “bear the bodies of as many meritorious men as the angels carry thither, as they did Lazarus.” Unless it happen to be your opinion, that his soul alone deserved to find its way to the said bosom. If you are not, then, in fun, and do not wish to make childish mistakes, you must understand by “Abraham&#8217;s bosom” that remote and separate abode of rest and peace in which Abraham now is; and that what was said to Abraham did not merely refer to him personally, but had reference to his appointment as the father of many nations, to whom he was presented for imitation as the first and principal example of faith; even as God willed Himself to be called “the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob,” although He is the God of an innumerable company.