Ante-Nicene Fathers (Volume 2) - XI - The Instructor continued

Required reading
Ante-Nicene Fathers (Volume 2) (Available from Amazon or free here) - Commence 'The Instructor' by reading Book II.

My summary
This week Clement gives us many practical instructions on the way the Christian is to live.

He gives us his recommended behaviours for:
(i) eating (e.g. gluttony, food sacrificed to idols, but also cleanliness);
(ii) drinking (e.g. drunkenness);
(iii) using expensive cups and plates;
(iv) feasts;
(v) laughter;
(vi) coarse language;
(vii) living with others;
(viii) using ointments on your head, including dyes;
(ix) sleeping;
(x) sex in Christian marriage (I think, most of the section was kept in Latin!);
(xi) clothing;
(xii) jewelery.

What grabbed me
Today's reading was rather legalistic!  To the point that it made me laugh out loud a number of times (which I'm sure was a violation of Clement's rules on laughter).  The funniest quote I daren't share on the blog, in case I offend others.

But here is one example of pedantic how Clement was: 'If any one is attacked with sneezing, just as in the case of hiccup, he must not startle those near him with the explosion, and so give proof of his bad breeding; but the hiccup is to be quietly transmitted with the expiration of the breath, the mouth being composed becomingly, and not gaping and yawning like the tragic masks. So the disturbance of hiccup may be avoided by making the respirations gently; for thus the threatening symptoms of the ball of wind will be dissipated in the most seemly way, by managing its egress so as also to conceal anything which the air forcibly expelled may bring up with it. To wish to add to the noises, instead of diminishing them, is the sign of arrogance and disorderliness. Those, too, who scrape their teeth, bleeding the wounds, are disagreeable to themselves and detestable to their neighbours. Scratching the ears and the irritation of sneezing are swinish itchings, and attend unbridled fornication. Both shameful sights and shameful conversation about them are to be shunned. Let the look be steady, and the turning and movement of the neck, and the motions of the hands in conversation, be decorous. In a word, the Christian is characterized by composure, tranquillity, calmness, and peace.'

I think it is a bit much to say that scratching your ears is 'unbridled fornication'.

Next week's reading
Conclude 'The Instructor' by reading Book III.

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.