Luke 10:30

And Jesus answering said, A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves, who stripped him of his clothing, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.
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Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
What are those two coins, unless perhaps the two Testaments that contain revealed within them the image of the eternal King, at the price of whose wounds we are healed? Precious blood redeemed us, that we may avoid the sores of final death.

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
“And bound up his wounds, pouring in oil and wine.” That Physician has many remedies with which he is accustomed to cure. His speech is a remedy. One of his sayings binds up wounds, another treats with oil, another pours in wine. He binds wounds with a stricter rule. He treats with the forgiveness of sins. He stings with the rebuke of judgment as if with wine.

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
That extraordinary Samaritan did not himself shun him whom the priest and the Levite had shunned. In the name of a sect, you may not shun him whom you will admire by interpretation of the word. Indeed, “guard” is signified by the name Samaritan. The interpretation means this. Who is the Guard, if not, “The Lord preserves the infants”? Thus, as there is one Jew in the letter and another in the spirit, so there is one Samaritan in public, another in secret. Here the Samaritan is going down. Who is he except he who descended from heaven, who also ascended to heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven? When he sees halfdead him whom none could cure before, like her with an issue of blood who had spent all her inheritance on physicians, he came near him. He became a neighbor by acceptance of our common feeling and kin by the gift of mercy.

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
Jericho is an image of this world. Adam, cast out from Paradise, that heavenly Jerusalem, descended to it by the mistake of his transgression, that is, departing from the living to hell, for whom change not of place but of conduct made the exile of his nature. He was greatly changed from that Adam who enjoyed eternal blessedness. When he turned aside to worldly sins, Adam fell among thieves, among whom he would not have fallen if he had not strayed from the heavenly command and made himself vulnerable to them. Who are those thieves, if not the angels of night and darkness, who sometimes transform themselves into angels of light but cannot persevere? These first steal the clothes of spiritual grace that we have received and are then accustomed to inflict wounds. If we preserve unstained the garments that we have put on, we cannot feel the robbers’ blows. Beware, for fear that you are first stripped as Adam was first stripped of the heavenly command, defrauded of protection, and divested...

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
Blessed is that innkeeper who can care for another’s wounds. Blessed is he to whom Jesus says, “Whatever you shall spend over and above, I will repay you.” A good steward is one who also spends over and above. Paul is a good steward, whose sermons and epistles overflow with the knowledge that he received. He followed the moderate command of the Lord with almost immoderate effort of mind and body, so that he raised many from deep sorrow by the stewardship of spiritual exhortation. He was a good keeper of his inn, in which the ass knows his master’s crib and the flocks of lambs are enclosed. He feared that the way would be easy for ravening wolves howling outside the corrals to attack the sheepfolds.

Ambrose of Milan

AD 397
“The next day,” what is this next day, if not that day of the Lord’s resurrection, of which it was said, “This is the day which the Lord has made”? “He took out two coins, and gave them to the host, and said, ‘Take care of him.’ ”

Augustine of Hippo

AD 430
Robbers left you halfdead on the road, but you have been found lying there by the passing and kindly Samaritan. Wine and oil have been poured on you. You have received the sacrament of the onlybegotten Son. You have been lifted onto his mule. You have believed that Christ became flesh. You have been brought to the inn, and you are being cured in the church.That is where and why I am speaking. This is what I too, what all of us are doing. We are performing the duties of the innkeeper. He was told, “If you spend any more, I will pay you when I return.” If only we spent at least as much as we have received! However much we spend, brothers and sisters, it is the Lord’s money.

Cornelius a Lapide

AD 1637
And Jesus answering said. Taking up or continuing His discourse. Euthymius. I.e. answering the lawyer and explaining fully and clearly to whom "neighbour" applied. A certain man went down from Jerusalem to Jericho, and fell among thieves. A Jew, S. Augustine says; and an inhabitant of the holy city. Bede. The parable is founded on incidents of at that time frequent occurrence, and is therefore a true history. For, as S. Jerome observes, between Jerusalem and Jericho was a place infested with robbers, called in the Hebrew tongue Adommim, or rather Addammim, i.e. red or bloody, because of the blood which was shed there. So Adrichomius describes Adommim as a place infamous even in later times for robberies and murders, terrible to behold, and so dangerous that no one dared to pass through it without an escort. There the Samaritan met with this man who, like many another traveller, had been grievously wounded by robbers. The place itself lay four leagues to the west of Jericho, and was ...

George Leo Haydock

AD 1849
A certain man This some would have to be a history: others rather judge it spoken by way of parable, to teach us to perform offices of charity towards all men without exception. (Witham) Were we to adhere to the mere words of this parable, it would seem to follow, that only those who do us good were to be esteemed our neighbours; for the context seems to intimate, that the Levite and the priest were not neighbours to the man who fell among the robbers, because they did not assist him. But according to the opinion of most fathers, the intent of this parable is the shew, that every person who has need of our assistance is our neighbour. (Maldonatus)

Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation - 2 Peter 1:20

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