Jerome:

20.28. “Just as the Son of man did not come be served but serve.” Note what we have frequently said, that he who serves is called the Son of man. "And to give his life as a redemption for many." This took place when he took the form of a slave that he might pour out his blood for the world.": And he did not say "to give his life as a redemption" for all, but "for many," that is, for those who wanted to believe. Jerome, St. Jerome Commentary on Matthew, in The Fathers of the Church, ed., Thomas P. Halton, et al, (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2008), 117: 229. [Underlining mine.]

On the basis of this comment from Jerome, Michael Haykin, in the recently published book From Heaven He Came and Sought Her, makes this claim regarding Jerome and the doctrine of limited satisfaction:

Here Jerome defines the “many” as “those who wanted to believe.” While there may be some ambiguity here in Jerome’s statement, the words at least hint that Jerome saw Christ’s death to be for a particular group of people–believers.

The question is, can that statement be contextualized in a way that that suggestion, that alleged “hint,” that Jerome believed Christ’s death was particular to the elect alone.¹

I think this can be accomplished in three ways. Michael A. G. Haykin, “We Trust in the Saving Blood: Definite Atonement in the Ancient Church, in From Heaven He Came and Sought Her, ed. David Gibson and Jonathan Gibson (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 2013), 70. See also John Gill, The Cause of God and Truth (London: CO. Waterford: 1855), 260.

1) It should be noted that within the quotation, itself, Jerome affirms that Jesus poured “out his blood for the world.”

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Chrysostom:

Ver. 4, 5. “In love,” saith he, “having foreordained us unto adoption as sons through Jesus

Christ unto Himself.”

Do you observe how that nothing is done without Christ? Nothing without the Father? The one hath predestinated, the other hath brought us near. And these words he adds by way of heightening the things which have been done, in the same way as he says also elsewhere, “And not only so, but we also rejoice in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ.” (Rom. v. 11.) For great indeed are the blessings bestowed, yet are they made far greater in being bestowed through Christ; because He sent not any servant, though it was to servants He sent, but the Only-begotten Son Himself.

Ver. 5. “According to the good pleasure,” he continues, “of His will.”

That is to say, because He earnestly willed it. This is, as one might say, His earnest desire.

For the word “good pleasure” every where means the precedent will, for there is also another will. As for example, the first will is that sinners should not perish; the second will is, that, if men become wicked, they shall perish. For surely it is not by necessity that He punishes them, but because He wills it. You may see something of the sort even in the words of Paul, where he says, “I would that all men were even as I myself.” (1 Cor. vii. 7.) And again, “I desire that the younger widows marry, bear children.” (1 Tim. v. 14.) By “good pleasure” then he means the first will, the earnest will, the will accompanied with earnest desire, as in case of us, for I shall not refuse to employ even a somewhat familiar expression, in order to speak with clearness to the simpler sort; for thus we ourselves, to express the intentness of the will, speak of acting according to our resolve. What he means to say then is this, God earnestly aims at, earnestly desires, our salvation. Wherefore then is it that He so loves, whence hath He such affection? It is of His goodness alone. For grace itself is the fruit of goodness. And for this cause, he saith, hath He predestinated us to the adoption of children; this being His will, and the object of His earnest wish, that the glory of His grace may be displayed. “According to the good pleasure of His will,” he proceeds, . . .

Chrysostom, “The Commentary and Homilies of St. Chrysostom Archbishop of Constantinople on the Epistles of St. Paul the Apostle to the Galatians and Ephesians,” tran. Gross Alexander, in The Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, 13: 52.

John 17:21 that they may all be one; even as You, Father, are in Me and I in You, that they also may be in Us, so that the world may believe that You sent Me.
John 17:22 “The glory which You have given Me I have given to them, that they may be one, just as We are one;
John 17:23 I in them and You in Me, that they may be perfected in unity, so that the world may know that You sent Me, and loved them, even as You have loved Me.

Wardlaw:

Again:-In John xvii. 9, Jesus says, in addressing hie Father–“I pray for them; I pray not for the world, but for them which thou hast given me.” But in the 2lst verse, it has been alleged by Arminians he does pray for the world:–in expressing his desire for the union of his people, he says–“that they all may be one, as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be one in us,–that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.” Now, without considering at present the design of Arminians in this, I wish the reader to observe, what some Calvinists have said in reply. They have actually understood “the world ” in this last occurrence of it to mean the elect–God’s chosen people scattered throughout all nations, and the prayer as a petition that they might, all of them, in successive generations, be brought to the knowledge and faith of his name. In this way, it is alleged, the two verses are at once reconciled. And so, undoubtedly, they are; but the reconciliation, as it appears to me, is effected at the expense of every principle of fair and rational criticism; by making the same term signify, first one thing, repeatedly, and in direct and specified discrimination from another,–and then, all at once, and without warning, the very thing from which it had been distinguished; and that, not only in remote parts of the same prayer, but in the, very same sentence. In verses 9, 14, 16, 18, 21,23, 25, the world is used in express distinction from the chosen people of God; and the distinction is absolutely marked in the very verse in which it is supposed to signify that chosen people–”that thy also may be one in us that the world may believe that thou has sent me.” So that this extraordinary principle of interpretation makes those whose union was to be the means of conviction, and the world who were to be convinced by it, one and the same! This will never do. Nor is them the least occasion for having recourse to any process so anomalous. The principle of interpretation is simple. In the explanation just given, it is assumed that the phrase “that the world may believe” can mean nothing lees than that those signified by “the world,” whosoever they were, should all individually be brought to true and saving faith. But the prayer is for the unity of his disciples: and, things being spoken of according to their proper tendencies, this unity is sought, as an evidence to the world of his divine mission. This is all. The tendency of all evidence is to produce conviction. And in all cases, the general design of every one by whom evidence is presented, must be the same. It must correspond with the tendency. It must be to convince. Such is the tendency, and such we are warranted to consider the design, of all the evidence of this gospel, or of the mission of Christ, and the truth of his doctrines. The petition under consideration is framed, in its expression, upon this simple principle; meaning no more than that in the love and union of his disciples the world might have evidence of the truth, such a should tend, like all evidence, whether the effect actually resulted or not, to the production of faith–to the conviction of his having come from God.–And this is not the only text, to the explanation of which this simple principle, of things being spoken of according to their general tendency, is the key.

Ralph Wardlaw, Two Essays: I. On The Assurance of Faith: II. On The Extent of the Atonement, And Universal Pardon (Glasgow: Printed at the University Press, for Archibald Fullarton & Co., 1831), 280-283.

Dearman:

6:7 The prophet illustrates Israel’s ongoing faithlessness by reference to an incident at a place named Adam and wickedness in Gilead. Some interpret Adam as a personal name arid thus as a reference to Gen. 3 and the disobedience in the garden.⁴⁹ According to this view, Israel was repeating the error of the first man’s disobedience to divine command. Another possibility is to take ādām as a collective reference to "people" acting disobediently.⁵⁰ The Hebrew particle šām ("there") in the verse, however, marks a geographical reference, and Adam is the likely antecedent (see below). In Hos. 10:9 a similar syntactical expression occurs, with an initial reference to Gibeah followed by the particle "there" in the next clause. BHS, followed by a number of commentators, suggests that the kě ("like/as") prefixed to Adam be changed to a bě ("in/at"), so that the phrase would read "but they transgressed the covenant in Adam." Given Hosea’s propensity for similes and comparisons employing a kě, the use of the kě to compare an action at a place is not unexpected.

As noted, at Adam in v. 7 is the likely antecedent for the particle there, although the particle possibly anticipates the reference to Gilead in v. 8. According to Josh. 3: 16 a city on the east bank of the Jordan River is named Adam (modem Tell Damiyeh), not far from Zarethan and the joining of the Jabbok River with the Jordan. The settlement was located along a route between Ephraim and Gilead, which would makes geographical sense, given the reference to the city of Gilead in v. 8. There are, furthermore, indications elsewhere in the broader historical context for political intrigue in Gilead that this obscure reference may reflect, such as the murder in Samaria of Pekahiah, king of Israel, by Pekah, who was accompanied by fifty men from Gilead (2 Kgs. 15:25).⁵¹ This event took place ca. 738, during the public activity of Hosea.

The phrase transgress the covenant in v. 7 occurs elsewhere in Hosea (8: 1) and in the or (2 Kgs. 18: 12; Jer. 34: 18), but the nature of the covenant transgressed at Adam is unclear. Should we think of it as the Mosaic covenant, as seems likely in 2 Kgs. 18: 12 (and probably in Hos. 8: 1); as the violation of a self-commitment, such as that indicated in Josh. 24: 16ff.; as a reference to some solemn commitment, like that of Jer. 34:18 (a solemn agreement to free slaves); or even to some agreement made with another state that infringes on YHWH’s sovereignty? In context the critique of Hos. 6:7-11a is that of Israel’s rebelliousness against YHWH; so that whatever particularities are to be associated with place and precipitating event(s) there, it is YHWH’s covenant that has been transgressed.⁵² Perhaps a parallel might be that of the "covenant of brothers" (Amos 1 :9), where the city-state Tyre is judged for breaking a solemn relationship by engaging in the slave trade or some other form of violence against a group of people. J. Andrew Dearman, The Book of Hosea (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans, 2010), 197-198. [Footnote values and content original.]

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