<<  Contents  >>

Book IV.¹

Chapter I.-Examination of the Antitheses of Marcion, Bringing Them to the Test of Marcion's Own Gospel. Certain True Antitheses in the Dispensations of the Old and the New Testaments.these Variations Quite Compatible with One and the Same God, Who Ordered Them.

Chapter II.-St. Luke's Gospel, Selected by Marcion as His Authority, and Mutilated by Him. The Other Gospels Equally Authoritative. Marcion's Terms of Discussion, However, Accepted, and Grappled with on the Footing of St. Luke's Gospel Alone.

Chapter III.⁶⁵ -Marcion Insinuated the Untrustworthiness of Certain Apostles Whom St. Paul Rebuked. The Rebuke Shows that It Cannot Be Regarded as Derogating from Their Authority. The Apostolic Gospels Perfectly Authentic.

Chapter IV.-Each Side Claims to Possess the True Gospel. Antiquity the Criterion of Truth in Such a Matter. Marcion's Pretensions as an Amender of the Gospel.

Chapter V.-By the Rule of Antiquity, the Catholic Gospels are Found to Be True, Including the Real St. Luke's. Marcion's Only a Mutilated Edition. The Heretic's Weakness and Inconsistency in Ignoring the Other Gospels.¹⁰⁶

Chapter VI.-Marcion's Object in Adulterating the Gospel. No Difference Between the Christ of the Creator and the Christ of the Gospel. No Rival Christ Admissible. The Connection of the True Christ with the Dispensation of the Old Testament Asserted.

Chapter VII.-Marcion Rejected the Preceding Portion of St. Luke's Gospel. Therefore This Review Opens with an Examination of the Case of the Evil Spirit in the Synagogue of Capernaum. He Whom the Demon Acknowledged Was the Creator's Christ.

Chapter VIII.-Other Proofs from the Same Chapter, that Jesus, Who Preached at Nazareth, and Was Acknowledged by Certain Demons as Christ the Son of God, Was the Creator's Christ. As Occasion Offers, the Docetic Errors of Marcion are Exposed.

Chapter IX.-Out of St. Luke's Fifth Chapter are Found Proofs of Christ's Belonging to the Creator, E.g. In the Call of Fishermen to the Apostolic Office, and in the Cleansing of the Leper. Christ Compared with the Prophet Elisha.

Chapter X.-Further Proofs of the Same Truth in the Same Chapter, from the Healing of the Paralytic, and from the Designation Son of Man Which Jesus Gives Himself. Tertullian Sustains His Argument by Several Quotations from the Prophets.

Chapter XI.-The Call of Levi the Publican. Christ in Relation to the Baptist. Christ as the Bridegroom. The Parable of the Old Wine and the New. Arguments Connecting Christ with the Creator.

Chapter XII.-Christ's Authority Over the Sabbath. As Its Lord He Recalled It from Pharisaic Neglect to the Original Purpose of Its Institution by the Creator the Case of the Disciples Who Plucked the Ears of Corn on the Sabbath. The Withered Hand Healed on the Sabbath.

Chapter XIII.-Christ's Connection with the Creator Shown. Many Quotations Out of the Old Testament Prophetically Bear on Certain Events of the Life of Jesus-Such as His Ascent to Praying on the Mountain; His Selection of Twelve Apostles; His Changing Simon's Name to Peter, and Gentiles from Tyre and Sidon Resorting to Him.

Chapter XIV.-Christ's Sermon on the Mount. In Manner and Contents It So Resembles the Creator's Dispensational Words and Deeds. It Suggests Therefore the Conclusion that Jesus is the Creator's Christ. The Beatitudes.

Chapter XV.-Sermon on the Mount Continued. Its Woes in Strict Agreement with the Creator's Disposition. Many Quotations Out of the Old Testament in Proof of This.

Chapter XVI.-The Precept of Loving One's Enemies. It is as Much Taught in the Creator's Scriptures of the Old Testament as in Christ's Sermon. The Lex Talionis of Moses Admirably Explained in Consistency with the Kindness and Love Which Jesus Christ Came to Proclaim and Enforce in Behalf of the Creator. Sundry Precepts of Charity Explained.

Chapter XVII.-Concerning Loans. Prohibition of Usury and the Usurious Spirit. The Law Preparatory to the Gospel in Its Provisions; So in the Present Instance. On Reprisals. Christ's Teaching Throughout Proves Him to Be Sent by the Creator.

Chapter XVIII.-Concerning the Centurion's Faith. The Raising of the Widow's Son. John Baptist, and His Message to Christ; And the Woman Who Was a Sinner. Proofs Extracted from All of the Relation of Christ to the Creator.

Chapter XIX.-The Rich Women of Piety Who Followed Jesus Christ's Teaching by Parables. The Marcionite Cavil Derived from Christ's Remark, When Told of His Mother and His Brethren. Explanation of Christ's Apparent Rejection Them.

Chapter XX.-Comparison of Christ's Power Over Winds and Waves with Moses' Command of the Waters of the Red Sea and the Jordan. Christ's Power Over Unclean Spirits. The Case of the Legion. The Cure of the Issue of Blood. The Mosaic Uncleanness on This Point Explained.

Chapter XXI.-Christ's Connection with the Creator Shown from Several Incidents in the Old Testament, Compared with St. Luke's Narrative of the Mission of the Disciples. The Feeding of the Multitude. The Confession of St. Peter. Being Ashamed of Christ. This Shame is Only Possible of the True Christ. Marcionite Pretensions Absurd.

Chapter XXII.-The Same Conclusion Supported by the Transfiguration. Marcion Inconsistent in Associating with Christ in Glory Two Such Eminent Servants of the Creator as Moses and Elijah. St. Peter's Ignorance Accounted for on Montanist Principle.

Chapter XXIII.-Impossible that Marcion's Christ Should Reprove the Faithless Generation. Such Loving Consideration for Infants as the True Christ Was Apt to Shew, Also Impossible for the Other. On the Three Different Characters Confronted and Instructed by Christ Samaria.

Chapter XXIV.-On the Mission of the Seventy Disciples, and Christ's Charge to Them. Precedents Drawn from the Old Testament. Absurdity of Supposing that Marcion's Christ Could Have Given the Power of Treading on Serpents and Scorpions.

Chapter XXV.-Christ Thanks the Father for Revealing to Babes What He Had Concealed from the Wise. This Concealment Judiciously Effected by the Creator. Other Points in St. Luke's Chap. X. Shown to Be Only Possible to the Creator's Christ.

Chapter XXVI.-From St. Luke's Eleventh Chapter Other Evidence that Christ Comes from the Creator. The Lord's Prayer and Other Words of Christ. The Dumb Spirit and Christ's Discourse on Occasion of the Expulsion. The Exclamation of the Woman in the Crowd.

Chapter XXVII.-Christ's Reprehension of the Pharisees Seeking a Sign. His Censure of Their Love of Outward Show Rather Than Inward Holiness. Scripture Abounds with Admonitions of a Similar Purport. Proofs of His Mission from the Creator.

Chapter XXVIII.-Examples from the Old Testament, Balaam, Moses, and Hezekiah, to Show How Completely the Instruction and Conduct of Christ¹¹³⁷ Are in Keeping with the Will and Purpose of the Creator.

Chapter XXIX.-Parallels from the Prophets to Illustrate Christ's Teaching in the Rest of This Chapter of St. Luke. The Sterner Attributes of Christ, in His Judicial Capacity, Show Him to Have Come from the Creator. Incidental Rebukes of Marcion's Doctrine of Celibacy, and of His Altering of the Text of the Gospel.

Chapter XXX.-Parables of the Mustard-Seed, and of the Leaven. Transition to the Solemn Exclusion Which Will Ensue When the Master of the House Has Shut the Door. This Judicial Exclusion Will Be Administered by Christ, Who is Shown Thereby to Possess the Attribute of the Creator.

Chapter XXXI.-Christ's Advice to Invite the Poor in Accordance with Isaiah. The Parable of the Great Supper a Pictorial Sketch of the Creator's Own Dispensations of Mercy and Grace. The Rejections of the Invitation Paralleled by Quotations from the Old Testament. Marcion's Christ Could Not Fulfil the Conditions Indicated in This Parable. The Absurdity of the Marcionite Interpretation.

Chapter XXXII.-A Sort of Sorites, as the Logicians Call It, to Show that the Parables of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Drachma Have No Suitable Application to the Christ of Marcion.

Chapter XXXIII.-The Marcionite Interpretation of God and Mammon Refuted. The Prophets Justify Christ's Admonition Against Covetousness and Pride. John Baptist the Link Between the Old and the New Dispensations of the Creator. So Said Christ-But So Also Had Isaiah Said Long Before. One Only God, the Creator, by His Own Will Changed the Dispensations. No New God Had a Hand in the Change.

Chapter XXXIV.-Moses, Allowing Divorce, and Christ Prohibiting It, Explained. John Baptist and Herod. Marcion's Attempt to Discover an Antithesis in the Parable of the Rich Man and the Poor Man in Hades Confuted. The Creator's Appointment Manifested in Both States.

Chapter XXXV.-The Judicial Severity of Christ and the Tenderness of the Creator, Asserted in Contradiction to Marcion. The Cure of the Ten Lepers. Old Testament Analogies. The Kingdom of God Within You; This Teaching Similar to that of Moses. Christ, the Stone Rejected by the Builders. Indications of Severity in the Coming of Christ. Proofs that He is Not the Impassible Being Marcion Imagined.

Chapter XXXVI.-The Parables of the Importunate Widow, and of the Pharisee and the Publican. Christ's Answer to the Rich Ruler, the Cure of the Blind Man. His Salutation-Son of David. All Proofs of Christ's Relation to the Creator, Marcion's Antithesis Between David and Christ Confuted.

Chapter XXXVII.-Christ and Zacch¦us. The Salvation of the Body as Denied by Marcion. The Parable of the Ten Servants Entrusted with Ten Pounds. Christ a Judge, Who is to Administer the Will of the Austere Man, I.e. The Creator.

Chapter XXXVIII.-Christ's Refutations of the Pharisees. Rendering Dues to C¦sar and to God. Next of the Sadducees, Respecting Marriage in the Resurrection. These Prove Him Not to Be Marcion's But the Creator's Christ. Marcion's Tamperings in Order to Make Room for His Second God, Exposed and Confuted.

Chapter XXXIX.-Concerning Those Who Come in the Name of Christ. The Terrible Signs of His Coming. He Whose Coming is So Grandly Described Both in the Old Testament and the New Testament, is None Other Than the Christ of the Creator. This Proof Enhanced by the Parable of the Fig-Tree and All the Trees. Parallel Passages of Prophecy.

Chapter XL.-How the Steps in the Passion of the Saviour Were Predetermined in Prophecy. The Passover. The Treachery of Judas. The Institution of the Lord's Supper. The Docetic Error of Marcion Confuted by the Body and the Blood of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Chapter XLI.-The Woe Pronounced on the Traitor a Judicial Act, Which Disproves Christ to Be Such as Marcion Would Have Him to Be. Christ's Conduct Before the Council Explained. Christ Even Then Directs the Minds of His Judges to the Prophetic Evidences of His Own Mission. The Moral Responsibility of These Men Asserted.

Chapter XLII.-Other Incidents of the Passion Minutely Compared with Prophecy. Pilate and Herod. Barabbas Preferred to Jesus. Details of the Crucifixion. The Earthquake and the MID-Day Darkness. All Wonderfully Foretold in the Scriptures of the Creator. Christ's Giving Up the Ghost No Evidence of Marcion's Docetic Opinions. In His Sepulture There is a Refutation Thereof.

Chapter XLIII.-Conclusions. Jesus as the Christ of the Creator Proved from the Events of the Last Chapter of St. Luke. The Pious Women at the Sepulchre. The Angels at the Resurrection. The Manifold Appearances of Christ After the Resurrection. His Mission of the Apostles Amongst All Nations. All Shown to Be in Accordance with the Wisdom of the Almighty Father, as Indicated in Prophecy. The Body of Christ After Death No Mere Phantom. Marcion's Manipulation of the Gospel on This Point.

Book IV.¹

Which Tertullian pursues his argument. Jesus is the Christ of the creator. He derives his proofs from St. Luke's gospel; that being the only historical portion of the New Testament partially accepted by Marcion. This book may also be regarded as a commentary on St. Luke. It gives remarkable proof of Tertullian's grasp of scripture, and proves that "The old testament is not contrary to the new." It also abounds in striking expositions of scriptural passages, embracing profound views of revelation, in connection with the nature of man.

Chapter I.-Examination of the Antitheses of Marcion, Bringing Them to the Test of Marcion's Own Gospel. Certain True Antitheses in the Dispensations of the Old and the New Testaments.these Variations Quite Compatible with One and the Same God, Who Ordered Them.

Every opinion and the whole scheme² of the impious and sacrilegious Marcion we now bring to the test³ of that very Gospel which, by his process of interpolation, he has made his own. To encourage a belief of this Gospel he has actually⁴ devised for it a sort of dower,⁵ in a work composed of contrary statements set in opposition, thence entitled Antitheses, and compiled with a view to such a severance of the law from the gospel as should divide the Deity into two, nay, diverse, gods-one for each Instrument, or Testament⁶ as it is more usual to call it; that by such means he might also patronize⁷ belief in "the Gospel according to the Antitheses." These, however, I would have attacked in special combat, hand to hand; that is to say, I would have encountered singly the several devices Of the Pontic heretic, if it were not much more convenient to refute them in and with that very gospel to which they contribute their support. Although it is so easy to meet them at once with a peremptory demurrer,⁸ yet, in order that I may both make them admissible in argument, and account them valid expressions of opinion, and even contend that they make for our side, that so there may be all the redder shame for the blindness of their author, we have now drawn out some antitheses of our own in opposition to Marcion.And indeed⁹ I do allow that one order did run its course in the old dispensation under the Creator,¹⁰ and that another is on its way in the new under Christ. I do not deny that there is a difference in the language of their documents, in their precepts of virtue, and in their teachings of the law; but yet all this diversity is consistent with one and the same God, even Him by whom it was arranged and also foretold. Long ago¹¹ did Isaiah declare that "out of Sion should go forth the law, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem"¹² -some other law, that is, and another word. In short, says he, "He shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people; "¹³ meaning not those of the Jewish people only, but of the nations which are judged by the new law of the gospel and the new word of the apostles, and are amongst themselves rebuked of their old error as soon as they have believed. And as the result of this, "they beat their swords into ploughshares, and their spears (which are a kind of hunting instruments) into pruning-hooks; "¹⁴ that is to say, minds, which once were fierce and cruel, are changed by them into good dispositions productive of good fruit. And again: "Hearken unto me, hearken unto me, my people, and ye kings, give ear unto me; for a law shall proceed from me, and my judgment for a light to the nations; "¹⁵ wherefore He had determined and decreed that the nations also were to be enlightened by the law and the word of the gospel. This will be that law which (according to David also) is unblameable, because "perfect, converting the soul"¹⁶ from idols unto God. This likewise will be the word concerning which the same Isaiah says, "For the Lord will make a decisive word in the land."¹⁷ Because the New Testament is compendiously short,¹⁸ and freed from the minute and perplexing¹⁹ burdens of the law. But why enlarge, when the Creator by the same prophet foretells the renovation more manifestly and clearly than the light itself? "Remember not the former things, neither consider the things of old" (the old things have passed away, and new things are arising). "Behold, I will do new things, which shall now spring forth."²⁰ So by Jeremiah: "Break up for yourselves new pastures,²¹ and sow not among thorns, and circumcise yourselves in the foreskin of your heart."²² And in another passage: "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Jacob, and with the house of Judah; not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day when I arrested their dispensation, in order to bring them out of the land of Egypt."²³ He thus shows that the ancient covenant is temporary only, when He indicates its change; also when He promises that it shall be followed by an eternal one. For by Isaiah He says: "Hear me, and ye shall live; and I will make an everlasting covenant with you," adding "the sure mercies of David,"²⁴ in order that He might show that that covenant was to run its course in Christ. That He was of the family of David, according to the genealogy of Mary,²⁵ He declared in a figurative way even by the rod which was to proceed out of the stem of Jesse.²⁶ Forasmuch then as he said, that from the Creator there would come other laws, and other words, and new dispensations of covenants, indicating also that the very sacrifices were to receive higher offices, and that amongst all nations, by Malachi when he says: "I have no pleasure in you, saith the Lord, neither will I accept your sacrifices at your hands. For from the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the same, my name shall be great among the Gentiles; and in every place a sacrifice is offered unto my name, even a pure offering"²⁷ -meaning simple prayer from a pure conscience,-it is of necessity that every change which comes as the result of innovation, introduces a diversity in those things of which the change is made, from which diversity arises also a contrariety. For as there is nothing, after it has undergone a change, which does not become different, so there is nothing different which is not contrary.²⁸ Of that very thing, therefore, there will be predicated a contrariety in consequence of its diversity, to which there accrued a change of condition after an innovation. He who brought about the change, the same instituted the diversity also; He who foretold the innovation, the same announced beforehand the contrariety likewise. Why, in your interpretation, do you impute a difference in the state of things to a difference of powers? Why do you wrest to the Creator's prejudice those examples from which you draw your antitheses, when you may recognise them all in His sensations and affections? "I will wound," He says, "and I will heal; ""I will kill," He says again, "and I will make alive"²⁹ -even the same "who createth evil and maketh peace; "³⁰ from which you are used even to censure Him with the imputation of fickleness and inconstancy, as if He forbade what He commanded, and commanded what He forbade. Why, then, have you not reckoned up the Antitheses also which occur in the natural works of the Creator, who is for ever contrary to Himself? You have not been able, unless I am misinformed, to recognise the fact,³¹ that the world, at all events,³² even amongst your people of Pontus, is made up of a diversity of elements which are hostile to one another.³³ It was therefore your bounden duty first to have determined that the god of the light was one being, and the god of darkness was another, in such wise that you might have been able to have distinctly asserted one of them to be the god of the law and the other the god of the gospel. It is, however, the settled conviction already³⁴ of my mind from manifest proofs, that, as His works and plans³⁵ exist in the way of Antitheses, so also by the same rule exist the mysteries of His religion.³⁶

Chapter II.-St. Luke's Gospel, Selected by Marcion as His Authority, and Mutilated by Him. The Other Gospels Equally Authoritative. Marcion's Terms of Discussion, However, Accepted, and Grappled with on the Footing of St. Luke's Gospel Alone.

You have now our answer to the Antitheses compendiously indicated by us.³⁷ I pass on to give a proof of the Gospel³⁸ -not, to be sure, of Jewry, but of Pontus-having become meanwhile³⁹ adulterated; and this shall indicate⁴⁰ the order by which we proceed. We lay it down as our first position, that the evangelical Testament⁴¹ has apostles for its authors,⁴² to whom was assigned by the Lord Himself this office of publishing the gospel. Since, however, there are apostolic⁴³ men also,⁴⁴ they are yet not alone, but appear with apostles and after apostles; because the preaching of disciples might be open to the suspicion of an affectation of glory, if there did not accompany it⁴⁵ the authority of the masters, which means that of Christ,⁴⁶ for it was that which made the apostles their masters. Of the apostles, therefore, John and Matthew first instil⁴⁷ faith into us; whilst of apostolic men, Luke and Mark renew it afterwards.⁴⁸ These all start with the same principles of the faith,⁴⁹ so far as relates to the one only God the Creator and His Christ, how that He was born of the Virgin, and came to fulfil⁵⁰ the law and the prophets. Never mind⁵¹ if there does occur some variation in the order of their narratives, provided that there be agreement in the essential matter⁵² of the faith, in which there is disagreement with Marcion. Marcion, on the other hand, you must know,⁵³ ascribes no author to his Gospel, as if it could not be allowed him to affix a title to that from which it was no crime (in his eyes) to subvert⁵⁴ the very body. And here I might now make a stand, and contend that a work ought not to be recognised, which holds not its head erect, which exhibits no consistency, which gives no promise of credibility from the fulness of its title and the just profession of its author. But we prefer to join issue⁵⁵ on every point; nor shall we leave unnoticed⁵⁶ what may fairly be understood to be on our side.⁵⁷ Now, of the authors whom we possess, Marcion seems to have singled out Luke⁵⁸ for his mutilating process.⁵⁹ Luke, however, was not an apostle, but only an apostolic man; not a master, but a disciple, and so inferior to a master-at least as far subsequent to⁶⁰ him as the apostle whom he followed (and that, no doubt, was Paul⁶¹ ) was subsequent to the others; so that, had Marcion even published his Gospel in the name of St. Paul himself, the single authority of the document,⁶² destitute of all support from preceding authorities, would not be a sufficient basis for our faith. There would be still wanted that Gospel which St. Paul found in existence, to which he yielded his belief, and with which he so earnestly wished his own to agree, that he actually on that account went up to Jerusalem to know and consult the apostles, "lest he should run, or had been running in vain; "⁶³ in other words, that the faith which he had learned, and the gospel which he was preaching, might be in accordance with theirs. Then, at last, having conferred with the (primitive) authors, and having agreed with them touching the rule of faith, they joined their hands in fellowship, and divided their labours thenceforth in the office of preaching the gospel, so that they were to go to the Jews, and St. Paul to the Jews and the Gentiles. Inasmuch, therefore, as the enlightener of St. Luke himself desired the authority of his predecessors for both his own faith and preaching, how much more may not I require for Luke's Gospel that which was necessary for the Gospel of his master.⁶⁴

Chapter III.⁶⁵ -Marcion Insinuated the Untrustworthiness of Certain Apostles Whom St. Paul Rebuked. The Rebuke Shows that It Cannot Be Regarded as Derogating from Their Authority. The Apostolic Gospels Perfectly Authentic.

In the scheme of Marcion, on the contrary,⁶⁶ the mystery⁶⁷ of the Christian religion begins from the discipleship of Luke. Since, however, it was on its course previous to that point, it must have had⁶⁸ its own authentic materials,⁶⁹ by means of which it found its own way down to St. Luke; and by the assistance of the testimony which it bore, Luke himself becomes admissible. Well, but⁷⁰ Marcion, finding the Epistle of Paul to the Galatians (wherein he rebukes even apostles⁷¹ ) for "not walking uprightly according to the truth of the gospel,"⁷² as well as accuses certain false apostles of perverting the gospel of Christ), labours very hard to destroy the character⁷³ of those Gospels which are published as genuine⁷⁴ and under the name of apostles, in order, forsooth, to secure for his own Gospel the credit which he takes away from them. But then, even if he censures Peter and John and James, who were thought to be pillars, it is for a manifest reason. They seemed to be changing their company⁷⁵ from respect of persons. And yet as Paul himself "became all things to all men,"⁷⁶ that he might gain all, it was possible that Peter also might have betaken himself to the same plan of practising somewhat different from what he taught. And, in like manner, if false apostles also crept in, their character too showed itself in their insisting upon circumcision and the Jewish ceremonies. So that it was not on account of their preaching, but of their conversation, that they were marked by St. Paul, who would with equal impartiality have marked them with censure, if they had erred at all with respect to God the Creator or His Christ. Each several case will therefore have to be distinguished. When Marcion complains that apostles are suspected (for their prevarication and dissimulation) of having even depraved the gospel, he thereby accuses Christ, by accusing those whom Christ chose. If, then, the apostles, who are censured simply for inconsistency of walk, composed the Gospel in a pure form,⁷⁷ but false apostles interpolated their true record; and if our own copies have been made from these,⁷⁸ where will that genuine text⁷⁹ of the apostle's writings be found which has not suffered adulteration? Which was it that enlightened Paul, and through him Luke? It is either completely blotted out, as if by some deluge-being obliterated by the inundation of falsifiers-in which case even Marcion does not possess the true Gospel; or else, is that very edition which Marcion alone possesses the true one, that is, of the apostles? How, then, does that agree with ours, which is said not to be (the work) of apostles, but of Luke? Or else, again, if that which Marcion uses is not to be attributed to Luke simply because it does agree with ours (which, of course,⁸⁰ is, also adulterated in its title), then it is the work of apostles. Our Gospel, therefore, which is in agreement with it, is equally the work of apostles, but also adulterated in its title.⁸¹

Chapter IV.-Each Side Claims to Possess the True Gospel. Antiquity the Criterion of Truth in Such a Matter. Marcion's Pretensions as an Amender of the Gospel.

We must follow, then, the clue⁸² of our discussion, meeting every effort of our opponents with reciprocal vigor. I say that my Gospel is the true one; Marcion, that his is. I affirm that Marcion's Gospel is adulterated; Marcion, that mine is. Now what is to settle the point for us, except it be that principle⁸³ of time, which rules that the authority lies with that which shall be found to be more ancient; and assumes as an elemental truth,⁸⁴ that corruption (of doctrine) belongs to the side which shall be convicted of comparative lateness in its origin.⁸⁵ For, inasmuch as error⁸⁶ is falsification of truth, it must needs be that truth therefore precede error. A thing must exist prior to its suffering any casualty;⁸⁷ and an object⁸⁸ must precede all rivalry to itself. Else how absurd it would be, that, when we have proved our position to be the older one, and Marcion's the later, ours should yet appear to be the false one, before it had even received from truth its objective existence;⁸⁹ and Marcion's should also be supposed to have experienced rivalry at our hands, even before its publication; and, in fine, that that should be thought to be the truer position which is the later one-a century⁹⁰ later than the publication of all the many and great facts and records of the Christian religion, which certainly could not have been published without, that is to say, before, the truth of the gospel. With regard, then, to the pending⁹¹ question, of Luke's Gospel (so far as its being the common property⁹² of ourselves and Marcion enables it to be decisive of the truth,⁹³ ) that portion of it which we alone receive⁹⁴ is so much older than Marcion, that Marcion, himself once believed it, when in the first warmth of faith he contributed money to the Catholic church, which along with himself was afterwards rejected,⁹⁵ when he fell away from our truth into his own heresy. What if the Marcionites have denied that he held the primitive faith amongst ourselves, in the face even of his own letter? What, if they do not acknowledge the letter? They, at any rate, receive his Antitheses; and more than that, they make ostentatious use⁹⁶ of them. Proof out of these is enough for me. For if the Gospel, said to be Luke's which is current amongst us⁹⁷ (we shall see whether it be also current with Marcion), is the very one which, as Marcion argues in his Antitheses, was interpolated by the defenders of Judaism, for the purpose of such a conglomeration with it of the law and the prophets as should enable them out of it to fashion their Christ, surely he could not have so argued about it, unless he had found it (in such a form). No one censures things before they exist,⁹⁸ when he knows not whether they will come to pass. Emendation never precedes the fault. To be sure,⁹⁹ an amender of that Gospel, which had been all topsy-turvy¹⁰⁰ from the days of Tiberius to those of Antoninus, first presented himself in Marcion alone-so long looked for by Christ, who was all along regretting that he had been in so great a hurry to send out his apostles without the support of Marcion! But for all that,¹⁰¹ heresy, which is for ever mending the Gospels, and corrupting them in the act, is an affair of man's audacity, not of God's authority; and if Marcion be even a disciple, he is yet not "above his master; "¹⁰² if Marcion be an apostle, still as Paul says, "Whether it be I or they, so we preach; "¹⁰³ if Marcion be a prophet, even "the spirits of the prophets will be subject to the prophets,"¹⁰⁴ for they are not the authors of confusion, but of peace; or if Marcion be actually an angel, he must rather be designated "as anathema than as a preacher of the gospel,"¹⁰⁵ because it is a strange gospel which he has preached. So that, whilst he amends, he only confirms both positions: both that our Gospel is the prior one, for he amends that which he has previously fallen in with; and that that is the later one, which, by putting it together out of the emendations of ours, he has made his own Gospel, and a novel one too.

Chapter V.-By the Rule of Antiquity, the Catholic Gospels are Found to Be True, Including the Real St. Luke's. Marcion's Only a Mutilated Edition. The Heretic's Weakness and Inconsistency in Ignoring the Other Gospels.¹⁰⁶

On the whole, then, if that is evidently more true which is earlier, if that is earlier which is from the very beginning, if that is from the beginning which has the apostles for its authors, then it will certainly be quite as evident, that that comes down from the apostles, which has been kept as a sacred deposit¹⁰⁷ in the churches of the apostles. Let us see what milk the Corinthians drank from Paul; to what rule of faith the Galatians were brought for correction; what the Philippians, the Thessalonians, the Ephesians read by it; what utterance also the Romans give, so very near¹⁰⁸ (to the apostles), to whom Peter and Paul conjointly¹⁰⁹ bequeathed the gospel even sealed with their own blood. We have also St. John's foster churches.¹¹⁰ For although Marcion rejects his Apocalypse, the order¹¹¹ of the bishops (thereof), when traced up to their origin, will yet rest on John as their author. In the same manner is recognised the excellent source¹¹² of the other churches. I say, therefore, that in them (and not simply such of them as were rounded by apostles, but in all those which are united with them in the fellowship of the mystery of the gospel of Christ¹¹³ ) that Gospel of Luke which we are defending with all our might has stood its ground from its very first publication; whereas Marcion's Gospel is not known to most people, and to none whatever is it known without being at the same time¹¹⁴ condemned. It too, of course,¹¹⁵ has its churches, but specially its own-as late as they are spurious; and should you want to know their original,¹¹⁶ you will more easily discover apostasy in it than apostolicity, with Marcion forsooth as their founder, or some one of Marcion's swarm.¹¹⁷ Even wasps make combs;¹¹⁸ so also these Marcionites make churches. The same authority of the apostolic churches will afford evidence¹¹⁹ to the other Gospels also, which we possess equally through their means,¹²⁰ and according to their usage-I mean the Gospels of John and Matthew-whilst that which Mark published may be affirmed to be Peter's¹²¹ whose interpreter Mark was. For even Luke's form¹²² of the Gospel men usually ascribe to Paul.¹²³ And it may well seem¹²⁴ that the works which disciples publish belong to their masters. Well, then, Marcion ought to be called to a strict account¹²⁵ concerning these (other Gospels) also, for having omitted them, and insisted in preference¹²⁶ on Luke; as if they, too, had not had free course in the churches, as well as Luke's Gospel, from the beginning. Nay, it is even more credible that they¹²⁷ existed from the very beginning; for, being the work of apostles, they were prior, and coeval in origin with¹²⁸ the churches themselves. But how comes it to pass, if the apostles published nothing, that their disciples were more forward in such a work; for they could not have been disciples, without any instruction from their masters? If, then, it be evident that these (Gospels) also were current in the churches, why did not Marcion touch them-either to amend them if they were adulterated, or to acknowledge them if they were uncorrupt? For it is but natural¹²⁹ that they who were perverting the gospel, should be more solicitous about the perversion of those things whose authority they knew to be more generally received. Even the false apostles (were so called) on this very account, because they imitated the apostles by means of their falsification. In as far, then, as he might have amended what there was to amend, if found corrupt, in so far did he firmly imply¹³⁰ that all was free from corruption which he did not think required amendment. In short,¹³¹ he simply amended what he thought was corrupt; though, indeed, not even this justly, because it was not really corrupt. For if the (Gospels) of the apostles¹³² have come down to us in their integrity, whilst Luke's, which is received amongst us,¹³³ so far accords with their rule as to be on a par with them in permanency of reception in the churches, it clearly follows that Luke's Gospel also has come down to us in like integrity until the sacrilegious treatment of Marcion. In short, when Marcion laid hands on it, it then became diverse and hostile to the Gospels of the apostles. I will therefore advise his followers, that they either change these Gospels, however late to do so, into a conformity with their own, whereby they may seem to be in agreement with the apostolic writings (for they are daily retouching their work, as daily they are convicted by us); or else that they blush for their master, who stands self-condemned¹³⁴ either way-when once¹³⁵ he hands on the truth of the gospel conscience smitten, or again¹³⁶ subverts it by shameless tampering. Such are the summary arguments which we use, when we take up arms¹³⁷ against heretics for the faith¹³⁸ of the gospel, maintaining both that order of periods, which rules that a late date is the mark of forgers,¹³⁹ and that authority of churches¹⁴⁰ which lends support to the tradition of the apostles; because truth must needs precede the forgery, and proceed straight from those by whom it has been handed on.

Chapter VI.-Marcion's Object in Adulterating the Gospel. No Difference Between the Christ of the Creator and the Christ of the Gospel. No Rival Christ Admissible. The Connection of the True Christ with the Dispensation of the Old Testament Asserted.

But we now advance a step further on, and challenge (as we promised to do) the very Gospel of Marcion, with the intention of thus proving that it has been adulterated. For it is certain¹⁴¹ that the whole aim at which he has strenuously laboured even in the drawing up of his Antitheses, centres in this, that he may establish a diversity between the Old and the New Testaments, so that his own Christ may be separate from the Creator, as belonging to this rival god, and as alien from the law and the prophets. It is certain, also, that with this view¹⁴² he has erased everything that was contrary to his own opinion and made for the Creator, as if it had been interpolated by His advocates, whilst everything which agreed with his own opinion he has retained. The latter statements we shall strictly examine;¹⁴³ and if they shall turn out rather for our side, and shatter the assumption of Marcion, we shall embrace them. It will then become evident, that in retaining them he has shown no less of the defect of blindness, which characterizes heresy, than he displayed when he erased all the former class of subjects. Such, then, is to be¹⁴⁴ the drift and form of my little treatise; subject, of course, to whatever condition may have become requisite on both sides of the question.¹⁴⁵ Marcion has laid down the position, that Christ who in the days of Tiberius was, by a previously unknown god, revealed for the salvation of all nations, is a different being from Him who was ordained by God the Creator for the restoration of the Jewish state, and who is yet to come. Between these he interposes the separation of¹⁴⁶ a great and absolute difference-as great as lies between what is just and what is good;¹⁴⁷ as great as lies between the law and the gospel; as great, (in short, ) as is the difference between Judaism and Christianity. Hence will arise also our rule,¹⁴⁸ by which we determine¹⁴⁹ that there ought to be nothing in common between the Christ of the rival god and the Creator; but that (Christ) must be pronounced to belong to the Creator,¹⁵⁰ if He has administered His dispensations, fulfilled His prophecies, promoted¹⁵¹ His laws, given reality to¹⁵² His promises, revived His mighty power,¹⁵³ remoulded His determinations¹⁵⁴ expressed His attributes, His properties. This law and this rule I earnestly request the reader to have ever in his mind, and so let him begin to investigate whether Christ be Marcion's or the Creator's.

Chapter VII.-Marcion Rejected the Preceding Portion of St. Luke's Gospel. Therefore This Review Opens with an Examination of the Case of the Evil Spirit in the Synagogue of Capernaum. He Whom the Demon Acknowledged Was the Creator's Christ.

In the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius¹⁵⁵ (for such is Marcion's proposition) he "came down to the Galilean city of Capernaum," of course meaning from the heaven of the Creator, to which he had previously descended from his own. What then had been his Course,¹⁵⁶ for him to be described as first descending from his own heaven to the Creator's? For why should I abstain from censuring those parts of the statement which do not satisfy the requirement of an ordinary narrative, but always end in a falsehood? To be sure, our censure has been once for all expressed in the question, which we have already¹⁵⁷ suggested: Whether, when descending through the Creator's domain, and indeed in hostility to him, he could possibly have been admitted by him, and by him been transmitted to the earth, which was equally his territory? Now, however, I want also to know the remainder of his course down, assuming that he came down. For we must not be too nice in inquiring¹⁵⁸ whether it is supposed that he was seen in any place. To come into view¹⁵⁹ indicates¹⁶⁰ a sudden unexpected glance, which for a moment fixed¹⁶¹ the eye upon the object that passed before the view, without staying. But when it happens that a descent has been effected, it is apparent, and comes under the notice of the eyes.¹⁶² Moreover, it takes account of fact, and thus obliges one to examine in what condition with what preparation,¹⁶³ with how much violence or moderation, and further, at what time of the day or night, the descent was made; who, again, saw the descent, who reported it, who seriously avouched the fact, which certainly was not easy to be believed, even after the asseveration. It is, in short, too bad¹⁶⁴ that Romulus should have had in Proculus an avoucher of his ascent to heaven, when the Christ of (this) god could not find any one to announce his descent from heaven; just as if the ascent of the one and the descent of the other were not effected on one and the same ladder of falsehood! Then, what had he to do with Galilee, if he did not belong to the Creator by whom¹⁶⁵ that region was destined (for His Christ) when about to enter on His ministry?¹⁶⁶ As Isaiah says: "Drink in this first, and be prompt, O region of Zabulon and land of Nephthalim, and ye others who (inhabit) the sea-coast, and that of Jordan, Galilee of the nations, ye people who sit in darkness, behold a great light; upon you, who inhabit (that) land, sitting in the shadow of death, the light hath arisen."¹⁶⁷ It is, however, well that Marcion's god does claim to be the enlightener of the nations, that so he might have the better reason for coming down from heaven; only, if it must needs be,¹⁶⁸ he should rather have made Pontus his place of descent than Galilee. But since both the place and the work of illumination according to the prophecy are compatible with Christ, we begin to discern¹⁶⁹ that He is the subject of the prophecy, which shows that at the very outset of His ministry, He came not to destroy the law and the prophets, but rather to fulfil them;¹⁷⁰ for Marcion has erased the passage as an interpolation.¹⁷¹ It will, however, be vain for him to deny that Christ uttered in word what He forthwith did partially indeed. For the prophecy about place He at once fulfilled. From heaven straight to the synagogue. As the adage runs: "The business on which we are come, do at once." Marcion must even expunge from the Gospel, "I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Isreal; "¹⁷² and, "It is not meet to take the children'sbread, and to cast it to dogs,"¹⁷³ -in order, forsooth, that Christ may not appear to be an Isrealite. But facts will satisfy me instead of words. Withdraw all the sayings of my Christ, His acts shall speak. Lo, He enters the synagogue; surely (this is going) to the lost sheep of the house of Isreal. Behold, it is to Isrealites first that He offers the "bread" of His doctrine; surely it is because they are "children" that He shows them this priority.¹⁷⁴ Observe, He does not yet impart it to others; surely He passes them by as "dogs." For to whom else could He better have imparted it, than to such as were strangers to the Creator, if He especially belonged not to the Creator? And yet how could He have been admitted into the synagogue-one so abruptly appearing,¹⁷⁵ so unknown; one, of whom no one had as yet been apprised of His tribe, His nation, His family, and lastly, His enrolment in the census of Augustus-that most faithful witness of the Lord's nativity, kept in the archives of Rome? They certainly would have remembered, if they did not know Him to be circumcised, that He must not be admitted into their most holy places. And even if He had the general right of entering¹⁷⁶ the synagogue (like other Jews), yet the function of giving instruction was allowed only to a man who was extremely well known, and examined and tried, and for some time invested with the privilege after experience duly attested elsewhere. But "they were all astonished at His doctrine." Of course they were; "for, says (St. Luke), "His word was with power¹⁷⁷ -not because He taught in opposition to the law and the prophets. No doubt, His divine discourse¹⁷⁸ gave forth both power and grace, building up rather than pulling down the substance of the law and the prophets. Otherwise, instead of "astonishment, they would feel horror. It would not be admiration, but aversion, prompt and sure, which they would bestow on one who was the destroyer of law and prophets, and the especial propounder as a natural consequence of a rival god; for he would have been unable to teach anything to the disparagement of the law and the prophets, and so far of the Creator also, without premising the doctrine of a different and rival divinity, Inasmuch, then, as the Scripture makes no other statement on the matter than that the simple force and power of His word produced astonishment, it more naturally¹⁷⁹ shows that His teaching was in accordance with the Creator by not denying (that it was so), than that it was in opposition to the Creator, by not asserting (such a fact). And thus He will either have to be acknowledged as belonging to Him,¹⁸⁰ in accordance with whom He taught; or else will have to be adjudged a deceiver since He taught in accordance with One whom He had come to oppose. In the same passage, "the spirit of an unclean devil" exclaims: "What have we to do with Thee, Thou Jesus? Art Thou come to destroy us? I know Thee who Thou art, the Holy One of God."¹⁸¹ I do not here raise the question whether this appellation was suitable to one who ought not to be called Christ, unless he were sent by the Creator.¹⁸² Elsewhere¹⁸³ there has been already given a full consideration of His titles.

My present discussion is, how the evil spirit could have known that He was called by such a name, when there had never at any time been uttered about Him a single prophecy by a god who was unknown, and up to that time silent, of whom it was not possible for Him to be attested as "the Holy One," as (of a god) unknown even to his own Creator. What similar event could he then have published¹⁸⁴ of a new deity, whereby he might betoken for "the holy one" of the rival god? Simply that he went into the synagogue, and did nothing even in word against the Creator? As therefore he could not by any means acknowledge him, whom he was ignorant of, to be Jesus and the Holy One of God; so did he acknowledge Him whom he knew (to be both). For he remembered how that the prophet had prophesied¹⁸⁵ of "the Holy One" of God, and how that God's name of "Jesus" was in the son of Nun.¹⁸⁶ These facts he had also received¹⁸⁷ from the angel, according to our Gospel: "Wherefore that which shall be born of thee shall be called the Holy One, the Son of God; "¹⁸⁸ and, "Thou shalt call his name Jesus."¹⁸⁹ Thus he actually had (although only an evil spirit) some idea of the Lord's dispensation, rather than Of any strange and heretofore imperfectly understood one. Because he also premised this question: "What have we to do with Thee? "-not as if referring to a strange Jesus, to whom pertain the evil spirits of the Creator. Nor did he say, What hast Thou to do with us? but, "What have we to do with Thee? "as if deploring himself, and deprecating his own calamity; at the prospect of which he adds: "Art Thou come to destroy us? "So completely did he acknowledge in Jesus the Son of that God who was judicial and avenging, and (so to speak) severe,¹⁹⁰ and not of him who was simply good,¹⁹¹ and knew not how to destroy or how to punish! Now for what purpose have we adduced his passage first?¹⁹² In order to show that Jesus was neither acknowledged by the evil spirit, nor affirmed by Himself, to be any other than the Creator's. Well, but Jesus rebuked him, you say. To be sure he did, as being an envious (spirit), and in his very confession only petulant, and evil in adulation-just as if it had been Christ's highest glory to have come for the destruction of demons, and not for the salvation of mankind; whereas His wish really was that His disciples should not glory in the subjection of evil spirits but in the fair beauty of salvation.¹⁹³ Why else¹⁹⁴ did He rebuke him? If it was because he was entirely wrong (in his invocation), then He was neither Jesus nor the Holy One of God; if it was because he was partially wrong-for having supposed him to be, rightly enough,¹⁹⁵ Jesus and the Holy One of God, but also as belonging to the Creator-most unjustly would He have rebuked him for thinking what he knew he ought to think (about Him), and for not supposing that of Him which he knew not that he ought to suppose-that he was another Jesus, and the holy one of the other god. If, however, the rebuke has not a more probable meaning¹⁹⁶ than that which we ascribe to it, follows that the evil spirit made no mistake, and was not rebuked for lying; for it was Jesus Himself, besides whom it was impossible for the evil spirit to have acknowledged any other, whilst Jesus affirmed that He was He whom the evil spirit had acknowledged, by not rebuking him for uttering a lie.

Chapter VIII.-Other Proofs from the Same Chapter, that Jesus, Who Preached at Nazareth, and Was Acknowledged by Certain Demons as Christ the Son of God, Was the Creator's Christ. As Occasion Offers, the Docetic Errors of Marcion are Exposed.

The Christ of the Creator had¹⁹⁷ to be called a Nazarene according to prophecy; whence the Jews also designate us, on that very account,¹⁹⁸ Nazerenes¹⁹⁹ after Him. For we are they of whom it is written, "Her Nazarites were whiter than snow; "²⁰⁰ even they who were once defiled with the stains of sin, and darkened with the clouds of ignorance. But to Christ the title Nazarene was destined to become a suitable one, from the hiding-place of His infancy, for which He went down and dwelt at Nazareth,²⁰¹ to escape from Archelaus the son of Herod. This fact I have not refrained from mentioning on this account, because it behoved Marcion's Christ to have forborne all connection whatever with the domestic localities of the Creator's Christ, when he had so many towns in Judµa which had not been by the prophets thus assigned²⁰² to the Creator's Christ. But Christ will be (the Christ) of the prophets, wheresoever He is found in accordance with the prophets. And yet even at Nazareth He is not remarked as having preached anything new,²⁰³ whilst in another verse He is said to have been rejected²⁰⁴ by reason of a simple proverb.²⁰⁵ Here at once, when I observe that they laid their hands on Him, I cannot help drawing a conclusion respecting His bodily substance, which cannot be believed to have been a phantom,²⁰⁶ since it was capable of being touched and even violently handled, when He was seized and taken and led to the very brink of a precipice. For although He escaped through the midst of them, He had already experienced their rough treatment, and afterwards went His way, no doubt²⁰⁷ because the crowd (as usually happens) gave way, or was even broken through; but not because it was eluded as by an impalpable disguise,²⁰⁸ which, if there had been such, would not at all have submitted to any touch.

"Tangere enim et tangi, nisi corpus, nulla potest res,"

²⁰⁹ is even a sentence worthy of a place in the world's wisdom. In short, He did himself touch others, upon whom He laid His hands, which were capable of being felt, and conferred the blessings of healing,²¹⁰ which were not less true, not less unimaginary, than were the hands wherewith He bestowed them. He was therefore the very Christ of Isaiah, the healer of our sicknesses.²¹¹ "Surely," says he, "He hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows." Now the Greeks are accustomed to use for carry a word which also signifies to take away. A general promise Is enough for me in passing.²¹² Whatever were the cures which Jesus effected, He is mine. We will come, however, to the kinds of cures. To liberate men, then, from evil spirits, is a cure of sickness. Accordingly, wicked spirits (just in the manner of our former example) used to go forth with a testimony, exclaiming, "Thou art the Son of God,"²¹³ -of what God, is clear enough from the case itself. But they were rebuked, and ordered not to speak; precisely because²¹⁴ Christ willed Himself to be proclaimed by men, not by unclean spirits, as the Son of God-even that Christ alone to whom this was befitting, because He had sent beforehand men through whom He might become known, and who were assuredly worthier preachers. It was natural to Him²¹⁵ to refuse the proclamation of an unclean spirit, at whose command there was an abundance of saints. He, however,²¹⁶ who had never been foretold (if, indeed, he wished to be acknowledged; for if he did not wish so much, his coming was in vain), would not have spurned the testimony of an alien or any sort of substance, who did not happen to have a substance of his own,²¹⁷ but had descended in an alien one. And now, too, as the destroyer also of the Creator, he would have desired nothing better than to be acknowledged by His spirits, and to be divulged for the sake of being feared:²¹⁸ only that Marcion says²¹⁹ that his god is not feared; maintaining that a good being Is not an object of fear, but only a judicial being, in whom reside the grounds²²⁰ of fear-anger, severity, judgments, vengeance, condemnation. But it was from fear, undoubtedly, that the evil spirits were cowed.²²¹ Therefore they confessed that (Christ) was the Son of a God who was to be feared, because they would have an occasion of not submitting if there were none for fearing. Besides, He showed that He was to be feared, because He drave them out, not by persuasion like a good being, but by command and reproof. Or else did he²²² reprove them, because they were making him an object of fear, when all the while he did not want to be feared? And in what manner did he wish them to go forth, when they could not do so except with fear? So that he fell into the dilemma²²³ of having to conduct himself contrary to his nature, whereas he might in his simple goodness have at once treated them with leniency. He fell, too, into another false position²²⁴ -of prevarication, when he permitted himself to be feared by the demons as the Son of the Creator, that he might drive them out, not indeed by his own power, but by the authority of the Creator. "He departed, and went into a desert place."²²⁵ This was, indeed, the Creator's customary region. It was proper that the Word²²⁶ should there appear in body, where He had aforetime, wrought in a cloud. To the gospel also was suitable that condition of place²²⁷ which had once been determined on for the law.²²⁸ "Let the wilderness and the solitary place, therefore, be glad and rejoice; "so had Isaiah promised.²²⁹ When "stayed" by the crowds, He said," I must preach the kingdom of God to other cities also."²³⁰ Had He displayed His God anywhere yet? I suppose as yet nowhere. But was He speaking of those who knew of another god also? I do not believe so. If, therefore, neither He had preached, nor they had known, any other God but the Creator, He was announcing the kingdom of that God whom He knew to be the only God known to those who were listening to Him.

Chapter IX.-Out of St. Luke's Fifth Chapter are Found Proofs of Christ's Belonging to the Creator, E.g. In the Call of Fishermen to the Apostolic Office, and in the Cleansing of the Leper. Christ Compared with the Prophet Elisha.

Out of so many kinds of occupations, why indeed had He such respect for that of fishermen, as to select from it for apostles Simon and the sons of Zebedee (for it cannot seem to be the mere fact itself for which the narrative was meant to be drawn out²³¹ ), saying to Peter, when he trembled at the very large draught of the fishes, "Fear not; from henceforth thou shalt catch men? "²³² By saying this, He suggested to them the meaning of the fulfilled prophecy, that it was even He who by Jeremiah had foretold, "Behold, I will send many fishers; and they shall fish them,"²³³ that is, men. Then at last they left their boats, and followed Him, understanding that it was He who had begun to accomplish what He had declared. It is quite another case, when he affected to choose from the college of shipmasters, intending one day to appoint the shipmaster Marcion his apostle. We have indeed already laid it down, in opposition to his Antitheses, that the position of Marcion derives no advantage from the diversity which he supposes to exist between the Law and the Gospel, inasmuch as even this was ordained by the Creator, and indeed predicted in the promise of the new Law, and the new Word, and the new Testament. Since, however, he quotes with especial care,²³⁴ as a proof in his domain,²³⁵ a certain companion in misery (suntalai/pwron), and associate in hatred (summisou/menon), with himself, for the cure of leprosy,²³⁶ I shall not be sorry to meet him, and before anything else to point out to him the force of the law figuratively interpreted, which, in this example of a leper (who was not to be touched, but was rather to be removed from all intercourse with others), prohibited any communication with a person who was defiled with sins, with whom the apostle also forbids us even to eat food,²³⁷ forasmuch as the taint of sins would be communicated as if contagious: wherever a man should mix himself with the sinner. The Lord, therefore, wishing that the law should be more profoundly understood as signifying spiritual truths by carnal facts²³⁸ -and thus²³⁹ not destroying, but rather building up, that law which He wanted to have more earnestly acknowledged-touched the leper, by whom (even although as man He might have been defiled) He could not be defiled as God, being of course incorruptible. The prescription, therefore, could not be meant for Him, that He was bound to observe the law and not touch the unclean person, seeing that contact with the unclean would not cause defilement to Him. I thus teach that this (immunity) is consistent in my Christ, the rather when I show that it is not consistent in yours. Now, if it was as an enemy²⁴⁰ of the law that He touched the leper-disregarding the precept of the law by a contempt of the defilement-how could he be defiled, when he possessed not a body²⁴¹ which could be defiled? For a phantom is not susceptible of defilement. He therefore, who could not be defiled, as being a phantom, will not have an immunity from pollution by any divine power, but owing to his fantastic vacuity; nor can he be regarded as having despised pollution, who had not in fact any material capacity²⁴² for it; nor, in like manner, as having destroyed the law, who had escaped defilement from the occasion of his phantom nature, not from any display of virtue. If, however, the Creator's prophet Elisha cleansed Naaman the Syrian alone,²⁴³ to the exclusion of²⁴⁴ so many lepers in Isreal,²⁴⁵ this fact contributes nothing to the distinction of Christ, as if he were in this way the better one for cleansing this Isrealite leper, although a stranger to him, whom his own Lord had been unable to cleanse. The cleansing of the Syrian rather²⁴⁶ was significant throughout the nations of the world²⁴⁷ of their own cleansing in Christ their light,²⁴⁸ steeped as they were in the stains of the seven deadly sins:²⁴⁹ idolatry, blasphemy, murder, adultery, fornication, false-witness, and fraud.²⁵⁰ Seven times, therefore, as if once for each,²⁵¹ did he wash in Jordan; both in order that he might celebrate the expiation of a perfect hebdomad;²⁵² and because the virtue and fulness of the one baptism was thus solemnly imputed²⁵³ to Christ, alone, who was one day to establish on earth not only a revelation, but also a baptism, endued with compendious efficacy.²⁵⁴ Even Marcion finds here an antithesis:²⁵⁵ how that Elisha indeed required a material resource, applied water, and that seven times; whereas Christ, by the employment of a word only, and that but once for all, instantly effected²⁵⁶ the cure. And surely I might venture²⁵⁷ to claim²⁵⁸ the Very Word also as of the Creator's substance. There is nothing of which He who was the primitive Author is not also the more powerful one. Forsooth,²⁵⁹ it is incredible that that power of the Creator should have, by a word, produced a remedy for a single malady, which once by a word brought into being so vast a fabric as the world! From what can the Christ of the Creator be better discerned, than from the power of His word? But Christ is on this account another (Christ), because He acted differently from Elisha-because, in fact, the master is more powerful than his servant! Why, Marcion, do you lay down the rule, that things are done by servants just as they are by their very masters? Are you not afraid that it will turn to your discredit, if you deny that Christ belongs to the Creator, on the ground that He was once more powerful than a servant of the Creator-since, in comparison with the weakness of Elisha, He is acknowledged to be the greater, if indeed greater!²⁶⁰ For the cure is the same, although there is a difference in the working of it. What has your Christ performed more than my Elisha? Nay, what great thing has the word of your Christ performed, when it has simply done that which a river of the Creator effected? On the same principle occurs all the rest. So far as renouncing all human glory went, He forbade the man to publish abroad the cure; but so far as the honour of the law was concerned, He requested that the usual course should be followed: "Go, show thyself to the priest, and present the offering which Moses commanded."²⁶¹ For the figurative signs of the law in its types He still would have observed, because of their prophetic import.²⁶² These types signified that a man, once a sinner, but afterwards purified²⁶³ from the stains thereof by the word of God, was bound to offer unto God in the temple a gift, even prayer and thanksgiving in the church through Christ Jesus, who is the Catholic Priest of the Father.²⁶⁴ Accordingly He added: "that it may be for a testimony unto you"-one, no doubt, whereby He would testify that He was not destroying the law, but fulfilling it; whereby, too, He would testify that it was He Himself who was foretold as about to undertake²⁶⁵ their sicknesses and infirmities. This very consistent and becoming explanation of "the testimony," that adulator of his own Christ, Marcion seeks to exclude under the cover of mercy and gentleness. For, being both good (such are his words), and knowing, besides, that every man who had been freed from leprosy would be sure to perform the solemnities of the law, therefore He gave this precept. Well, what then? Has He continued in his goodness (that is to say, in his permission of the law) or not? For if he has persevered in his goodness, he will never become a destroyer of the law; nor will he ever be accounted as belonging to another god, because there would not exist that destruction of the law which would constitute his claim to belong to the other god. If, however, he has not continued good, by a subsequent destruction of the law, it is a false testimony which he has since imposed upon them in his cure of the leper; because he has forsaken his goodness, in destroying the law. If, therefore, he was good whilst upholding the law,²⁶⁶ he has now become evil as a destroyer of the law. However, by the support which he gave to the law, he affirmed that the law was good. For no one permits himself in the support of an evil thing. Therefore he is not only bad if he has permitted obedience to a bad law; but even worse still, if he has appeared²⁶⁷ as the destroyer of a good law. So that if he commanded the offering of the gift because he knew that every cured leper would be sure to bring one; he possibly abstained from commanding what he knew would be spontaneously done. In vain, therefore, was his coming down, as if with the intention of destroying the law, when he makes concessions to the keepers of the law. And yet,²⁶⁸ because he knew their disposition,²⁶⁹ he ought the more earnestly to have prevented their neglect of the law,²⁷⁰ since he had come for this purpose. Why then did he not keep silent, that man might of his own simple will obey the law? For then might he have seemed to some extent²⁷¹ to have persisted in his patience. But he adds also his own authority increased by the weight of this "testimony." Of what testimony, I ask,²⁷² if not that of the assertion of the law? Surely it matters not in what way he asserted the law-whether as good, or as supererogatory,²⁷³ or as patient, or as inconstant-provided, Marcion, I drive you from your position.²⁷⁴ Observe,²⁷⁵ he commanded that the law should be fulfilled. In whatever way he commanded it, in the same way might he also have first uttered that sentiment:²⁷⁶ "I came not to destroy the law, but to fulfil it."²⁷⁷ What business, therefore, had you to erase out of the Gospel that which was quite consistent in it?²⁷⁸ For you have confessed that, in his goodness, he did in act what you deny that he did in word.²⁷⁹ We have therefore good proof that He uttered the word, in the fact that He did the deed; and that you have rather expunged the Lord's word, than that our (evangelists)²⁸⁰ have inserted it.

Chapter X.-Further Proofs of the Same Truth in the Same Chapter, from the Healing of the Paralytic, and from the Designation Son of Man Which Jesus Gives Himself. Tertullian Sustains His Argument by Several Quotations from the Prophets.

The sick of the palsy is healed,²⁸¹ and that in public, in the sight of the people. For, says Isaiah, "they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God."²⁸² What glory, and what excellency? "Be strong, ye weak hands, and ye feeble knees: "²⁸³ this refers to the palsy. "Be strong; fear not."²⁸⁴ Be strong is not vainly repeated, nor is fear not vainly added; because with the renewal of the limbs there was to be, according to the promise, a restoration also of bodily energies: "Arise, and take up thy couch; "and likewise moral courage²⁸⁵ not to be afraid of those who should say, "Who can forgive sins, but God alone? "So that you have here not only the fulfilment of the prophecy which promised a particular kind of healing, but also of the symptoms which followed the cure. In like manner, you should also recognise Christ in the same prophet as the forgiver of sins. "For," he says, "He shall remit to many their sins, and shall Himself take away our sins."²⁸⁶ For in an earlier passage, speaking in the person of the Lord himself, he had said: "Even though your sins be as scarlet, I will make them as white as snow; even though they be like crimson, I will whiten them as wool."²⁸⁷ In the scarlet colour He indicates the blood of the prophets; in the crimson, that of the Lord, as the brighter. Concerning the forgiveness of sins, Micah also says: "Who is a God like unto Thee? pardoning iniquity, and passing by the transgressions of the remnant of Thine heritage. He retaineth not His anger as a testimony against them, because He delighteth in mercy. He will turn again, and will have compassion upon us; He wipeth away our iniquities, and casteth our sins into the depths of the sea."²⁸⁸ Now, if nothing of this sort had been predicted of Christ, I should find in the Creator examples of such a benignity as would hold out to me the promise of similar affections also in the Son of whom He is the Father. I see how the Ninevites obtained forgiveness of their sins from the Creator²⁸⁹ -not to say from Christ, even then, because from the beginning He acted in the Father's name. I read, too, how that, when David acknowledged his sin against Uriah, the prophet Nathan said unto him, "The Lord hath cancelled²⁹⁰ thy sin, and thou shalt not die; "²⁹¹ how king Ahab in like manner, the husband of Jezebel, guilty of idolatry and of the blood of Naboth, obtained pardon because of his repentance;²⁹² and how Jonathan the son of Saul blotted out by his deprecation the guilt of a violated fast.²⁹³ Why should I recount the frequent restoration of the nation itself after the forgiveness of their sins?-by that God, indeed, who will have mercy rather than sacrifice, and a sinner's repentance rather than his death.²⁹⁴ You will first have to deny that the Creator ever forgave sins; then you must in reason show²⁹⁵ that He never ordained any such prerogative for His Christ; and so you will prove how novel is that boasted²⁹⁶ benevolence of the, of course, novel Christ when you shall have proved that it is neither compatible with²⁹⁷ the Creator nor predicted by the Creator. But whether to remit sins can appertain to one who is said to be unable to retain them, and whether to absolve can belong to him who is incompetent even to condemn, and whether to forgive is suitable to him against whom no offence can be committed, are questions which we have encountered elsewhere,²⁹⁸ when we preferred to drop suggestions²⁹⁹ rather than treat them anew.³⁰⁰ Concerning the Son of man our rule³⁰¹ is a twofold one: that Christ cannot lie, so as to declare Himself the Son of man, if He be not truly so; nor can He be constituted the Son of man, unless He be born of a human parent, either father or mother. And then the discussion will turn on the point, of which human parent He ought to be accounted the son-of the father or the mother? Since He is (begotten) of God the Father, He is not, of course, (the son) of a human father. If He is not of a human father, it follows that He must be (the son) of a human mother. If of a human mother, it is evident that she must be a virgin. For to whom a human father is not ascribed, to his mother a husband will not be reckoned; and then to what mother a husband is not reckoned, the condition of virginity belongs.³⁰² But if His mother be not a virgin, two fathers will have to be reckoned to Him-a divine and a human one. For she must have a husband, not to be a virgin; and by having a husband, she would cause two fathers-one divine, the other human-to accrue to Him, who would thus be Son both of God and of a man. Such a nativity (if one may call it so)³⁰³ the mythic stories assign to Castor or to Hercules. Now, if this distinction be observed, that is to say, if He be Son of man as born of His mother, because not begotten of a father, and His mother be a virgin, because His father is not human-He will be that Christ whom Isaiah foretold that a virgin should conceive,³⁰⁴ On what principle you, Marcion, can admit Him Son of man, I cannot possibly see. If through a human father, then you deny him to be Son of God; if through a divine one also,³⁰⁵ then you make Christ the Hercules of fable; if through a human mother only, then you concede my point; if not through a human father also,³⁰⁶ then He is not the son of any man,³⁰⁷ and He must have been guilty of a lie for having declared Himself to be what He was not. One thing alone can help you in your difficulty: boldness on your part either to surname your God as actually the human father of Christ, as Valentinus did³⁰⁸ with his ¦on; or else to deny that the Virgin was human, which even Valentinus did not do. What now, if Christ be described³⁰⁹ in Daniel by this very title of "Son of man? "Is not this enough to prove that He is the Christ of prophecy? For if He gives Himself that appellation which was provided in the prophecy for the Christ of the Creator, He undoubtedly offers Himself to be understood as Him to whom (the appellation) was assigned by the prophet. But perhaps³¹⁰ it can be regarded as a simple identity of names;³¹¹ and yet we have maintained³¹² that neither Christ nor Jesus ought to have been called by these names, if they possessed any condition of diversity. But as regards the appellation "Son of man," in as far as it Occurs by accident,³¹³ in so far there is a difficulty in its occurrence along with³¹⁴ a casual identity of names. For it is of pure³¹⁵ accident, especially when the same cause does not appear³¹⁶ whereby the identity may be occasioned. And therefore, if Marcion's Christ be also said to be born of man, then he too would receive an identical appellation, and there would be two Sons of man, as also two Christs and two Jesuses. Therefore, since the appellation is the sole right of Him in whom it has a suitable reason,³¹⁷ if it be claimed for another in whom there is an identity of name, but not of appellation,³¹⁸ then the identity of name even looks suspicious in him for whom is claimed without reason the identity of appellation. And it follows that He must be believed to be One and the Same, who is found to be the more fit to receive both the name and the appellation; while the other is excluded, who has no right to the appellation, because he has no reason to show for it. Nor will any other be better entitled to both than He who is the earlier, and has had allotted to Him the name of Christ and the appellation of Son of man, even the Jesus of the Creator. It was He who was seen by the king of Babylon in the furnace with His martyrs: "the fourth, who was like the Son of man."³¹⁹ He also was revealed to Daniel himself expressly as "the Son of man, coming in the clouds of heaven" as a Judge, as also the Scripture shows.³²⁰ What I have advanced might have been sufficient concerning the designation in prophecy of the Son of man. But the Scripture offers me further information, even in the interpretation of the Lord Himself. For when the Jews, who looked at Him as merely man, and were not yet sure that He was God also, as being likewise the Son of God, rightly enough said that a man could not forgive sins, but God alone, why did He not, following up their point³²¹ about man, answer them, that He³²² had power to remit sins; inasmuch as, when He mentioned the Son of man, He also named a human being? except it were because He wanted, by help of the very designation "Son of man" from the book of Daniel, so to induce them to reflect³²³ as to show them that He who remitted sins was God and man-that only Son of man, indeed, in the prophecy of Daniel, who had obtained the power of judging, and thereby, of course, of forgiving sins likewise (for He who judges also absolves); so that, when once that objection of theirs³²⁴ was shattered to pieces by their recollection of Scripture, they might the more easily acknowledge Him to be the Son of man Himself by His own actual forgiveness of sins. I make one more observation,³²⁵ how that He has nowhere as yet professed Himself to be the Son of God-but for the first time in this passage, in which for the first time He has remitted sins; that is, in which for the first time He has used His function of judgment, by the absolution. All that the opposite side has to allege in argument against these things, (I beg you) carefully weigh³²⁶ what it amounts to. For it must needs strain itself to such a pitch of infatuation as, on the one hand, to maintain that (their Christ) is also Son of man, in order to save Him from the charge of falsehood; and, on the other hand, to deny that He was born of woman, lest they grant that He was the Virgin's son. Since, however, the divine authority and the nature of the case, and common sense, do not admit this insane position of the heretics, we have here the opportunity of putting in a veto³²⁷ in the briefest possible terms, on the substance of Christ's body, against Marcion's phantoms. Since He is born of man, being the Son of man. He is body derived from body.³²⁸ You may, I assure you,³²⁹ more easily find a man born without a heart or without brains, like Marcion himself, than without a body, like Marcion's Christ. And let this be the limit to your examination of the heart, or, at any rate, the brains of the heretic of Pontus.³³⁰

Chapter XI.-The Call of Levi the Publican. Christ in Relation to the Baptist. Christ as the Bridegroom. The Parable of the Old Wine and the New. Arguments Connecting Christ with the Creator.

The publican who was chosen by the Lord,³³¹ he adduces for a proof that he was chosen as a stranger to the law and uninitiated in³³² Judaism, by one who was an adversary to the law. The case of Peter escaped his memory, who, although he was a man of the law, was not only chosen by the Lord, but also obtained the testimony of possessing knowledge which was given to him by the Father.³³³ He had nowhere read of Christ's being foretold as the light, and hope, and expectation of the Gentiles! He, however, rather spoke of the Jews in a favourable light, when he said, "The whole needed not a physician, but they that are sick."³³⁴ For since by "those that are sick" he meant that the heathens and publicans should be understood, whom he was choosing, he affirmed of the Jews that they were "whole" for whom he said that a physician was not necessary. This being the case, he makes a mistake in coming down³³⁵ to destroy the law, as if for the remedy of a diseased condition. because they who were living under it were "whole," and "not in want of a physician." How, moreover, does it happen that he proposed the similitude of a physician, if he did not verify it? For, just as nobody uses a physician for healthy persons, so will no one do so for strangers, in so far as he is one of Marcion's god-made men,³³⁶ having to himself both a creator and preserver, and a specially good physician, in his Christ. This much the comparison predetermines, that a physician is more usually furnished by him to whom the sick people belong. Whence, too, does John come upon the scene? Christ, suddenly; and just as suddenly, John!³³⁷ After this fashion occur all things in Marcion's system. They have their own special and plenary course³³⁸ in the Creator's dispensation. Of John, however, what else I have to say will be found in another passage.³³⁹ To the several points which now come before us an answer must be given. This, then, I will take care to do³⁴⁰ -demonstrate that, reciprocally, John is suitable to Christ, and Christ to Joan, the latter, of course, as a prophet of the Creator, just as the former is the Creator's Christ; and so the heretic may blush at frustrating, to his own frustration, the mission of John the Baptist. For if there had been no ministry of John at all-"the voice," as Isaiah calls him, "of one crying in the wilderness," and the preparer of the ways of the Lord by denunciation and recommendation of repentance; if, too, he had not baptized (Christ) Himself³⁴¹ along with others, nobody could have challenged the disciples of Christ, as they ate and drank, to a comparison with the disciples of John, who were constantly fasting and praying; because, if there existed any diversity³⁴² between Christ and John, and their followers respectively, no exact comparison would be possible, nor would there be a single point where it could be challenged. For nobody would feel surprise, and nobody would be perplexed, although there should arise rival predictions of a diverse deity, which should also mutually differ about modes of conduct,³⁴³ having a prior difference about the authorities³⁴⁴ upon which they were based. Therefore Christ belonged to John, and John to Christ; while both belonged to the Creator, and both were of the law and the prophets, preachers and masters. Else Christ would have rejected the discipline of John, as of the rival god, and would also have defended the disciples, as very properly pursuing a different walk, because consecrated to the service of another and contrary deity. But as it is, while modestly³⁴⁵ giving a reason why "the children of the bridegroom are unable to fast during the time the bridegroom is with them," but promising that "they should afterwards fast, when the bridegroom was taken away from them,"³⁴⁶ He neither defended the disciples, (but rather excused them, as if they had not been blamed without some reason), nor rejected the discipline of John, but rather allowed³⁴⁷ it, referring it to the time of John, although destining it for His own time. Otherwise His purpose would have been to reject it,³⁴⁸ and to defend its opponents, if He had not Himself already belonged to it