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| Marcion's Christ Not the Subject of Prophecy. The Absurd Consequences of This Theory of the Heretic. PREVIOUS SECTION - NEXT SECTION - HELP
Chapter
IV.—Marcion’s Christ Not the Subject of Prophecy. The
Absurd Consequences of This Theory of the Heretic.
He3127 disdained, I
suppose, to imitate the order of our God, as one who was displeasing to
him, and was by all means to be vanquished. He wished to come, as a new
being in a new way—a son previous to his father’s
announcement, a sent one before the authority of the sender; so that he
might in person3128 propagate a most
monstrous faith, whereby it should come to be believed that Christ was
come before it should be known that He had an existence. It is here
convenient to me to treat that other point: Why he came not after
Christ? For when I observe that, during so long a period, his
lord3129
3129 Ejus (i.e. Marcionis)
Dominum, meaning Marcion’s God, who had not yet been
revealed. | bore with the greatest patience the very
ruthless Creator who was all the while announcing His Christ to men, I
say, that whatever reason impelled him to do so, postponing thereby his
own revelation and interposition, the self-same reason imposed on him
the duty of bearing with the Creator (who had also in His Christ
dispensations of His own to carry out); so that, after the completion
and accomplishment of the entire plan of the rival God and the rival
Christ,3130
3130 The Creator and His
Christ, as rivals of Marcion’s. | he might then
superinduce his own proper dispensation. But he grew weary of so long
an endurance, and so failed to wait till the end of the Creator’s
course. It was of no use, his enduring that his Christ should be
predicted, when he refused to permit him to be manifested.3131
3131 He twits Marcion
with introducing his Christ on the scene too soon. He ought to
have waited until the Creator’s Christ (prophesied of
through the Old Testament) had come. Why allow him to be predicted, and
then forbid His actual coming, by his own arrival on the scene first?
Of course, M. must be understood to deny that the Christ of the New
Testament is the subject of the Old Testament prophecies at all.
Hence T.’s anxiety to adduce prophecy as the main evidence
of our Lord as being really the Creator’s Christ. | Either it was without just cause that he
interrupted the full course of his rival’s time, or without just
cause did he so long refrain from interrupting it. What held him
back at first? Or what disturbed him at last? As the case
now stands, however,3132 he has committed
himself in respect of both, having revealed himself so tardily after
the Creator, so hurriedly before His Christ; whereas he ought long ago
to have encountered the one with a confutation, the other to have
forborne encountering as yet—not to have borne with the one so
long in His ruthless hostility, nor to have disquieted the other, who
was as yet quiescent! In the case of both, while depriving them of
their title to be considered the most good God, he showed himself at
least capricious and uncertain; lukewarm (in his resentment) towards
the Creator, but fervid against His Christ, and powerless3133 in respect of them both! For he no more
restrained the Creator than he resisted His Christ. The Creator still
remains such as He really is. His Christ also will come,3134
3134 The reader will
remember that Tertullian is here arguing on Marcion’s ground,
according to whom the Creator’s Christ, the Christ predicted
through the O.T., was yet to come. Marcion’s Christ, however, had
proved himself so weak to stem the Creator’s course, that he had
no means really of checking the Creator’s Christ from coming. It
had been better, adds Tertullian, if Marcion’s Christ had waited
for the Creator’s Christ to have first appeared. | just as it is written of Him. Why did
he3135 come after the Creator, since he was unable
to correct Him by punishment?3136 Why did he reveal
himself before Christ, whom he could not hinder from
appearing?3137 If, on the
contrary,3138 he did chastise the
Creator, he revealed himself, (I suppose,) after Him in order that
things which require correction might come first. On which account
also, (of course,) he ought to have waited for Christ to appear first,
whom he was going to chastise in like manner; then he would be His
punisher coming after Him,3139
3139 Posterior emendator
futurus: an instance of Tertullian’s style in paradox. | just as he had been
in the case of the Creator. There is another consideration:
since he will at his second advent come after Him, that as he at His
first coming took hostile proceedings against the Creator, destroying
the law and the prophets, which were His, so he may, to be
sure,3140 at his second coming proceed in opposition
to Christ, upsetting3141 His kingdom. Then,
no doubt, he would terminate his course, and then (if ever)3142 be worthy of belief; for else, if his work
has been already perfected, it would be in vain for him to come, for
there would indeed be nothing that he could further
accomplish.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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