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| Introductory. The Apostle Paul Himself Not the Preacher of a New God. Called by Jesus Christ, Although After the Other Apostles, His Mission Was from the Creator. States How. The Argument, as in the Case of the Gospel, Confining Proofs to Such Portions of St. Paul's Writings as Marcion Allowed.
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Book
V.
Wherein Tertullian proves, with respect
to St. Paul’s epistles, what he had proved in the preceding book
with respect to St. Luke’s gospel. Far from being at variance,
they were in perfect unison with the writings of the Old Testament, and
therefore testified that the Creator was the only God, and that the
Lord Jesus was his Christ. As in the preceding books, Tertullian
supports his argument with profound reasoning, and many happy
illustrations of Holy Scripture.
————————————
Chapter I.—Introductory. The
Apostle Paul Himself Not the Preacher of a New God. Called by
Jesus Christ, Although After the Other Apostles, His Mission Was from
the Creator. States How. The Argument, as in the Case of the Gospel,
Confining Proofs to Such Portions of St. Paul’s Writings as
Marcion Allowed.
There is nothing without a
beginning but God alone. Now, inasmuch as the beginning occupies the
first place in the condition of all things, so it must necessarily take
precedence in the treatment of them, if a clear knowledge is to be
arrived at concerning their condition; for you could not find the means
of examining even the quality of anything, unless you were certain of
its existence, and that after discovering its origin.5192
| 5192 Cum cognoveris unde
sit. | Since therefore I am brought, in the course
of my little work, to this point,5193
I require to
know of Marcion the origin of his apostle5194
| 5194 We have already
more than once referred to Marcion’s preference for St.
Paul. “The reason of the preference thus given to that
apostle was his constant and strenuous opposition to the Judaizing
Christians, who wished to reimpose the yoke of the Jewish ceremonies on
the necks of their brethren. This opposition the Marcionites
wished to construe into a direct denial of the authority of the Mosaic
law. They contended also from St. Paul’s assertion, that he
received his appointment to the apostolic office not from man, but from
Christ, that he alone delivered the genuine doctrines of the gospel.
This deference for St. Paul accounts also for Marcion’s accepting
St. Luke’s Gospel as the only authentic one, as we saw in
the last book of this treatise; it was because that evangelist had been
the companion of St. Paul” (Bp. Kaye, On the Writings of
Tertullian, 3d edition, pp. 474–475). |
even—I, who am to some degree a new disciple,5195
| 5195 Novus aliqui
discipulus. | the follower of no other master; who at the
same time5196
can believe
nothing, except that nothing ought to be believed hastily5197
(and that I may further say is
hastily believed, which is believed without any examination5198
of its beginning); in short, I who have the
best reason possible for bringing this inquiry to a most careful
solution,5199
since a man is
affirmed to me to be an apostle whom I do not find mentioned in the
Gospel in the catalogue5200
of the apostles.
Indeed, when I hear that this man was chosen by the Lord after He had
attained His rest in heaven, I feel that a kind of improvidence is
imputable to Christ, for not knowing before that this man was necessary
to Him; and because He thought that he must be added to the apostolic
body in the way of a fortuitous encounter5201
rather than a deliberate selection; by necessity (so to speak), and not
voluntary choice, although the members of the apostolate had been duly
ordained, and were now dismissed to their several missions.
Wherefore, O
shipmaster of Pontus,5202
| 5202 Marcion is
frequently called “Ponticus Nauclerus,” probably
less on account of his own connection with a seafaring life, than that
of his countrymen, who were great sailors. Comp. book. i. 18.
(sub fin.) and book iii. 6. [pp. 284, 325.] | if you have never
taken on board your small craft5203
any contraband
goods or smuggler’s cargo, if you have never thrown overboard or
tampered with a freight, you are still more careful and conscientious,
I doubt not, in divine things; and so I should be glad if you would
inform us under what bill of lading5204
you admitted
the Apostle Paul on board, who ticketed him,5205
| 5205 Quis illum tituli
charactere percusserit. |
what owner forwarded him,5206
| 5206 Quis transmiserit
tibi. | who handed him to
you,5207
that so you may land him without any
misgiving,5208
lest he should turn
out to belong to him,5209
| 5209 Ne illius
probetur, i.e., to the Catholic, for Marcion did
not admit all St. Paul’s epistles (Semler). | who can
substantiate his claim to him by producing all his apostolic
writings.5210
| 5210 Omnia apostolatus ejus
instrumenta. | He professes
himself to be “an apostle”—to use his own,
words—“not of men, nor by man, but by Jesus
Christ.”5211
Of course, any one
may make a profession concerning himself; but his profession is only
rendered valid by the authority of a second person. One man signs,
another countersigns;5212
one man appends his
seal, another registers in the public records.5213
No
one is at once a proposer and a seconder to himself. Besides, you have
read, no doubt, that “many shall come, saying, I am
Christ.”5214
Now if any one can
pretend that he is Christ, how much more might a man profess to be an
apostle of Christ! But still, for my own part, I appear5215
in the character of a disciple and an
inquirer; that so I may even thus5216
both refute
your belief, who have nothing to support it, and confound your
shamelessness, who make claims without possessing the means of
establishing them. Let there be a Christ, let there be an apostle,
although of another god; but what matter? since they are only to
draw their proofs out of the Testament of the Creator. Because even the
book of Genesis so long ago promised me the Apostle Paul. For
among the types and prophetic blessings which he pronounced over his
sons, Jacob, when he turned his attention to Benjamin, exclaimed,
“Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf; in the morning he shall devour
the prey, and at night he shall impart nourishment.”5217
| 5217 Gen. xlix. 27, Septuagint, the latter clause being
καὶ εἰς
τὸ ἑσπέρας
δίδωσι
τροφήν. | He foresaw that Paul would arise out of the
tribe of Benjamin, a voracious wolf, devouring his prey in the morning:
in order words, in the early period of his life he would devastate the
Lord’s sheep, as a persecutor of the churches; but in the evening
he would give them nourishment, which means that in his declining years
he would educate the fold of Christ, as the teacher of the Gentiles.
Then, again, in Saul’s conduct towards David, exhibited first in
violent persecution of him, and then in remorse and
reparation,5218
on his receiving
from him good for evil, we have nothing else than an
anticipation5219
| 5219 Non aliud portendebat
quam. | of Paul in
Saul—belonging, too, as they did, to the same tribe—and of
Jesus in David, from whom He descended according to the Virgin’s
genealogy.5220
| 5220 Secundum Virginis
censum. | Should you,
however, disapprove of these types,5221
| 5221 Figurarum
sacramenta. | the Acts of
the Apostles,5222
| 5222 Although St.
Luke wrote the Acts of the Apostles, Marcion does not seem to have
admitted this book into his New Testament. “It is clearly
excluded from his catalogue, as given by Epiphanius. The same thing
appears from the more ancient authority of Tertullian, who begins his
Book v. against Marcion with showing the absurdity of his conduct in
rejecting the history and acts of the apostles, and yet receiving St.
Paul as the chief of the apostles, whose name is never mentioned in the
Gospel with the other apostles, especially since the account given by
Paul himself in Gal.
i.–ii. confirms
the account which we have in the Acts. But the reason why he rejected
this book is (as Tertullian says) very evident, since from it we can
plainly show that the God of the Christians and the God of the Jews, or
the Creator, was the same being and that Christ was sent by Him, and by
no other” (Lardner’s Works, Hist. of Heretics, chap.
x. sec. 41). | at all events, have
handed down to me this career of Paul, which you must not refuse to
accept. Thence I demonstrate that from a persecutor he became “an
apostle, not of men, neither by man;”5223
thence am I led to believe the Apostle himself; thence do I find
reason for rejecting your defence of him,5224
| 5224 Inde te a defensione
ejus expello. |
and for bearing fearlessly your taunt. “Then you deny the
Apostle Paul.” I do not calumniate him whom I
defend.5225
| 5225 An insinuation that
Marcion’s defence of Paul was, in fact, a calumny of the
apostle. | I deny him, to
compel you to the proof of him. I deny him, to convince you that he is
mine. If you have regard to our belief you should admit the particulars
which comprise it. If you challenge us to your belief, (pray) tell us
what things constitute its basis.5226
Either prove
the truth of what you believe, or failing in your proof, (tell us) how
you believe. Else what conduct is yours,5227
believing in opposition to Him from whom alone comes the proof of that
which you believe? Take now from my point of view5228
the apostle, in the same manner as you have
received the Christ—the apostle shown to be as much mine
as the Christ is. And here, too, we will fight within the same lines,
and challenge our adversary on the mere ground of a simple
rule,5229
| 5229 In ipso gradu
præscriptionis. | that even an apostle who is said not to
belong to the Creator—nay, is displayed as in actual hostility to
the Creator—can be fairly regarded as teaching5230
| 5230 Oportere
docere…sapere…velle. | nothing, knowing nothing, wishing nothing in
favour of the Creator whilst it would be a first principle with him to
set forth5231
another god with as
much eagerness as he would use in withdrawing us from the law of the
Creator. It is not at all likely that he would call men away from
Judaism without showing them at the same time what was the god in whom
he invited them to believe; because nobody could possibly pass from
allegiance to the Creator without knowing to whom he had to cross over.
For either Christ had already revealed another god—in which case
the apostle’s testimony would also follow to the same effect, for
fear of his not being else regarded5232
as an apostle
of the god whom Christ had revealed, and because of the impropriety of
his being concealed by the apostle who had been already revealed by
Christ—or Christ had made no such revelation concerning God;
then there was all the greater need why the apostle should
reveal a God who could now be made known by no one else, and who would
undoubtedly be left without any belief at all, if he were revealed not
even by an apostle. We have laid down this as our first principle,
because we wish at once to profess that we shall pursue the same method
here in the apostle’s case as we adopted before in Christ’s
case, to prove that he proclaimed no new god;5233
| 5233 Nullum alium deum
circumlatum. |
that is, we shall draw our evidence from the epistles of St.
Paul himself. Now, the garbled form in which we have found the
heretic’s Gospel will have already prepared us to expect to
find5234
| 5234 Præjudicasse
debebit. | the epistles also mutilated by him with like
perverseness—and that even as respects their number.5235
| 5235 Marcion only
received ten of St. Paul’s epistles, and these altered by
himself. | E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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