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| St. Paul Quite in Accordance with St. Peter and Other Apostles of the Circumcision. His Censure of St. Peter Explained, and Rescued from Marcion's Misapplication. The Strong Protests of This Epistle Against Judaizers. Yet Its Teaching is Shown to Be in Keeping with the Law and the Prophets. Marcion's Tampering with St. Paul's Writings Censured.
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Chapter
III.—St. Paul Quite in Accordance with St. Peter and Other
Apostles of the Circumcision. His Censure of St. Peter Explained, and
Rescued from Marcion’s Misapplication. The Strong Protests of
This Epistle Against Judaizers. Yet Its Teaching is Shown to Be in
Keeping with the Law and the Prophets. Marcion’s Tampering with
St. Paul’s Writings Censured.
But with regard to the countenance5268
of Peter and the rest of the apostles, he
tells us5269
| 5269 Scribit often
takes the place of inquit; naturally enough as referring to the
epistles. | that
“fourteen years after he went up to Jerusalem,” in order to
confer with them5270
about the rule
which he followed in his gospel, lest perchance he should all those
years have been running, and be running still, in vain, (which would be
the case,) of course, if his preaching of the gospel fell short of
their method.5271
So great had been
his desire to be approved and supported by those whom you wish on all
occasions5272
to be understood as
in alliance with Judaism! When indeed he says, that
“neither was Titus circumcised,”5273
he
for the first time shows us that circumcision was the only question
connected with the maintenance5274
of the law, which
had been as yet agitated by those whom he therefore calls “false
brethren unawares brought in.”5275
These persons
went no further than to insist on a continuance of the law, retaining
unquestionably a sincere belief in the Creator. They perverted the
gospel in their teaching, not indeed by such a tampering with the
Scripture5276
| 5276 Interpolatione
Scripturæ. | as should enable
them to expunge5277
the Creator’s
Christ, but by so retaining the ancient régime as not to
exclude the Creator’s law. Therefore he says: “Because of
false brethren unawares brought in, who came in privily to spy out our
liberty which we have in Christ, that they might bring us into bondage,
to whom we gave place by subjection not even for an
hour.”5278
Let us only attend
to the clear5279
sense and to the
reason of the thing, and the perversion of the Scripture will be
apparent. When he first says, “Neither Titus, who was with me,
being a Greek, was compelled to be circumcised,” and then
adds, “And that because of false brethren unawares brought
in,”5280
etc., he gives us
an insight into his reason5281
| 5281 Incipit reddere
rationem. | for acting in a
clean contrary way,5282
| 5282 Contrarii utique
facti. [Farrar, St. Paul, pp. 232 and 261.] | showing us
wherefore he did that which he would neither have done nor shown to us,
if that had not happened which induced him to act as he did. But
then5283
I want you to tell us whether they would
have yielded to the subjection that was demanded,5284
| 5284 See Conybeare
and Howson, in loc. | if these false brethren had not crept in to
spy out their liberty? I apprehend not. They therefore gave way (in a
partial concession), because there were persons whose weak faith
required consideration.5285
| 5285 Fuerunt propter quos
crederetur. | For their
rudimentary belief, which was still in suspense about the observance of
the law, deserved this concessive treatment,5286
| 5286 The following
statement will throw light upon the character of the two classes
of Jewish professors of Christianity referred to by Tertullian:
“A pharisaic section was sheltered in its bosom (of the church at
Jerusalem), which continually strove to turn Christianity into a sect
of Judaism. These men were restless agitators, animated by the
bitterest sectarian spirit; and although they were numerically a small
party, yet we know the power of the turbulent minority. But besides
these Judaizing zealots, there was a large proportion of the Christians
at Jerusalem, whose Christianity, though more sincere than that of
those just mentioned, was yet very weak and imperfect…Many of
them still only knew of a Christ after the flesh—a Saviour of
Israel—a Jewish Messiah. Their minds were in a state of
transition between the law and the gospel; and it was of great
consequence not to shock their prejudices too rudely; lest they should
be tempted to make shipwreck of their faith and renounce their
Christianity altogether.” These were they whose prejudices
required to be wisely consulted in things which did not touch the
foundation of the gospel. (Conybeare and Howson’s St.
Paul, People’s Edition, vol. ii. pp. 259, 260.) |
when even the apostle himself had some suspicion that he might have
run, and be still running, in vain.5287
Accordingly,
the false brethren who were the spies of their Christian liberty must
be thwarted in their efforts to bring it under the yoke of their own
Judaism before that Paul discovered whether his labour had been in
vain, before that those who preceded him in the apostolate gave him
their right hands of fellowship, before that he entered on the office
of preaching to the Gentiles, according to their arrangement with
him.5288
He therefore made some concession, as was
necessary, for a time; and this was the reason why he had Timothy
circumcised,5289
and the Nazarites
introduced into the temple,5290
which incidents are
described in the Acts. Their truth may be inferred from their
agreement with the apostle’s own profession, how “to the
Jews he became as a Jew, that he might gain the Jews, and to them that
were under the law, as
under the law,”—and so here with respect to those who come
in secretly,—“and lastly, how he became all things to all
men, that he might gain all.”5291
Now, inasmuch
as the circumstances require such an interpretation as this, no one
will refuse to admit that Paul preached that God and that Christ whose
law he was excluding all the while, however much he allowed it, owing
to the times, but which he would have had summarily to abolish if he
had published a new god. Rightly, then, did Peter and James and John
give their right hand of fellowship to Paul, and agree on such a
division of their work, as that Paul should go to the heathen, and
themselves to the circumcision.5292
Their
agreement, also, “to remember the poor”5293
was in complete conformity with the law of
the Creator, which cherished the poor and needy, as has been shown in
our observations on your Gospel.5294
| 5294 See above, book iv.
chap. xiv. p. 365. | It is thus
certain that the question was one which simply regarded the law, while
at the same time it is apparent what portion of the law it was
convenient to have observed. Paul, however, censures Peter for not
walking straightforwardly according to the truth of the gospel. No
doubt he blames him; but it was solely because of his inconsistency in
the matter of “eating,”5295
| 5295 Victus: see
Gal. ii. 12; or, living, see ver.
14. | which he
varied according to the sort of persons (whom he associated with)
“fearing them which were of the circumcision,”5296
but not on account of any perverse opinion
touching another god. For if such a question had arisen, others also
would have been “resisted face to face” by the man who had
not even spared Peter on the comparatively small matter of his doubtful
conversation. But what do the Marcionites wish to have believed (on the
point)? For the rest, the apostle must (be permitted to) go on with his
own statement, wherein he says that “a man is not justified by
the works of the law, but by faith:”5297
faith, however, in the same God to whom belongs the law also. For of
course he would have bestowed no labour on severing faith from the law,
when the difference of the god would, if there had only been any, have
of itself produced such a severance. Justly, therefore, did he refuse
to “build up again (the structure of the law) which he had
overthrown.”5298
The law, indeed,
had to be overthrown, from the moment when John “cried in the
wilderness, Prepare ye the ways of the Lord,” that
valleys5299
| 5299 Rivi: the
wadys of the East. | and hills and
mountains may be filled up and levelled, and the crooked and the rough
ways be made straight and smooth5300
—in other
words, that the difficulties of the law might be changed into the
facilities of the gospel.
For he remembered that the time was come of which
the Psalm spake, “Let us break their bands asunder, and cast off
their yoke from us;”5301
since the time when
“the nations became tumultuous, and the people imagined vain
counsels;” when “the kings of the earth stood up, and the
rulers were gathered together against the Lord, and against His
Christ,”5302
in order that
thenceforward man might be justified by the liberty of faith, not by
servitude to the law,5303
| 5303 Gal. ii.
16 and iii. 11. | “because the
just shall live by his faith.”5304
Now, although
the prophet Habakkuk first said this, yet you have the apostle here
confirming the prophets, even as Christ did. The object, therefore, of
the faith whereby the just man shall live, will be that same God to
whom likewise belongs the law, by doing which no man is
justified. Since, then, there equally are found the curse in the
law and the blessing in faith, you have both conditions set forth
by5305
the Creator: “Behold,” says He,
“I have set before you a blessing and a curse.”5306
You cannot establish a diversity of authors
because there happens to be one of things; for the diversity is itself
proposed by one and the same author. Why, however, “Christ was
made a curse for us,”5307
is declared by the
apostle himself in a way which quite helps our side, as being the
result of the Creator’s appointment. But yet it by no means
follows, because the Creator said of old, “Cursed is every one
that hangeth on a tree,”5308
that Christ
belonged to another god, and on that account was accursed even then in
the law. And how, indeed, could the Creator have cursed by anticipation
one whom He knew not of? Why, however, may it not be more suitable for
the Creator to have delivered His own Son to His own curse, than to
have submitted Him to the malediction of that god of yours,—in
behalf, too, of man, who is an alien to him? Now, if this appointment
of the Creator respecting His Son appears to you to be a cruel one, it
is equally so in the case of your own god; if, on the contrary, it be
in accordance with reason in your god, it is equally so—nay, much more
so—in mine. For it would be more credible that that God had
provided blessing for man, through the curse of Christ, who formerly
set both a blessing and a curse before man, than that he had done so,
who, according to you,5309
never at any time
pronounced either. “We have received therefore, the promise of
the Spirit,” as the apostle says, “through faith,”
even that faith by which the just man lives, in accordance with the
Creator’s purpose.5310
What I say, then,
is this, that that God is the object of faith who prefigured the grace
of faith. But when he also adds, “For ye are all the children of
faith,”5311
it becomes clear
that what the heretic’s industry erased was the mention of
Abraham’s name; for by faith the apostle declares us to be
“children of Abraham,”5312
and after mentioning him he expressly called us “children of
faith” also. But how are we children of faith? and of whose
faith, if not Abraham’s? For since “Abraham believed God,
and it was accounted to him for righteousness;”5313
since, also, he deserved for that reason to
be called “the father of many nations,” whilst we, who are
even more like him5314
in believing in
God, are thereby justified as Abraham was, and thereby also obtain
life—since the just lives by his faith,—it therefore
happens that, as he in the previous passage called us “sons of
Abraham,” since he is in faith our (common) father,5315
so here also he named us “children of
faith,” for it was owing to his faith that it was promised that
Abraham should be the father of (many) nations. As to the fact itself
of his calling off faith from circumcision, did he not seek thereby to
constitute us the children of Abraham, who had believed previous to his
circumcision in the flesh?5316
| 5316 In integritate
carnis. | In short,5317
faith in one of two gods cannot possibly
admit us to the dispensation5318
| 5318 Formam:
“plan” or “arrangement.” | of the
other,5319
| 5319 Alterius dei…dei
alterius. | so that it should
impute righteousness to those who believe in him, and make the just
live through him, and declare the Gentiles to be his children through
faith. Such a dispensation as this belongs wholly to Him through whose
appointment it was already made known by the call of this self-same
Abraham, as is conclusively shown5320
by the natural
meaning.5321
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