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| A Series of Dilemmas. They Show that Hermogenes Cannot Escape from the Orthodox Conclusion.
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Chapter
XVI.—A Series of Dilemmas. They Show that Hermogenes Cannot
Escape from the Orthodox Conclusion.
On the very threshold,6278
| 6278
Præstructione. The notion is of the foundation of an
edifice: here ="preliminary remarks” (see our
Anti-Marcion, v. 5, p. 438). |
then, of this doctrine,6279
which I shall
probably have to treat of elsewhere, I distinctly lay it down as my
position, that both good and evil must be ascribed either to God, who
made them out of Matter; or to Matter itself, out of which He made
them; or both one and the other to both of them together,6280
because they are bound together—both
He who created, and that out of which He created; or (lastly) one to
One and the other to the Other,6281
because after
Matter and God there is not a third. Now if both should prove to belong
to God, God evidently will be the author of evil; but God, as
being good, cannot be the author of evil. Again, if both are ascribed
to Matter, Matter will evidently be the very mother of
good,6282
but inasmuch as Matter is wholly evil, it
cannot be the mother of good. But if both one and the other should be
thought to belong to Both together, then in this case also Matter will
be comparable with God; and both will be equal, being on equal terms
allied to evil as well as to good. Matter, however, ought not to be
compared with God, in order that it may not make two gods. If,
(lastly,) one be ascribed to One, and the other to the Other—that
is to say, let the good be God’s, and the evil belong to
Matter—then, on the one hand, evil must not be ascribed to God,
nor, on the other hand, good to Matter. And God, moreover, by
making both good things and evil things out of Matter, creates
them along with it. This being the case, I cannot tell how
Hermogenes6283
| 6283 The usual reading is
“Hermogenes.” Rigaltius, however, reads
“Hermogenis,” of which Oehler approves; so as to make
Tertullian say, “I cannot tell how I can avoid the opinion of
Hermogenes, who,” etc. etc. | is to escape from
my conclusion; for he supposes that God cannot be the author of evil,
in what way soever He created evil out of Matter, whether it was of His
own will, or of necessity, or from the reason (of the case). If,
however, He is the author of evil, who was the actual Creator, Matter
being simply associated with Him by reason of its furnishing Him
with substance,6284
| 6284 Per substantiæ
suggestum. | you now do away
with the cause6285
| 6285 Excusas jam causam.
Hermogenes held that Matter was eternal, to exclude God from the
authorship of evil. This causa of Matter he was now
illogically evading. Excusare = ex, causa, “to cancel the
cause.” | of your
introducing Matter. For it is not the less true, that it is by
means of Matter that God shows Himself the author of evil, although
Matter has been assumed by you expressly to prevent God’s
seeming to be the author of evil. Matter being therefore excluded,
since the cause of it is excluded, it remains that God without doubt,
must have made all things out of nothing. Whether evil things were
amongst them we shall see, when it shall be made clear what are evil
things, and whether those things are evil which you at present deem to
be so. For it is more worthy of God that He produced even these of His
own will, by producing them out of nothing, than from the
predetermination of another,6286
| 6286 De præjudicio
alieno. | (which must have
been the case) if He had produced them out of Matter. It is liberty,
not necessity, which suits the character of God. I would much rather
that He should have even willed to create evil of Himself, than that He
should have lacked ability to hinder its creation.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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