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| Not the Soul, But the Natural Body Which Died, is that Which is to Rise Again. The Resurrection of Lazarus Commented on. Christ's Resurrection, as the Second Adam, Guarantees Our Own.
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Chapter LIII.—Not the Soul, But the Natural Body Which Died,
is that Which is to Rise Again. The Resurrection of Lazarus Commented
on. Christ’s Resurrection, as the Second Adam, Guarantees Our
Own.
Some, however, contend that the soul is
“the natural (or animate) body,”7687
| 7687 What in our
version is rendered “a natural body,” is St.
Paul’s σῶμα
ψυχικόν, which the heretics
held to be merely a periphrasis for ψυχή. We have rendered
Tertullian’s phrase corpus animale by “animate
body,” the better to suit the argument. |
with the view of withdrawing the flesh from all connection with
the risen body. Now, since it is a clear and fixed point that the
body which is to rise again is that which was sown in death,
they must be challenged to an examination of the very fact itself. Else
let them show that the soul was sown after death; in a word, that it
underwent death,—that is, was demolished, dismembered, dissolved
in the ground, nothing of which was ever decreed against it by God: let
them display to our view its corruptibility and dishonour (as well as)
its weakness, that it may also accrue to it to rise again in
incorruption, and in glory, and in power.7688
Now in the case of Lazarus, (which we may take as) the palmary instance
of a resurrection, the flesh lay prostrate in weakness, the flesh was
almost putrid in the dishonour of its decay, the flesh stank in
corruption, and yet it was as flesh that Lazarus rose
again—with his soul, no doubt. But that soul was incorrupt;
nobody had wrapped it in its linen swathes; nobody had deposited it in
a grave; nobody had yet perceived it “stink;” nobody for
four days had seen it “sown.” Well, now, this entire
condition, this whole end of Lazarus, the flesh indeed of all men is
still experiencing, but the soul of no one. That substance,
therefore, to which the apostle’s whole description manifestly
refers, of which he clearly speaks, must be both the natural (or
animate) body when it is sown, and the spiritual body when it is raised
again. For in order that you may understand it in this sense, he points
to this same conclusion, when in like manner, on the authority of the
same passage of Scripture, he displays to us “the first man Adam
as made a living soul.”7689
| 7689 Compare ver. 45 with Gen. ii. 7. | Now since Adam was
the first man, since also the flesh was man prior to the soul7690
| 7690 See this put more
fully above, c. v., near the end. | it undoubtedly follows that it was the flesh
that became the living soul. Moreover, since it was a bodily substance
that assumed this condition, it was of course the natural (or animate)
body that became the living soul. By what designation would they have
it called, except that which it became through the soul, except that
which it was not previous to the soul, except that which it can never
be after the soul, but through its resurrection? For after it has
recovered the soul, it once more becomes the natural (or animate) body,
in order that it may become a spiritual body. For it only resumes in
the resurrection the condition which it once had. There is therefore by no means the
same good reason why the soul should be called the natural (or
animate) body, which the flesh has for bearing that designation.
The flesh, in fact, was a body before it was an animate body. When the
flesh was joined by the soul,7691
it then became the
natural (or animate) body. Now, although the soul is a corporeal
substance,7692
| 7692 See the De
Anima, v.–ix., for a full statement of Tertullian’s
view of the soul’s corporeality. | yet, as it is not
an animated body, but rather an animating one, it cannot be called the
animate (or natural) body, nor can it become that thing which it
produces. It is indeed when the soul accrues to something else that it
makes that thing animate; but unless it so accrues, how will it ever
produce animation? As therefore the flesh was at first an animate
(or natural) body on receiving the soul, so at last will it become a
spiritual body when invested with the spirit. Now the apostle, by
severally adducing this order in Adam and in Christ, fairly
distinguishes between the two states, in the very essentials of their
difference. And when he calls Christ “the last
Adam,”7693
you may from this
circumstance discover how strenuously he labours to establish
throughout his teaching the resurrection of the flesh, not of the soul.
Thus, then, the first man Adam was flesh, not soul, and only afterwards
became a living soul; and the last Adam, Christ, was Adam only because
He was man, and only man as being flesh, not as being soul. Accordingly
the apostle goes on to say: “Howbeit that was not first which is
spiritual, but that which is natural, and afterward that which is
spiritual,”7694
as in the case of
the two Adams. Now, do you not suppose that he is distinguishing
between the natural body and the spiritual body in the same flesh,
after having already drawn the distinction therein in the two Adams,
that is, in the first man and in the last? For from which substance is
it that Christ and Adam have a parity with each other? No doubt
it is from their flesh, although it may be from their soul also. It is,
however, in respect of the flesh that they are both man; for the flesh
was man prior to the soul. It was actually from it that they
were able to take rank, so as to be deemed—one the first, and the
other the last man, or Adam. Besides, things which are different in
character are only incapable of being arranged in the same order when
their diversity is one of substance; for when it is a diversity either
in respect of place, or of time, or of condition, they probably do
admit of classification together. Here, however, they are called
first and last, from the substance of their (common) flesh, just as
afterwards again the first man (is said to be) of the earth, and the
second of heaven;7695
but although He is
“of heaven” in respect of the spirit, He is yet man
according to the flesh. Now since it is the flesh, and not the soul,
that makes an order (or classification together) in the two Adams
compatible, so that the distinction is drawn between them of “the
first man becoming a living soul, and the last a quickening
spirit,”7696
so in like manner
this distinction between them has already suggested the conclusion that
the distinction is due to the flesh; so that it is of the flesh that
these words speak: “Howbeit that was not first which is
spiritual, but that which is natural, and afterward that which is
spiritual.”7697
And thus, too, the
same flesh must be understood in a preceding passage:
“That which is sown is the natural body, and that which rises
again is the spiritual body; because that is not first which is
spiritual, but that which is natural: since the first Adam was
made a living soul, the last Adam a quickening spirit.”7698
It is all about man, and all about
the flesh because about man.
What shall we say then? Has not the flesh even now
(in this life) the spirit by faith? so that the question still remains
to be asked, how it is that the animate (or natural) body can be said
to be sown? Surely the flesh has received even here the
spirit—but only its “earnest;”7699
| 7699 2 Cor. i. 22, v. 5, and Eph. i. 14. | whereas of the soul (it has received) not
the earnest, but the full possession. Therefore it has the name of
animate (or natural) body, expressly because of the higher
substance of the soul (or anima,) in which it is sown, destined
hereafter to become, through the full possession of the spirit which it
shall obtain, the spiritual body, in which it is raised again. What
wonder, then, if it is more commonly called after the substance with
which it is fully furnished, than after that of which it has yet but a
sprinkling?E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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