leans to the alternative of not saving, it will show itself to greater perfection by not inter- posing help than by helping. Now, you will not be able to attribute goodness (to your god) in reference to the Creator, (if accom- panied with) failure towards all. For whom- soever you call in to judge the question, it is as a dispenser of goodness, if so be such a title can be made out,"^ and not as a squanderer thereof, as you claim your god to be, that you must submit the divine character for de- termination. So long, then, as you prefer your god to the Creator on the simple ground of his goodness, and since he professes to have this attribute as solely and wholly his own, he ought not to have been wanting in it to any one. However, I do not now wish to prove that Marcion's god is imperfect in goodness because of the perdition of the greater number. I am content to illustrate >2 Traducetur. '3 Nee jam. '4 Immo.
'5 Minor numero.
'6 Non fiunt salvi. [Kayc, p. 347.] '7 Pauciores. '8 Partiaria exitii. '9 Non facit salvos.
"° Si forte {i.e. et tuxoi tin-tp Oifta., with a touch of irony, — a fro. quent phrase in TertuUian.)
TERTULLIAN AGAINST MARCION.
[book I.
this imperfection by the fact that even those whom he saves are found to possess but an imperfect salvation — that is, they are saved only so far as the soul is concerned,' but lost in their body, which, according to him, does not rise again. Now, whence comes this halv- ing of salvation, if not from a failure of good- ness? What could have been a better proof of a perfect goodness, than the recovery of the whole man to salvation? Totally damned by the Creator, he should have been totally restored by the most merciful god. I rather think that by Marcion's rule the body is bap- tized, is deprived of marriage,'' is cruelly tor- tured in confession. But although sins are attributed to the body, yet they are preceded by the guilty concupiscence of the soul; nay, the first motion of sin must be ascribed to the soul, to which the flesh acts in the capacity of a servant. By and by, when freed from the soul, the flesh sins no more.^ So that in this matter goodness is unjust, and likewise imperfect, in that it leaves to destruction the more harmless substance, which sins rather by compliance than in will. Now, although Christ put not on the verity of the flesh, as your heresy is pleased to assume. He still vouchsafed to take upon Him the semblance thereof. Surely, therefore, some regard was due to it from Him, because of this His feigned assumption of it. Besides, what else is man than flesh, since no doubt it was the corporeal rather than the spiritual " element from which the Author of man's nature gave him his designation?5 "And the Lord God made man of the dust of the ground," not of spirit- ual essence; this afterwards came from the divine afflatus: "and man became a living soul." What, then, is man? Made, no doubt of it, of the dust; and God placed him in paradise, because He moulded him, not breathed him, into being — a fabric of flesh, not of spirit. Now, this being the case, with what face will you contend for the perfect character of that goodness which did not fail in some one particular only of man's deliver- ance, but in its general capacity? If that is a plenary grace and a substantial mercy which brings salvation to the soul alone, this were the better life which we now enjoy whole and entire; whereas to rise again but in part will be a chastisement, not a liberation. The ' Anima tenus. Comp. De Prascr. Har. 33, where Marcion, as well as Apelles, Valentinus, and others, are charged with the Sad- ducean denial of the resurrection of the flesh, which is censured 2 Compare De Prascr. Hcer. 33, where Marcion and Apelles are brought under St. Paul's reproach in i Tim. iv. 3.
4Animalis (from anima, the vital principle "the breath of life ") is here opposed to corporalis.
SQIXDi homOy from DTblKHi humus, the ground; see the Hebrew of Gen. ii. 7.
proof of the perfect goodness is, that man, after his rescue, should be delivered from the domicile and power of the malignant deity unto the protection of the most good and merciful God. Poor dupe of Marcion, fever* is hard upon you; and your painful flesh produces a crop of all sorts of briers and thorns. Nor is it only to the Creator's thun- derbolts that you lie exposed, or to wars, and pestilences, and His other heavier strokes, but even to His creeping insects. In what respect do you suppose yourself liberated from His kingdom when His flies are still creeping upon your face? If your deliverance lies in the future, why not also in the present, that it may be perfectly wrought? Far different is our condition in the sight of Him who is the Author, the Judge, the injured ' Head of our race! You display Him as a merely good God; but you are unable to prove that He is perfectly good, because you are not by Him perfectly delivered.
CHAP. XXV. — GOD IS NOT A BEING OF SIMPLE GOODNESS; OTHER ATTRIBUTES BELONG TO HIM. MARCION SHOWS INCONSISTENCY IN THE PORTRAITURE OF HIS SIMPLY GOOD AND EMOTIONLESS GOD.
As touching this question of goodness, we have in these outlines of our argument shown it to be in no way compatible with Deity, — as being neither natural,* nor rational, nor per- fect, but wrong,' and unjust, and unworthy of the very name of goodness, — because, as far as the congruity of the divine character is concerned, it cannot indeed be fitting that that Being should be regarded as God who is al- leged to have such a goodness, and that not in a modified way, but simply and solely. For it is, furthermore, at this point quite open to discussion, whether God ought to be regarded as a Being of simple goodness, to the exclusion of all those other attributes,'" sensations, and affections, which the Marcionites indeed trans- fer from their god to the Creator, and which we acknowledge to be worthy characteristics of the Creator too, but only because we con- sider Him to be God. Well, then, on this ground we shall deny him to be God in whom all things are not to be found which befit the Divine Being. If (Marcion) chose" to take any one of the school of Epicurus, and entitle him God in the name of Christ, on the ground Febricitas. 7 Offensum, probably in respect of the Marcionite treatment of His attributes.
^ Ingenitam. In chap. xxii. this word seems to be synonymous with nattiralem. Comp. book ii. 3, where it has this sense in the phrase " Deo ingenita." 9 Improbam. 'i> Appendicibus. " Aflectavit.
ciiAr XXVI.]
TERTULLIAN AGAINST MARCION.
that what is happy and incorruptible can bring no trouble either on itself or anything else (for Marcion, while poring over' this opinion of the divine indifference, has removed from him all the severity and energy of the judicial ■ character), it was his duty to have developed his conceptions into some imperturbable and listless god (and then what could /le have had in common with Christ, who occasioned trouble both to the Jews by what He taught, and to Himself by what He felt?), or else to have admitted that he was possessed of the same emotions as others ^ (and in such case what would he have had to do with Epicurus, who was no friend •* to either him or Christians?). For that a being who in ages past^ was in a quiescent state, not caring to communicate any knowledge of himself by any work all the while, should come after so long a time to entertain a concern for man's salvation, of course by his own will, — did he not by this very fact become susceptible of the impulse * of a new volition, so as palpably to be open to al! other emotions? But what volition is un- accompanied with the spur of desire? ' Who wishes for what he desires not? Moreover, care will be another companion of the will. For who will wish for any object and desire to have it, without also caring to obtain it? When, therefore, (Marcion's god) felt both a will and a desire for man's salvation, he cer- tainly occasioned some concern and trouble both to himself and others. This Marcion's theory suggests, though Epicurus demurs. For he® raised up an adversary against him- self in that very thing against which his will, and desire, and care were directed, — whether it were sin or death, — and more especially in their Tyrant and Lord, the Creator of man. Again,' nothing will ever run its course with- out hostile rivalr}','" which shall not (itself) be without a hostile aspect. In fact," when will- ing, desiring, and caring to deliver man, (Mar- cion's god) already in the very act encounters a rival, both in Him from whom He effects the deliverance (for of course " he means the liberation to be an opposition to Him), and also in those things from which the deliverance is wrought (the intended liberation being to the advantage of some other things). For it must needs be, that upon rivalry its own ' Ruminans.
2 ludiciarias vires.
3 De ceteris raotibus.
4 Nee necessario.
5 Retro.
^ Concussibilis.
7 Concupiscentiae.
9 Porro.
ancillary passions" will be in attendance, against whatever objects its emulation is di- rected: anger, discord, hatred, disdain, indig- nation, spleen, loathing, displeasure. Now, since all these emotions are present to rivalry; since, moreover, the rivalry which arises in liberating man e.xcites them; and since, again, this deliverance of man is an operation of goodness, it follows that this goodness avails nothing without its endowments,'* that is to say, without those sensations and affections whereby it carries out its purpose '^ against the Creator; so that it cannot even in this be ruled '* to be irrational, as if it were wanting in proper sensations and affections. These points we shall have to insist on '^ much more fully, when we come to plead the cause of the Creator, where they will also incur our con- demnation.
chap. xxvi. — in the attribute of justice, marcion's god is hopelessly weak and ungodlike. he dislikes evil, but does not punish its perpetration.
But it is here sufficient that the extreme perversity of their god is proved from the mere exposition of his lonely goodness, in which they refuse to ascribe to him such emo- tions of mind as they censure in the Creator. Now, if he is susceptible of no feeling of ri- valry, or anger, or damage, or injury, as one who refrains from exercising judicial power, I cannot tell how any system of discipline — and that, too, a plenary one — can be consistent in him. For how is it possible that he should issue commands, if he does not mean to exe- cute them; or forbid sins, if he intends not to punish them, but rather to decline the func- tions of the judge, as being a stranger to all notions of severity and judicial chastisement? For why does he forbid the commission of that which he punishes not when perpetrated? It would have been far more right, if he had not forbidden what he meant not to punish, than that he should punish what he had not forbidden. Nay, it was his duty even to have permitted what he was about to prohibit in so unreasonable a way, as to annex no penalty to the offence.'® For even now that is tacitly permitted which is forbidden without any in- fliction of vengeance. Besides, he only for- bids the commission of that which he does not like to have done. Most listless, therefore, is he, since he takes no offence at the doing of what he dislikes to be done, although dis- '3 Officiales suae. '4 Suis dotibus. '5 Administratur. •6 Praescribatur. '7 Defendemus. '8 Ut non defensurus. for other instances.
Defendo = vindico. Sec Oehler's note TERTULLIAN AGAINST xMARCION.
[book I.
pleasure ought to be the companion of his violated will. Now, if he is offended, he ought to be angry; if angry, he ought to inflict pun- ishment. For such infliction is the just fruit of anger, and anger is the debt of displeasure, and displeasure (as I have said) is the com- panion of a violated will. However, he inflicts no punishment; therefore he takes no offence. He takes no offence, therefore his will is not wronged, although that is done which he was unwilling to have done; and the trans- gression is now committed with the acquies- cence of' his will, because whatever offends not the will is not committed against the will. Now, if this is to be the principle of the divine virtue or goodness, to be unwilling indeed that a thing be done and to prohibit it, and yet not be moved by its commission, we then allege that he has been moved already when he declared his unwillingness; and that it is vain for him not to be moved by the accom- plishment of a thing after being moved at the possibility thereof, when he willed it not to be done. For he prohibited it by his not willing it. Did he not therefore do a judicial act, when he declared his unwillingness, and consequent prohibition of it? For he judged that it ought not to be done, and he deliberately declared ^ that it should be forbidden. Consequently by this time even he performs the part of a judge. If it is unbecoming for God to discharge a judicial function, or at least only so far becoming that He may merely declare His unwillingness, and pronounce His prohibition, then He may not even punish for an offence when it is committed. Now, nothing is so unworthy of the Divine Being as not to execute retribution on what He has disliked and forbidden. First, He owes the infliction of chastisement to whatever sentence or law He promulges, for the vindication of His authority and the maintenance of sub- mission to it; secondly, because hostile opposi- tion is inevitable to what He has disliked to be done, and by that dislike forbidden. More- over, it would be a more unworthy course for God to spare the evil-doer than to punish him, especially in the most good and holy God, who is not otherwise fully good than as the enemy of evil, and that to such a degree as to display His love of good by the hatred of evil, and to fulfil His defence of the former by the extirpation of the latter.
CHAP. XXVII. — DANGEROUS EFFECTS TO RELIG- ION AND MORALITY OF THE DOCTRINE OF SO WEAK A GOD.
Again, he plainly judges evil by not willing ' Secundum. ^ Proounciavit.
it, and condemns it by prohibiting it; while, on the other hand, he acquits it by not aveng- ing it, and lets it go free by not punishing it. What a prevaricator of truth is such a god I What a dissembler with his own decision! Afraid to condemn what he really condemns, afraid to hate what he does not love, permitting that to be done which he does not allow, choosing to indicate what he dislikes rather than deeply examine it! This will turn out an imaginary goodness, a phantom of disci- pline, perfunctory in duty, careless in sin. Listen, ye sinners; and ye who have not yet come to this, hear, that you may attain to such a pass! A better god has been discovered, who never takes offence, is never angry, never inflicts punishment, who has prepared no fire in hell, no gnashing of teeth in the outer darkness! He is purely and simply good. He indeed forbids all delinquency, but only in word. He is in you, if you are willing to pay him homage, ^ for the sake of appearances, that you may seem to honour God; for your fear he does not want. And so satisfied are the Marcionites with such pretences, that they have no fear of their god at all. They say it is only a bad man who will be feared, a good man will be loved. Foolish man, do you say that he whom you call Lord ought not to be feared, whilst the very title you give him indi- cates a power which must itself be feared? But how are you going to love, without some fear that you do not love? Surely (such a god) is neither your Father, towards whom your love for duty's sake should be consistent with fear because of His power; nor your proper ■» Lord, whom you should love for His human- ity and fear as your teacher. ^ Kidnappers " indeed are loved after this fashion, but they are not feared. For power will not be feared, except it be just and regular, although it may possibly be loved even when corrupt: for it is by allurement that it stands, not by au- thority; by flattery, not by proper influence. And what can be more direct flattery than not to punish sins? Come, then, if you do not fear God as being good, why do you not boil over into every kind of lust, and so realize that which is, I believe, the main enjoyment of life to all who fear not God? Why do you not frequent the customary pleasures of the maddening circus, the bloodthirsty arena, and 3 Obsequium subsignare.
4 Legitimus.
5 Propter disciplinam.
*Plagiarii. The Plagiarius is the av8pajro5i<rTiiv or the \^v\a.yu>-^6<^ of Alex. Greek. This "man-stealing" profession was often accompanied with agreeable external accomplishments. Nempe i/zuxaywyoi, quia blandis et mellitis verbis servos alienos sollicitant, et ad se alliciunt. Clemens Alex. Strom, i. Kvkoi iipnayef npo^aTuiv KiaSioi<! iyKfKpvtinevoi, avSpanoiiaroi re ita't ilivxayuiyol tvyXoxTtroi, K\eirToyT(f niv a^afut, K.T.K. — Desid. Herald. Aniviati. ad ArnobiuiM, p. loi.
CHAP. XXIX.]
TERTULLIAN AGAINST \k\RCION.
the lascivious theatre? ' Why in persecutions also do you not, when the censer is presented, at once redeem your life by the denial of your faith? God forbid, you say with redoubled = emphasis. So you do fear sin, and by your fear prove that He is an object of fear Who forbids the sin. This is quite a different matter from that obsequious homage you pay to the god whom you do not fear, which is identical in perversity indeed to is own con- duct, in prohibiting a thing without annexing the sanction of punishment. Still more vainly do they act, who when asked, What is to be- come of every sinner in that great day? reply, that he is to be cast away out of sight. Is not even this a question of judicial determina- tion? He is adjudged to deserve rejection, and that by a sentence of condemnation; un- less the sinner is cast away forsooth for his salvation, that even a leniency like this may fall in consistently with the character of your most good and excellent god! And what will it be to be cast away, but to lose that which a man was in the way of obtaining, were it not for his rejection — that is, his salvation? Therefore his being cast away will involve the forfeiture of salvation; and this sentence can- not possibly be passed upon him, except by an angry and offended authority, who is also the punisher of sin — that is, by a judge.
CHAP. XXVni. — THIS PERVERSE DOCTRINE DE- PRIVES BAPTISM OF ALL ITS GRACE. IF MAR- CION BE RIGHT, THE SACRAMENT WOULD CON- FER NO REMISSION OF SINS, NO REGENERATION, NO GIFT OF THE SPIRIT.
And what will happen to him after he is cast away? He will, they say, be thrown into the Creator's fire. Then has no remedial provision been made (by their god) for the purpose of banishing those that sin against him, without resorting to the cruel measure of delivering them over to the Creator? And what will the Creator then do? I suppose He will prepare for them a hell doubly charged with brimstone,^ as for blasphemers against Himself; except indeed their god in his zeal, as perhaps might happen, should show clem- ency to his rival's revolted subjects. Oh, what a god is this! everyAvhere perverse; no- where rational; in all cases vain; and there- fore a nonentity! * — in whose state, and con- dition, and nature, and every appointment, I see no coherence and consistency; no, not even in the very sacrament of his faith! For ' Comp. Apology, 58.
2 Absit, inquis, absit. [i.e., the throwing of a grain of incense into the censer, before the Emperor's image or that of a heathen god.]
3 Sulphuratiorem gehennam.
4 Ita nerainem.
what end does baptism serve, according to him? If the remission of sins, how will he make it evident that he remits sins, when he affords no evidence that he retains them? Because he would retain them, if he performed the functions of a judge. If deliverance from death, how could he deliver from death, who has not delivered to death? For he must have delivered the sinner to death, if he had from the beginning condemned sin. If the re- generation of man, how can he regenerate, who has never generated? For the repetition of an act is impossible to him, by whom nothing any time has been ever done. If the bestowal of the Holy Ghost, how will he be- stow the Spirit, who did not at first impart the life? For the life is in a sense the supple- ment 5 of the Spirit. He therefore seals man, who had never been unsealed* in respect of him; ' washes man, who had never been de- filed so far as he was concerned;' and into this sacrament of salvation wholly plunges that flesh which is beyond the pale of salva- tion! * No farmer will irrigate ground that will yield him no fruit in return, except he be as stupid as Marcion's god. Why then impose sanctity upon' our most infirm and most un- worthy flesh, either as a burden or as a glory?
What shall I say, too, of the uselessness of a discipline which sanctifies what is already sanctified? Why burden the infirm, or glorify the unworthy? Why not remunerate with sal- vation what it burdens or else glorifies? Why keep back from a work its due reward, by not recompensing the flesh with salvation? Why even permit the honour of sanctity in it to die?
CHAP. XXIX. — MARCION FORBIDS MARRIAGE. TERTULLIAN ELOQUENTLY DEFENDS IT AS HOLY, AND CAREFULLY DISCRIMINATES BE- TWEEN marcion's DOCTRINE AND HIS OWN MONTANISM.
The flesh is not, according to Marcion, im- mersed in the water of the sacrament, unless it be' in virginity, widowhood, or celibacy, or has purchased by divorce a title to baptism, as if even generative impotents" did not all receive their flesh from nuptial union. Now, such a scheme as this must no doubt involve the proscription of marriage. Let us see, then, whether it be a just one: not as if we 5 Suffectura. A something whereon the Spirit may operate; so that the Spirit has a pro'fectura over the anima. [Kaye, p.
o Resignatum. Tertullian here yields to his love of antithesis, and maizes almost nonsense of signo and resigno. The lattef verb has the meaning violate (in opposition to signo, in the phrase virgo signata, a pure unviolated virgin).
7 Apud se.
8 Exsortem salutis.
9 Free from all matrimonial impurity.
'o Spadonibus. This word is more general in sense than eunuch, embracinir such as are impotent both by nature and by castration, White and Riddle's Lat. Diet. s. r/.
TERTULLIAN AGAINST MARCION.
[book I.
aimed at destroying the happiness of sanctity, as do certain Nicolaitans in their maintenance of lust and luxury, but as those who have come to the knowledge of sanctity, and pursue it and prefer it, without detriment, however, to marriage; not as if we superseded a bad thing by a good, but only a good thing by a better. For we do not reject marriage, but simply re- frain from it.' Nor do we prescribe sanctity = as the rule, but only recommend it, observing it as a good, yea, even the better state, if each man uses it carefully ^ according to his ability; but at the same time earnestly vindicating marriage, whenever hostile attacks are made against it is a polluted thing, to the disparage- ment of the Creator. For He bestowed His blessing on matrimony also, as on an honour- able estate, for the increase of the human race; as He did indeed on the whole of His crea- tion,'* for wholesome and good uses. Meats and drinks are not on this account to be con- demned, because, when served up with too exquisite a daintiness, they conduce to glut- tony; nor is raiment to be blamed, because, when too costlily adorned, it becomes inflated with vanity and pride. So, on the same prin- ciple, the estate of matrimony is not to be re- fused, because, when enjoyed without modera-