Church Fathers: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 3: 3.01.40 Tertullian - Against Marcion Bk 4 - Notes

Church Fathers: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 3: 3.01.40 Tertullian - Against Marcion Bk 4 - Notes

Online Resource Library

Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | Download

Church Fathers: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 3: 3.01.40 Tertullian - Against Marcion Bk 4 - Notes

TOPIC: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 3 (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 3.01.40 Tertullian - Against Marcion Bk 4 - Notes

Other Subjects in this Topic:

The Writings of Tertullian

Part Second - Anti-Marcion (Cont.)

II. The Five Books Against Marcion. (C0nt.)

Book IV. (Cont.)

Dr. Holmes’ Note

Dr. Holmes appends the following as a note to the Fourth Book. (see cap. vi. p 351.) The following statement, abridged from Dr. Lardner (The History of Heretics, chap. x. sees. 35-40), may be useful to the reader, in reference to the subject of the preceding Book: - Marcion received but eleven books of the New Testament, and these strangely curtailed and altered. He divided them into two parts, which he called τὸ Εὐαγγέλιον (the Gospel) and τὸ Ἀποστολικόν (the Apostolicon).

(1.) The former contained nothing more than a mutilated, and sometimes interpolated, edition of St. Luke; the name of that evangelist, however, he expunged from the beginning of his copy. Luk_1:1-80 and Luk_2:1-52 he rejected entirely, and began at Luk_3:1, reading the opening verse thus: “In the xv. year of Tiberius Caesar, God descended into Capernaum, a city of Galilee.”

(2.) According to Irenaeus, Epiphanius, and Theodoret, he rejected the genealogy and baptism of Christ; whilst from Tertullian’s statement (chap. vii.) it seems likely that he connected what part of Luk_3:1-38 - Luk_3:1, Luk_3:2 - he chose to retain, with Luk_4:31, at a leap.

(3). He further eliminated the history of the temptation. That part of Luk_4:1-44 which narrates Christ’s going into the synagogue at Nazareth and reading out of Isaiah he also rejected, and all afterwards to the end of Luk_4:30.

(4.) Epiphanius mentions sundry slight alterations in Luk_5:14, Luk_5:24; Luk_6:5, Luk_6:17. In Luk_8:19 he expunged ἡ μήτηρ αὐτοῦ καὶ ἀδελφοὶ αὐτοῦ. From Tertullian’s remarks (chap. xix.), it would seem at first as if Marcion had added to his Gospel that answer of our Saviour which we find related by St. Mat_12:48: “Who is my mother, and who are my brethren?” For he represents Marcion (as in De carne Christi, vii., he represents other heretics, who deny the nativity) as making use of these words for his favourite argument. But, after all, Marcion might use these words against those who allowed the authenticity of Matthew’s Gospel, without inserting them in his own Gospel; or else Tertullian might quote from memory, and think that to be in Luke which was only in Matthew - as he has done at least in three instances. (Lardner refers two of these instances to passages in chap. vii. of this Book iv., where Tertullian mentions, as erasures from Luke, what really are found in Mat_5:17 and Mat_15:24. The third instance referred to by Lardner probably occurs at the end of chap. ix. of this same Book iv., where Tertullian ₄₂₄again mistakes Mat_5:17 for a passage of Luke, and charges Marcion with expunging it; curiously enough, the mistake recurs in chap. xii. of the same Book.) In Luk_10:21 Marcion omitted the first πάτερ and the words καὶ τῆς γῆς, that he might not allow Christ to call His Father the Lord of earth, or of this world. The second πατήρ in this verse, not open to any inconvenience, he retained. In Luk_11:29 he omitted the last words concerning the sign of the prophet Jonah; he also omitted all of Luk_11:30, Luk_11:31 and Luk_11:32; in Luk_11:42 he read κλῆσιν, ‘calling,’ instead of κρίσιν ‘judgment.’ He rejected Luk_11:49, Luk_11:50, Luk_11:51, because the passage related to the prophets. He entirely omitted Luk_12:6; whilst in Luk_12:8 he read ἔμπροσθεν τοῦ Θεοῦ instead of ἔμπροσθεν τῶν ἀγγέλων τοῦ Θεοῦ. He seems to have left out all of Luk_12:28, and expunged ὑμῶν from Luk_12:30 and Luk_12:32, reading only ὁ πατήρ. In Luk_12:38, instead of the words ἐν τῇ δευτέρᾳ φυλακῇ καὶ ἐν τῇ τρίτῃ φυλακῇ, he read ἐν τῇ ἑσπερινῇ φυλακῇ. In Luk_13:1-35 he omitted Luk_13:1-5, whilst in Luk_13:28 of the same chapter, where we read, “When ye shall see Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, and ye yourselves thrust out,” he read (by altering, adding, and transposing), “When ye shall see all the just in the kingdom of God, and you yourselves cast out, and bound without, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” He likewise excluded all the remaining verses of this chapter. All Luk_15:1-32 after the Luk_15:10, in which is contained the parable of the prodigal son, he eliminated from his Gospel. In Luk_17:10 he left out all the words after λέγετε. He made many alterations in the story of the ten lepers; he left out part of Luk_17:12, all Luk_17:13, and altered Luk_17:14, reading thus: “There met Him ten lepers; and He sent them away, saying, Show yourselves to the priest;” after which he inserted a clause from Luk_4:27: “There were many lepers in the days of Eliseus the prophet, but none of them were cleansed, but Naaman the Syrian.” In Luk_18:19 he added the words ὁ πατήρ, and in Luk_18:20 altered οἶδας, thou knowest, into the first person. He entirely omitted Luk_18:31-33, in which our blessed Saviour declares that the things foretold by the prophets concerning His sufferings, and death, and resurrection, should all be fulfilled. He expunged nineteen verses out of Luk_19:1-48, from the end of Luk_19:27 to the beginning of Luk_19:47. In Luk_20:1-47 he omitted ten verses, from the end of Luk_20:8 to the end of Luk_20:18. He rejected also Luk_20:37 and Luk_20:38, in which there is a reference to Moses. Marcion also erased of Luk_21:1-38 Luk_21:1-18, as well as Luk_21:21 and Luk_21:22, on account of this clause, “that all things which are written may be fulfilled;” Luk_20:16 was left out by him, so also Luk_20:35-37, 50, and 51 (and, adds Lardner, conjecturally, not herein following his authority Epiphanius, also Luk_20:38 and 49). In Luk_23:2, after the words “perverting the nation,” Marcion added, “and destroying the law and the prophets;” and again, after “forbidding to give tribute unto Caesar,” he added, “and perverting women and children.” He also erased Luk_23:43. In Luk_24:1-53 he omitted that part of the conference between our Saviour and the two disciples going to Emmaus, which related to the prediction of His sufferings, and which is contained in Luk_24:26 and Luk_24:27. These two verses he omitted, and changed the words at the end of Luk_24:25, ἐλάλησαν οἱ προφῆται, into ἐλάλησα ὑμῖν. Such are the alterations, according to Epiphanius, which Marcion made in his Gospel from St. Luke. Tertullian says (in the 4th chapter of the preceding Book) that Marcion erased the passage which gives an account of the parting of the raiment of our Saviour among the soldiers. But the reason he assigns for the erasure - ‘respiciens Psalmi prophetiam’ - shows that in this, as well as in the few other instances which we have already named, where Tertullian has charged Marcion with so altering passages, his memory deceived him into mistaking Matthew for Luke, for the reference to the passage in the Psalm is only given by St. Mat_27:35.

(5.) On an impartial review of these alterations, some seem to be but slight; others might be nothing but various readings; but others, again, are undoubtedly designed perversions. ₄₂₅There were, however, passages enough left unaltered and unexpunged by the Marcionites, to establish the reality of the flesh and blood of Christ, and to prove that the God of the Jews was the Father of Christ, and of perfect goodness as well as justice. Tertullian, indeed, observes (chap. xliii.) that “Marcion purposely avoided erasing all the passages which made against him, that he might with the greater confidence deny having erased any at all, or at least that what he had omitted was for very good reasons.”

(6.) To show the unauthorized and unwarrantable character of these alterations, omissions, additions, and corruptions, the Catholic Christians asserted that their copies of St. Luke’s Gospel were more ancient than Marcion’s (so Tertullian in chap. iii. of this Book iv.); and they maintained also the genuineness and integrity of the unadulterated Gospel, in opposition to that which had been curtailed and altered by him (chap. v.).

Elucidations.

I.

(Deadly Sins, cap. ix.)

To maintain a modern and wholly uncatholic system of Penitence, the schoolmen invented a technical scheme of sins mortal and sins venial, which must not be read into the Fathers, who had no such technicalities in mind. By “deadly sins” they meant all such as St. John recognizes (1Jo_5:16-17), and none other; that is to say sins of surprise and infirmity, sins having in them no malice or wilful disobedience, such as an impatient word, or a momentary neglect of duty. Should a dying man commit a deliberate sin and then expire, even after a life of love and obedience, who could fail to recognize the fearful nature of such an end? But, should his last word be one of infirmity and weakness, censurable but not involving wilful disobedience, surely we may consider it as provided for by the comfortable words - “there is a sin not unto death.” Yet “all unrighteousness is sin,” and the Fathers held that all sin should be repented of and confessed before God; because all sin when it is finished bringeth forth death.”

In St. Augustine’s time, when moral theology became systematized in the West, by his mighty genius and influence, the following were recognized degrees of guilt: (1.) Sins deserving excommunication. (2.) Sins requiring to be confessed to the brother offended in order to God’s forgiveness, and (3.) sins covered by God’s gracious covenant, when daily confessed in the Lord’s Prayer, in public, or in private. And this classification was professedly based on Holy Scripture. Thus: (1.) on the text - “To deliver such an one unto Satan, etc.” (1Co_5:4-5). (2.) On the text - (Mat_18:15), “Confess your sins one to another, brethren” (St. Jam_5:16), and (3.) on the text - (St. Mat_6:12), “Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us.” This last St. Augustine^{1101 regards as the “daily medication” of our ordinary life, habitual penitence and faith and the baptismal covenant being presupposed.

The modern Trent theology has vastly amplified the scholastic teachings and refinements, and the elevation of Liguori to the rank of a church-doctor has virtually made the whole system de fide with the Latins. The Easterns know nothing of this modern and uncatholic teaching, and it is important that the student of the Ante-Nicene Patrologia should be on his guard against the novel meanings which the Trent theology imposes upon orthodox (Nicene) language. The long ages during which Eastern orthodoxy has been obscured by ₄₂₆the sufferings and consequent ignorance of the Greeks, have indeed tainted their doctrinal and practical system, but it still subsists in amazing contrast with Latin impurity. See, on the “indulgences,” of the latter, the “Orthodox Theology of Macarius, Bishop of Vinnitza,” Tom. II. p. 541, Paris, 1860.}II.

(Reservation of Baptism, cap. xi., note)

It is important, here, to observe the heretical origin of a sinful superstition which becomes conspicuous in the history of Constantine. If the church tolerated it in his case, it was doubtless in view of this extraordinary instance of one, who was a heathen still, at heart, becoming a guardian and protector of the persecuted Faithful. It is probable that he was regarded as a Cyrus or a Nebuchadnezzar whom God had raised up to protect and to deliver His people; who was to be honoured and obeyed as “God’s minister” (Rom_8:4), in so far, and for this purpose. The church was scrupulous and he was superstitious; it would have been difficult to discipline him and worse not to discipline him. Tacitly, therefore, he was treated as a catechumen, but was not formally admitted even to that class. He permitted Heathenism, and while he did so, how could he be received as a Christian? The Christian church never became responsible for his life and character, but strove to reform him and to prepare him for a true confession of Christ at some “convenient season.” In this, there seems to have been a great fault somewhere, chargeable perhaps to Eusebius or to some other Christian counsellor; but, when could any one say - “the emperor is sincere and humble and penitent and ought now to be received into the church.” It was a political conversion, and as such was accepted, and Constantine was a heathen till near his death. As to his final penitence and acceptance - “Forbear to judge.” 2Ki_10:29-31. Concerning his baptism, see Eusebius, de Vita Const. iv. 61, see also, Mosheim’s elaborate and candid views of the whole subject: First Three Centuries, Vol. II. 460-471.

III.

(Peter, cap. xiii.)

The great Gallican, Launoy, doctor of the Sorbonne, has proved that the Fathers understand the Rock to be Christ, while, only rarely, and that rhetorically, not dogmatically, St. Peter is called a stone or a rock; a usage to which neither Luther nor Calvin could object. Tertullian himself, when he speaks dogmatically, is in accord with other Fathers, and gives no countenance to the modern doctrine of Rome. See La Papauté, of the Abbé Guettée, pp. 42-61. It is important, also, to note that the primacy of St. Peter, more or less, whatever it may have been in the mind of the Fathers, was wholly personal, in their view. Of the fables which make it hereditary and a purtenance of Rome they knew nothing.

IV.

(Loans, cap. xvii.)

The whole subject of usury, in what it consists, etc., deserves to receive more attention than it does in our times, when nominal Christians are steeped in the sin of money-traffic to the injury of neighbours, on a scale truly gigantic. God’s word clearly rebukes this sin. So does the Council of Nice.^{1102 Now by what is the sin defined? Certainly by the spirit of the Gospel; but, is it also, by the letter? A sophistical casuistry which maintains the letter, and then sophisticates and refines so as to explain it all away, is the product of school divinity and of modern Jesuitry; but even the great Bossuet is its apologist. (see his Traité de l’ Usure. opp. ix. p. 49, etc., ed. Paris, 1846.) But for an exhaustive review of the whole matter, I ask attention to Huet, Le Règne Social, etc. (Paris, 1853) pp. 334-345.

₄₂₇}V.

(The Baptist, cap. xviii.)

The interpretation of Tertullian, however, has the all-important merit (which Bacon and Hooker recognize as cardinal) of flowing from the Scripture without squeezing. (1.) Our Lord sent the message to John as a personal and tender assurance to him. (2.) The story illustrates the decrease of which the Baptist had spoken prophetically (St. Joh_3:30); and (3.) it sustains the great principle that Christ alone is without sin, this being the one fault recorded of the Baptist, otherwise a singular instance of sinlessness. The B. Virgin’s fault (gently reproved by the Lord, St. Joh_2:4.), seems in like manner introduced on this principle of exhibiting the only sinless One, in His Divine perfections as without spot. So even Joseph and Moses (Psa_106:33, and Gen_47:20.) are shewn “to be but men.” The policy of Joseph has indeed been extravagantly censured.

VI.

(ap. xix., note 518. Also, cap. xxvi.)

Tertullian seems with reflect the early view of the church as to our Lord’s total abnegation of all filial relations with the Virgin, when He gave to her St. John, instead of Himself, on the Cross. For this purpose He had made him the beloved disciple and doubtless charged him with all the duties with which he was to be clothed. Thus He fulfilled the figurative law of His priesthood, as given by Moses, (Deu_33:9,) and crucified himself, from the beginning, according to his own Law (St. Luk_14:26-27,) which he identifies with the Cross, here and also in St. Mat_10:37-38. These then are the steps of His own holy example, illustrating His own precept, for doubtless, as “the Son of man,” His filial love was superlative and made the sacrifice the sharper: (1.) He taught Joseph that He had no earthly father, when he said - “Wist ye not that I must be in my Father’s house,” (St. Luk_3:1-38:49, Revised); but, having established this fact, he then became “subject” to both his parents, till His public ministry began. (2.) At this time, He seems to have admonished His mother, that He could not recognize her authority any longer, (St. Joh_2:4,) having now entered upon His work as the Son of God. (3.) Accordingly, He refused, thenceforth, to know her save only as one of His redeemed, excepting her in nothing from this common work for all the Human Race, (St. Mat_12:48,) in the passage which Tertullian so forcibly expounds. (4.) Finally, when St. Mary draws near to the cross, apparently to claim the final recognition of the previous understanding (St. Joh_2:4,) to which the Lord had referred her at Cana - He fulfils His last duty to her in giving her a son instead of Himself, and thereafter (5) recognizes her no more; not even in His messages after the Resurrection, nor when He met her with other disciples. He rewards her, instead, with the infinite love He bears to all His saints, and with the brightest rewards which are bestowed upon Faith. In this consists her superlative excellence and her conspicuous glory among the Redeemed (St. Luk_1:47-48) in Christ’s account.

VII.

(Children, cap. xxiii.)

In this beautiful testimony of our author to the sanctity of marriage, and the blessedness of its fruits, I see his austere spirit reflecting the spirit of Christ so tenderly and so faithfully, in the love of children, that I am warmly drawn to him. I cannot give him up to Montanism at this period of his life and labours. Surely, he was as yet merely persuaded that the prophetic charismata were not extinct, and that they had been received by his ₄₂₈Phrygian friends, although he may still have regarded them as prophesying subject to all the infirmities which St. Paul attributes even to persons elevated by spiritual gifts. (1Co_14:1-40.) Why not recognize him in all his merits, until his open and senile lapse is complete?

VIII.

(Hades, cap. xxxiv.)

Here again our author shews his unsettled view as to Shoal or Hades, on which see Kaye, pp. 247-150. Here he distinguishes between the Inferi and Abraham’s bosom; but (in B. iii. cap. 24.) he has already, more aptly, regarded the Inferi, or Hades, as the common receptacle of departed spirits, where a “great gulf” indeed, separates between the two classes.

A caricature may sometimes illustrate characteristic features more powerfully than a true portrait. The French call the highest gallery in theatres, paradis; and I have sometimes explained it by the fact that the modern drama originated in the monkish Mysteries, revived so profanely in our own day. To reconcile the poor to a bad place they gave it the name of Paradise, thus illustrating their Mediaeval conceptions; for trickling down from Tertullian his vivid notions seem to have suffused all Western theology on this subject. Thus, then, one vast receptacle receives all the dead. The pit, as we very appropriately call it in English, answers to the place of lost spirits, where the rich man was in torments. Above, are ranged the family of Abraham reclining, as it were, in their father’s bosom, by turns. Far above, under skylights, (for the old Mysteries were celebrated in the day-time) is the Paradise, where the Martyrs see God, and are represented as “under the altar” of heaven itself. Now, abandoning our grotesque illustration, but using it for its topography, let us conceive of our own globe, as having a world-wide concavity such as they imagined, from literalizing the under-world of Sheol. In its depths is the Phylace, (1Pe_3:9) of “spirits in prison.” In a higher region repose the blessed spirits in “Abraham’s bosom.” Yet nearer to the ethereal vaults, are the martyrs in Paradise, looking out into heavenly worlds. The immensity of the scale does not interfere with the vision of spirits, nor with such communications as Abraham holds with his lost son in the history of Dives and Lazarus. Here indeed Science comes to our aid, for if the telephone permits such conversations while we are in the flesh, we may at least imagine that the subtile spirit can act in like manner, apart from such contrivances. Now, so far as Tertullian is consistent with him self, I think these explanations may clarify his words and references. The Eastern Theology is less inconsistent and bears the marks alike of Plato and of Origen. But of this hereafter. Of a place, such as the Mediaeval Purgatory, affirmed as de fide by the Trent creed, the Fathers knew nothing at all. See Vol. 2. p. 490, also 522, this Series.

ADDITIONAL NOTE.

(Passage not easy to identify, chap. xxv., note 712)

Easy enough, by the LXX. See Isaiah 63:3, LXX. καὶ τῶν εθνῶν οὐκ ἔστιν ἀνὴρ μετ ̓ εμοῦ. The first verse, referring to Edom, leads our author to accentuate this point of Gentile ignorance.

FOOTNOTES

^{1101 Opp. Tom, vi. p. 228. Ed. Migne.

^{1102 Calmet. Opp. i. 483 and Tom. x., p. 525.}}