Church Fathers: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 4: 4.01.18 Tertullian - Appendix Part 5 of 5

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Church Fathers: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 4: 4.01.18 Tertullian - Appendix Part 5 of 5



TOPIC: Ante-Nicene Fathers Volume 4 (Other Topics in this Collection)
SUBJECT: 4.01.18 Tertullian - Appendix Part 5 of 5

Other Subjects in this Topic:

The Writings of Tertullian

Part Fourth (Cont.)

X. Appendix. (Cont.)

5. Five Books in Reply to Marcion. (Cont.)

(Author Uncertain.)

Book V. General Reply to Sundry of Marcion’s Heresies.260

The first Book did the enemy’s words recall In order, which the senseless renegade Composed and put forth lawlessly; hence, too, Touched briefly flesh’s hope, Christ’s victory, 5 And false ways’ speciousness. The next doth teach The Law’s conjoinèd mysteries, and what In the new covenant the one God hath Delivered. The third shows the race, create From freeborn mother, to be ministers 10 Sacred to seers and patriarchs;261 whom Thou, O Christ, in number twice six out of all,262 Chosest; and, with their names, the lustral263 times Of our own elders noted, (times preserved On record,) showing in whose days appeared 15 The author264 of this wickedness, unknown, Lawless, and roaming, cast forth265 with his brood. The fourth, too, the piacular rites recalls Of the old Law themselves, and shows them types In which the Victim True appeared, by saints 20 Expected long since, with the holy Seed. This fifth doth many twists and knots untie, Rolls wholly into sight what ills soe’er Were lurking; drawing arguments, but not Without attesting prophet. And although 25 With strong arms fortified we vanquish foes, Yet hath the serpent mingled so at once All things polluted, impious, unallowed, Commaculate, - the blind’s path without light! A voice contaminant! - that, all the while 30 We are contending the world’s Maker is Himself sole God, who also spake by voice Of seers, and proving that there is none else Unknown; and, while pursuing Him with praise, Who is by various endearment266 known, 35 Are blaming - among other fallacies - The Unknown’s tardy times: our subject’s fault Will scarce keep pure our tongue. Yet, for all that, Guile’s many hidden venoms us enforce (Although with double risk267) to ope our words. 40 Who, then, the God whom ye say is the true, Unknown to peoples, alien, in a word, To all the world?268 Him whom none knew before? Came he from high? If ’tis his own269 he seeks, Why seek so late? If not his own, why rob 45 Bandit-like? and why ply with words unknown So oft throughout Law’s rein a People still Lingering ’neath the Law? If, too, he comes To pity and to succour all combined, And to re-elevate men vanquisht quite 50 By death’s funereal weight, and to release Spirit from flesh’s bond obscene, whereby The inner man (iniquitously dwarfed) Is held in check; why, then, so late appear His ever-kindness, duteous vigilance? 55 How comes it that he ne’er at all before Offered himself to any, but let slip Poor souls in numbers?270 and then with his mouth Seeks to regain another’s subjects: ne’er Expected; not known; sent into the orb. 60 Seeking the “ewe” he had not lost before, The Shepherd ought271 to have disrobed himself Of flesh, as if his victor-self withal Had ever been a spirit, and as such272 Willèd to rescue all expelled souls, 65 162 Without a body, everywhere, and leave The spoilèd flesh to earth; wholly to till The world273 on one day equally with corpses To leave the orb void; and to raise the souls To heaven. Then would human progeny 70 At once have ceased to be born; nor had Thereafter any scion of your274 kith Been born, or spread a new pest275 o’er the orb. Or (since at that time276 none of all these things Is shown to have been done) he should have set 75 A bound to future race; with solid heart Nuptial embraces would he, in that case, Have sated quite;277 made men grow torpid, reft Of fruitful seed; made irksome intercourse With female sex; and closed up inwardly 80 The flesh’s organs genital: our mind Had had no will, no potent faculty Our body: after this the “inner man” Could withal, joined with blood,278 have been infused And cleaved to flesh, and would have ever been 85 Perishing. Ever perishes the “ewe:” And is there then no power of saving her? Since man is ever being born beneath Death’s doom, what is the Shepherd’s work, if thus The “ewe” is stated279 to be found? Unsought, 90 In that case, but not rescued, she is proved. But now choice is allowed of entering Wedlock, as hath been ever; and that choice Sure progeny hath yoked: nations are born And folk scarce numerable, at whose birth 95 Their souls by living bodies are received; Nor was it meet that Paul (though, for the time, He did exhort some few, discerning well The many pressures of a straitened time) To counsel men in like case to abide 100 As he himself:280 for elsewhere he has bidden The tender ages marry, nor defraud Each other, but their compact’s dues discharge. But say, whose suasion hath, with fraud astute, Made you “abide,” and in divided love 105 Of offspring live secure, and commit crime Adulterous, and lose your life? and, though ’Tis perishing, belie (by verbal name) That fact. For which cause all the so sweet sounds Of his voice pours he forth, that “you must do, 110 Undaunted, whatsoever pleases you Outwardly chaste, stealthily stained with crime! Of honourable wedlock, by this plea,281 He hath deprived you. But why more? ’Tis well (Forsooth) to be disjoined! for the world, too, 115 Expedient ’tis! lest any of your seed Be born! Then will death’s organs282 cease at length! The while you hope salvation to retain, Your “total man” quite loses part of man, With mind profane: but neither is man said 120 To be sole spirit, nor the flesh is called “The old man;” nor unfriendly are the flesh And spirit, the true man combined in one, The inner, and he whom you call “old foe;”283 Nor are they seen to have each his own set 125 Of senses. One is ruled; the other rules, Groans, joys, grieves, loves; himself284 to his own flesh Most dear, too; through which285 his humanity Is visible, with which commixt he is Held ever: to its wounds he care applies 130 And pours forth tears; and nutriments of food Takes, through its limbs, often and eagerly: This hopes he to have ever with himself Immortal; o’er its fracture doth he groan; And grieves to quit it limb by limb: fixt time 135 Death lords it o’er the unhappy flesh; that so From light dust it may be renewed, and death Unfriendly fail at length, when flesh, released, Rises again. This will that victory be Supreme and long expected, wrought by Him, 140 The aye-to-be-revered, who did become 163 True man; and by His Father’s virtue won: Who man’s redeemed limbs unto the heavens Hath raised,286 and richly opened access up Thither in hope, first to His nation; then 145 To those among all tongues in whom His work Is ever doing: Minister imbued With His Sire’s parent-care, seen by the eye Of the Illimitable, He performed, By suffering, His missions.287 What say now 150 The impious voices? what th’ abandoned crew? If He Himself, God the Creator’s self, Gave not the Law,288 He who from Egypt’s vale289 Paved in the waves a path, and freely gave The seats which He had said of old, why comes 155 He in that very People and that land Aforesaid? and why rather sought He not Some other290 peoples or some rival291 realms? Why, further, did He teach that, through the seers, (With Name foretold in full, yet not His own,) 160 He had been often sung of? Whence, again, Could He have issued baptism’s kindly gifts, Promised by some one else, as His own works? These gifts men who God’s mandates had transgressed, And hence were found polluted, longed for 165 And begged a pardoning rescue from fierce death. Expected long, they292 came: but that to those Who recognised them when erst heard, and now Have recognised them, when in due time found, Christ’s true hand is to give them, this, with voice 170 Paternal, the Creator-Sire Himself Warns ever from eternity, and claims; And thus the work of virtue which He framed, And still frames, arms, and fosters, and doth now Victorious look down on and reclothe 175 With His own light, should with Perennial praise Abide.293 What294 hath the Living Power done To make men recognise what God can give And man can suffer, and thus live?295 But since Neither predictions earlier nor facts 180 The latest can suade senseless frantic296 men That God became a man, and (after He Had suffered and been buried) rose; that they May credit those so many witnesses Harmonious,297 who of old did cry aloud 185 With heavenly word, let them both298 learn to trust At least terrestrial reason. When the Lord Christ came to be, as flesh, born into the orb In time of king Augustus’ reign at Rome, First, by decree, the nations numbered are 190 By census everywhere: this measure, then, This same king chanced to pass, because the Will Supreme, in whose high reigning hand doth lie The king’s heart, had impelled him:299 he was first To do it, and the enrolment was reduced 195 To orderly arrangement. Joseph then Likewise, with his but just delivered wife Mary,300 with her celestial Son alike, Themselves withal are numbered. Let, then, such As trust to instruments of human skill, 200 Who may (approving of applying them As attestators of the holy word) Inquire into this census, if it be But found so as we say, then afterwards Repent they and seek pardon while time still 205 Is had.301 164 The Jews, who own302 to having wrought A grave crime, while in our disparagement They glow, and do resist us, neither call Christ’s family unknown, nor can303 affirm They hanged a man, who spake truth, on a tree:304 210 Ignorant that the Lord’s flesh which they bound305 Was not seed-gendered. But, while partially They keep a reticence, so partially They triumph; for they strive to represent God to the peoples commonly as man. 215 Behold the error which o’ercomes you both!306 This error will our cause assist, the while, We prove to you those things which certain are. They do deny Him God; you falsely call Him man, a body bodiless! and ah! 220 A various insanity of mind Sinks you; which him who hath presumed to hint You both do, sinking, sprinkle:307 for His deeds Will then approve Him man alike and God Commingled, and the world308 will furnish signs 225 No few. While then the Son Himself of God Is seeking to regain the flesh’s limbs,309 Already robed as King, He doth sustain Blows from rude palms; with spitting covered is His face; a thorn-inwoven crown His head 230 Pierces all round; and to the tree310 Himself Is fixed; wine drugged with myrrh,311 is drunk, and gall312 Is mixt with vinegar; parted His robe,313 And in it314 lots are cast; what for himself Each one hath seized he keeps; in murky gloom, 235 As God from fleshly body silently Outbreathes His soul, in darkness trembling day Took refuge with the sun; twice dawned one day; Its centre black night covered: from their base Mounts move in circle, wholly moved was earth, 240 Saints’ sepulchres stood ope, and all things joined In fear to see His passion whom they knew! His lifeless side a soldier with bare spear Pierces, and forth flows blood, nor water less Thence followed. These facts they315 agree to hide, 245 And are unwilling the misdeed to own, Willing to blink the crime. Can spirit, then, Without a body wear a robe? or is’t Susceptible of penalty? the wound Of violence does it hear? or die? or rise? 250 Is blood thence poured? from what flesh, since ye say He had none? or else, rather, feigned He? if ’Tis safe for you to say so; though you do (Headlong) so say, by passing over more In silence. Is not, then, faith manifest? 255 And are not all things fixed? The day before He then316 should suffer, keeping Passover, And handing down a memorable rite317 To His disciples, taking bread alike And the vine’s juice, “My body, and My blood 260 Which is poured318 for you, this is,” did He say; And bade it ever afterward be done. Of what created elements were made, Think ye, the bread and wine which were (He said) His body with its blood? and what must be 265 Confessèd? Proved He not Himself the world’s319 Maker, through deeds? and that He bore at once A body formed from flesh and blood? This God, This true Man, too, the Father’s Virtue ’neath An Image,320 with the Father ever was, 270 United both in glory and in age;321 Because alone He ministers the words Of the All-Holder; whom He322 upon earth Accepts;323 through Whom He all things aid create: God’s Son, God’s dearest Minister, is He! 275 Hence hath He generation, hence Name too, Hence, finally, a kingdom; Lord from Lord; Stream from perennial Fount! He, He it was 165 Who to the holy fathers (whosoe’er Among them doth profess to have “seen God”324) - 280 God is our witness - since the origin Of this our world,325 appearing, opened up The Father’s words of promise and of charge From heaven high: He led the People out; Smote through th’ iniquitous nation; was Himself 285 The column both of light and of cloud’s shade; And dried the sea; and bids the People go Right through the waves, the foe therein involved And covered with the flood and surge: a way Through deserts made He for the followers 290 Of His high biddings; sent down bread in showers326 From heaven for the People; brake the rock; Bedewed with wave the thirsty;327 and from God The mandate of the Law to Moses spake With thunder, trumpet-sound, and flamey column 295 Terrible to the sight, while men’s hearts shook. After twice twenty years, with months complete, Jordan was parted; a way oped; the wave Stood in a mass; and the tribes shared the land, Their fathers’ promised boons! The Father’s word, 300 Speaking Himself by prophets’ mouth, that He328 Would come to earth and be a man, He did Predict; Christ manifestly to the earth Foretelling. Then, expected for our aid, Life’s only Hope, the Cleanser of our flesh329 305 Death’s Router, from th’ Almighty Sire’s empire At length He came, and with our human limbs He clothed Him. Adam - virgin - dragon - tree,330 The cause of ruin, and the way whereby Rash death us all had vanquisht! by the same 310 Our Shepherd treading, seeking to regain His sheep - with angel - virgin - His own flesh - And the “tree’s” remedy;331 whence vanquisht man And doomed to perish was aye wont to go To meet his vanquisht peers; hence, interposed, 315 One in all captives’ room, He did sustain In body the unfriendly penalty With patience; by His own death spoiling death; Becomes salvation’s cause; and, having paid Throughly our debts by throughly suffering 320 On earth, in holy body, everything, Seeks the infern! here souls, bound for their crime, Which shut up all together by Law’s weight, Without a guard,332 were asking for the boons Promised of old, hoped for, and tardy, He 325 To the saints’ rest admitted, and, with light, Brought back. For on the third day mounting up,333 A victor, with His body, by His Sire’s Virtue immense, (salvation’s pathway made,) And bearing God and man is form create, 330 He clomb the heavens, leading back with Him Captivity’s first-fruits (a welcome gift And a dear figure334 to the Lord), and took His seat beside light’s Father, and resumed The virtue and the glory of which, while 335 He was engaged in vanquishing the foe, He had been stripped;335 conjoined with Spirit; bound With flesh, on our part. Him, Lord, Christ, King, God, Judgment and kingdom given to His hand, The father is to send unto the orb.



FOOTNOTES



260 I make no apology for the ruggedness of the versification and the obscurity of the sense in this book, further than to say that the state of the Latin text is such as to render it almost impossible to find any sense at all in many places, while the grammar and metre are not reducible to any known laws. It is about the hardest and most uninteresting book of the five.

261 Or, “consecrated by seers and patriarchs.”

262 i.e., all the number of Thy disciples.

263 Tempora lustri, i.e., apparently the times during which these “elders” (i.e., the bishops, of whom a list is given at the end of book iii.) held office. “Lustrum” is used of other periods than it strictly implies, and this seems to give some sense to this difficult passage.

264 i.e., Marcion.

265 i.e., excommunicated.

266 Complexu vario.

267 Ancipiti quamquam cum crimine. The last word seems almost = “discrimine;” just as our author uses “cerno” = “discerno.”

268 Mundo.

269 Cf. Joh_1:11, and see the Greek.

270 Whether this be the sense I know not. The passage is a mass of confusion.

271 i.e., according to Marcion’s view.

272 i.e., as spirits, like himself.

273 Mundum.

274 i.e., Marcionite.

275 See book ii. 3.

276 i.e., apparently on the day of Christ’s resurrection.

277 Replesset, i.e., replevisset. If this be the right reading, the meaning would seem to be, “would have taken away all further desire for” them, as satiety or repletion takes away all appetite for food. One is almost inclined to hazard the suggestion “represset,” i.e., repressisset, “he would have repressed,” but that such a contraction would be irregular. Yet, with an author who takes such liberties as the present one, perhaps that might not be a decisive objection.

278 “Junctus,” for the edd.’s “junctis,” which, if retained, will mean “in the case of beings still joined with (or to) blood.”

279 “Docetur,” for the edd.’s “docentur.” The sense seems to be, if there be any, exceedingly obscure; but for the idea of a half-salvation - the salvation of the “inner man” without the outer - being no salvation at all, and unworthy of “the Good Shepherd” and His work, we may compare the very difficult passage in the de Pudic., c. xiii. ad fin.

280 This sense, which I deduce from a transposition of one line and the supplying of the words “he did exhort,” which are not expressed, but seem necessary, in the original, agrees well with 1Co_7:1-40, which is plainly the passage referred to.

281 “Causa;” or perhaps “means.” It is, of course, the French “chose.”

282 i.e., you and your like, through whom sin, and in consequence death, is disseminated.

283 Here, again, for the sake of the sense, I have transposed a line.

284 i.e., “the other,” the “inner man,” or spirit.

285 i.e., through flesh.

286 i.e., in His own person.

287 I hope I have succeeded in giving some intelligible sense; but the passage as it stands in the Latin is nearly hopeless.

288 I read “legem” for “leges.”

289 I read “valle” for “calle.”

290 Alios.

291 Altera.

292 i.e., “the gifts of baptism.”

293 This seems to give sense to a very obscure passage, in which I have been guided more by Migne’s pointing than by Oehler’s.

294 I read here “quid” for “quod.”

295 i.e., to make men live by recognising that. Cf. the Psalmist’s prayer: “Give me understanding and I shall live” (Psa_119:144; Psalm 118:144, LXX).

296 The “furentes” of Pam. and Rig. is preferred to Oehler’s “ferentes.”

297 “Complexis,” lit. “embracing.”

298 i.e., both Jews and Gentile heretics, the “senseless frantic men” just referred to probably; or possibly the “ambo” may mean “both sects,” viz., the Marcionites and Manichees, against whom the writer whom Oehler supposes to be the probable author of these “Five Books,” Victorinus, a rhetrician of Marseilles, directed his efforts. But it may again be the acc. neut. pl., and mean “let them” - i.e., the “senseless frantic men” - “learn to believe as to both facts,” i.e., the incarnation and the resurrection; (see vers. 179, 180;) “the testimony at least of human reason.”

299 I would suggest here, for

“…quia summa voluntas

In cujus manu regnantis cor legibus esset,”

something like this,

“…quia summa voluntas,

In cujus manu regnantis cor regis, egisset,”

which would only add one more to our author’s false quantities. “Regum egisset” would avoid even that, while it would give some sense. Cf. Pro_21:1.

300 Maria cum conjuge feta. What follows seems to decide the meaning of “feta,” as a child could hardly be included in a census before birth.

301 Again I have had to attempt to amend the text of the Latin in order to extract any sense, and am far from sure that I have extracted the right one.

302 “Fatentur,” unless our author use it passively = “are confessed.”

303 “Possunt,” i.e., probably “have the hardihood.”

304 Because Christ plainly, as they understood Him, “made Himself the Son of God;” and hence, if they confessed that He had said the truth, and yet that they hanged Him on a tree, they would be pronouncing their own condemnation.

305 “Vinctam” for “victam” I read here.

306 i.e., you and the Jews. See above on 185.

307 Quod qui praesumpsit mergentes spargitis ambo. What the meaning is I know not, unless it be this: if any one hints to you that you are in an error which is sinking you into perdition, you both join in trying to sink him (if “mergentes” be active; or “while you are sinking,” if neuter), and in sprinkling him with your doctrine (or besprinkling him with abuse).

308 Mundus.

309 “Sum carnis membra requirit,” i.e., seeking to regain for God all the limbs of the flesh as His instruments. Cf. Rom_6:13, Rom_6:19.

310 Ligno.

311 “Scriblita,” a curious word.

312 Fel miscetur aceto. The reading may have arisen - and it is not confined to our author - from confounding ὄξος with οἶνος. Cf. Mat_27:33 with Mar_15:23.

313 This is an error, if the “coat” be meant.

314 Perhaps for “in illa” we should read “in illam” - “on it,” for “in it.

315 The Jews.

316 For “ante diem quam cum pateretur” I have read “qua tum.”

317 Or, “deed” - “factum.”

318 Or, “is being poured” - “funditur.”

319 Mundi.

320 I read with Migne, “Patris sub imagine virtus,” in preference to the conjecture which Oehler follows, “Christi sub imagine virtus.” The reference seems clearly to be to Heb_1:3.

321 Aevo. Perhaps here = “eternity.”

322 i.e., “The All Holder.”

323 Capit.

324 Cf. Jacob’s words in Gen_32:30; Manoah’s in Jdg_13:22; etc.

66Mundi.

326 For “dimisit in umbris” I read here “demisit in imbris.” If we retain the former reading, it will then mean, “dispersed during the shades of night,” during which it was that the manna seems always to have fallen.

327 “Sitientis” in Oehler must be a misprint for “sitientes.”

328 There ought to be a “se” in the Latin if this be the meaning.

329 For “Mundator carnis serae” = “the Cleanser of late flesh” (which would seem, if it mean anything, to mean that the flesh had to wait long for its cleansing), I have read “carnis nostrae.”

330 Lignum.

331 I have followed the disjointed style of the Latin as closely as I could here.

332 Here we seem to see the idea of the “limbus patrum.”

333 “Subiens” = “going beneath,” i.e., apparently coming beneath the walls of heaven.

334 i.e., a figure of the future harvest.

335 I have hazarded the conjecture “minutus” here for the edd.’s “munitus.” It adds one more, it is true, to our author’s false quantities, but that is a minor difficulty, while it improves (to my mind) the sense vastly.



(N.B. - It has been impossible to note the changes which I have had to make in the text of the Latin. In some cases they will suggest themselves to any scholar who may compare the translation with the original; and in others I must be content to await a more fitting opportunity, if such ever arise, for discussing them.) 166





Elucidations.

I.

(Appendix.)

About these versifications, which are “poems” only as mules are horses, it is enough to say of them, with Dupin, “They are no more Tertullian’s than they are Virgil’s or Homer’s. The poem called Genesis seems to be that which Gennadius attributes to Salvian, Bishop of Marseilles. That concerning the Judgment of God was, perhaps, composed by Verecundus, an African bishop. In the books Against Marcion there are some opinions different from those of Tertullian. There is likewise a poem To a Senator in Pamelius’ edition, one of Sodom, and in the Bibliotheca Patrum one of Jonas and Nineve; the first of which is ancient, and the other two seem to be by the same author.”

It is worth while to observe that this rhymester makes two bishops out of one.336 Cletus and Anacletus he supposes different persons, which brings Clement into the fourth place in the see of Rome. Our author elsewhere makes St. Clement the immediate successor of the apostles?337



II.

(Or is there ought, etc., 1. 136.)

In taking leave of Tertullian, it may be well to say a word of his famous saying, Certum est quia impossibile est. It occurs in the tract De Carne Christi,338 and is one of those startling epigrammatic dicta of our author which is no more to be pressed in argument than any other bon-mot of a wit or a poet. It is evidently designed as a rhetorical climax, to enforce the same idea which we find in the hymn of Aquinas: -

“Et si sensus deficit,

Ad firmandum cor sincerum

Sola fides sufficit.”

As Jeremy Taylor339 argues, the condition is, that holy Scripture affirms it. If that be the case, then “ all things are possible with God:” I believe; but I do not argue, for it is impossible with men. This is the plain sense of the great Carthaginian doctor’s pithy rhetoric. But Dr. Bunsen sets it on all-fours, and treats it as if it were soberly designed to defy reason, - that reason to which Tertullian constantly makes his appeal against Marcion, and in many of his sayings340 hardly less witty. Speaking of Hippolytus, that writer remarks,341 “He might have said on some points, Credibile licet ineptum: he would never have exclaimed with Tertullian, ‘Credibile quia ineptum.’” Why attempt to prove the absurdity of such a reflection? As well attempt to defend St. John’s hyperbole (Joh_21:25) against a mind incapable of comprehending a figure of speech.







FOOTNOTES



336 See p. 156, lines 364, 365, supra.

337 See De Praescrip., cap. xxxii. vol. 3. p. 258.

338 Cap. v. vol. 3. p. 525.

339 Christ in the Holy Sacrament, § xi. 6.

340 De Anima, cap. xvii.

341 Vol. i. p. 304.