[7243] Commentator.
[7244] Originis carnalis: i.e. "origin of the flesh of."
[7245] Matt. i. 1.
[7246] Rom. i. 3; 2 Tim. ii. 8.
[7247] In nomine: or, "for the sake of."
[7248] Gal. iii. 8, 16.
[7249] Censetur.
Chapter XXIII.--Simeon's "Sign that Should Be Contradicted," Applied to the Heretical Gainsaying of the True Birth of Christ. One of the Heretics' Paradoxes Turned in Support of Catholic Truth.
We acknowledge, however, that the prophetic declaration of Simeon is fulfilled, which he spoke over the recently-born Saviour: [7250] "Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel, and for a sign that shall be spoken against." [7251] The sign (here meant) is that of the birth of Christ, according to Isaiah: "Therefore the Lord Himself shall give you a sign: behold, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son." [7252] We discover, then, what the sign is which is to be spoken against--the conception and the parturition of the Virgin Mary, concerning which these sophists [7253] say: "She a virgin and yet not a virgin bare, and yet did not bear;" just as if such language, if indeed it must be uttered, would not be more suitable even for ourselves to use! For "she bare," because she produced offspring of her own flesh and "yet she did not bear," since she produced Him not from a husband's seed; she was "a virgin," so far as (abstinence) from a husband went, and "yet not a virgin," as regards her bearing a child. There is not, however, that parity of reasoning which the heretics affect: in other words it does not follow that for the reason "she did not bear," [7254] she who was "not a virgin" was "yet a virgin," even because she became a mother without any fruit of her own womb. But with us there is no equivocation, nothing twisted into a double sense. [7255] Light is light; and darkness, darkness; yea is yea; and nay, nay; "whatsoever is more than these cometh of evil." [7256] She who bare (really) bare; and although she was a virgin when she conceived, she was a wife [7257] when she brought forth her son. Now, as a wife, she was under the very law of "opening the womb," [7258] wherein it was quite immaterial whether the birth of the male was by virtue of a husband's co-operation or not; [7259] it was the same sex [7260] that opened her womb. Indeed, hers is the womb on account of which it is written of others also: "Every male that openeth the womb shall be called holy to the Lord." [7261] For who is really holy but the Son of God? Who properly opened the womb but He who opened a closed one? [7262] But it is marriage which opens the womb in all cases. The virgin's womb, therefore, was especially [7263] opened, because it was especially closed. Indeed [7264] she ought rather to be called not a virgin than a virgin, becoming a mother at a leap, as it were, before she was a wife. And what must be said more on this point? Since it was in this sense that the apostle declared that the Son of God was born not of a virgin, but "of a woman," he in that statement recognised the condition of the "opened womb" which ensues in marriage. [7265] We read in Ezekiel of "a heifer [7266] which brought forth, and still did not bring forth." Now, see whether it was not in view of your own future contentions about the womb of Mary, that even then the Holy Ghost set His mark upon you in this passage; otherwise [7267] He would not, contrary to His usual simplicity of style (in this prophet), have uttered a sentence of such doubtful import, especially when Isaiah says, "She shall conceive and bear a son." [7268]
[7250] Literally, "Lord."
[7251] Luke ii. 34.
[7252] Isa. vii. 14.
[7253] Academici isti: "this school of theirs."
[7254] i.e. "Because she produced not her son from her husband's seed."
[7255] Defensionem.
[7256] Matt. v. 37.
[7257] Nupsit.
[7258] Nupsit ipsa patefacti corporis lege.
[7259] De vi masculi admissi an emissi.
[7260] i.e. "The male."
[7261] Ex. xiii. 2; Luke ii. 23.
[7262] Clausam: i.e. a virgin's.
[7263] Magis.
[7264] Utique.
[7265] Nuptialem passionem.
[7266] Epiphanius (Hær. xxx. 30) quotes from the apocryphal Ezekiel this passage: Texetai he damalis, kai erousin--ou tetoken. So Clem. Alex. Stromata, vii. Oehler.
[7267] Ceterum.
[7268] Isa. vii. 14.
Chapter XXIV.--Divine Strictures on Various Heretics Descried in Various Passages of Prophetical Scripture. Those Who Assail the True Doctrine of the One Lord Jesus Christ, Both God and Man, Thus Condemned.
For when Isaiah hurls denunciation against our very heretics, especially in his "Woe to them that call evil good, and put darkness for light," [7269] he of course sets his mark upon those amongst you [7270] who preserve not in the words they employ the light of their true significance, (by taking care) that the soul should mean only that which is so called, and the flesh simply that which is confest to our view, and God none other than the One who is preached. [7271] Having thus Marcion in his prophetic view, he says, "I am God, and there is none else; there is no God beside me." [7272] And when in another passage he says, in like manner, "Before me there was no God," [7273] he strikes at those inexplicable genealogies of the Valentinian Æons. Again, there is an answer to Ebion in the Scripture: "Born, [7274] not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God." In like manner, in the passage, "If even an angel of heaven preach unto you any other gospel than that which we have preached unto you, let him be anathema," [7275] he calls attention to the artful influence of Philumene, [7276] the virgin friend of Apelles. Surely he is antichrist who denies that Christ has come in the flesh. [7277] By declaring that His flesh is simply and absolutely true, and taken in the plain sense of its own nature, the Scripture aims a blow at all who make distinctions in it. [7278] In the same way, also, when it defines the very Christ to be but one, it shakes the fancies of those who exhibit a multiform Christ, who make Christ to be one being and Jesus another,--representing one as escaping out of the midst of the crowds, and the other as detained by them; one as appearing on a solitary mountain to three companions, clothed with glory in a cloud, the other as an ordinary man holding intercourse with all, [7279] one as magnanimous, but the other as timid; lastly, one as suffering death, the other as risen again, by means of which event they maintain a resurrection of their own also, only in another flesh. Happily, however, He who suffered "will come again from heaven," [7280] and by all shall He be seen, who rose again from the dead. They too who crucified Him shall see and acknowledge Him; that is to say, His very flesh, against which they spent their fury, and without which it would be impossible for Himself either to exist or to be seen; so that they must blush with shame who affirm that His flesh sits in heaven void of sensation, like a sheath only, Christ being withdrawn from it; as well as those who (maintain) that His flesh and soul are just the same thing, [7281] or else that His soul is all that exists, [7282] but that His flesh no longer lives.
[7269] Isa. v. 20.
[7270] Istos.
[7271] Prædicatur.
[7272] Isa. xlv. 5.
[7273] Isa. xlvi. 9.
[7274] John i. 13. Tertullian's quotation is, as usual, in the singular, "natus."
[7275] Gal. i. 8.
[7276] Comp. de Præscr. Hæret. c. xxx. p. 257, supra.
[7277] 1 John iv. 3.
[7278] Disceptatores ejus.
[7279] Ceteris passivum.
[7280] Acts i. 11.
[7281] Tantundem.
[7282] Tantummodo.
Chapter XXV.--Conclusion. This Treatise Forms a Preface to the Other Work, "On the Resurrection of the Flesh," Proving the Reality of the Flesh Which Was Truly Born, and Died, and Rose Again.
But let this suffice on our present subject; for I think that by this time proof enough has been adduced of the flesh in Christ having both been born of the virgin, and being human in its nature. And this discussion alone might have been sufficient, without encountering the isolated opinions which have been raised from different quarters. We have, however, challenged these opinions to the test, both of the arguments which sustain them, and of the Scriptures which are appealed to, and this we have done ex abundanti; so that we have, by showing what the flesh of Christ was, and whence it was derived, also predetermined the question, against all objectors, of what that flesh was not. The resurrection, however, of our own flesh will have to be maintained in another little treatise, and so bring to a close this present one, which serves as a general preface, and which will pave the way for the approaching subject now that it is plain what kind of body that was which rose again in Christ.
Elucidations.
------------------------
I.
(In the body of a dove, cap. iii. p. 523.)
The learned John Scott, in his invaluable work The Christian Life, [7283] identifies the glory shed upon the Saviour at his baptism, with that mentioned by Ezekiel (Cap. xliii. 2) and adds: "In this same glorious splendor was Christ arrayed first at his Baptism and afterward at his Transfiguration....By the Holy Ghost's descending like a Dove, it is not necessary we should understand his descending in the shape or form of a Dove, but that in some glorious form, or appearance, he descended in the same manner as a Dove descends....Came down from above just as a dove with his wings spread forth is observed to do, and lighted upon our Saviour's head." I quote this as the opinion of one of the most learned and orthodox of divines, but not as my own, for I cannot reconcile it, as he strives to do, with St. Luke iii. 22. Compare Justin Martyr, vol. i. p. 243, and note 6, this series. Grotius observes, says Dr. Scott, that in the apocryphal Gospel of the Nazarenes, it is said that at the Baptism of our Lord "a great light shone round about the place."
II.
(His mother and His brethren, cap. vii. p. 527.)
It is not possible that the author of this chapter had ever conceived of the Blessed Virgin otherwise than as "Blessed among women," indeed, but enjoying no especial prerogative as the mother of our Lord. He speaks of "denying her" and "putting her away" after He began His Ministry, as He requires His ministers to do, after His example. How extraordinary this language--"the repudiation of carnal relationship." According to our author, never charged with heresy on this point, the high rewards of the holy Mary, in the world to come will be those due to her faith, not to the blessing of "her breasts and of her womb." Christ designates those as "more blessed," who hear His word and keep it. This the Blessed Virgin did pre-eminently, and herein was her own greater blessedness; that is, (our author shews) her crown of glory depends chiefly, like that of other saints, on her faith and works, not on her mere Maternity.
[7283] I quote the Ed. London, 1739, Vol. V., p. 249.
tertullian resurrection_flesh anf03 tertullian-resurrection_flesh On the Resurrection of the Flesh /ccel/schaff/anf03.v.viii.html
On the Resurrection of the Flesh
VI.
On the Resurrection of the Flesh.
The heretics against whom this work is directed, were the same who maintained that the demiurge, or the god who created this world and gave the Mosaic dispensation, was opposed to the supreme God. Hence they attached an idea of inherent corruption and worthlessness to all his works--amongst the rest, to the flesh or body of man; affirming that it could not rise again, and that the soul alone was capable of inheriting immortality. [7284]
[Translated by Dr. Holmes.]
------------------------
Chapter I.--The Doctrine of the Resurrection of the Body Brought to Light by the Gospel. The Faintest Glimpses of Something Like It Occasionally Met with in Heathenism. Inconsistencies of Pagan Teaching.
The resurrection of the dead is the Christian's trust. [7285] By it we are believers. To the belief of this (article of the faith) truth compels us--that truth which God reveals, but the crowd derides, which supposes that nothing will survive after death. And yet they do honour [7286] to their dead, and that too in the most expensive way according to their bequest, and with the daintiest banquets which the seasons can produce, [7287] on the presumption that those whom they declare to be incapable of all perception still retain an appetite. [7288] But (let the crowd deride): I on my side must deride it still more, especially when it burns up its dead with harshest inhumanity, only to pamper them immediately afterwards with gluttonous satiety, using the selfsame fires to honour them and to insult them. What piety is that which mocks its victims with cruelty? Is it sacrifice or insult (which the crowd offers), when it burns its offerings to those it has already burnt? [7289] But the wise, too, join with the vulgar crowd in their opinion sometimes. There is nothing after death, according to the school of Epicurus. After death all things come to an end, even death itself, says Seneca to like effect. It is satisfactory, however, that the no less important philosophy of Pythagoras and Empedocles, and the Plantonists, take the contrary view, and declare the soul to be immortal; affirming, moreover, in a way which most nearly approaches (to our own doctrine), [7290] that the soul actually returns into bodies, although not the same bodies, and not even those of human beings invariably: thus Euphorbus is supposed to have passed into Phythagoras, and Homer into a peacock. They firmly pronounced the soul's renewal [7291] to be in a body, [7292] (deeming it) more tolerable to change the quality (of the corporeal state) than to deny it wholly: they at least knocked at the door of truth, although they entered not. Thus the world, with all its errors, does not ignore the resurrection of the dead.