{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/003/0030457.htm","path":"chr/ecf/003/0030457.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/003/0030457.htm","text":"Chapter XI.\u2014The Second Epistle to the Corinthians. The Creator the Father of Mercies. Shown to Be Such in the Old Testament, and Also in Christ. The Newness of the New Testament. The Veil of Obdurate Blindness Upon Israel, Not Reprehensible on Marcion\u2019s Principles. The Jews Guilty in Rejecting the Christ of the Creator. Satan, the God of This World. The Treasure in Earthen Vessels Explained Against Marcion. The Creator\u2019s Relation to These Vessels, I.e. Our Bodies.\nIf, owing to the fault of human error, the word God has become a common name (since in the world there are said and believed to be \u201cgods many\u201d 5679 ), yet \u201cthe blessed God,\u201d (who is \u201cthe Father) of our Lord Jesus Christ,\u201d 5680 will be understood to be no other God than the Creator, who both blessed all things (that He had made), as you find in Genesis, 5681 and is Himself \u201cblessed by all things,\u201d as Daniel tells us. 5682 Now, if the title of Father may be claimed for (Marcion\u2019s) sterile god, how much more for the Creator? To none other than Him is it suitable, who is also \u201cthe Father of mercies,\u201d 5683 and (in the prophets) has been described as \u201cfull of compassion, and gracious, and plenteous in mercy.\u201d 5684 In Jonah you find the signal act of His mercy, which He showed to the praying Ninevites. 5685 How inflexible was He at the tears of Hezekiah! 5686 How ready to forgive Ahab, the husband of Jezebel, the blood of Naboth, when he deprecated His anger. 5687 How prompt in pardoning David on his confession of his sin 5688 \u2014preferring, indeed, the sinner\u2019s repentance to his death, of course because of His gracious attribute of mercy. 5689 Now, if Marcion\u2019s god has exhibited or proclaimed any such thing as this, I will allow him to be \u201cthe Father of mercies.\u201d Since, however, he ascribes to him this title only from the time he has been revealed, as if he were the father of mercies from the time only when he began to liberate the human race, then we on our side, too, 5690 adopt the same precise date of his alleged revelation; but it is that we may deny him! It is then not competent to him to ascribe any quality to his god, whom indeed he only promulged by the fact of such an ascription; for only if it were previously evident that his god had an existence, could he be permitted to ascribe an attribute to him. The ascribed attribute is only an accident; but accidents 5691 are preceded by the statement of the thing itself of which they are predicated, especially when another claims the attribute which is ascribed to him who has not been previously shown to exist. Our denial of his existence will be all the more peremptory, because of the fact that the attribute which is alleged in proof of it belongs to that God who has been already revealed. Therefore \u201cthe New Testament\u201d will appertain to none other than Him who promised it\u2014if not \u201cits letter, yet its spirit;\u201d 5692 and herein will lie its newness. Indeed, He who had engraved its letter in stones is the same as He who had said of its spirit, \u201cI will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh.\u201d 5693 Even if \u201cthe letter killeth, yet the Spirit giveth life;\u201d 5694 and both belong to Him who says: \u201cI kill, and I make alive; I wound, p. 453 and I heal.\u201d 5695 We have already made good the Creator\u2019s claim to this twofold character of judgment and goodness 5696 \u2014\u201ckilling in the letter\u201d through the law, and \u201cquickening in the Spirit\u201d through the Gospel. Now these attributes, however different they be, cannot possibly make two gods; for they have already (in the prevenient dispensation of the Old Testament) been found to meet in One. 5697 He alludes to Moses\u2019 veil, covered with which \u201chis face could not be stedfastly seen by the children of Israel.\u201d 5698 Since he did this to maintain the superiority of the glory of the New Testament, which is permanent in its glory, over that of the Old, \u201cwhich was to be done away,\u201d 5699 this fact gives support to my belief which exalts the Gospel above the law and you must look well to it that it does not even more than this. For only there is superiority possible where was previously the thing over which superiority can be affirmed. But then he says, \u201cBut their minds were blinded\u201d 5700 \u2014of the world; certainly not the Creator\u2019s mind, but the minds of the people which are in the world. 5701 Of Israel he says, Even unto this day the same veil is upon their heart;\u201d 5702 showing that the veil which was on the face of Moses was a figure of the veil which is on the heart of the nation still; because even now Moses is not seen by them in heart, just as he was not then seen by them in eye. But what concern has Paul with the veil which still obscures Moses from their view, if the Christ of the Creator, whom Moses predicted, is not yet come? How are the hearts of the Jews represented as still covered and veiled, if the predictions of Moses relating to Christ, in whom it was their duty to believe through him, are as yet unfulfilled? What had the apostle of a strange Christ to complain of, if the Jews failed in understanding the mysterious announcements of their own God, unless the veil which was upon their hearts had reference to that blindness which concealed from their eyes the Christ of Moses? Then, again, the words which follow, But when it shall turn to the Lord, the evil shall be taken away,\u201d 5703 properly refer to the Jew, over whose gaze Moses\u2019 veil is spread, to the effect that, when he is turned to the faith of Christ, he will understand how Moses spoke of Christ. But how shall the veil of the Creator be taken away by the Christ of another god, whose mysteries the Creator could not possibly have veiled\u2014unknown mysteries, as they were of an unknown god? So he says that \u201cwe now with open face\u201d (meaning the candour of the heart, which in the Jews had been covered with a veil), \u201cbeholding Christ, are changed into the same image, from that glory\u201d (wherewith Moses was transfigured as by the glory of the Lord) \u201cto another glory.\u201d 5704 By thus setting forth the glory which illumined the person of Moses from his interview with God, and the veil which concealed the same from the infirmity of the people, and by superinducing thereupon the revelation and the glory of the Spirit in the person of Christ\u2014\u201ceven as,\u201d to use his words, \u201cby the Spirit of the Lord\u201d 5705 \u2014he testifies that the whole Mosaic system 5706 was a figure of Christ, of whom the Jews indeed were ignorant, but who is known to us Christians. We are quite aware that some passages are open to ambiguity, from the way in which they are read, or else from their punctuation, when there is room for these two causes of ambiguity. The latter method has been adopted by Marcion, by reading the passage which follows, \u201cin whom the God of this world,\u201d 5707 as if it described the Creator as the God of this world, in order that he may, by these words, imply that there is another God for the other world. We, however, say that the passage ought to be punctuated with a comma after God, to this effect: \u201cIn whom God hath blinded the eyes of the unbelievers of this world.\u201d 5708 \u201cIn whom\u201d means the Jewish unbelievers, from some of whom the gospel is still hidden under Moses\u2019 veil. Now it is these whom God had threatened for \u201cloving Him indeed with the lip, whilst their heart was far from Him,\u201d 5709 in these angry words: \u201cYe shall hear with your ears, and not understand; and see with your eyes, but not perceive;\u201d 5710 and, \u201cIf ye will not believe, ye shall not understand;\u201d 5711 and again, \u201cI will take away the wisdom of their wise men, p. 454 and bring to nought 5712 the understanding of their prudent ones.\u201d But these words, of course, He did not pronounce against them for concealing the gospel of the unknown God. At any rate, if there is a God of this world, 5713 He blinds the heart of the unbelievers of this world, because they have not of their own accord recognised His Christ, who ought to be understood from His Scriptures. 5714 Content with my advantage, I can willingly refrain from noticing to any greater length 5715 this point of ambiguous punctuation, so as not to give my adversary any advantage, 5716 indeed, I might have wholly omitted the discussion. A simpler answer I shall find ready to hand in interpreting \u201cthe god of this world\u201d of the devil, who once said, as the prophet describes him: \u201cI will be like the Most High; I will exalt my throne in the clouds.\u201d 5717 The whole superstition, indeed, of this world has got into his hands, 5718 so that he blinds effectually the hearts of unbelievers, and of none more than the apostate Marcion\u2019s. Now he did not observe how much this clause of the sentence made against him: \u201cFor God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to (give) the light of the knowledge (of His glory) in the face of (Jesus) Christ.\u201d 5719 Now who was it that said; \u201cLet there be light?\u201d 5720 And who was it that said to Christ concerning giving light to the world: \u201cI have set Thee as a light to the Gentiles\u201d 5721 \u2014to them, that is, \u201cwho sit in darkness and in the shadow of death?\u201d 5722 (None else, surely, than He), to whom the Spirit in the Psalm answers, in His foresight of the future, saying, \u201cThe light of Thy countenance, O Lord, hath been displayed upon us.\u201d 5723 Now the countenance (or person 5724 ) of the Lord here is Christ. Wherefore the apostle said above: \u201cChrist, who is the image of God.\u201d 5725 Since Christ, then, is the person of the Creator, who said, \u201cLet there be light,\u201d it follows that Christ and the apostles, and the gospel, and the veil, and Moses\u2014nay, the whole of the dispensations\u2014belong to the God who is the Creator of this world, according to the testimony of the clause (above adverted to), and certainly not to him who never said, \u201cLet there be light.\u201d I here pass over discussion about another epistle, which we hold to have been written to the Ephesians, but the heretics to the Laodiceans. In it he tells 5726 them to remember, that at the time when they were Gentiles they were without Christ, aliens from (the commonwealth of) Israel, without intercourse, without the covenants and any hope of promise, nay, without God, even in his own world, 5727 as the Creator thereof. Since therefore he said, that the Gentiles were without God, whilst their god was the devil, not the Creator, it is clear that he must be understood to be the lord of this world, whom the Gentiles received as their god\u2014not the Creator, of whom they were in ignorance. But how does it happen, that \u201cthe treasure which we have in these earthen vessels of ours\u201d 5728 should not be regarded as belonging to the God who owns the vessels? Now since God\u2019s glory is, that so great a treasure is contained in earthen vessels, and since these earthen vessels are of the Creator\u2019s make, it follows that the glory is the Creator\u2019s; nay, since these vessels of His smack so much of the excellency of the power of God, that power itself must be His also! Indeed, all these things have been consigned to the said \u201cearthen vessels\u201d for the very purpose that His excellence might be manifested forth. Henceforth, then, the rival god will have no claim to the glory, and consequently none to the power. Rather, dishonour and weakness will accrue to him, because the earthen vessels with which he had nothing to do have received all the excellency! Well, then, if it be in these very earthen vessels that he tells us we have to endure so great sufferings, 5729 in which we bear about with us the very dying of God, 5730 (Marcion\u2019s) god is really ungrateful and unjust, if he does not mean to restore this same substance of ours at the resurrection, wherein so much has been endured in loyalty to him, in which Christ\u2019s very death is borne about, wherein too the excellency of his power is treasured. 5731 For he gives prominence to the statement, \u201cThat the life also of Christ may be manifested in our body,\u201d 5732 as a contrast to the preceding, that His death is borne about in our body. Now of what life of Christ does he here speak? Of that which we are now living? Then how is it, that in the words which follow he exhorts us not to the things p. 455 which are seen and are temporal, but to those which are not seen and are eternal 5733 \u2014in other words, not to the present, but to the future? But if it be of the future life of Christ that he speaks, intimating that it is to be made manifest in our body, 5734 then he has clearly predicted the resurrection of the flesh. 5735 He says, too, that \u201cour outward man perishes,\u201d 5736 not meaning by an eternal perdition after death, but by labours and sufferings, in reference to which he previously said, \u201cFor which cause we will not faint.\u201d 5737 Now, when he adds of \u201cthe inward man\u201d also, that it \u201cis renewed day by day,\u201d he demonstrates both issues here\u2014the wasting away of the body by the wear and tear 5738 of its trials, and the renewal of the soul 5739 by its contemplation of the promises.\nDan. 2:19, 20, Dan. 3:28, 29, Dan. 4:34, 37.\n452:5683 452:5684\nPs. 86:15, Ps. 12:4, Ps. 45:8, Jonah 4:2.\n452:5685 452:5686 452:5687 452:5688 452:5689 452:5690 452:5691\nThe Contingent qualities in logic.\n452:5692 452:5693 452:5694 453:5695 453:5696\nSee above in book ii. [cap. xi. p. 306.]\n453:5697\nApud unum recenseri pr\u00e6venerunt.\n453:5698\n2 Cor. 3:7, 13.\n453:5699\n2 Cor. 3:7, 8.\n453:5700\nObtunsi: \u201cblunted,\u201d 2 Cor. iii. 14.\n453:5701\nHe seems to have read the clause as applying to the world, but St. Paul certainly refers only to the obdurate Jews. The text is: \u201cSed obtunsi sunt sensus mundi.\n453:5702 453:5703 453:5704 453:5705\n2 Cor. iii. 18, but T.\u2019s reading is \u201ctanquam a domino spirituum\u201d (\u201ceven as by the Lord of the Spirits,\u201d probably the sevenfold Spirit.). The original is, \u03ba\u03b1\u03b8\u03ac\u03c0\u03b5\u03c1 \u1f00\u03c0\u1f78 \u039a\u03c5\u03c1\u03af\u03bf\u03c5 \u03a0\u03bd\u03b5\u03cd\u03bc\u03b1\u03c4\u03bf\u03c2, \u201cby the Lord the Spirit.\u201d\n453:5706 453:5707 453:5708\nHe would stop off the phrase \u03c4\u03bf\u1fe6 \u03b1\u1f30\u1ff6\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2 \u03c4\u03bf\u03cd\u03c4\u03bf\u03c5 from \u1f41 \u0398\u03b5\u1f78\u03c2, and remove it to the end of the sentence as a qualification of \u03c4\u1ff6\u03bd \u1f00\u03c0\u03af\u03c3\u03c4\u03c9\u03bd. He adds another interpretation just afterwards, which, we need not say, is both more consistent with the sense of the passage and with the consensus of Christian writers of all ages, although \u201cit is historically curious\u201d (as Dean Alford has remarked) \u201cthat Iren\u00e6us [H\u00e6res. iv. 48, Origen, Tertullian (v. 11, contra Marcion)], Chrysostom, \u0152cumenius, Theodoret, Theophylact, all repudiate, in their zeal against the Manich\u00e6ans, the grammatical rendering, and take \u03c4\u1ff6\u03bd \u1f00\u03c0\u03af\u03c3\u03c4\u03c9\u03bd \u03c4\u03bf\u1fe6 \u03b1\u1f30\u1ff6\u03bd\u03bf\u03c2 \u03c4\u03bf\u03cd\u03c4\u03bf\u03c5 together\u201d (Greek Testament, in loc.). [I have corrected Alford\u2019s reference to Tertullian which he makes B. iv. 11.]\n453:5709 453:5710\nIsa. vi. 10 (only adapted).\n453:5711\nIsa. vii. 9, Sept.\n454:5712 454:5713\nSaid concessively, in reference to M.\u2019s position above mentioned.\n454:5714\nMarcion\u2019s \u201cGod of this world\u201d being the God of the Old Testament.\n454:5715\nHactenus: pro non amplius (Oehler) tractasse.\n454:5716\n\u201cA fuller criticism on this slight matter might give his opponent the advantage, as apparently betraying a penury of weightier and more certain arguments\u201d (Oehler).\n454:5717 454:5718 454:5719 454:5720 454:5721\nIsa. xlix. 6 (Sept. quoted in Acts xiii. 47).\n454:5722 454:5723\nPs. iv. 7 (Sept.).\n454:5724\nPersona: the \u03c0\u03c1\u03cc\u03c3\u03c9\u03c0\u03bf\u03bd of the Septuagint.\n454:5725 454:5726 454:5727 454:5728 454:5729 454:5730\nOehler, after Fr. Junius, defends the reading \u201cmortificationem dei,\u201d instead of Domini, in reference to Marcion, who seems to have so corrupted the reading.\n454:5731 454:5732 455:5733 455:5734 455:5735 455:5736 455:5737 455:5738 455:5739","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol III: Tertullian: Part II: The Se...","type":"page"}