{"collection":"chr","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/browse/chr/ecf/003/0030466.htm","path":"chr/ecf/003/0030466.htm","source_url":"https://sacred-texts.com/chr/ecf/003/0030466.htm","text":"Chapter XX.\u2014The Epistle to the Philippians. The Variances Amongst the Preachers of Christ No Argument that There Was More Than One Only Christ. St. Paul\u2019s Phrases\u2014Form of a Servant, Likeness, and Fashion of a Man\u2014No Sanction of Docetism. No Antithesis (Such as Marcion Alleged) in the God of Judaism and the God of the Gospel Deducible from Certain Contrasts Mentioned in This Epistle. A Parallel with a Passage in Genesis. The Resurrection of the Body, and the Change Thereof.\nWhen (the apostle) mentions the several motives of those who were preaching the gospel, how that some, \u201cwaxing confident by his bonds, were more fearless in speaking the word,\u201d while others \u201cpreached Christ even out of envy and strife, and again others out of good-will,\u201d many also \u201cout of love,\u201d and certain \u201cout of contention,\u201d and some \u201cin rivalry to himself,\u201d 6096 he had a favourable opportunity, no doubt, 6097 of taxing what they preached with a diversity of doctrine, as if it were no less than this which caused so great a variance in their tempers. But while he exposes these tempers as the sole cause of the diversity, he avoids inculpating the regular mysteries of the faith, 6098 and affirms that there is, notwithstanding, but one Christ and His one God, whatever motives men had in preaching Him. Therefore, says he, it matters not to me \u201cwhether it be in pretence or in truth that Christ is preached,\u201d 6099 because one Christ alone was announced, whether in their \u201cpretentious\u201d or their \u201ctruthful\u201d faith. For it was to the faithfulness of their preaching that he applied the word truth, not to the rightness of the rule itself, because there was indeed but one rule; whereas the conduct of the preachers varied: in some of them it was true, i.e. single-minded, while in others it was sophisticated with over-much learning. This being the case, it is manifest that that Christ was the subject of their preaching who was always the theme of the prophets. Now, if it were a completely different Christ that was being introduced by the apostle, the novelty of the thing would have produced a diversity (in belief.). For there would not have been wanting, in spite of the novel teaching, 6100 men to interpret the preached gospel of the Creator\u2019s Christ, since the majority of persons everywhere now-a-days are of our way of thinking, rather than on the heretical side. So that the apostle would not in such a passage as the present one have refrained from remarking and censuring the diversity. Since, however, there is no blame of a diversity, there is no proof of a novelty. Of course 6101 the Marcionites suppose that they have the apostle on their side in the following passage in the matter of Christ\u2019s substance\u2014that in Him there was nothing but a phantom of flesh. For he says of Christ, that, \u201cbeing in the form of God, He thought it not robbery to be equal with God; 6102 but emptied 6103 Himself, and took upon Him the form of a servant,\u201d not the reality, \u201cand was made in the likeness of man,\u201d not a man, \u201cand was found in fashion as a man,\u201d 6104 not in his substance, that is to say, his flesh; just as if to a subp. 473 stance there did not accrue both form and likeness and fashion. It is well for us that in another passage (the apostle) calls Christ \u201cthe image of the invisible God.\u201d 6105 For will it not follow with equal force from that passage, that Christ is not truly God, because the apostle places Him in the image of God, if, (as Marcion contends,) He is not truly man because of His having taken on Him the form or image of a man? For in both cases the true substance will have to be excluded, if image (or \u201cfashion\u201d) and likeness and form shall be claimed for a phantom. But since he is truly God, as the Son of the Father, in His fashion and image, He has been already by the force of this conclusion determined to be truly man, as the Son of man, \u201cfound in the fashion\u201d and image \u201cof a man.\u201d For when he propounded 6106 Him as thus \u201cfound\u201d in the manner 6107 of a man, he in fact affirmed Him to be most certainly human. For what is found, manifestly possesses existence. Therefore, as He was found to be God by His mighty power, so was He found to be man by reason of His flesh, because the apostle could not have pronounced Him to have \u201cbecome obedient unto death,\u201d 6108 if He had not been constituted of a mortal substance. Still more plainly does this appear from the apostle\u2019s additional words, \u201ceven the death of the cross.\u201d 6109 For he could hardly mean this to be a climax 6110 to the human suffering, to extol the virtue 6111 of His obedience, if he had known it all to be the imaginary process of a phantom, which rather eluded the cross than experienced it, and which displayed no virtue 6112 in the suffering, but only illusion. But \u201cthose things which he had once accounted gain,\u201d and which he enumerates in the preceding verse\u2014\u201ctrust in the flesh,\u201d the sign of \u201ccircumcision,\u201d his origin as \u201can Hebrew of the Hebrews,\u201d his descent from \u201cthe tribe of Benjamin,\u201d his dignity in the honours of the Pharisee 6113 \u2014he now reckons to be only \u201closs\u201d to himself; 6114 (in other words,) it was not the God of the Jews, but their stupid obduracy, which he repudiates. These are also the things \u201cwhich he counts but dung for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ\u201d 6115 (but by no means for the rejection of God the Creator); \u201cwhilst he has not his own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through Him,\u201d i.e. Christ, \u201cthe righteousness which is of God.\u201d 6116 Then, say you, according to this distinction the law did not proceed from the God of Christ. Subtle enough! But here is something still more subtle for you. For when (the apostle) says, \u201cNot (the righteousness) which is of the law, but that which is through Him,\u201d he would not have used the phrase through Him of any other than Him to whom the law belonged. \u201cOur conversation,\u201d says he, \u201cis in heaven.\u201d 6117 I here recognise the Creator\u2019s ancient promise to Abraham: \u201cI will multiply thy seed as the stars of heaven.\u201d 6118 Therefore \u201cone star differeth from another star in glory.\u201d 6119 If, again, Christ in His advent from heaven \u201cshall change the body of our humiliation, that it may be fashioned like unto His glorious body,\u201d 6120 it follows that this body of ours shall rise again, which is now in a state of humiliation in its sufferings and according to the law of mortality drops into the ground. But how shall it be changed, if it shall have no real existence? If, however, this is only said of those who shall be found in the flesh 6121 at the advent of God, and who shall have to be changed,\u201d 6122 what shall they do who will rise first? They will have no substance from which to undergo a change. But he says (elsewhere), \u201cWe shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord (in the air).\u201d 6123 Then, if we are to be caught up alone with them, surely we shall likewise be changed together with them.\nCompare the treatise, De Resur. Carnis, c. vi. (Oehler).\n472:6103 472:6104 473:6105 473:6106 473:6107 473:6108 473:6109 473:6110 473:6111 473:6112 473:6113\nCandid\u00e6 pharisae\u00e6: see Phil. iii. 4-6.\n473:6114 473:6115 473:6116 473:6117 473:6118 473:6119 473:6120\nPhil. iii. 21. [I have adhered to the original Greek, by a trifling verbal change, because Tertullian\u2019s argument requires it.]\n473:6121 473:6122\nDeputari, which is an old reading, should certainly be demutari, and so say the best authorities. Oehler reads the former, but contends for the latter.\n473:6123","title":"Ante-Nicene Fathers, Vol III: Tertullian: Part II: The Ep...","type":"page"}