Tertullian on Marriage

Life has been extraordinarily busy this summer, with events scheduled almost every single day. There's so much I could say about my the days and weeks of the past two months, but there are hardly enough time to do so. 13 hours from now I marry my gorgeous fiancee, and begin married life with her by my side. I'm beyond excited, and can't wait for that moment! Luckily, there has been some time for reflection, and as I await the excitement of the day's events, I came across this exceptional quote by Tertullian that I had to share.

Polycarp vs. the Gnostics

Polycarp was a theologian and father of the Christian church in the mid 2nd century. It is recorded that he was a disciple of the Apostle John, and was ordained as Bishop of Smyrna by John himself. He is often remembered for his steadfast faith and witness in the face of his martyrdom in AD 160, but his extant writings are also notable for his battle against gnosticism. Eusebius records the following humourous events in Polycarp's life:



Appalled at the gnostic heretics he encountered in his waning years, he shouted out, "O good God! For what times hast thou kept me, that I should endure such things!"

He recalled that one time while traveling with John, the two entered Ephesus' city baths, and upon finding early gnostic Cerinthus there, both rushed out, exclaiming, "Let us flee, lest even the bath-house fall in, for within is Cerinthus, the enemy of truth!"

On a visit to Rome, Polycarp met the heretic Marcion, who called on Polycarp to 'recognise him' - to which Polycarp replied, "I recognise you... I recognise the firstborn of Satan."
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A a privately-produced film featuring Polycarp's life and death is set to come out in the near future; for more information on that, check out Polycarp: Destroyer of Gods.

Tatian on the Logos

 

The Logos has really become one of my favourite topics, and the Fathers of the Early Church are consistently a flowing source of insight on the Trinity. In the same vein as Tertullian's words, here is another interesting discussion on the subject. In his work Address to the Greeks, Tatian, an Assyrian theologian whose harmony of the four gospels was very popular in the 2nd century church, writes the following in a chapter entitled "The Doctrine of the Christians as to the Creation of the World":

        God was in the beginning; but the beginning, we have been taught, is the power of the Logos. For the Lord of the universe, who is Himself the necessary ground (ὑπόστασις) of all being, inasmuch as no creature was yet in existence, was alone; but inasmuch as He was all power, Himself the necessary ground of things visible and invisible, with Him were all things; with Him, by Logos-power (διὰ λογικῆς δυνάμεως), the Logos Himself also, who was in Him, subsists.

        And by His simple will the Logos springs forth; and the Logos, not coming forth in vain, becomes the first-begotten work of the Father. Him (the Logos) we know to be the beginning of the world. But He came into being by participation, not by abscission; for what is cut off is separated from the original substance, but that which comes by participation, making its choice of function, does not render him deficient from whom it is taken. For just as from one torch many fires are lighted, but the light of the first torch is not lessened by the kindling of many torches, so the Logos, coming forth from the Logos-power of the Father, has not divested of the Logos-power Him who begat Him.

        I myself, for instance, talk, and you hear; yet, certainly, I who converse do not become destitute of speech (λόγος) by the transmission of speech, but by the utterance of my voice I endeavour to reduce to order the unarranged matter in your minds. And as the Logos, begotten in the beginning, begat in turn our world, having first created for Himself the necessary matter, so also I, in imitation of the Logos, being begotten again, and having become possessed of the truth, am trying to reduce to order the confused matter which is kindred with myself. For matter is not, like God, without beginning, nor, as having no beginning, is of equal power with God; it is begotten, and not produced by any other being, but brought into existence by the Framer of all things alone.

An Inquisitor's Description of the Lollards

          Sometime around the year 1400, a Roman Catholic inquisitor named Reinher described the Lollards & Wycliffites in the following manner. For words that border on outright admiration, it is strange that he still believed men of this conduct were highly deserving of censure:

          "The disciples of Wycliffe are men of a serious, modest deportment, avoiding all ostentation in dress, mixing little with the busy world, and complaining of the debauchery of mankind. They maintain themselves wholly by their own labour, and utterly despise wealth; being fully content with bare necessities. They follow no traffic, because it is attended with so much lying, swearing, and cheating. They are chaste and temperate; are never seen in taverns, or amused by the trifling gaieties of life. You find them always employed, either learning or teaching. They are concise and devout in their prayers; blaming an un-animated prolixity [the unnecessarily lengthy prayers of the Romish priesthood]. They never swear; speak little; and in their public preaching they lay the chief stress on charity. They never mind canonical hours, because they say, that a paternoster [Lord's Prayer] or two, repeated with devotion, is better than tedious hours spent without devotion. They explain the scriptures in a different way from the holy doctors and the church of Rome. They speak little, and humbly, and are well-behaved in appearance."

Text from The Lollards, by George Stokes, 1838, 7-8.

A Good Summer

“Summer will end soon enough, and childhood as well."
- George R.R. Martin, A Feast for Crows

       Summer 2014 is finishing well for me; the adventures in work, ministries, and various fun sundry activities from the past three months are all worthy to be recounted to future listening ears. Topping it off, in July I asked my beautiful girlfriend to marry me, and we are now counting down the days to our wedding (taking place July, 2015). Along with that, I started a new job teaching jr. high and high school science and Latin classes at a local Christian prep school. The doors the Lord has opened for me have been a great blessing, and I look forward to continuing the work of His Kingdom to the best of my ability.

       Meanwhile, I haven't been on my blog very much - or Facebook, or Twitter, or Youtube, for that matter. I've actually had a Bible review sitting in my drafts folder for the last month and a half, so I'll see about finishing that up soon. In the meantime, here is a quote to mull over from Tertullian, one of my favourite early church fathers:

"Christians are made, not born."
 
       Are we being fine craftsmen, fashioning and sharpening other Christians? Or are we just consumers, ingesting the nice parts of Christianity and ignoring its calls for a change of heart and of action?

The Christian Community in the 2nd Century

          Every once in a while, you read something that simply makes you excited about your Christian faith - whether it's a great sermon, an insightful blog post, or - as in this case - an ancient document. The Epistle to Diognetus is an apologetic treatise written by an anonymous author who was apparently well versed in elegant Greek. Likely penned between 120 and 200 AD, it was not well circulated, as neither Eusebius nor any other early church Father mentions it. The writer addresses himself in chapter 11, stating, "Although I am an instructor of the Gentiles now, I was a pupil of the Apostles once; and what was delivered to me then, I now minister faithfully to students of the truth." (Realistically however, anyone who believed the creed and adhered to the traditional early Christian lifestyle could call oneself a 'pupil of the Apostles'.) The fact that the author refers to Jesus Christ as "the Word" [Logos] reveals that he may have been a Johannine Christian. The epistle's contents hint that the author may have been Justin Martyr.

          The letter opens with a greeting to "my lord Diognetus", likely a nobleman, who is stated to have professed a "deep interest... in Christianity." (While unlikely to be the same man, the private tutor/teacher to Marcus Aurelius was named Diognetus.) The short chapters that follow involve the author detailing the superstitious follies of Paganism, the rigid scrupulousness of Judaism, the characteristics of a true Christian community, the reasons behind the persecution of Believers, the supernatural nature of the Christian revelation and mysterious incarnation, and a list of practical conclusions and a call for an inward reception of Christ the Word [Logos].

          It was chapter 5's detailing of the characteristics of a Christian community that caught my eye. I would hope that these words, written centuries ago to a unbeliever very much interested in the beliefs of Christianity, would echo true of today's community of Believers:

          "The difference between Christians and the rest of mankind is not a matter of nationality, or language, or customs. Christians do not live apart in separate cities of their own, speak any special dialect, nor practise any eccentric way of life. The doctrine they profess is not the invention of busy human minds and brains, nor are they, like some, adherents to this or that school of human thought. They pass their lives in whatever township - Greek or foreign - each man's lot has determined; and conform to ordinary local usage in their clothing, diet, and other habits."
 
          "Nevertheless the organisation of their community does exhibit some features that are remarkable, and even surprising. For instance, thought they are residents at home in their own countries, their behaviour is more like that of transients; they take their full part as citizens, but they also submit to anything and everything as if they were aliens. For them, any foreign country is a motherland, and any motherland is a foreign country. Like other men, they marry and beget children, though they do not expose their infants. Any Christian is free to share his neighbour's table, but never his marriage bed."
 
          "Though destiny has placed them here in the flesh, they do not live after the flesh; their days are passed on the earth, but their citizenship is above in the heavens. They obey the prescribed laws, but in their own private lives they transcend the laws. They show love to all men - and all men persecute them. They are misunderstood, and condemned, yet by suffering and death they are quickened to life. They are poor, yet making many rich; lacking all things, yet having all things in abundance. They are dishonoured, yet made glorious in their very dishonour; slandered yet vindicated. They repay calumny with blessings, and abuse with courtesy. For the good they do, they suffer stripes as evildoers; and under the strokes they rejoice like men given new life. Jews assail them as heretics, and Greeks harass them with persecutions; and yet of all their ill-wishers there is not one who can produce good grounds for his hostility."

This text is from the 1987 Penguin Classics edition of Early Christian Writings: The Apostolic Fathers, translated by Maxwell Staniforth, edited by Andrew Louth.

Tertullian on the Logos

"In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God... And the Logos became flesh and dwelt among us, and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth." - John 1:1, 14 [NKJV]

Most English Bibles today translate the Greek term Logos as 'word', though it can also mean 'reason', 'thought', 'mind', 'message', and 'wisdom'. God imparted His Logos to the fallen physical world in the form of the Messiah, Jesus Christ of Nazareth, and through His sacrifice laid upon Him the sins of the world, saving all those who believe and call upon His name. [Isaiah 53:6, Acts 16:31]

Crafting a clear and solid description of the Logos, however, can be a daunting task, but the writings of the Apostolic Fathers can provide excellent answers for such questions.

I recently finished Paul Pavao's excellent book, In the Beginning was the Logos: The Council of Nicea for Everyman, which earns my accolades as one of the clearest and most accessible books ever written about the history and theology of the early church. Chapter 17 deals wholly with the discussion of the Trinity and the Logos, not just at the Council of Nicea, but also in written works throughout the first several centuries of Christianity. Pages 316-318 highlight some of the fantastic words of Tertullian (c. 160 - c. 225 AD), whose work Against Praxeas describes the Logos in relation to God:

          "Observe, then, that when you are silently conversing with yourself, this very process is carried on within you by your reason, which meets you with a word at every movement of your thought... Whatever you think, there is a word... You must speak it in your mind."[5] 

          "I would not hesitate... to call a tree the son or offspring of the root, and the river of the spring, and the ray of the sun. Every original source is a parent, and everything which issues from the origin is an offspring. Much more is the Word of God, who has actually received as his own peculiar designation the name of Son."

          "But still the tree is not severed from the root, nor the river from the spring, nor the ray from the sun. Nor, indeed, is the Word [Logos] separated from God."

          "Following, therefore, the form of these analogies, I confess that I call God and his Word, the Father and his Son, two. For the root and the tree are distinctly two things, but correlatively joined. The spring and the river are also two forms, but indivisible. So likewise the sun and the ray are two forms, but coherent ones." [8]

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Pavao summarizes Tertullian's view on his page devoted to the Early Christian Definition of the Trinity as the following: "In other words, there was a time when the Logos of God was inside of God. God was alone, but he had fellowship with his own Logos inside of him. When it was time to create the world, it was then that God birthed the Word as the second person of the Trinity."

It is worth noting that Tertullian was the first theologian to use the word "Trinity" (in Latin, Trinitas), though a similar term had been used earlier by Theophilus of Antioch, being the Greek word Triados.

Luther: "Contribute to the Honour of God"

           My opinions on Martin Luther oscillate between appalled and inspired, usually ending up around neutral. Catholics and secularists love to focus on all his terrible denunciations of the Roman Catholic Church, Jews, and other groups not in agreement with him (including some Protestant sects); Protestants on the other hand love to focus on his successful split from Rome, contributions to Biblical literacy, and his popular theological doctrines. I would never choose to completely 'endorse' Luther, but some quotes of his are very much share-able, including this one from his "First Sunday After Epiphany" sermon - certainly a Lollard precept:

"He who cannot - by the gracious and lovely message of God's mercy so lavishly bestowed upon us in Christ - be persuaded, in a spirit of love and delight, to contribute to the honour of God and the benefit of his neighbour, is worthless to Christianity, and all effort is lost on him."


Those words of Luther hearken back to the words pious assertion of Clement of Rome, who wrote in his epistle of 1 Clement 44:

"Who, then, is noble-minded among you? Who compassionate? Who full of love? Let him declare, 'If on my account sedition, disagreements, and schism have arisen, I will depart. I will go away wherever you desire, and I will do what the many command. Only let the flock of God live on terms of peace with the elders set over it'."