Against Praxeas; Against Marcion; On Baptism; Apology

As touching the propriety of His names, it has already been seen¹ that both of them² are suitable to Him who was the first both to announce His Christ to mankind, and to give Him the further name³ of Jesus. The impudence, therefore, of Marcion's Christ will be evident, when he says that many will come in his name, whereas this name does not at all belong to him, since he is not the Christ and Jesus of the Creator, to whom these names do properly appertain; and more especially when he prohibits those to be received whose very equal in imposture he is, inasmuch as he (equally with them⁴) comes in a name which belongs to another—unless it was his business to warn off from a mendaciously assumed name the disciples (of One) who, by reason of His name being properly given to Him, possessed also the verity thereof. But when "they shall by and by come and say, I am Christ,"⁵ they will be received by you, who have already received one altogether like them.⁶ Christ, however, comes in His own name. What will you do, then, when He Himself comes who is the very Proprietor of these names, the Creator's Christ and Jesus? Will you reject Him? But how iniquitous, how unjust and disrespectful to the good God, that you should not receive Him who comes in His own name, when you have received another in His name! Now, let us see what are the signs which He ascribes to the times. "Wars," I observe, "and kingdom against kingdom, and nation against nation, and pestilence, and famines, and earthquakes, and fearful sights, and great signs from heaven"⁷ —all which things are suitable for a severe and terrible God. Now, when He goes on to say that "all these things must needs come to pass,"⁸ what does He represent Himself to be? The Destroyer, or the Defender of the Creator? For He affirms that these appointments of His must fully come to pass; but surely as the good God, He would have frustrated rather than advanced events so sad and terrible, if they had not been His own (decrees). "But before all these," He foretells that persecutions and sufferings were to come upon them, which indeed were "to turn for a testimony to them," and for their salvation.⁹ Hear what is predicted in Zechariah: "The Lord of hosts¹⁰ shall protect them; and they shall devour them, and subdue them with sling-stones; and they shall drink their blood like wine, and they shall fill the bowls as it were of the altar. And the Lord shall save them in that day, even His people, like sheep; because as sacred stones they roll,"¹¹ etc. And that you may not suppose that these predictions refer to such sufferings as await them from so many wars with strangers,¹² consider the nature (of the sufferings). In a prophecy of wars which were to be waged with legitimate arms, no one would think of enumerating stones as weapons, which are better known in popular crowds and unarmed tumults. Nobody measures the copious streams of blood which flow in war by bowlfuls, nor limits it to what is shed upon a single altar. No one gives the name of sheep to those who fall in battle with arms in hand, and while repelling force with force, but only to those who are slain, yielding themselves up in their own place of duty and with patience, rather than fighting in self-defence. In short, as he says, "they roll as sacred stones," and not like soldiers fight. Stones are they, even foundation stones, upon which we are ourselves edified—"built," as St. Paul says, "upon the foundation of the apostles,"¹³ who, like "consecrated stones," were rolled up and down exposed to the attack of all men. And therefore in this passage He forbids men "to meditate before what they answer" when brought before tribunals,¹⁴ even as once He suggested to Balaam the message which he had not thought of,¹⁵ nay, contrary to what he had thought; and promised "a mouth" to Moses, when he pleaded in excuse the slowness of his speech,¹⁶ and that wisdom which, by Isaiah, He showed to be irresistible: "One shall say, I am the Lord's, and shall call himself by the name of Jacob, and another shall subscribe himself by the name of Israel."¹⁷ Now, what plea is wiser and more irresistible than the simple and open¹⁸ confession made in a martyr's cause, who "prevails with God"—which is what "Israel" means?¹⁹ Now, one cannot wonder that He forbade "premeditation," who actually Himself received from the Father the ability of uttering words in season: "The Lord hath given to me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season (to him that is weary);"²⁰ except that Marcion introduces to us a Christ who is not subject to the Father. That persecutions from one's nearest friends are predicted, and calumny out of hatred to His name,²¹ I need not again refer to. But "by patience,"²² says He, "ye shall yourselves be saved."²³ Of this very patience the Psalm says, "The patient endurance of the just shall not perish for ever;"²⁴ because it is said in another Psalm, "Precious (in the sight of the Lord) is the death of the just"—arising, no doubt, out of their patient endurance, so that Zechariah declares: "A crown shall be to them that endure."²⁵ But that you may not boldly contend that it was as announcers of another god that the apostles were persecuted by the Jews, remember that even the prophets suffered the same treatment of the Jews, and that they were not the heralds of any other god than the Creator. Then, having shown what was to be the period of the destruction, even "when Jerusalem should begin to be compassed with armies,"²⁶ He described the signs of the end of all things: "portents in the sun, and the moon, and the stars, and upon the earth distress of nations in perplexity—like the sea roaring—by reason of their expectation of the evils which are coming on the earth."²⁷

That "the very powers also of heaven have to be shaken,"²⁸ you may find in Joel: "And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth—blood and fire, and pillars of smoke; the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible day of the Lord come."²⁹ In Habakkuk also you have this statement: "With rivers shall the earth be cleaved; the nations shall see thee, and be in pangs. Thou shalt disperse the waters with thy step; the deep uttered its voice; the height of its fear was raised;³⁰ the sun and the moon stood still in their course; into light shall thy coruscations go; and thy shield shall be (like) the glittering of the lightning's flash; in thine anger thou shalt grind the earth, and shalt thresh the nations in thy wrath."³¹ There is thus an agreement, I apprehend, between the sayings of the Lord and of the prophets touching the shaking of the earth, and the elements, and the nations thereof. But what does the Lord say afterwards? "And then shall they see the Son of man coming from the heavens with very great power. And when these things shall come to pass, ye shall look up, and raise your heads; for your redemption hath come near," that is, at the time of the kingdom, of which the parable itself treats.³² "So likewise ye, when ye shall see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is nigh at hand."³³ This will be the great day of the Lord, and of the glorious coming of the Son of man from heaven, of which Daniel wrote: "Behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven,"³⁴ etc. "And there was given unto Him the kingly power,"³⁵ which (in the parable) "He went away into a far country to receive for Himself," leaving money to His servants wherewithal to trade and get increase³⁶ —even (that universal kingdom of) all nations, which in the Psalm the Father had promised to give to Him: Ask of me, and I will give Thee the heathen for Thine inheritance."³⁷ "And all that glory shall serve Him; His dominion shall be an everlasting one, which shall not be taken from Him, and His kingdom that which shall not be destroyed,"³⁸ because in it "men shall not die, neither shall they marry, but be like the angels."³⁹ It is about the same advent of the Son of man and the benefits thereof that we read in Habakkuk: "Thou wentest forth for the salvation of Thy people, even to save Thine anointed ones,"⁴⁰ —in other words, those who shall look up and lift their heads, being redeemed in the time of His kingdom. Since, therefore, these descriptions of the promises, on the one hand, agree together, as do also those of the great catastrophes, on the other—both in the predictions of the prophets and the declarations of the Lord, it will be impossible for you to interpose any distinction between them, as if the catastrophes could be referred to the Creator, as the terrible God, being such as the good god (of Marcion) ought not to permit, much less expect—whilst the promises should be ascribed to the good god, being such as the Creator, in His ignorance of the said god, could not have predicted. If, however, He did predict these promises as His own, since they differ in no respect from the promises of Christ, He will be a match in the freeness of His gifts with the good god himself; and evidently no more will have been promised by your Christ than by my Son of man. (If you examine) the whole passage of this Gospel Scripture, from the inquiry of the disciples⁴¹ down to the parable of the fig-tree⁴² you will find the sense in its connection suit in every point the Son of man, so that it consistently ascribes to Him both the sorrows and the joys, and the catastrophes and the promises; nor can you separate them from Him in either respect. For as much, then, as there is but one Son of man whose advent is placed between the two issues of catastrophe and promise, it must needs follow that to that one Son of man belong both the judgments upon the nations, and the prayers of the saints. He who thus comes in midway so as to be common to both issues, will terminate one of them by inflicting judgment on the nations at His coming; and will at the same time commence the other by fulfilling the prayers of His saints: so that if (on the one hand) you grant that the coming of the Son of man is (the advent) of my Christ, then, when you ascribe to Him the infliction of the judgments which precede His appearance, you are compelled also to assign to Him the blessings which issue from the same. If (on the other hand) you will have it that it is the coming of your Christ, then, when you ascribe to him the blessings which are to be the result of his advent, you are obliged to impute to him likewise the infliction of the evils which precede his appearance. For the evils which precede, and the blessings which immediately follow, the coming of the Son of man, are both alike indissolubly connected with that event. Consider, therefore, which of the two Christs you choose to place in the person of the Son of man, to whom you may refer the execution of the two dispensations. You make either the Creator a most beneficent God, or else your own god terrible in his nature! Reflect, in short, on the picture presented in the parable: "Behold the fig-tree, and all the trees; when they produce their fruit, men know that summer is at hand. So likewise ye, when ye see these things come to pass, know ye that the kingdom of God is very near."⁴³ Now, if the fructification of the common trees⁴⁴ be an antecedent sign of the approach of summer, so in like manner do the great conflicts of the world indicate the arrival of that kingdom which they precede. But every sign is His, to whom belong the thing of which it is the sign; and to everything is appointed its sign by Him to whom the thing belongs. If, therefore, these tribulations are the signs of the kingdom, just as the maturity of the trees is of the summer, it follows that the kingdom is the Creator's to whom are ascribed the tribulations which are the signs of the kingdom. Since the beneficent Deity had premised that these things must needs come to pass, although so terrible and dreadful, as they had been predicted by the law and the prophets, therefore He did not destroy the law and the prophets, when He affirmed that what had been foretold therein must be certainly fulfilled. He further declares, "that heaven and earth shall not pass away till all things be fulfilled."⁴⁵ What things, pray, are these? Are they the things which the Creator made? Then the elements will tractably endure the accomplishment of their Maker's dispensation. If, however, they emanate from your excellent god, I much doubt whether⁴⁶ the heaven and earth will peaceably allow the completion of things which their Creator's enemy has determined! If the Creator quietly submits to this, then He is no "jealous God." But let heaven and earth pass away, since their Lord has so determined; only let His word remain for evermore! And so Isaiah predicted that it should.⁴⁷ Let the disciples also be warned, "lest their hearts be overcharged with surfeiting and drunkenness, and cares of this world; and so that day come upon them unawares, like a snare"⁴⁸ —if indeed they should forget God amidst the abundance and occupation of the world. Like this will be found the admonition of Moses,—so that He who delivers from "the snare" of that day is none other than He who so long before addressed to men the same admonition.⁴⁹ Some places there were in Jerusalem where to teach; other places outside Jerusalem whither to retire⁵⁰ —"in the day-time He was teaching in the temple;" just as He had foretold by Hosea: "In my house did they find me, and there did I speak with them."⁵¹ "But at night He went out to the Mount of Olives." For thus had Zechariah pointed out: "And His feet shall stand in that day on the Mount of Olives."⁵² Fit hours for an audience there also were. "Early in the morning"⁵³ must they resort to Him, who (having said by Isaiah, "The Lord giveth me the tongue of the learned") added, "He hath appointed me the morning, and hath also given me an ear to hear."⁵⁴ Now if this is to destroy the prophets,⁵⁵ what will it be to fulfil them?

In like manner does He also know the very time it behoved Him to suffer, since the law prefigures His passion. Accordingly, of all the festal days of the Jews He chose the passover.⁵⁶ In this Moses had declared that there was a sacred mystery:⁵⁷ "It is the Lord's passover."⁵⁸ How earnestly, therefore, does He manifest the bent of His soul: "With desire I have desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer."⁵⁹ What a destroyer of the law was this, who actually longed to keep its passover! Could it be that He was so fond of Jewish lamb?⁶⁰ But was it not because He had to be "led like a lamb to the slaughter; and because, as a sheep before her shearers is dumb, so was He not to open His mouth,"⁶¹ that He so profoundly wished to accomplish the symbol of His own redeeming blood? He might also have been betrayed by any stranger, did I not find that even here too He fulfilled a Psalm: "He who did eat bread with me hath lifted up⁶² his heel against me."⁶³ And without a price might He have been betrayed. For what need of a traitor was there in the case of one who offered Himself to the people openly, and might quite as easily have been captured by force as taken by treachery? This might no doubt have been well enough for another Christ, but would not have been suitable in One who was accomplishing prophecies. For it was written, "The righteous one did they sell for silver."⁶⁴ The very amount and the destination⁶⁵ of the money, which on Judas' remorse was recalled from its first purpose of a fee,⁶⁶ and appropriated to the purchase of a potter's field, as narrated in the Gospel of Matthew, were clearly foretold by Jeremiah:⁶⁷ "And they took the thirty pieces of silver, the price of Him who was valued⁶⁸ and gave them for the potter's field." When He so earnestly expressed His desire to eat the passover, He considered it His own feast; for it would have been unworthy of God to desire to partake of what was not His own. Then, having taken the bread and given it to His disciples, He made it His own body, by saying, "This is my body,"⁶⁹ that is, the figure of my body. A figure, however, there could not have been, unless there were first a veritable body.⁷⁰ An empty thing, or phantom, is incapable of a figure. If, however, (as Marcion might say,) He pretended the bread was His body, because He lacked the truth of bodily substance, it follows that He must have given bread for us. It would contribute very well to the support of Marcion's theory of a phantom body,⁷¹ that bread should have been crucified! But why call His body bread, and not rather (some other edible thing, say) a melon,⁷² which Marcion must have had in lieu of a heart! He did not understand how ancient was this figure of the body of Christ, who said Himself by Jeremiah: "I was like a lamb or an ox that is brought to the slaughter, and I knew not that⁷³ they devised a device against me, saying, Let us cast the tree upon His bread,"⁷⁴ which means, of course, the cross upon His body. And thus, casting light, as He always did, upon the ancient prophecies,⁷⁵ He declared plainly enough what He meant by the bread, when He called the bread His own body. He likewise, when mentioning the cup and making the new testament to be sealed "in His blood,"⁷⁶ affirms the reality of His body. For no blood can belong to a body which is not a body of flesh. If any sort of body were presented to our view, which is not one of flesh, not being fleshly, it would not possess blood. Thus, from the evidence of the flesh, we get a proof of the body, and a proof of the flesh from the evidence of the blood. In order, however, that you may discover how anciently wine is used as a figure for blood, turn to Isaiah, who asks, "Who is this that cometh from Edom, from Bosor with garments dyed in red, so glorious in His apparel, in the greatness of his might? Why are thy garments red, and thy raiment as his who cometh from the treading of the full winepress?"⁷⁷ The prophetic Spirit contemplates the Lord as if He were already on His way to His passion, clad in His fleshly nature; and as He was to suffer therein, He represents the bleeding condition of His flesh under the metaphor of garments dyed in red, as if reddened in the treading and crushing process of the wine-press, from which the labourers descend reddened with the wine-juice, like men stained in blood. Much more clearly still does the book of Genesis foretell this, when (in the blessing of Judah, out of whose tribe Christ was to come according to the flesh) it even then delineated Christ in the person of that patriarch,⁷⁸ saying, "He washed His garments in wine, and His clothes in the blood of grapes"⁷⁹ —in His garments and clothes the prophecy pointed out his flesh, and His blood in the wine. Thus did He now consecrate His blood in wine, who then (by the patriarch) used the figure of wine to describe His blood.

"Woe," says He, "to that man by whom the Son of man is betrayed!"⁸⁰ Now it is certain that in this woe must be understood the imprecation and threat of an angry and incensed Master, unless Judas was to escape with impunity after so vast a sin. If he were meant to escape with impunity, the "woe" was an idle word; if not, he was of course to be punished by Him against whom he had committed the sin of treachery. Now, if He knowingly permitted the man, whom He⁸¹ deliberately elected to be one of His companions, to plunge into so great a crime, you must no longer use an argument against the Creator in Adam's case, which may now recoil on your own God:⁸² either that he was ignorant, and had no foresight to hinder the future sinner;⁸³ or that he was unable to hinder him, even if he was ignorant;⁸⁴ or else that he was unwilling, even if he had the foreknowledge and the ability; and so deserved the stigma of maliciousness, in having permitted the man of his own choice to perish in his sin. I advise you therefore (willingly) to acknowledge the Creator in that god of yours, rather than against your will to be assimilating your excellent god to Him. For in the case of Peter,⁸⁵ too, he gives you proof that he is a jealous God, when he destined the apostle, after his presumptuous protestations of zeal, to a flat denial of him, rather than prevent his fall.⁸⁶ The Christ of the prophets was destined, moreover, to be betrayed with a kiss,⁸⁷ for He was the Son indeed of Him who was "honoured with the lips" by the people.⁸⁸ When led before the council, He is asked whether He is the Christ.⁸⁹ Of what Christ could the Jews have inquired⁹⁰ but their own? Why, therefore, did He not, even at that moment, declare to them the rival (Christ)? You reply, In order that He might be able to suffer. In other words, that this most excellent god might plunge men into crime, whom he was still keeping in ignorance. But even if he had told them, he would yet have to suffer. For he said, "If I tell you, ye will not believe."⁹¹ And refusing to believe, they would have continued to insist on his death. And would he not even more probably still have had to suffer, if had announced himself as sent by the rival god, and as being, therefore, the enemy of the Creator? It was not, then, in order that He might suffer, that He at that critical moment refrained from proclaiming⁹² Himself the other Christ, but because they wanted to extort a confession from His mouth, which they did not mean to believe even if He had given it to them, whereas it was their bounden duty to have acknowledged Him in consequence of His works, which were fulfilling their Scriptures. It was thus plainly His course to keep Himself at that moment unrevealed,⁹³ because a spontaneous recognition was due to Him. But yet for all this, He with a solemn gesture⁹⁴ says, "Hereafter shall the Son of man sit on the right hand of the power of God."⁹⁵ For it was on the authority of the prophecy of Daniel that He intimated to them that He was "the Son of man,"⁹⁶ and of David's Psalm, that He would "sit at the right hand of God."⁹⁷ Accordingly, after He had said this, and so suggested a comparison of the Scripture, a ray of light did seem to show them whom He would have them understand Him to be; for they say: "Art thou then the Son of God?"⁹⁸ Of what God, but of Him whom alone they knew? Of what God but of Him whom they remembered in the Psalm as having said to His Son, "Sit Thou on my right hand?" Then He answered, "Ye say that I am;"⁹⁹ as if He meant: It is ye who say this—not I. But at the same time He allowed Himself to be all that they had said, in this their second question.¹⁰⁰ By what means, however, are you going to prove to us that they pronounced the sentence "Ergo tu filius Dei es" interrogatively, and not affirmatively?¹⁰¹ Just as, (on the one hand,) because He had shown them in an indirect manner,¹⁰² by passages of Scripture, that they ought to regard Him as the Son of God, they therefore meant their own words, "Thou art then the Son of God," to be taken in a like (indirect) sense,¹⁰³ as much as to say, "You do not wish to say this of yourself plainly,"¹⁰⁴ so, (on the other hand,) He likewise answered them, "Ye say that I am," in a sense equally free from doubt, even affirmatively;¹⁰⁵ and so completely was His statement to this effect, that they insisted on accepting that sense which His statement indicated.¹⁰⁶

For when He was brought before Pilate, they proceeded to urge Him with the serious charge¹⁰⁷, of declaring Himself to be Christ the King;¹⁰⁸ that is, undoubtedly, as the Son of God, who was to sit at God's right hand. They would, however, have burdened Him¹⁰⁹ with some other title, if they had been uncertain whether He had called Himself the Son of God—if He had not pronounced the words, "Ye say that I am," so as (to admit) that He was that which they said He was. Likewise, when Pirate asked Him, "Art thou Christ (the King)?" He answered, as He had before (to the Jewish council)¹¹⁰ "Thou sayest that I am"¹¹¹ in order that He might not seem to have been driven by a fear of his power to give him a fuller answer. "And so the Lord hath stood on His trial."¹¹² And he placed His people on their trial. The Lord Himself comes to a trial with "the elders and rulers of the people," as Isaiah predicted.¹¹³ And then He fulfilled all that had been written of His passion. At that time "the heathen raged, and the people imagined vain things; the kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers gathered themselves together against the Lord and against His Christ."¹¹⁴ The heathen were Pilate and the Romans; the people were the tribes of Israel; the kings were represented in Herod, and the rulers in the chief priests. When, indeed, He was sent to Herod gratuitously¹¹⁵ by Pilate,¹¹⁶ the words of Hosea were accomplished, for he had prophesied of Christ: "And they shall carry Him bound as a present to the king."¹¹⁷ Herod was "exceeding glad" when he saw Jesus, but he heard not a word from Him.¹¹⁸ For, "as a lamb before the shearer is dumb, so He opened not His mouth,"¹¹⁹ because "the Lord had given to Him a disciplined tongue, that he might know how and when it behoved Him to speak"¹²⁰ —even that "tongue which clove to His jaws," as the Psalm¹²¹ said it should, through His not speaking. Then Barabbas, the most abandoned criminal, is released, as if he were the innocent man; while the most righteous Christ is delivered to be put to death, as if he were the murderer.¹²² Moreover two malefactors are crucified around Him, in order that He might be reckoned amongst the transgressors.¹²³ Although His raiment was, without doubt, parted among the soldiers, and partly distributed by lot, yet Marcion has erased it all (from his Gospel),¹²⁴ for he had his eye upon the Psalm: "They parted my garments amongst them, and cast lots upon my vesture."¹²⁵ You may as well take away the cross itself! But even then the Psalm is not silent concerning it: "They pierced my hands and my feet."¹²⁶ Indeed, the details of the whole event are therein read: "Dogs compassed me about; the assembly of the wicked enclosed me around. All that looked upon me laughed me to scorn; they did shoot out their lips and shake their heads, (saying,) He hoped in God, let Him deliver Him."¹²⁷ Of what use now is (your tampering with) the testimony of His garments? If you take it as a booty for your false Christ, still all the Psalm (compensates) the vesture of Christ.¹²⁸ But, behold, the very elements are shaken. For their Lord was suffering. If, however, it was their enemy to whom all this injury was done, the heaven would have gleamed with light, the sun would have been even more radiant, and the day would have prolonged its course¹²⁹ —gladly gazing at Marcion's Christ suspended on his gibbet! These proofs¹³⁰ would still have been suitable for me, even if they had not been the subject of prophecy. Isaiah says: "I will clothe the heavens with blackness."¹³¹ This will be the day, concerning which Amos also writes: And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord, that the sun shall go down at noon and the earth shall be dark in the clear day."¹³² (At noon)¹³³ the veil of the temple was rent"¹³⁴ by the escape of the cherubim,¹³⁵ which "left the daughter of Sion as a cottage in a vineyard, as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers."¹³⁶ With what constancy has He also, in Psalm xxx., laboured to present to us the very Christ! He calls with a loud voice to the Father, "Into Thine hands I commend my spirit,"¹³⁷ that even when dying He might expend His last breath in fulfilling the prophets. Having said this, He gave up the ghost."¹³⁸ Who? Did the spirit¹³⁹ give itself up; or the flesh the spirit? But the spirit could not have breathed itself out. That which breathes is one thing, that which is breathed is another. If the spirit is breathed it must needs be breathed by another. If, however, there had been nothing there but spirit, it would be said to have departed rather than expired.¹⁴⁰ What, however, breathes out spirit but the flesh, which both breathes the spirit whilst it has it, and breathes it out when it loses it? Indeed, if it was not flesh (upon the cross), but a phantom¹⁴¹ of flesh (and¹⁴² a phantom is but spirit, and¹⁴³ so the spirit breathed its own self out, and departed as it did so), no doubt the phantom departed, when the spirit which was the phantom departed: and so the phantom and the spirit disappeared together, and were nowhere to be seen.¹⁴⁴ Nothing therefore remained upon the cross, nothing hung there, after "the giving up of the ghost;"¹⁴⁵ there was nothing to beg of Pilate, nothing to take down from the cross, nothing to wrap in the linen, nothing to lay in the new sepulchre.¹⁴⁶ Still it was not nothing¹⁴⁷ that was there. What was there, then? If a phantom Christ was yet there. If Christ had departed, He had taken away the phantom also. The only shift left to the impudence of the heretics, is to admit that what remained there was the phantom of a phantom! But what if Joseph knew that it was a body which he treated with so much piety?¹⁴⁸ That same Joseph "who had not consented" with the Jews in their crime?¹⁴⁹ The "happy man who walked not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stood in the way of sinners, nor sat in the seat of the scornful."¹⁵⁰

It was very meet that the man who buried the Lord should thus be noticed in prophecy, and thenceforth be "blessed;"¹⁵¹ since prophecy does not omit the (pious) office of the women who resorted before day-break to the sepulchre with the spices which they had prepared.¹⁵² For of this incident it is said by Hosea: "To seek my face they will watch till day-light, saying unto me, Come, and let us return to the Lord: for He hath taken away, and He will heal us; He hath smitten, and He will bind us up; after two days will He revive us: in the third day He will raise us up."¹⁵³ For who can refuse to believe that these words often revolved¹⁵⁴ in the thought of those women between the sorrow of that desertion with which at present they seemed to themselves to have been smitten by the Lord, and the hope of the resurrection itself, by which they rightly supposed that all would be restored to them? But when "they found not the body (of the Lord Jesus),"¹⁵⁵ "His sepulture was removed from the midst of them,"¹⁵⁶ according to the prophecy of Isaiah. "Two angels however, appeared there."¹⁵⁷ For just so many honorary companions¹⁵⁸ were required by the word of God, which usually prescribes "two witnesses."¹⁵⁹ Moreover, the women, returning from the sepulchre, and from this vision of the angels, were foreseen by Isaiah, when he says, "Come, ye women, who return from the vision;"¹⁶⁰ that is, "come," to report the resurrection of the Lord. It was well, however, that the unbelief of the disciples was so persistent, in order that to the last we might consistently maintain that Jesus revealed Himself to the disciples as none other than the Christ of the prophets. For as two of them were taking a walk, and when the Lord had joined their company, without its appearing that it was He, and whilst He dissembled His knowledge of what had just taken place,¹⁶¹ they say: "But we trusted that it had been He which should have redeemed Israel,"¹⁶² —meaning their own, that is, the Creator's Christ. So far had He been from declaring Himself to them as another Christ! They could not, however, deem Him to be the Christ of the Creator; nor, if He was so deemed by them, could He have tolerated this opinion concerning Himself, unless He were really He whom He was supposed to be. Otherwise He would actually be the author of error, and the prevaricator of truth, contrary to the character of the good God. But at no time even after His resurrection did He reveal Himself to them as any other than what, on their own showing, they had always thought Him to be. He pointedly¹⁶³ reproached them: "O fools, and slow of heart in not believing that which He spake unto you."¹⁶⁴ By saying this, He proves that He does not belong to the rival god, but to the same God. For the same thing was said by the angels to the women: "Remember how He spake unto you when He was yet in Galilee, saying, The Son of man must be delivered up, and be crucified, and on the third day rise again."¹⁶⁵ "Must be delivered up;" and why, except that it was so written by God the Creator? He therefore upbraided them, because they were offended solely at His passion, and because they doubted of the truth of the resurrection which had been reported to them by the women, whereby (they showed that) they had not believed Him to have been the very same as they had thought Him to be. Wishing, therefore, to be believed by them in this wise, He declared Himself to be just what they had deemed Him to be—the Creator's Christ, the Redeemer of Israel. But as touching the reality of His body, what can be plainer? When they were doubting whether He were not a phantom—nay, were supposing that He was one—He says to them, "Why are ye troubled, and why do thoughts arise in your hearts? See¹⁶⁶ my hands and my feet, that it is I myself; for a spirit hath not bones, as ye see me have."¹⁶⁷ Now Marcion was unwilling to expunge from his Gospel some statements which even made against him—I suspect, on purpose, to have it in his power from the passages which he did not suppress, when he could have done so, either to deny that he had expunged anything, or else to justify his suppressions, if he made any. But he spares only such passages as he can subvert quite as well by explaining them away as by expunging them from the text. Thus, in the passage before us, he would have the words, "A spirit hath not bones, as ye see me have," so transposed, as to mean, "A spirit, such as ye see me to be, hath not bones;" that is to say, it is not the nature of a spirit to have bones. But what need of so tortuous a construction, when He might have simply said, "A spirit hath not bones, even as you observe that I have not?" Why, moreover, does He offer His hands and His feet for their examination—limbs which consist of bones—if He had no bones? Why, too, does He add, "Know that it is I myself,"¹⁶⁸ when they had before known Him to be corporeal? Else, if He were altogether a phantom, why did He upbraid them for supposing Him to be a phantom? But whilst they still believed not, He asked them for some meat,¹⁶⁹ for the express purpose of showing them that He had teeth.¹⁷⁰

And now, as I would venture to believe,¹⁷¹ we have accomplished our undertaking. We have set forth Jesus Christ as none other than the Christ of the Creator. Our proofs we have drawn from His doctrines, maxims,¹⁷² affections, feelings, miracles, sufferings, and even resurrection—as foretold by the prophets.¹⁷³ Even to the last He taught us (the same truth of His mission), when He sent forth His apostles to preach His gospel "among all nations;"¹⁷⁴ for He thus fulfilled the psalm: "Their sound is gone out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world."¹⁷⁵ Marcion, I pity you; your labour has been in vain. For the Jesus Christ who appears in your Gospel is mine.