Tertullian · a new plain-English translation from the original language
[1] When he lists the variety of preaching — that some, emboldened by trust in his chains, proclaimed the word more boldly, others out of envy and rivalry, some indeed out of a wish to be well thought of, most out of love, a few out of jealousy, and by now some even preached Christ out of sheer spite — this would certainly have been the place to criticize the preaching itself for its diversity of opinion, if such diversity had produced so great a variety even of doctrines. But in laying out this diversity he proposes only differences of temperament, not of the rule of the sacraments, and confirms that one Christ and one God of his was preached whatever the motive behind the preaching; and so he says, It makes no difference to me whether Christ is announced out of rivalry or out of truth, because one and the same Christ was being announced, whether out of rivalry or out of a genuine faith. [2] For he applied the mention of 'truth' to the sincerity of the preaching, not to the rule itself — since the rule was indeed one, but the faith of some of the preachers was true, that is, straightforward, and of others overly learned. Since this is so, it is clear that the Christ preached was the one who had always been announced. For if a wholly different Christ had been introduced, far from the apostle's own, the innovation involved would surely have produced real diversity. Nor, indeed, would there have been lacking people to interpret the gospel preaching as pointing nonetheless to the Christ of the Creator, since even today our view holds the larger share everywhere over the heretical one. On this point too the apostle would not have kept silent about denouncing and rebuking such diversity. So, since the diversity is not even singled out for criticism, the novelty is not established either. [3] Now, on the subject of Christ's substance, here too the Marcionites think the apostle backs them up — that there was a phantom of flesh in Christ — when he says that, though he was constituted in the form of God, he did not think it robbery to be equal with God, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant — not the reality of one — and being made in the likeness of men — not in a man — and found in the shape of a man — not in substance, that is, not in flesh. [4] As if 'shape' and 'likeness' and 'form' did not also apply to substance! It is worth noting, though, that elsewhere he likewise styles Christ the image of the unseen God. Surely, then, here too, where he sets him in the 'form' of God, will Christ not truly be God, if likewise he was not truly man when constituted in the 'shape' of man? On both counts the reality would have to be excluded, if 'form' and 'likeness' and 'shape' are to be claimed for a phantom. But if in the 'form' and 'image' by which he is the Son of the Father he is prejudged to be truly God, then equally in the 'form' and 'image' by which he is the Son of man he must be found truly man. [5] Indeed he set down 'found' deliberately, as denoting a most certain man. For what is found is agreed to exist. Just so, God too was found, through his power, as man was found through his flesh — since Paul would not have pronounced him subject to death had he not been constituted in a mortal substance. And it is more telling still that he adds, even the death of the cross. He would not have magnified the atrocity by extolling the greatness of this submission, had he known it to be an illusion produced by a phantom — a submission that merely tricked death rather than truly underwent it, that performed no real act in the suffering but only a piece of playacting. [6] As for the things he had once counted gain — which he also lists above: the glory of the flesh, the mark of circumcision, his lineage as a Hebrew of Hebrews, his status of the tribe of Benjamin, the shining rank of a Pharisee — these he now counts as loss; not loss of God, but the folly of the Jews. He reckons them as so much dung by comparison with the knowledge of Christ, not by way of rejecting the Creator-God, holding a righteousness that is no longer his own, the one that comes from the law, but the one that comes through him — that is, through Christ, from God. So, you say, by this very distinction the law was not of Christ's God. Rather subtle of you. Well then, take something subtler still. When he says, not the righteousness that is of the law, but the one that is through him, he would not have said through him of anyone other than the one whose law it was. [7] Our citizenship, he says, is in the heavens. I recognize here the ancient promise of the Creator made to Abraham: And I will make your seed as the stars of heaven. That is also why star differs from star in glory. But if Christ, coming from the heavens, will transfigure the body of our humiliation to be conformed to the body of his glory, then this body of ours will indeed rise again — this body which is humbled in its sufferings, and cast down into the earth under that very law of death. For how will it be transfigured, if it will not exist at all? Or if this is said only of those who, at God's coming, are found still alive in the flesh and are to be changed, what then will happen to those who rise first? Will they have nothing left to be transfigured from? And yet he says, Together with them we shall be snatched up amid the clouds to greet the Lord. If we are caught up together with them, then we are transfigured together with them too.
21. ON THE EPISTLE TO PHILEMON.