The Methods of Marcion's Argument Incorrect and Absurd. The Proper Course of the Argument

The occasion of reproducing this little work, the fortunes of which we noticed in the preface of our first book, has furnished us with the opportunity of distinguishing, in our treatment of the subject of two Gods in opposition to Marcion, each of them with a description and section of his own, according to the division of the subject-matter, defining one of the gods to have no existence at all, and maintaining of the Other that He is rightly²⁶⁹³ God; thus far keeping pace with the heretic of Pontus, who has been pleased to admit one unto, and exclude the other.²⁶⁹⁴ For he could not build up his mendacious scheme without pulling down the system of truth. He found it necessary to demolish²⁶⁹⁵ some other thing, in order to build up the theory which he wished. This process, however, is like constructing a house without preparing suitable materials.²⁶⁹⁶ The discussion ought to have been directed to this point alone, that he is no god who supersedes the Creator. Then, when the false god had been excluded by certain rules which prescriptively settle what is the character of the One only perfect Divinity, there could have remained no longer any question as to the true God. The proof of His existence would have been clear, and that, too, amid the failure of all evidence in support of any other god; and still clearer²⁶⁹⁷ would have seemed the point as to the honour in which He ought without controversy to be held: that He ought to be worshipped rather than judged; served reverentially rather than handled critically, or even dreaded for His severity. For what was more fully needed by man than a careful estimate of²⁶⁹⁸ the true God, on whom, so to speak, he had alighted,²⁶⁹⁹ because there was no other god?

Chapter II.—The True Doctrine of God the Creator. The Heretics Pretended to a Knowledge of the Divine Being, Opposed to and Subversive of Revelation. God's Nature and Ways Past Human Discovery. Adam's Heresy.

We have now, then, cleared our way to the contemplation of the Almighty God, the Lord and Maker of the universe. His greatness, as I think, is shown in this, that from the beginning He made Himself known: He never hid Himself, but always shone out brightly, even before the time of Romulus, to say nothing of that of Tiberius; with the exception indeed that the heretics, and they alone, know Him not, although they take such pains about Him. They on this account suppose that another god must be assumed to exist, because they are more able to censure than deny Him whose existence is so evident, deriving all their thoughts about God from the deductions of sense; just as if some blind man, or a man of imperfect vision,²⁷⁰⁰ chose to assume some other sun of milder and healthier ray, because he sees not that which is the object of sight.²⁷⁰¹ There is, O man, but one sun which rules²⁷⁰² this world and even when you think otherwise of him, he is best and useful; and although to you he may seem too fierce and baneful, or else, it may be, too sordid and corrupt, he yet is true to the laws of his own existence. Unable as you are to see through those laws, you would be equally impotent to bear the rays of any other sun, were there one, however great and good. Now, you whose sight is defective²⁷⁰³ in respect of the inferior god, what is your view of the sublimer One? Really you are too lenient²⁷⁰⁴ to your weakness; and set not yourself to the proof²⁷⁰⁵ of things, holding God to be certainly, undoubtedly, and therefore sufficiently known, the very moment you have discovered Him to exist, though you know Him not except on the side where He has willed His proofs to lie. But you do not even deny God intelligently,²⁷⁰⁶ you treat of Him ignorantly;²⁷⁰⁷ nay, you accuse Him with a semblance of intelligence,²⁷⁰⁸ whom if you did but know Him, you would never accuse, nay, never treat of.²⁷⁰⁹ You give Him His name indeed, but you deny the essential truth of that name, that is, the greatness which is called God; not acknowledging it to be such as, were it possible for it to have been known to man in every respect,²⁷¹⁰ would not be greatness. Isaiah even so early, with the clearness of an apostle, foreseeing the thoughts of heretical hearts, asked, "Who hath known the mind of the Lord? For who hath been His counsellor? With whom took He counsel?...or who taught Him knowledge, and showed to Him the way of understanding?"²⁷¹¹ With whom the apostle agreeing exclaims, "Oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! how unsearchable are His judgments, and His ways past finding out!"²⁷¹² "His judgments unsearchable," as being those of God the Judge; and "His ways past finding out," as comprising an understanding and knowledge which no man has ever shown to Him, except it may be those critics of the Divine Being, who say, God ought not to have been this,²⁷¹³ and He ought rather to have been that; as if any one knew what is in God, except the Spirit of God.²⁷¹⁴ Moreover, having the spirit of the world, and "in the wisdom of God by wisdom knowing not God,"²⁷¹⁵ they seem to themselves to be wiser²⁷¹⁶ than God; because, as the wisdom of the world is foolishness with God, so also the wisdom of God is folly in the world's esteem. We, however, know that "the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men."²⁷¹⁷ Accordingly, God is then especially great, when He is small²⁷¹⁸ to man; then especially good, when not good in man's judgment; then especially unique, when He seems to man to be two or more. Now, if from the very first "the natural man, not receiving the things of the Spirit of God,"²⁷¹⁹ has deemed God's law to be foolishness, and has therefore neglected to observe it; and as a further consequence, by his not having faith, "even that which he seemeth to have hath been taken from him"²⁷²⁰—such as the grace of paradise and the friendship of God, by means of which he might have known all things of God, if he had continued in his obedience—what wonder is it, if he,²⁷²¹ reduced to his material nature, and banished to the toil of tilling the ground, has in his very labour, downcast and earth-gravitating as it was, handed on that earth-derived spirit of the world to his entire race, wholly natural²⁷²² and heretical as it is, and not receiving the things which belong to God? Or who will hesitate to declare the great sin of Adam to have been heresy, when he committed it by the choice²⁷²³ of his own will rather than of God's? Except that Adam never said to his fig-tree, Why hast thou made me thus? He confessed that he was led astray; and he did not conceal the seducer. He was a very rude heretic. He was disobedient; but yet he did not blaspheme his Creator, nor blame that Author of his being, Whom from the beginning of his life he had found to be so good and excellent, and Whom he had perhaps²⁷²⁴ made his own judge from the very first.

Chapter III.—God Known by His Works. His Goodness Shown in His Creative Energy; But Everlasting in Its Nature; Inherent in God, Previous to All Exhibition of It. The First Stage of This Goodness Prior to Man.

It will therefore be right for us, as we enter on the examination of the known God, when the question arises, in what condition He is known to us, to begin with His works, which are prior to man; so that His goodness, being discovered immediately along with Himself, and then constituted and prescriptively settled, may suggest to us some sense whereby we may understand how the subsequent order of things came about. The disciples of Marcion, moreover, may possibly be able, while recognising the goodness of our God, to learn how worthy it is likewise of the Divine Being, on those very grounds whereby we have proved it to be unworthy in the case of their god. Now this very point,²⁷²⁵ which is a material one in their scheme,²⁷²⁶ Marcion did not find in any other god, but eliminated it for himself out of his own god. The first goodness, then,²⁷²⁷ was that of the Creator, whereby God was unwilling to remain hidden for ever; in other words, (unwilling) that there should not be a something by which God should become known. For what, indeed, is so good as the knowledge and fruition²⁷²⁸ of God? Now, although it did not transpires that this was good, because as yet there existed nothing to which it could transpire,²⁷²⁹ yet God foreknew what good would eventually transpire, and therefore He set Himself about developing²⁷³⁰ His own perfect goodness, for the accomplishment of the good which was to transpire; not, indeed, a sudden goodness issuing in some accidental boon²⁷³¹ or in some excited impulse,²⁷³² such as must be dated simply from the moment when it began to operate. For if it did itself produce its own beginning when it began to operate, it had not, in fact, a beginning itself when it acted. When, however, an initial act had been once done by it, the scheme of temporal seasons began, for distinguishing and noting which, the stars and luminaries of heaven were arranged in their order. "Let them be," says God, "for seasons, and for days, and years."²⁷³³ Previous, then, to this temporal course, (the goodness) which created time had not time; nor before that beginning which the same goodness originated, had it a beginning. Being therefore without all order of a beginning, and all mode of time, it will be reckoned to possess an age, measureless in extent²⁷³⁴ and endless in duration;²⁷³⁵ nor will it be possible to regard it as a sudden or adventitious or impulsive emotion, because it has nothing to occasion such an estimate of itself; in other words, no sort of temporal sequence. It must therefore be accounted an eternal attribute, inbred in God,²⁷³⁶ and everlasting,²⁷³⁷ and on this account worthy of the Divine Being, putting to shame for ever²⁷³⁸ the benevolence of Marcion's god, subsequent as he is to (I will not say) all beginnings and times, but to the very malignity of the Creator, if indeed malignity could possibly have been found in goodness.