Separatio legis et evangelii proprium et principale opus est Marcionis, nec poterunt negare discipuli eius quod in summo instrumento habent, quo denique initiantur et indurantur in hanc haeresim. Nam hae sunt Antitheses Marcionis, id est contrariae oppositiones, quae conantur discordiam evangelii cum lege committere, ut ex diversitate sententiarum utriusque instrumenti diversitatem quoque argumententur deorum. The separation of Law and Gospel is the primary and principal exploit of Marcion. His disciples cannot deny this, which stands at the head of their document, that document by which they are inducted, into and confirmed in this heresy. For such are Marcion's Antitheses, or Contrary Oppositions, which are designed to show the conflict and disagreement of the Gospel and the Law, so that from the diversity of principles between those two documents they may argue further for a diversity of gods. Therefore, as it is precisely this separation (separatio) of Law and Gospel which has suggested a god of the Gospel, other than and in opposition to the God of the Law, it is evident that before that separation (separationem) was made, god was still unknown who has just come into notice in consequence of the argument for separation (separationis): and so he was not revealed by Christ, who came before the separation (separationem), but was invented by Marcion, who set up the separation (separationem) in opposition to that peace between Gospel and Law which previously, from the appearance of Christ until the impudence of Marcion, had been kept unimpaired and unshaken by virtue of that reasoning which refused to contemplate any other god of the Law and the Gospel than that Creator against whom after so long a time, by a man of Pontus, separation (separatio) has been let loose. [Adv Marc. 1.19.4]
Nunc et de pusillitatibus et malignitatibus ceterisque notis et ipse adversus Marcionem antitheses aemulas faciam. Si ignoravit deus meus esse alium super se, etiam tuus omnino non scivit esse alium infra se. Quod enim ait Heraclitus ille tenebrosus, eadem via sursum et deorsum. [2.28.1]
Ceterum ipsas quoque Antitheses Marcionis cominus cecidis- sem, si operosiore destructione earum egeret defensio creatoris tam boni quam et iudicis, secundum utriusque partis exempla con- gruentia deo, ut ostendimus. Quodsi utraque pars bonitatis atque iustitiae dignam plenitudinem divinitatis efficiunt omnia potentis, compendio interim possum antitheses retudisse, gestientes ex qualitatibus ingeniorum sive legum sive virtutum discernere, atque ita alienare Christum a creatore, ut optimum a iudice, et mitem a fero, et salutarem ab exitioso. Magis enim eos coniungunt quos in eis diversitatibus ponunt quae deo congruunt. Aufer titulum Marcionis et intentionem atque propositum operis ipsius, et nihil aliud praestaret1 quam demonstrationem eiusdem dei optimi et iudicis, quia haec duo in solum deum competunt. Nam et ipsum studium in eis exemplis opponendi Christum creatori ad unitatem magis spectat. Adeo enim ipsa et una erat substantia divinitatis, bona et severa, et eisdem exemplis et in similibus argumentis, ut bonitatem suam voluerit ostendere in quibus prae- miserat severitatem; quia nec mirum erat diversitas temporalis, si postea dens mitior pro rebus edomitis, qui retro austerior pro indomitis. Ita per antitheses facilius ostendi potest ordo creatoris a Christo refonnatus quam repercussus, et redditus potius quam exclusus, praesertim deum tuum ab omni motu amariore secernas, utique et ab aemulatione creatoris scilicet. Nam si ita est, quomodo eum antitheses singulas species creatoris aemulatum demonstrant? Agnoscam igitur et in hoc per illas deum meum zeloten, qui res suas arbustiores in primordiis bona, ut rationali, aemulatione maturitatis praecuraverit suo iure, cuius antitheses etiam ipse mundus eius agnoscet ex contrarietatibus elementorum, summa tamen ratione modulatus. Quam ob rem, inconsiderantis- sime Marcion, alium deum lucis ostendisse debueras, alium vero tenebraram, quo facilius alium bonitatis, alium severitatis persuasisses. Ceterum eius erit antithesis cuius est et in mundo. [2.29.1 - 4]
Omnem sententiam et omnem paraturam impii atque sacrilegi Marcionis ad ipsum iam evangelium eius provocamus quod inter- polando suum fecit. Et ut fidem instrueret, dotem quandam com- mentatus est illi, opus ex contrarietatum oppositionibus Antitheses cognominatum et ad separationem legis et evangelii coactum, qua duos deos dividens, proinde diversos, alterum alterius instrumenti, vel, quod magis usui est dicere, testamenti, ut exinde evangelio quoque secundum Antitheses credendo patrocinaretur. Sed et istas proprio congressu cominus, id est per singulas iniectiones Pontici, cecidissem, si non multo opportunius in ipso et cum ipso evangelio cui procurant retunderentur; quamquam tam facile est praescriptive occurrere, et quidem ut accepto eas faciam, ut rato habeam, ut nobiscum facere dicam, quo magis de caecitate auctoris sui erubescant, nostrae iam antitheses adversus Mar- cionem. [4.1.1 - 3]
Cur ergo non et antitheses ad naturalia reputasti contrarii sibi semper creatoris? Nec mundum saltim recogitare potuisti, nisi fallor, etiam apud Ponticos ex diversitatibus structum aemularum invicem substantiarum. Prius itaque debueras alium deum luminis, alium tenebrarum determinasse, ut ita posses alium legis, alium evangelii asseverasse. Ceterum praeiudicatum est ex mani- festis, cuius opera et ingenia per antitheses constant, eadem forma constare etiam sacramenta. Habes nunc ad Antitheses expeditam a nobis responsionem. Transeo nunc ad evangelii, sane non Iudaici sed Pontici, interim adulterati demonstrationem, praestructuram ordinem quem aggredimur. Constituimus inprimis evangelicum instrumentum apostolos auctores habere, quibus hoc munus evangelii promul- gandi ab ipso domino sit impositum. Si et apostolicos, non tamen solos, sed cum apostolis et post apostolos,1 quoniam praedicatio discipulorum suspecta fieri posset de gloriae studio, si non adsistat illi auctoritas magistrorum, immo Christi, quae magistros aposto- los fecit. [4.1.10, 4.2.1]
Quid nunc, si negaverint Marcionitae primam apud nos fidem eius, adversus epistulam quoque ipsius? Quid si nec epistulam agnoverint? Certe Antitheses non modo fatentur Marcionis, sed et praeferunt. Ex his mihi probatio sufficit. Si enim id evangelium quod Lucae refertur penes nos (viderimus an et penes Marcionem) ipsum est quod Marcion per Antitheses suas arguit ut interpolatum a protectoribus Iudaismi ad concor- porationem legis et prophetarum, qua etiam Christum inde con- fingerent, utique non potuisset arguere nisi quod invenerat. Nemo post futura reprehendit quae ignorat futura. Emendatio culpam non antecedit. Emendator sane evangelii a Tiberianis usque ad Antoniniana tempora eversi Marcion solus et primus obvenit, expectatus tamdiu a Christo, paenitente iam quod apostolos prae- misisse properasset sine praesidio Marcionis. [4.4.3 - 5]
Sed alium iam hinc inimus gradum, ipsum, ut professi sumus, evangelium Marcionis provocantes, sic quoque probaturi adul- teratum. Certe enim totum quod elaboravit etiam Antitheses praestruendo in hoc cogit, ut veteris et novi testamenti diversita- tem constituat,1 proinde Christum suum a creatore separatum, ut dei alterius, ut alienum legis et prophetarum. Certe propterea contraria quaeque sententiae suae erasit, conspirantia cum crea- tore, quasi ab assertoribus eius intexta: competentia autem sen- tentiae suae reservavit. Haec conveniemus, haec amplectemur, si nobiscum magis fuerint, si Marcionis praesumptionem percusse- rint. Tunc et illa constabit codem vitio haereticae caecitatis erasa quo et haec reservata. [4.6.1 - 2]
Praestruximus quidem adversus Antitheses nihil proficere pro- posito Marcionis quam putat diversitatem legis et evangelii, ut et hanc a creatore dispositam, denique praedicatam in repromis- sione novae legis et novi sermonis et novi testamenti. Sed quoniam attentius argumentatur apud illum suum nescio quem suntalaipwron, id est commiseronem, et summisou&menon, id est coodibilem, in leprosi purgationem, non pigebit ei occurrere et inprimis figuratae legis vim ostendere, quae in exemplo leprosi non contingendi, immo ab omni commercio submovendi, communicationem pro- hibebat hominis delictis commaculati, cum qualibus et apostolus cibum quoque vetat sumere; participari enim stigmata delicto- rum, quasi ex contagione, si qui se cum peccatore miscuerit. [4.9.3]
Sed ecce Christus diligit parvulos, tales esse docens debere qui semper maiores velint esse. Creator autem ursos pueris im- misit, ulciscens Helisaeum propheten convicia ab eis passum. Satis impudens antithesis, cum tam diversa committit, parvulos et pueros, innocentem adhuc aetatem, et iudicii iam capacem, quae conviciari poterat, ne dicam blasphemare. [4.23.4 - 5]
Adlegit et alios septuaginta apostolos super duodecim. Quo enim duodecim secundum totidem fontes in Elim, si non et septua- ginta secundum totidem arbusta palmarum? Antitheses plurimum causarum diversitas fecit, non potestatum. Sed qui diversitatem causarum non respexit, facile eam potestatum existimavit. Pro- fectionem filiorum Israelis creator etiam illis spoliis aureorum et argenteorum vasculorum et vestium praeter oneribus consparsio- num ofFarcinatam educit ex Aegypto, Christus autem nec virgam discipulis in viam ferre praescripsit. [4.24.1]
Sic et dominus, in quam introissent domum, pacem ei dicere. Exemplo eodem est. Mandavit enim et hoc Helisaeus, cum introisset ad Sunamitin, diceret ei, Pax viro tuo, pax filio tuo. Haec erunt potius nostrae antitheses, quae comparant, non quae separant Christum. Dignus est autem operarius mercede sua, quis magis pronuntiarit quam deus iudex? quia et hoc ipsum iudicare est, dignum facere mercede operarium. Nulla retributio non ex iudicatione constitit. Iam nunc et hic lex consignatur creatoris, etiam boves operantes dignos operarios mercede iudicantis. Bovi, inquit, terenti os non colligabis. [4.24.4]
Quodsi in praecepto est dei regnum, propone igitur contra, secundum nostras antitheses, Moysen, et una sententia est. Praeceptum, inquit, excelsum non est, nec longe a te. Non est in caelo, ut dicas, Quis ascendet in caelum et deponet nobis illud, et auditum illud facieraus? nec ultra mare est, ut dicas, Quis transfretabit et sumet illud nobis, et auditum illud faciemus? Prope te est verbum, in ore tuo, et in corde tuo, et in manibus tuis facere illud. Hoc erit, Non hic, nec illic; ecce enim intra vos est regnum dei.[4.35.13]
Qui hoc se et cognovit et cognosci ab omnibus voluit, fidem hominis etsi melius oculatam, etsi veri luminis compotem, exteriore quoque visione donavit, ut et nos regulam simulque mercedem fidei disceremus. Qui vult videre Iesum, David filium credat per virginis censum. Qui non ita credet, non audiet ab illo, Fides tua te salvum fecit, atque ita caecus remanebit, ruens in antithesim, ruentem et ipsam anti- thesim. Sic enim caecus caecum deducere solet. Nam si aliquando Davidem in recuperatione Sionis offenderant caeci resistentes quominus admitteretur (in figuram populi proinde caeci, non admissuri quandoque Christum filium David), ideo Christus ex diverso caeco subvenit, ut hinc se ostenderet non esse filium David, ut3 ex animi diversitate bonus caecis, quos ille iusserat caedi. Et cur fidei et quidem4 pravae praestitisse se dixit? Atquin et hoc filius David, antithesim de suo retundam. [4.36.12 - 13]
What is so striking about this list is not only that the information about the 'antitheses' is concentrated in Book Four but also the end of Book Two which - is usually attributed to Theophilus of Antioch. The details about the 'antitheses' appear at the very end of the work, almost as if they were tacked on as a means of clarifying the original point of the treatise.
Indeed the entire treatise here is twenty nine chapters long. It is only in chapter twenty eight that the concept of 'Marcion's antitheses' are suddenly introduced and when it is done it assumes that the reader has a priori knowledge of the work. The nature of the reference makes it appear to come from the hand of final editor of the volume. I don't know if the reader is aware of it but Irenaeus's Against Heresies - also developed into five volumes - betrays the hand of a 'final editor' who appears at the beginning and end of most of the individual books (and sometimes within the main argument) who reminds the reader of things said previously or in other volumes of Irenaeus's writings. The 'final editor' may well be Irenaeus himself but Against Marcion betrays a very similar 'feel' to it.
The final editor of this volume appears at the very beginning to alert the reader that at least four other versions of this text existed at one time or another - some under a different name and associated with 'apostates' from the Church. It is curious then that at the very end of Theophilus's volume in specific a final editor should appear to strengthen the original arguments of the author. Briggman has already put his stamp on what he identifies as 'over a century of scholarship' which identifies Irenaeus as modifying a pre-existent Theophilian corpus. I think this is yet another example of the basic structure behind Against Marcion and the key to making sense of the actual development of the corpus.
I think it is Irenaeus's hand which appears suddenly at the end of Book Two to introduce a concept not actually mentioned in the work as a whole until that point. At the beginning of chapter 25 Tertullian makes his first reference to the "pusillitates et infirmitates et incongruentias" of the Creator.
I shall proceed to interpret and cleanse the rest of what you take to be instances of pettiness and weakness and inconsequence. God calls out, Adam, where art thou?
The same terms appear at the beginning of chapter 27 immediately following an allusion to a very Jewish notion of Moses being greater than his god among the Marcionites that:
Now at length—that I may dispose of the rest of these questions in one single answer—for all those details which you (Marcion) class together as petty and weak and unworthy (pusilla et infirma et indigna), with intent to drag the Creator down, I shall set before you a straightforward and definite reason: it is that God would not have been able to enter into converse with men except by taking to himself those human thoughts and feelings by which he might reduce the force of his majesty, which human mediocrity was utterly unable to bear, by virtue of a humility, unworthy indeed of himself but necessary for man, and consequently worthy even of God, since nothing is so worthy of God as the salvation of man. Of this I might have discoursed at greater length if I had been treating with heathens— although even with heretics the method of attack is not very different. But seeing that you yourselves have already stated your belief that a god has dwelt in human shape and in all the rest of what belongs to man's estate, you will assuredly not demand any further persuasion that God has in fact made himself conformable to human condition, but are confuted by virtue of your own creed.
Before we go any further it is worth noting that the arguments of the Marcionites here are exactly like that of the heretic Marinus in De Recta in Deum Fide. The Marcionites acknowledged that God was shaped like man only possessing glorious flesh. The 'pettiness, weakness, unworthiness' identified by the Marcionites was the flesh that the Creator gave to Adam. They may even have criticized his creation or his ability to create. But the 'heresy' of the Marcionites cannot be demonstrated to go beyond the substance of Adam.
I think it is critical to take careful note of Theophilus's original discussion because it makes clear that the actual beliefs of the Marcionites were reported very differently before Irenaeus. Theophilus wrote:
Therefore all the (attributes and activities) you make requisition of as worthy of God are to be found in the Father, inaccessible to sight and contact, peaceable also, and, so to speak, a god philosophers can approve of: but all the things you repudiate as unworthy, are to be accounted to the Son, who was both seen and heard, and held converse, the Father's agent and minister, who commingles in himself man and God, in the miracles God, in the pettinesses man (in pusillitatibus hominem), so as to add as much to man as he detracts from God. In fact the whole of that which in my God is dishonourable in your sight, is a sign and token of man's salvation. God entered into converse with man, so that man might be taught how to act like God. God treated on equal terms with man, so that man might be able to treat on equal terms with God. God was found to be small, so that man might become very great (Deus pusillus inventus est, ut homo maximus fieret). As you despise a God of that sort I wonder if you do honestly believe that God was crucified. How great then is your unreasonableness in the face of both one and the other of the Creator's courses of action. You mark him down as a judge, yet the sternness which is natural to a judge in accordance with the demands of the cases before him you stigmatize as cruelty. You demand a God supremely good, yet that gentleness which is the natural outcome of his kindness, which has conversed at a lower level in such proportion as human insignificance could comprehend, you devalue as pettiness (pusillitatem depretiatis). He meets with your approval neither as great nor as small, neither as judge nor as friend. But what if these same characteristics are found to be in your god too? I have already, in the book assigned to him, proved that he is a judge, and as a judge necessarily stern, and as stern also cruel— if cruelty is the proper word.
In other words what often goes unnoticed is that Theophilus had a very different understanding of the Marcionite heresy - or perhaps we should say a very clearly defined understanding of the Marcionite redefining of the Jewish godhead.
As we have just seen the Marcionites understood only the Father to be perfect. The Son was the God (Elohim or theos in LXX) who created man in the Garden of Eden. He is clearly distinguished from Yawheh or kurios who is understood to be the judge. However he was saddled nevertheless with the accusation of having manufactured man imperfectly owing to his substance. It is critical therefore to understand that before Irenaeus the exactness of the Marcionite position was far better defined. It was Irenaeus who confused everything - perhaps deliberately so.
It is no wonder then that we see the specific term 'antitheses' introduced for the first time in the original Theophilian treatise in chapter 28. We can attribute this to Irenaeus who is trying to strengthen the original text. Apparently Theophilus's original description of the Marcionites made the sect's opinions seem too reasonable so we see added to the text:
Now in the matter of pettinesses and malignities, and the rest of those bad marks, I can myself put together a few rival antitheses in opposition to Marcion. If my God was unaware that there was another god above him, yours likewise did not know that there was another beneath him: as it was put by Heraclitus the obscure, It is the same road upwards as downwards. In fact, if he had not been ignorant of him, he would have opposed him from the start.
Indeed Theophilus's original text up until this point of being a fair and almost friendly discussion of the Marcionite sect. It is only at this point - at the very end of the treatise - that not only are the 'tables turned' on the Marcionites, but that a great deal of vitriol is heaped against the heretic.
The entire argument suddenly shifts from Marcion's devaluation of the Son (something that sounds vaguely Arian in nature) to an all out assault on the Marcionites for worshiping a god completely out of touch with Judaism. In chapter 29 - after the final editor accuses the Marcionite god of 'neglecting humanity' and 'murder' but arguments which specifically develop from a previously unmentioned treatise called the Antitheses. We read in the final chapter:
Now if my plea that the Creator combines goodness with judgement had called for a more elaborate demolition of Marcion's Antitheses, I should have gone on to overthrow them one by one, on the principle that the instances cited of both aspects are, as I have already proved, jointly in keeping with God. Both aspects, the goodness and the judgement, combine to produce a complete and worthy conception of a divinity to which nothing is impossible: and so I am for the time being content to have rebutted in summary fashion those antitheses which, by criticism of the moral value of the Creator's works, his laws, and his miracles, indicate anxiety to establish a division, making Christ a stranger to the Creator—as it were the supremely good a stranger to the judge, the kind to the cruel, the bringer of salvation a stranger to the author of destruction. Instead of dividing, those antitheses do rather combine into unity the two whom they place in such oppositions as, when combined together, give a complete conception of God. Take away Marcion's title, take away the intention and purpose of his work, and this book will provide neither more nor less than a description of one and the same God, in his supreme goodness and in his judgement— for these two conceptions are conjoined in God and in him alone. In fact Marcion's very anxiety, by means of the instances cited, to set Christ in opposition to the Creator, does rather envisage their unity. For the one and only real and objective divinity showed itself, in these very instances and these very deductions from them, to be both kind and stern: for his purpose was to give evidence of his kindness, particularly in those against whom he had previously shown severity. The change which time brought about is nothing to be wondered at: God subsequently became more gentle, in proportion as things had become subdued, having been at first more strict when they were unsubdued. So Marcion's antitheses make it easier to explain how the Creator's mode of action was by Christ rather refashioned than repudiated, re- stored rather than rejected: especially so when you make your good god exempt from every bitterness of feeling, and, in that case, from hostility to the Creator. If that is the case how can the antitheses prove he has been in opposition to one or another aspect of the Creator's character? To sum up: I shall by means of these antitheses recognize in Christ my own jealous God. He did in the beginning by his own right, by a hostility which was rational and therefore good, provide beforehand for the maturity and fuller ripeness of the things which were his. His antitheses are in conformity with his own world: for it is composed and regulated by elements contrary to each other, yet in perfect proportion. Therefore, most thoughtless Marcion, you ought rather to have shown that there is one god of light and another of darkness: after that you would have found it easier to persuade us that there is one god of kindness and another of severity. In any case, the antithesis, or opposition, will belong to that God in whose world it is to be found.
We should not believe even for a minute that Theophilus wrote any of these words. This was a later section - indeed all references to the Antitheses - can be viewed as deriving from Irenaeus's hand.
If we look at the original reference to the Antitheses in Book One Chapter 19 it is said that Marcionite sought to separate the Gospel and the Law by means of these 'antitheses.' Here it is said that he sought to divide the Creator from Christ. In Irenaeus's own work both statements are repeatedly made - in the latter case we read it described as 'separating Jesus from Christ.' The implication clearly now when all is put together is that Jesus was understood by the Marcionites and their original heretical opponents to have been Elohim or theos in the LXX, the merciful and kind god according to Philo who created man in the beginning.
It is Irenaeus who obscured this understanding from us - i.e. the understanding that the Marcionites were an outgrowth of Philo's Alexandrian Judaism. Jesus must have come to earth with Christ. My suspicion is that the nomen sacrum IC is a direct transcription of the Hebrew ish. The antitheses in 1 Corinthians chapter 15 are meant to reinforce the very same 'separation' of Jesus and Christ, the Creator and Christ, the Law and the Gospel that we have in our sources. The difficulty has always been (a) all later writers (Tertullian, Epiphanius) depend on Irenaean source material and (b) deliberately obscured the original reports of writers like Theophilus to make it more difficult for us to see that.
dating back to conversations with his grandfather, Gaston Frank. "He said we represent one of the last descendants of the Frankist Jewish faith in the world," he muses. "I grew up thinking that our family was something like the Last of the Mohicans."