Celsus in the next place alleges, that "certain Christians, having misunderstood the words of Plato, loudly boast of a 'super-celestial' God (τὸν ὑπερουράνιον θεόν) thus ascending beyond the heaven of the Jews."
I reconstructed the passage as follows:
καὶ οἷος ὁ ὑπερουράνιος, τοιοῦτοι καὶ οἱ ἐπουράνιοι, καὶ καθὼς ἐφορέσαμεν τὴν εἰκόνα τοῦ τοῦ ἐπουρανίου, φορέσωμεν καὶ τὴν εἰκόνα τοῦ ὑπερουρανίου.
and as is the super-heavenly one, so also are those who are of heaven, and just as we have borne the image of the heavenly one, so shall we bear the image of the super-heavenly one.
I found the citation in question in De Resurrectione, indeed in the very same passage I made reference to in my last post. Let's take a look at the order the material appears in that text.
We begin with Tertullian's citation of 1 Corinthians 15:48, pretty much the same as our standard text:
Therefore, As is the choic one, such are they also that are choic: as is the heavenly one, such are they also that are heavenly. (Qualis ergo choicus tales et choici, et qualis caelestis tales et caelestes)
Then we read, in what immediately follows our last citation Tertullian, the reference to the concept of the 'super-celestial' which prompted my investigation in the first place. But now I see embedded in the discussion a new version of 1 Corinthians 15:40 - 41 embedded in the material:
Such in substance? Or such at first in discipline and afterwards in the dignity which has been the aim of the discipline? Yet even in substance choic men and heavenly can by no means be dissevered when once the apostle has described them as men. For even if Christ alone is truly heavenly, nay rather even more than heavenly (immo et supercaelestis), and yet is man, as being flesh and soul, and as far as this condition of the substances goes is in no degree distinguished from the choic quality, it follows that those who after his fashion are heavenly must be understood to have been declared heavenly not on the ground of their present substance but on the ground of their future splendour: because at the previous point from which that distinction derived it was shown that it is by difference of dignity that there is one glory of the super-celestial and another of the super-earthly, and one glory of the sun, another of the moon, and another of the stars, seeing that star also differs from star in glory (de dignitatis differentia ostensa est alia supercaelestium gloria, alia superterrenorum,et alia solis, alia lunae, alia stellarum, quia et stella a stella differt in Gloria) [1 Cor. 15. 40-1] yet not in substance.
And then this is followed by my exact proposed 'Marcionite' reading for 1 Corinthians 15:49:
Consequently, having premised that there is in the same substance a difference of the dignity which must now be sought after and hereafter will be attained, he adds also an exhortation for us even here to seek after Christ's attire by discipline, and there to attain to his altitude by glory: As we have worn the image of the choic man, let us also wear the image of him who is super-celestial (Sicut portavimus imaginem choici, portemus etiam imaginem supercaelestis)[1 Cor. 15. 49]
That is quite a transformation of the original text, and it seems - as I noted before to have been known to Celsus c. 177 CE.
Now - even in light of this discovery - I am left with the next question, is Tertullian's citation recording the original order in the Marcionite recension? That is:
As is the choic one, such are they also that are choic: as is the heavenly one, such are they also that are heavenly. For there is one glory of the super-celestial and another of the super-earthly, and one glory of the sun, another of the moon, and another of the stars, seeing that star also differs from star in glory. As we have worn the image of the choic man, let us also wear the image of him who is super-celestial. For this I say that flesh and blood cannot obtain by inheritance the kingdom of God.Hmmmm ...
