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| Apelles and His Followers, Displeased with Our Earthly Bodies, Attributed to Christ a Body of a Purer Sort. How Christ Was Heavenly Even in His Earthly Flesh.
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Chapter
VIII.—Apelles and His Followers, Displeased with Our Earthly
Bodies, Attributed to Christ a Body of a Purer Sort. How Christ Was
Heavenly Even in His Earthly Flesh.
These passages alone, in which Apelles and Marcion
seem to place their chief reliance when interpreted according to the
truth of the entire uncorrupted gospel, ought to have been sufficient
for proving the human flesh of Christ by a defence of His birth. But
since Apelles’ precious set7056
lay a very
great stress on the shameful condition7057
of
the flesh, which they will have to have been furnished with souls
tampered with by the fiery author of evil,7058
| 7058 Ab igneo illo
præside mali: see Tertullian’s de Anima. xxiii.;
de Resur. Carn. v.; Adv. Omnes Hæres. vi. |
and so unworthy of Christ; and because they on that account suppose
that a sidereal substance is suitable for Him, I am bound to refute
them on their own ground. They mention a certain angel of great renown
as having created this world of ours, and as having, after the
creation, repented of his work. This indeed we have treated of in a
passage by itself; for we have written a little work in opposition to
them, on the question whether one who had the spirit, and will,
and power of Christ for such operations, could have done anything which
required repentance, since they describe the said angel by the
figure of “the lost sheep.” The world, then, must be a
wrong thing,7059
according to the
evidence of its Creator’s repentance; for all repentance is the
admission of fault, nor has it indeed any existence except through
fault. Now, if the world7060
| 7060 Mundus is here
the universe or entire creation. | is a fault, as is
the body, such must be its parts—faulty too; so in like manner
must be the heaven and its celestial (contents), and everything which
is conceived and produced out of it. And “a corrupt tree must
needs bring forth evil fruit.”7061
The flesh of
Christ, therefore, if composed of celestial elements, consists of
faulty materials, sinful by reason of its sinful origin;7062
so that it must be a part of that substance
which they disdain to clothe Christ with, because of its
sinfulness,—in other words, our own. Then, as there is no
difference in the point of ignominy, let them either devise for Christ
some substance of a purer stamp, since they are displeased with our
own, or else let them recognise this too, than which even a heavenly
substance could not have been better. We read in so many
words:7063
“The first
man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from
heaven.”7064
This passage,
however, has nothing to do with any difference of substance; it only
contrasts with the once7065
“earthy” substance of the flesh of the first man, Adam, the
“heavenly” substance of the spirit of the second man,
Christ. And so entirely does the passage refer the celestial man to the
spirit and not to the flesh, that those whom it compares to Him
evidently become celestial—by the Spirit, of course—even in
this “earthy flesh.” Now, since Christ is heavenly even in
regard to the flesh, they could not be compared to Him, who are not
heavenly in reference to their flesh.7066
If, then, they who become heavenly, as Christ also was, carry about an
“earthy” substance of flesh, the conclusion which is
affirmed by this fact is, that Christ Himself also was heavenly, but in
an “earthy” flesh, even as they are who are put on a level
with Him.7067
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