{"id":913,"date":"2021-01-01T16:15:33","date_gmt":"2021-01-02T00:15:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/readingthechurchfathers.wordpress.com\/?p=913"},"modified":"2021-01-01T16:15:33","modified_gmt":"2021-01-02T00:15:33","slug":"tertullian-the-prescription-against-heretics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-the-prescription-against-heretics\/","title":{"rendered":"Tertullian: The Prescription Against Heretics"},"content":{"rendered":"<h4>The Rule of Faith<\/h4>\n<p>Now, with regard to this rule of faith\u2014that we may from this point acknowledge what it is which we defend\u2014it is, you must know, that which prescribes the belief that there is one only God, and that He is none other than the Creator of the world, who produced all things out of nothing through His own Word, first of all sent forth; that this Word is called His Son, and, under the name of God, was seen \u201cin diverse manners\u201d by the patriarchs, heard at all times in the prophets, at last brought down by the Spirit and Power of the Father into the Virgin Mary, was made flesh in her womb, and, being born of her, went forth as Jesus Christ; thenceforth He preached the new law and the new promise of the kingdom of heaven, worked miracles; having been crucified, He rose again the third day; (then) having ascended into the heavens, He sat at the right hand of the Father; sent instead of Himself the Power of the Holy Ghost to lead such as believe; will come with glory to take the saints to the enjoyment of everlasting life and of the heavenly promises, and to condemn the wicked to everlasting fire, after the resurrection of both these classes shall have happened, together with the restoration of their flesh.<\/p>\n<h4>Apostolic Transmission<\/h4>\n<p>Since the Lord Jesus Christ sent the apostles to preach, no others ought to be received as preachers than those whom Christ appointed; for \u201cno man knoweth the Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal Him.\u201d Nor does the Son seem to have revealed Him to any other than the apostles, whom He sent forth to preach. Now, what that was which they preached\u2014in other words, what it was which Christ revealed to them\u2014can properly be proved in no other way than by those very churches which the apostles founded in person, by declaring the gospel to them directly themselves, both viv\u00e2 voce and subsequently by their epistles. All doctrine which agrees with the apostolic churches\u2014those moulds and original sources of the faith must be reckoned for truth, as undoubtedly containing that which the (said) churches received from the apostles, the apostles from Christ, Christ from God.<\/p>\n<p>run over the apostolic churches, in which the very thrones of the apostles are still preeminent in their places, in which their own authentic writings are read, uttering the voice and representing the face of each of them severally. Achaia is very near you, (in which) you find Corinth. Since you are not far from Macedonia, you have Philippi; (and there too) you have the Thessalonians. Since you are able to cross to Asia, you get Ephesus. Since, moreover, you are close upon Italy, you have Rome, from which there comes even into our own hands the very authority (of apostles themselves). How happy is its church, on which apostles poured forth all their doctrine along with their blood! where Peter endures a passion like his Lord\u2019s! where Paul wins his crown in a death like John\u2019s where the Apostle John was first plunged, unhurt, into boiling oil, and thence remitted to his island-exile! See what she has learned, what taught, what fellowship has had with even (our) churches in Africa! One Lord God does she acknowledge, the Creator of the universe, and Christ Jesus (born) of the Virgin Mary, the Son of God the Creator; and the Resurrection of the flesh; the law and the prophets she unites in one volume with the writings of evangelists and apostles, from which she drinks in her faith. This she seals with the water (of baptism), arrays with the Holy Ghost, feeds with the Eucharist, cheers with martyrdom, and against such a discipline thus (maintained) she admits no gainsayer.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Rule of Faith Now, with regard to this rule of faith\u2014that we may from this point acknowledge what it is which we defend\u2014it is, you must know, that which prescribes the belief that there is one only God, and that He is none other than the Creator of the world, who produced all things out of nothing through His own Word, first of all sent forth; that this Word [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[27],"tags":[33,122],"class_list":["post-913","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-tertullian","tag-apostolic-transmission","tag-rule-of-faith"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":784,"url":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-on-the-divinity-of-christ\/","url_meta":{"origin":913,"position":0},"title":"Tertullian: On the Divinity of Christ","author":"Nemo","date":"January 15, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"God made the world, and all which it contains, by His Word, and Reason, and Power. ... The Word, and Reason, and Power, by which God made all, have spirit as their proper and essential substratum, in which the Word has in being to give forth utterances, and reason abides\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Tertullian&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Tertullian","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/category\/tertullian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":999,"url":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-on-the-trinity\/","url_meta":{"origin":913,"position":1},"title":"Tertullian On the Trinity","author":"Nemo","date":"January 14, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"The Word is a Substantive Being For you will say, what is a word, but a voice and sound of the mouth, and air when struck against, intelligible to the ear, but for the rest a sort of void, empty, and incorporeal thing. I, on the contrary, contend that nothing\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Tertullian&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Tertullian","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/category\/tertullian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":980,"url":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-on-the-flesh-of-christ\/","url_meta":{"origin":913,"position":2},"title":"Tertullian: On the Flesh of Christ","author":"Nemo","date":"January 11, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"The Virgin Birth He who was going to consecrate a new order of birth, must Himself be born after a novel fashion, concerning which Isaiah foretold how that the Lord Himself would give the sign. What, then, is the sign? \u201cBehold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son.\u201d Accordingly,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Tertullian&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Tertullian","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/category\/tertullian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":412,"url":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-the-unity-of-the-divine-law\/","url_meta":{"origin":913,"position":3},"title":"Tertullian: The Unity Of The Divine Law","author":"Nemo","date":"May 14, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"He gave to all nations the selfsame law, which at definite and stated times He enjoined should be observed, when He willed, and through whom He willed, and as He willed. For in the beginning of the world He gave to Adam himself and Eve a law, that they were\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Tertullian&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Tertullian","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/category\/tertullian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":988,"url":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-on-the-resurrection-of-the-flesh\/","url_meta":{"origin":913,"position":4},"title":"Tertullian: On the Resurrection of the Flesh","author":"Nemo","date":"January 12, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"The Creation of Man Imagine God wholly employed and absorbed in it\u2014in His hand, His eye, His labour, His purpose, His wisdom, His providence, and above all, in His love, which was dictating the lineaments (of this creature). For, whatever was the form and expression which was then given to\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Tertullian&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Tertullian","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/category\/tertullian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1012,"url":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/tertullian-on-prayer\/","url_meta":{"origin":913,"position":5},"title":"Tertullian: On Prayer","author":"Nemo","date":"January 17, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"In the Lord's Prayer is comprised an epitome of the whole Gospel. Prayer is alone that which vanquishes God. But Christ has willed that it be operative for no evil: He had conferred on it all its virtue in the cause of good. And so it knows nothing save how\u2026","rel":"","context":"In &quot;Tertullian&quot;","block_context":{"text":"Tertullian","link":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/category\/tertullian\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/peqR9l-eJ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/913\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nemoslibrary.com\/patristics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}