Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-fscjk Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-24T19:00:53.345Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Eschatology of Tertullian

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Jaroslav Pelikan
Jaroslav Pelikan
Affiliation:
Concordia Theological Seminary
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

One of the most important results of the New Testament study that has gone on during the past generation is its realization that the theology of the New Testament is unintelligible outside the context of its eschatological message. The precise meaning of that message is still the subject of much investigation and controversy, but its importance has become a matter of general agreement among New Testament students. Much less general is the realization of the implications of this insight for other areas of theological concern. Rudolf Bultmann's recent essay on mythology and the New Testament has served to raise again the question of the relevance of New Testament eschatology for systematic theology. That question has far-reaching implications for the study of the history of theology as well, implications with which historical theology has not yet come to terms. The relation between primitive Christian eschatology and the development of ancient Christian theology is a problem deserving of more study than the standard interpretations of the history of dogma have given it, for it can help iiluminate the origins of such dogmas as the Trinity and ancient Christology. Among the historians of dogma, only Martin Werner has taken up the problem in great detail, and his discussion of it has not yet issued in any new historico-theological synthesis.

Type
Research Article
Information
Church History , Volume 21 , Issue 2 , June 1952 , pp. 108 - 122
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Church History 1952

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 See Albert Schweitzer's interesting account of how he came to this realization, Out of My Life and Thought, tr. by C. T. Campion (New York, 1949), pp. 32–59Google Scholar; a summary of the total development appears in Wilder, Amos N., Eschatology and Ethics in the Teaching of Jesus (New York, 1939), pp. 28–41Google Scholar; for the development in the last decade and a half, cf. Bartsch, Hans-Werner, Handback der evangelisch-theologischen Arbelt 1938 bis 1948 (Stuttgart, 1949), pp. 44–78Google Scholar. Bultmann, Rudolf, “Neucs Testament und Mythologie,” reprinted with several replies in Kerygma und Mythos (Hamburg, 1948)Google Scholar. Werner, Martin, Die Entstehung des christlichen Dogmas (Bern, 1941).Google Scholar

2 Harnack, Adolf, Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte, I (3rd ed.; Freiburg, 1894), 532–60Google Scholar; Warfield, B. B., “Tertullian and the Beginnings of the Doctrine of the Trinity,” Studies in Tertullian and Augustine (New York, 1930) pp. 3–109Google Scholar. On Tertullian's terminology, cf. Evans, E., “Tertullian's Theological Terminology,” The Church Quarterly Review, CXXXIX (1944), 56–77Google Scholar. On Tertullian's esehatology, see Harnack, op. cit., pp. 568–72, and his Grundriss der Dogmengeschichte (4th ed.; Tubingen, 1905), pp. 121–22Google Scholar. The presentation of Morgan, James, The Importance of Tertullian in the Development of Christian Dogma (London, 1928), pp. 144–47Google Scholar, is brief and not particularly illuminating. Reinhold Seeberg's material on the eschatology of Tertullian, , Lehrbuch der Dogmengeschichte, I (3rd ed.; Leipzig, 1920), 466–73Google Scholar, is largely based on the most detailed discussion of the question I have been able to find, namely, the analysis by the Roman Catholic theologian Atzberger, Leonhard, Geschichte der christlichen Eschatologie innerhalb der vornicänischen Zeit (Freiburg i. Br., 1896), pp. 291 ff.Google Scholar

3 Ad nationes, Bk. II, ch. 8, Quinti Septimii Fiorentis Tertulliani quae supersunt omnia, ed. by Francis Oehler (3 vols.; Leipzig, 1853), I, 365Google Scholar. Hereafter I shall refer to Tertullian's writings by book and chapter (where both are necessary), following this reference by a reference in parentheses to Oehler's edition.

4 De testimonia animae, ch. 2 (I, 403). On the providentia Dei, see, for example, Adversus Marcionem, Bk. II, ch. 5 (II, 89–90); Ibid., Bk. II, ch. 15 (II, 102); De ieiunio, ch. 4 (I, 856).

5 “… cuius erat etiam finis temporum, sicut initium,” Adversus Marcionem, Bk. V, ch. 4 (II, 283). For his use of aevum, cf. De pallio, ch. 2 (I, 923) on the aevi historiae; Scorpiace, ch. 6 (I, 510); De pudicitia, ch. 13 (I, 819); and especially Apologeticus, ch. 48 (I, 294). The relation of aevum to saeculum and of saeculum to mundus is not always clear; cf. Ad uxorem, Bk. I, eh. 7 (I, 679); De cultu feminarum, Bk. T, eh. 1 (I, 702); and De idololatria, ch. 9 (I, 79). On the relation of the Christian and classical views of time, see Cullmann, Oscar, Christ and Time, tr. by Filson, Floyd V. (Philadelphia, 1950)Google Scholar; Herman Hansheer has provided some valuable insights into “St. Augustine's conception of time,” Philosophical Review, XLVI (1937), 503–12Google Scholar. Tertulhan's own evaluation of the classical view of time appears in such passages as Ad nationes, Bk. II, ch. 12 (I, 380), where he discusses the myths of Chronos and Saturn; also Ibid., ch. 3 (I, 354); De pallio, ch. 2 (I, 919); Apologeticus, ch. 11 (I, 157–58). See also the cryptic statement, De oratione, ch. 22 (I, 576).

6 He gives most explicit voice to his philosophy of history in such passages as Ad nationes, Bk. II, ch. 17 (I, 396); De monogamia, ch. 5 (I, 767); and De pudicitia, ch. 9 (I, 812) on Israel. The phrase corpus temporum occurs Apologeticus, ch. 26 (I, 225), and vas temporum, Adversus Marcionem, Bk. V, ch. 6 (II, 290). On time being in collecto (I Cor. 7:29), see De monogamia, ch. 3 (I, 765); Ibid., ch. 14 (I, 784); De pudicitia, ch. 16 (I, 628); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. V, ch. 7 (II, 294); and the references in note 24 below. He was convinced that “nos sumus, in quos decurrerunt fines saeculorum,” De cultu feminarum, Bk. II, ch. 9 (I, 728).

7 “…sic omnia ad voluntatem dei referre,” De exhortatione castitatis, ch. 2 (I, 739). The devil as interpolator naturae, De cultu feminarum, Bk. I, ch. 8 (I, 710), and the division of the world between God and the devil, De spectaculis, ch. 24 (I, 56). Other references to the problem of evil include Ad martyras, ch. 5 (I, 14); De patientia, ch. 14 (I, 612); and the prediefion that “erit mali finis,” Adversus Hermogenem, ch. 11. (II, 349).

8 On pagan parallcls, see the discussion in Apologeticus, ch. 22 ff. (I, 206 ff.). On the prospect of judging the evil angels (I Cor. 6:3), De pudicitia, ch. 14 (I, 821); Ad uxorem, Bk. II, cli. 6 (I, 692); De paenitentia, ch. 7 (I, 657); De cultu feminarum, Bk. I, ch. 2 (I, 704–705); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. II, ch. 9 (II, 95); De fuga, ch. 10 (I, 479). On the union between angels and women and similar matters, De virginibus velandis, ch. 7 (I, 893); De corona, ch. 14 (I, 454); De idololatria, ch. 9 (I, 77–78) Apologeticus, ch. 35 (I, 247–48); and De cultu feminarum, Bk. I, ch. 2 (I, 703 ff). On the Book of Enoch, De idololatria, ch. 4 (I, 70–71); De cultu feminarum, Bk. I, cli. 4 (I, 705–706); and the comments of Zahn, Theodor, Geschichte des Neutestamentlichen Kanons, I (Erlangen, 1888), pp. 120–22.Google Scholar

9 Adversus Marcionem. Bk. V, ch. 17 (II, 324) and De fuga, ch. 12 (I, 484). There are similar statements, De corona, ch. 7 (I, 434); De spectaculis, ch. 8 (I, 33); De baptismo, ch. 9 (I, 628). Other indications of his apocalyptic interest are his references to the universe, e. g., Apologeticus, ch. 48 (I, 295); De Corona, ch. 6 (I, 429); and his discussions in Adversus Marcionem of the devils' apostasy, Bk. II, cli. 10 (II, 96–97) and Bk. V, ch. 8 (II, 296).

10 Taylor, Henry Osborn, The Medieval Mind (4th ed.; London, 1938), I, 490.Google Scholar

11 De praescriptione haereticorum, ch. 1 (II, 3) and De pudicitia, ch. 1 (I, 791). On the parallel to the time of the flood. De baptismo, ch. 8 (I, 627); and Demonogamia, ch. 16 (I, 786). On indifference to the wrath of God, De patientia, ch. 2 (I, 589); and De testimonio animae, ch. 2 (I, 403). On the pilgrimage through evil days, De corona, ch. 13 (I, 451); De exhortatione castitatis, ch. 12 (I, 753); also De fuga, ch. 9 (I, 477); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 16 (II, 143); De cultu feminarum, Bk. II ch. 6 (I, 723) and ch. 13 (I, 734).

12 “…imminentem saeculo procellam,” De paenitentia, ch. 1 (I, 644). On Sodom and Gomorrah, Ad uxorem, Bk. I, ch. 5 (I, 677); De monogamia, ch. 16 (I, 786); De exhortatione castitatis, ch. 9 (I, 751).

13 On the distinction of first and second advent, Apologeticus, ch. 21 (I, 200) Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 4 (II, 125) and ch. 7 (II, 130–31); and Werner, op. cit., pp. 155–56. Tertullian's prayer for the coming of the kingdom appears De oratione, ch. 5 (I, 560); see also Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 25 (II, 156–57).

14 Tertulhiari's well-known description of the spectacle of Christ's return appears in De spectaculis, ch. 30 (1, 61). De oratione, ch. 29 (I, 584); see also Ad uxorem, Bk. I. ch. 5 (I, 676); Apologeticus, ch. 18 (I, 185) and ch. 47 (1, 290.)

15 “Spes, quam hominis patientia expectat.” De patientia, ch. 12 (I, 610). One of the few passages I have discovered where spes or sperare is used without an eschatological connotation is Adversus Marcionem, Bk. I, ch. 29 (1, 83), but here its significance is purely secular. See the general axiom, … De praescriptione haereticorum, ch. 23 (II, 22). On the resurrection and the spes resurrcctionis, cf. De resurrectione carnis (11, 467–551); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. I, ch. 21 (II, 70); De praescriptione haereticorum, ch. 7 (II, 8–9); Apologeticus, ch. 48 (I, 291); Ad nationes, Bk. I, ch. 19 (I, 345); Adversus Hermogenem, ch. 34 (II, 369), connecting it with the creatio ex nihilo. Spes aeterna in De pudicitia, ch. 9 (I, 810); spes adventus domini in De baptismo, ch. 19 (I, 639); spes nostra in De patientia, ch. 9 (I, 603–604) and De pudicitia, ch. 8 (I, 808); spes per exspectationem in De oratione, ch. 22 (1, 579); spes in regno, ibid., ch. 9 (I, 563). On eipis in the New Testament, see Bultmann's, Rudolf essay sub voce in Kittel, Gerhard (ed.), Theologisches Wörterbuch zum Neucn Testament (Stuttgart, 1933 ff.), II, 515–531, esp. pp. 527–30Google Scholar. As my later discussion will show, I am influenced by Prof. Bultmann's thesis that used in a religious sense, clpis seems never to be utterly devoid of eschatological content, but at the same time seems often to connote more than merely the hope of the parousia. itself.

16 “… cuius iudicium in suos… vertitur… in aeternitate aut poenae aut salutis,” De patientia, ch. 4 (I, 593); Apologeticus, ch. 41 (I, 272); Ad scapulam, ch. 2 (I, 540). He insists that “iudicium soli deo competit,” De fuga, ch. 1 (I, 462); also De patientia, ch. 10 (I, 605), He uses the judgment in directing himself to Christians, Ad martyras, ch. 2 (I, 6–7); Ad uxorem, Bk. II, ch. 3 (I, 687). He describes pagan parallels to the Christian view of judgment, Ad nationes, Bk. I, ch. 19 (I, 345–46); see also Apologeticus, ch. 48 (I, 292) and his comment, De idololatria, ch. 1 (I, 67). And he makes frequent reference to the orthodox view of judgment in antithesis to Marcion's dualism. Adversus Marcionem, Bk. I, ch. 24–27 (II, 75–80) and passim, even to the point of asserting, Bk. II, ch, 11–12 (II, 98–99), that God was a Judge before evil came to he; see also De praescriptione haereticorum, ch. 44 (II, 42).

17 For an example of the identification of inferi and the sinus Abrahae, cf. De idololatria, ch. 13 (I, 88–89) and Oehler's lengthy comment sub loco. On the other hand, he is very insistent upon distinguishing between them in Adversus Marcionem, Bk. IV, ch. 24 (II, 249–50) and criticizes the pagan view of the inferi, Ad nationes, Bk. II, ch. 14 (I. 388); and Apoiogeticus, ch. 11 (I, 160).

18 Ad uxorem, Bk. I, ch. 6 (I, 678–79). On the Apocalypse, De pudicitia, ch. 19 (I, 835–36) and De fuga, ch. 7 (I, 475). Christ's removal of the fire, De corona, ch. 11 (I, 444), and baptism's extinction of it, De baptismo, ch. 10 (I, 630) repentance and the gehenna in corde, De paenitentia, ch. 12 (I, 663–64); on modesty, De pudicitia, ch. 2 (I, 791–92). The judgment is related to ethics, e. g., in De idololatria, ch. 24 (I, 106–107) De ieiunio, ch. 16 (I, 876); and Adversus Marcionem, Bk. I, ch. 27 (II, 79).

19 A good example is the frequency with which the symbol of Antichrist occurs in his writings, De ieiunio, ch. 11 (I, 869); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. I, ch. 22 (II, 71); Ibid., Bk. V, ch. 12 (II, 311); Ibid., Bk. V, ch. 16 (II, 321), connecting Antichrist and the “man of sin” in II Thess. 2: Scorpiace, ch. 12 (I, 529); De fuga, ch. 12 (I, 487); De monogamia, ch. 16 (I, 786).

20 Werner. op. cit., p. 76; the same viewpoint appears in Schweitzer, Albert, The Mysticism of Paul the Apostle, tr. by Montgomery, William (New York 1931), esp. pp. 52–100Google Scholar. But on Paul's relation to the eschatology of Judaism, see Rudolf Bultmann's discussion of the Pauline concept of dikaiosyne, Theologie des Neuen Testaments, I (Tübingen, 1948), 269–75.Google Scholar

21 Werner, op. cit., pp. 88–98. Tertullian, De ieiunio, ch. 10 (I, 866), discussing Matt. 27:45–54; Adversus Marcionem, Bk. IV, ch. 42 (II, 270–71) on Luke 23:44–46; also De fuga, ch. 12 (I, 483); Ad scapulam, ch. 3 (I, 543, 545).

22 De fuga, ch. 6 (I, 472–73) on Matt. 10: 35; see Werner's recitation of the patristic use of this passage, op. cit., pp. 72–73. De praescriptione haereticorum, ch. 8 (II, 11). De pudicitia, ch. 9 (I, 812); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. IV ch. 19 (II, 206), where he criticizes the hermeneutical procedure of Marcion and his followers.

23 Sorpiace, ch. 11 (I, 523): “tune eveniet quod est scriptum, si non aliud evenit.” On the “end,” cf. De fuga, ch. 7 (I, 475); Scorpiace, ch. 10 (I, 525); De monogamia, ch. 15 (I, 785). A similar exegesis of Matt. 10:26 and its parallels occurs, De virginibus velandis, ch. 14 (I, 905) and Adversus Marcionem, Bk. IV, ch. 28 (II, 234). On the eschatology of the Old Testament, De fuga, ch. 3 (I, 468) and Scorpiace, ch. 7 (I, 513); also Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, oh. 13 (II, 138–39). On the Crown, Scorpiace, ch. 13 (I, 532); De corona, ch. 15 (I, 455–56). For an evaluation of Tertulhan's use of the Old Testament in comparison with his contemporaries, see Diestel, Ludwig, Geschichte des Alten Testaments in der christlichen Kirche (Jean, 1869), pp. 33–36.Google Scholar

24 On judging, De pudicitia, ch. 2 (I, 795); De patientia, ch. 10 (I, 605). On marriage when times was in collecto, see the passages in note 6 above. The eschatological strictures on marriage appear, De monogamia, ch. 7 (I, 771); De exhortatione castitatis, ch. 6 (I, 746); Ad uxorem, Bk. II, ch. 3 (I, 687). The defense of marriage appears, Adversus Marcioncm, Bk. I, ch. 29 (II, 82); but see; the interesting statement, Ibid., Bk. V, ch 7 (II, 294); also Ad uxorem, Bk. I, ch. 2 (I, 671).

25 Ad martyras, ch. 3 (I, 10). Apologeticus, ch. 34 (I, 240); De idololatria, ch. 18 (I, 100). Apologeticus, ch. 21 (I, 204), See also De fuga, ch. 12 (I, 487); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 24 (II, 156); De pallio, ch. 1 (I, 913–15); Ad nationes, Bk. I, ch. 17 (I, 342); De corona, ch. 13 (I, 451). The most penetrating summary I know of Tertullian's attitude toward the Empire is that of Cochrane, Charles Norris, Christianity and Classical Culture (Oxford, 1940)Google Scholar, especially the discussion of “Regnum Caesaris Regnum Diaboli.”

26 Apologeticus, ch. 32 (I, 230). Ad scapulam, ch. 2 (I, 541–42); Apologeticus, ch. 40 (I, 270–71); Ad scapulam, ch. I (I, 540) and ch. 4 (I, 546).

27 “Oramus etiam… pro mora finis,” Apologeticus, ch. 39 (I, 255–56). Oehler refers, sub loco, note d, to a book by J. D. Kluge on this passage, but I have been unable to locate it. Werner, op. cit., p. 111.

28 Lietzmann, Hans, The Beginnings of the Christian Church, II, The Founding of the Church Universal, tr. by Woolf, Bertram Lee (New York, 1938), pp. 295–97.Google Scholar

29 One of the most complete recitations of the regula fldei is in De praescriptione hacreticorum, ch. 13 (II, 14–15), whose echatological portion reads: “lesum Christum… venturum cum claritate ad sumendos sanctos in vitae aeternae et promissorum caelestium fructum et ad profanos iudicandos igni perpetuo, facta utriusque partis resuscitatione cum carnis restitutione. Haec regula a Christo, ut probabitur, instituta.” An interesting variation on the usual phraseology occurs, De virginibus velandis, ch. 1 (I, 884): “… venturum iudicare vivos et mortuos per carnis etiam resurrectionem.” Cf. also his reference to the signaculum fldei in De spectaculis, ch. 24 (I, 56). On Tertulian's significance for the development of the regula fldei, cf. the brief comments of Cullman, Oscar, The Earliest Christian Confessions, tr. by Reid, J. K. S. (London, 1949). p. 40Google Scholar and elsewhere: also Kattenbusch, Ferdinand, Das apostolische Symbol, II, Verbreitung und Bedeutung des Taufsymbols (Leipzig, 1900), 53–101, esp. p. 89Google Scholar on the last passage quoted above. But see Werner's warning, op. cit., p. 174, that “the rule of faith is a clear index not of a fixed and constantly identical tradition, but of one which was caught in the process of evolution and revision.”

30 For example, De praescriptione haereticorue, ch. 44 (II, 42); De spectaculis, ch. 30 (I, 61); De corona, ch. 15 (I, 455–56); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 24 (II, 158); De exhortatione castitatis, ch. 13 (I, 757); Ad nationes, Bk. II, ch. 17 (I, 396). Incidentally, the fact that this pattern occurs in several treatises casts some doubt on Adolf Harnack's conclusion regarding the date of the lost treatise De paradiso, Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius, II. Theil, Die Chronologie, II (Leipzig, 1904), 279.Google Scholar

31 See Amos Wilder's telling comments on this historicism, op. cit., pp. 3–27.

32 See the passages referred to in notes 7–8 above.

33 As will be evident throughout this closing section, I am deeply indebted to the analysis of Otto, Rudolf, Reich Gottes und Menschensohn (Munich, 1934), pp. 55–58, 118–122Google Scholar; and to Karl Schmidt's discussion of “Die basileia Christi” in Kittel, op. cit., I, 581–92.

34 On the praeiudicium I have quoted Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 24 (II, 158). Other references to it are Ad urorem, Bk. II, ch. 6 (I, 692); Scorpiace, ch. 6 (I, 511); Apologeticus, ch. 39 (I, 257); De cultu feminarum, Bk. I, ch. 2 (I, 705). This last passage also discusses a praedemnatio, as does Apologeticus, ch. 23 (I, 215).

35 De cultu feminarum, Bk. II, ch. 7 (I, 725); De exhortatione castitatis, ch. 13 (I, 757). On the revelation of the kingdom substantialiter, see Adversus Marcionem, Bk. IV, ch. 35 (II, 255). Other indications are statements like De spectaculis, ch. 30 (I, 63); Scorpiace, ch. 10 (I, 520); De paenitentia, ch. 2 (I, 647); Apologeticus, ch. 45 (I, 279–80); Adversus Marcionem, Bk. I, ch. 24 (I, 17) De praescriptione haereticorum, ch. 44 (II, 42): and perhaps the enigmatic “perisse” in De idololatria, ch. 1 (I, 67).

36 See notes 21–23 above. It was a general hermeneutical axiom that obscure or infrequent matters are to be interpreted in terms of those that are clear or appear frequently, de pudicitia, ch. 17 (I, 832). In the relation of the eschatological “not yet” to the equally eschatological “already,” this axiom produced, Simultaneously, the insistence that “what you see going on cannot he called future.” Adversus Marcionem, Bk. III, ch. 20 (II, 150), and the assertion that in the Scriptures “future things are oceasionally treated as though they had already happened,” Ibid., ch. 5 (II, 126).

37 Pauck, Wilhelm, The Heritage of the Reformation (Chicago, 1950), p. 138Google Scholar. In my interpretation of Tertullian's Christology I would, therefore, be unable to share Werner's judgment, op. cit., p. 104, that it is “völlig enteschatologisiert.”