EXCERPTS FROM EARLY CHURCH FATHERS
Christian truth amid manifold errors
01. Tertullian,
apologist of Truth.
02. Philosophers drew their doctrines from Christian tradition.
03. Pagan gods non-existent, wicked, comparatively new.
04. Emptiness of philosophy and traditional worship.
05. Prominent past figures discredited.
06. Churchmen overcome the evil spirits.
07. Christian otherworldliness.
08. Christians
inequitably treated for their name only.
09. Cruelties and absurd accusations suffered by the Christians.
10. Pagan injustice and misunderstanding.
11. Contrast between Christian sober ways and pagan wantonness.
12. Christians more loyal to Rome than unbelievers.
13. Pagan disregard of the revered customs.
14. Christians
are renouncing to exercise their considerable power.
15. On the exemplary reaction of a Christian soldier.
16. Unyielding firmness against compromising scorpions.
17. Concerning flight under persecution.
18. Imprisoned martyrs as points of reference in the Church.
19. Hardship as a preparatory training for virtue and victory.
20. Compendium
of unsound teachings.
21. Concerning the Valentinians.
22. On the introduction of another divinity above the Biblical God.
23. On the Christ of the Creator.
24. Concerning the doctrines of Hermogenes.
25. Concerning the Psychics.
26. Concerning remittance of sins.
27. Concerning fasting.
28. Concerning marriage.
29. On the New Prophecy.
30. On
the non-eternity of the visible world.
31. On the nature of the soul.
32. On the resurrection of the flesh.
33. On the relationship between the Divine Persons.
34. On the importance of Baptism.
35. Concerning
caution against idolatry.
36. Concerning participation in public shows.
37. On the image of the Christian preacher.
38. Concerning patience.
39. On the proper behaviour of Christian women.
40. Concerning modesty.
EXCERPTS FROM EARLY CHURCH FATHERS
Tertullian is traditionally regarded as a fiery apologist of unknown biography who burst into Latin Christianity, in the reign of Septimius Severus, with a number of remarkable treatises that he composed over a relatively short period of time, after which he fizzled out for the rest of his long-lasting life. Surprisingly, he focused his attacks on a Greek painter, and also fought some other unfamiliar character that could not share his admiration for a strange group of visionaries who lived in Phrygia long time since. Some less demanding section of the clergy unleashed his fury no less than an otherwise unrecorded persecution of Christians. Not only himself but also his epoch is elusive. Ruthless opponents of the bishop Cyprian, who fled Carthage when Decius launched his anti-Christian campaign, followed his guidelines in a religious confrontation closely mirroring the subsequent Donatist controversy that flared up in Africa after Diocletian’s resignation. Following his unrelenting defence of the orthodox stance and his proscription of all heretics, at some point in time he supposedly forsook the Church Catholic to follow the ridiculous directions and put up with the frivolities of a gang of false prophets. Such two hardly compatible stages in his career were not successive but widely overlapping.
A quite different approach is presented in Did Tertullian really exist? Did Cyprian? Did Hippolytus? according to which the efforts of early 4th-century African and Roman rigorists, forcefully denouncing an entrenched ecclesiastical body intent on preserving its former privileged position in the Church in spite of the disappointing behaviour of many of its members in times of harassment, along with the reaction of the hierarchical organization under attack, gave rise to the purported works of their respective literary champions, which conveniently came down from the preceding century to the assistance of Donatists and Caecilianists.