Chapter I.—Satan’s Wiles Against the Truth. How They Take the Form of the Praxean Heresy. Account of the Publication of This Heresy.

In various ways has the devil rivalled and resisted the truth.  Sometimes his aim has been to destroy the truth by defending it. He maintains that there is one only Lord, the Almighty Creator of the world, in order that out of this doctrine of the unity he may fabricate a heresy. He says that the Father Himself came down into the Virgin, was Himself born of her, Himself suffered, indeed was Himself Jesus Christ. Here the old serpent has fallen out with himself, since, when he tempted Christ after John’s baptism, he approached Him as “the Son of God;” surely intimating that God had a Son, even on the testimony of the very Scriptures, out of which he was at the moment forging his temptation: “If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread.”1    Matt. iv. 3. Again:  “If thou be the Son of God, cast thyself down from hence;2    Ver. 6. for it is written, He shall give His angels charge concerning thee”—referring no doubt, to the Father—“and in their hands they shall bear thee up, that thou hurt not thy foot against a stone.”3    Ps. xci. 11. Or perhaps, after all, he was only reproaching the Gospels with a lie, saying in fact: “Away with Matthew; away with Luke! Why heed their words? In spite of them, I declare that it was God Himself that I approached; it was the Almighty Himself that I tempted face to face; and it was for no other purpose than to tempt Him that I approached Him. If, on the contrary, it had been only the Son of God, most likely I should never have condescended to deal with Him.” However, he is himself a liar from the beginning,4    John viii. 44. and whatever man he instigates in his own way; as, for instance, Praxeas. For he was the first to import into Rome from Asia this kind of heretical pravity, a man in other respects of restless disposition, and above all inflated with the pride of confessorship simply and solely because he had to bear for a short time the annoyance of a prison; on which occasion, even “if he had given his body to be burned, it would have profited him nothing,” not having the love of God,5    1 Cor. xiii. 3. whose very gifts he has resisted and destroyed.  For after the Bishop of Rome6    Probably Victor. [Elucidation II.] had acknowledged the prophetic gifts of Montanus, Prisca, and Maximilla, and, in consequence of the acknowledgment, had bestowed his peace7    Had admitted them to communion. on the churches of Asia and Phrygia, he, by importunately urging false accusations against the prophets themselves and their churches, and insisting on the authority of the bishop’s predecessors in the see, compelled him to recall the pacific letter which he had issued, as well as to desist from his purpose of acknowledging the said gifts. By this Praxeas did a twofold service for the devil at Rome:  he drove away prophecy, and he brought in heresy; he put to flight the Paraclete, and he crucified the Father.  Praxeas’ tares had been moreover sown, and had produced their fruit here also,8    “The connection renders it very probable that the hic quoque of this sentence forms an antithesis to Rome, mentioned before, and that Tertullian expresses himself as if he had written from the very spot where these things had transpired. Hence we are led to conclude that it was Carthage.”—Neander, Antignostikus, ii. 519, note 2, Bohn. while many were asleep in their simplicity of doctrine; but these tares actually seemed to have been plucked up, having been discovered and exposed by him whose agency God was pleased to employ.  Indeed, Praxeas had deliberately resumed his old (true) faith, teaching it after his renunciation of error; and there is his own handwriting in evidence remaining among the carnally-minded,9    On the designation Psychici, see our Anti-Marcion, p. 263, note 5, Edin. in whose society the transaction then took place; afterwards nothing was heard of him. We indeed, on our part, subsequently withdrew from the carnally-minded on our acknowledgment and maintenance of the Paraclete.10    [This statement may only denote a withdrawal from the communion of the Bishop of Rome, like that of Cyprian afterwards. That prelate had stultified himself and broken faith with Tertullian; but, it does not, necessarily, as Bp. Bull too easily concludes, define his ultimate separation from his own bishop and the North-African church.] But the tares of Praxeas had then everywhere shaken out their seed, which having lain hid for some while, with its vitality concealed under a mask, has now broken out with fresh life. But again shall it be rooted up, if the Lord will, even now; but if not now, in the day when all bundles of tares shall be gathered together, and along with every other stumbling-block shall be burnt up with unquenchable fire.11    Matt. xiii. 30.

CAPUT PRIMUM.

Varie diabolus aemulatus est veritatem. Affectavit illam aliquando defendendo concutere. Unicum Dominum vindicat omnipotentem mundi conditorem, ut et de unico haeresim faciat. Ipsum dicit Patrem descendisse in Virginem , ipsum ex ea natum, ipsum passum, denique ipsum esse Jesum Christum. Excidit sibi coluber, quia Jesum Christum post baptisma Joannis tentans, ut Filium Dei aggressus est; 0155A certus filium Deum habere, vel ex ipsis Scripturis de quibus tunc tentationem struebat: Si tu es filius Dei, dic ut lapides isti panes fiant; item: Si tu es filius Dei, dejice te hinc: scriptum est enim, quod mandavit angelis suis super te (utique Pater) ut te manibus suis tollant, necubi ad lapidem pedem tuum offendas. (Matth. IV, 3-6; Ps. XC, 11). Aut numquid mendacium Evangeliis exprobravit , dicens: «Viderit Matthaeus et Lucas: caeterum, ego ad ipsum Deum accessi, ipsum omnipotentem cominus tentavi. Ideo et accessi, ideo et tentavi. Caeterum, si filius Dei esset, nunquam illum fortasse dignarer?» Sed 0155B enim ipse potius a primordio mendax est (I Joan. III, 8); et si quem hominem de suo subornaverit , ut Praxean. Nam iste primus ex Asia hoc genus perversitatis intulit Romae; homo et alias inquietus, insuper de jactatione martyrii inflatus, ob solum et simplex et breve carceris taedium; quando et si corpus suum tradidisset exurendum, nihil profecisset, dilectionem Dei non habens (I Cor., XIII, 3), cujus charismata quoque expugnavit. Nam idem tunc episcopum romanum, agnoscentem jam prophetias Montani, Priscae, Maximillae, et ex ea agnitione pacem Ecclesiis Asiae et Phrygiae inferentem, falsa de ipsis prophetis et ecclesiis eorum asseverando, et praecessorum ejus auctoritates defendendo, coegit et litteras pacis revocare jam emissas, et a proposito 0156A recipiendorum charismatum concessare. Ita duo negotia diaboli Praxeas Romae procuravit, prophetiam expulit, et haeresim intulit; Paracletum fugavit, et Patrem crucifixit. Fructicaverant avenae praxeanae, hic quoque superseminatae, dormientibus multis (Matth., XIII, 26) in simplicitate doctrinae; traductae dehinc per quem Deus voluit, etiam evulsae videbantur. Denique caverat pristinum doctor de emendatione sua; et manet chirographum apud Psychicos , apud quos tunc gesta res est, exinde silentium. Et nos quidem postea agnitio Paracleti, atque defensio, disjunxit a Psychicis. Avenae vero 0156B illae utique tunc semen excusserant. Ita aliquamdiu per hypocrisin subdola vivacitate latitavit, et nunc denuo erupit. Sed et denuo eradicabitur, si voluerit Dominus, in isto commeatu; si quo minus, die suo colligentur omnes adulterae fruges, et cum caeteris scandalis igni inextinguibili cremabuntur (ibid.).