apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

586 EPISTLE OF S. POLYCARP.
attacked in the two will be the same. Polycarp here is evidently
quoting the words of i John iv. 2, 3 ; but, as I have said already (p. 382),
the application is not necessarily the same as in the Apostle's context.
Under any circumstances, though applicable to Marcion, it would apply
equally well to almost every sect of Gnostics besides. The same may
'
be said of the second position attacked, Whosoever confesseth not the
testimony of the Cross ',
which might include not only divers Gnostic
sects but many others besides. We have come across similar expressions
in the Ignatian Epistles, and we can hardly doubt that the
reference is the same in both writers (see above pp. 373, 376, and below
II.
pp. 74, 173 sq, 272, etc.). But, while the first two expressions are
wide enough to include Marcion along with many others, the case is
wholly different with the third, 'Whosoever perverteth the oracles of the
Lord to (serve)
his own lusts and saith that there is neither resurrection
nor judgment'. To this type of error, and this only, the description
'first-born of Satan' is applied in Polycarp's letter; and it is altogether
inapplicable to Marcion. No doubt Marcion, like every other heretical
teacher of the second century, or indeed of any century, did ' pervert
the oracles of the Lord' by his tortuous interpretations, but he did not
moral character of Marcion
pervert them 'to his own lusts'. The high
is unimpeachable, and is recognized by the orthodox writers of the
second century, who have no worse charge to bring against him than
disappointed ambition. TertuUian finds no terms too strong to condemn
Marcion ;
but even TertuUian bears decisive testimony to the exceptional
purity of his life'. He was an ascetic of the most rigorous
type. It is a significant fact that, when Scholten^ wishes to fasten this
denunciation on Marcion as an argument against the authenticity of
Polycarp's Epistle, he stops short at 'pervert the oracles of the Lord'
and takes no account of the concluding words 'to his own lusts', though
these contain the very sting of the accusation. Obviously the allusion
is to the antinomian license wiucli many early Gnostic teachers extracted
from the spiritual teaching of the Gospel. Germs of this immoral
doctrine appear at least half a century before the professed
date of
Polycarp's Epistle in the incipient Gnosticism which S. Paul rebukes at
Corinth (i Cor. vii. 12— 18, viii. i sq).
Still clearer indications meet us
in the Pastoral Epistles (i
Tim. i.
6sq, ii. i sq, vi. 3 sq, 2 Tim. ii. 16 sq,
iii. 2 sq, iv. 3 sq, Tit. i. 10 sq); and when we reach the epoch of the
1
In Ps-TertuU. Haer. 17, Epiphan. 30, who speaks of the 'continentia Mar-
Haer. xUi. i, there is a story discreditable cionensis', evidently knows nothing
to Marcion, but it is doubtless a libel. See also adv. MciJ-c. i. i, 29,
iv. 11.
The genuine TertuUian de Praescr. Haer. ^
Die AeUesten Zeugnisse p. 41.
of it.