Tertullian: Against Marcion, Books I–V

Chapter XXIV.—On the Mission of the Seventy Disciples, and Christ’s Charge to Them. Precedents Drawn from the Old Testament. Absurdity of Supposing that Marcion’s Christ Could Have Given the Power of Treading on Serpents and Scorpions.

He chose also seventy other missionaries ^{Edition note 1} besides the twelve. Now why, if the twelve followed the number of the twelve fountains of Elim, ^{Edition note 2} should not the seventy correspond to the like number of the palms of that place? ^{Edition note 3} Whatever be the Antitheses of the comparison, it is a diversity in the causes, not in the powers, which has mainly produced them. But if one does not keep in view the diversity of the causes, ^{Edition note 4} he is very apt to infer a difference of powers. ^{Edition note 5} When the children of Israel went out of Egypt, the Creator brought them forth laden with their spoils of gold and silver vessels, and with loads besides of raiment and unleavened dough; ^{Edition note 6} whereas Christ commanded His disciples not to carry even a staff ^{Edition note 7} for their journey.

The former were thrust forth into a desert, but the latter were sent into cities. Consider the difference presented in the occasions, ^{Edition note 8} and you will understand how it was one and the same power which arranged the mission ^{Edition note 9} of His people according to their poverty in the one case, and their plenty in the other. He cut down ^{Edition note 10} their supplies when they could be replenished through the cities, just as He had accumulated ^{Edition note 11} them when exposed to the scantiness of the desert.

Even shoes He forbade them to carry. For it was He under whose very protection the people wore not out a shoe, ^{Edition note 12} even in the wilderness for the space of so many years. “No one,” says He, “shall ye salute by the way.” ^{Edition note 13} What a destroyer of the prophets, forsooth, is Christ, seeing it is from them that He received his precept also! When Elisha sent on his servant Gehazi before him to raise the Shunammite’s son from death, I rather think he gave him these instructions: ^{Edition note 14}

For what is a wayside blessing but a mutual salutation as men meet? So also the Lord commands: “Into whatsoever house they enter, let them say, Peace be to it.” ^{Edition note 17} Herein He follows the very same example. For Elisha enjoined upon his servant the same salutation when he met the Shunammite; he was to say to her: “Peace to thine husband, peace to thy child.” ^{Edition note 18} Such will be rather our Antitheses; they compare Christ with, instead of sundering Him from, the Creator.

“The labourer is worthy of his hire.” ^{Edition note 19} Who could better pronounce such a sentence than the Judge? For to decide that the workman deserves his wages, is in itself a judicial act. There is no award which consists not in a process of judgment. The law of the Creator on this point also presents us with a corroboration, for He judges that labouring oxen are as labourers worthy of their hire: “Thou shalt not muzzle,” says He, “the ox when he treadeth out the corn.” ^{Edition note 20} Now, who is so good to man ^{Edition note 21} as He who is also merciful to cattle?

Now, when Christ pronounced labourers to be worthy of their hire, He, in fact, exonerated from blame that precept of the Creator about depriving the Egyptians of their gold and silver vessels. ^{Edition note 22} For they who had built for the Egyptians their houses and cities, were surely workmen worthy of their hire, and were not instructed in a fraudulent act, but only set to claim compensation for their hire, which they were unable in any other way to exact from their masters. ^{Edition note 23} That the kingdom of God was neither new nor unheard of, He in this way affirmed, whilst at the same time He bids them announce that it was near at hand. ^{Edition note 24} Now it is that which was once far off, which can be properly said to have become near.

If, however, a thing had never existed previous to its becoming near, it could never have been said to have approached, because it had never existed at a distance. Everything which is new and unknown is also sudden. ^{Edition note 25} Everything which is sudden, then, first receives the accident of time ^{Edition note 26} when it is announced, for it then first puts on appearance of form. ^{Edition note 27} Besides it will be impossible for a thing either to have been tardy ^{Edition note 28} all the while it remained unannounced, ^{Edition note 29} or to have approached ^{Edition note 30} from the time it shall begin to be announced.

He likewise adds, that they should say to such as would not receive them: “Notwithstanding be ye sure of this, that the kingdom of God is come nigh unto you.” ^{Edition note 31} If He does not enjoin this by way of a commination, the injunction is a most useless one. For what mattered it to them that the kingdom was at hand, unless its approach was accompanied with judgment?—even for the salvation of such as received the announcement thereof. How, if there can be a threat without its accomplishment, can you have in a threatening god, one that executes also, and in both, one that is a judicial being? ^{Edition note 32} So, again, He commands that the dust be shaken off against them, as a testimony,—the very particles of their ground which might cleave ^{Edition note 33} to the sandal, not to mention ^{Edition note 34} any other sort of communication with them. ^{Edition note 35} But if their churlishness ^{Edition note 36} and inhospitality were to receive no vengeance from Him, for what purpose does He premise a testimony, which surely forbodes some threats?

Furthermore, when the Creator also, in the book of Deuteronomy, forbids the reception of the Ammonites and the Moabites into the church, ^{Edition note 37} because, when His people came from Egypt, they fraudulently withheld provisions from them with inhumanity and inhospitality, ^{Edition note 38} it will be manifest that the prohibition of intercourse descended to Christ from Him. The form of it which He uses—“He that despiseth you, despiseth me” ^{Edition note 39} —the Creator had also addressed to Moses: “Not against thee have they murmured, but against me.” ^{Edition note 40} Moses, indeed, was as much an apostle as the apostles were prophets.

The authority of both offices will have to be equally divided, as it proceeds from one and the same Lord, (the God) of apostles and prophets. Who is He that shall bestow “the power of treading on serpents and scorpions?” ^{Edition note 41} Shall it be He who is the Lord of all living creatures or he who is not god over a single lizard? Happily the Creator has promised by Isaiah to give this power even to little children, of putting their hand in the cockatrice den and on the hole of the young asps without at all receiving hurt. ^{Edition note 42} And, indeed, we are aware (without doing violence to the literal sense of the passage, since even these noxious animals have actually been unable to do hurt where there has been faith) that under the figure of scorpions and serpents are portended evil spirits, whose very prince is described ^{Edition note 43} by the name of serpent, dragon, and every other most conspicuous beast in the power of the Creator. ^{Edition note 44} This power the Creator conferred first of all upon His Christ, even as the ninetieth Psalm says to Him: “Upon the asp and the basilisk shalt Thou tread; the lion and the dragon shalt Thou trample under foot.” ^{Edition note 45} So also Isaiah: “In that day the Lord God shall draw His sacred, great, and strong sword” (even His Christ) “against that dragon, that great and tortuous serpent; and He shall slay him in that day.” ^{Edition note 46} But when the same prophet says,

he points out the way of faith, by which we shall reach to God; and then to this way of faith he promises this utter crippling ^{Edition note 48} and subjugation of all noxious animals. Lastly, you may discover the suitable times of the promise, if you read what precedes the passage:

When, therefore, He proclaimed the benefits of His cures, then also did He put the scorpions and the serpents under the feet of His saints—even He who had first received this power from the Father, in order to bestow it upon others and then manifested it forth conformably to the order of prophecy. ^{Edition note 50}