Apostolic Tradition

Tertullian, Against Marcion 5.19

Tertullian · c. 155–c. 220 AD

In my prescription against heresies, I always nail down a summary from the testimony of the ages, vindicating our prior rule against every heretical generation. The apostle himself will now prove this, speaking of the hope laid up for you in heaven, which you heard in the word of truth, the gospel, which has come to you just as it has into the whole world (Colossians 1:5-6). If the evangelical tradition had already remained everywhere back then, how much more so now? And if ours is the one that has remained everywhere, more than any heretical teaching—certainly not that of Antoninian Marcion—then ours will be apostolic. But Marcion's teaching, even if it had filled the whole world, still could not defend itself as apostolic, not even then. For it will be proven to be the one that first filled the world, namely, the gospel of that God who also sang this about its preachings: their sound has gone out into all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world (Psalm 19:4).

Latin

Soleo in praescriptione aduersus haeresis: omnes de testimomio temporum compendium figere, priorem uindicans regulam nostram omni haeretica posteritate. hoc nunc probabit et apostolus dicens: de spe reposita ia caelis quam audistis in sermone ueritatis euangelii, quod peruenit ad uos sicut et in totum mundum. nam si iam tunc traditio euangelica ubique manauerat, quanto magis nunc? porro, si nostra est quae ubique manauit, magis quam omnis haeretica, nedum Antoniniani Marcionis, nostra erit apostolica. Marcionis autem cum totum impleuerit mundum, ne tunc quidem se defendere poterit de apostolica. eam enim et sic constabit esse, quae prior mundum repleuit, illius scilicet dei euangelio, qui et hoc cecinit de praedicationibus eius: in omnem terram exiit sonus eorum et in terminos orbis uerba eorum.

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