Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies 4.33
The spiritual disciple truly receives the Spirit of God, who from the beginning was present in all of God's arrangements with humanity, announcing future things, revealing present things, and explaining past things. He judges all, yet is judged by no one. For he judges the nations, creatures who serve the Creator more than the created order, consuming their entire effort in vain with a reprobate mind. He also judges the Jews, who do not perceive the word of liberty and refuse to go free even though their Liberator is present. Instead, they pretend to serve God outside the Law at the wrong time, as if He needed anything, and they neither know nor wish to understand Christ's advent, which He accomplished for human salvation, even though all the prophets announced His two advents. In the first, He was made man in affliction, knowing how to bear infirmity, and sat upon a colt, the foal of a donkey (Zech 9:9); He was the stone rejected by the builders (Psalm 118:22), and like a lamb led to the slaughter (Isaiah 53:7), dissolving Amalek by the extension of His hands; gathering the scattered children from the ends of the earth into the Father's fold, remembering His dead who slept, and descending to them to raise them up. In the second advent, He will come upon the clouds, bringing a day like a burning furnace, striking the earth with the word of His mouth, and slaying the impious with the breath of His lips. He will hold a winnowing fork in His hand, clear His threshing floor, gather the wheat into His barn, but burn the chaff with unquenchable fire.
Let us examine, then, the doctrine of Marcion: how does he accept that there are two gods, infinitely separated from one another? How can he be good if he draws alien men away from the One who made them and calls them into his own kingdom? Why does his goodness fail by not saving all? Why does he appear good toward men but most unjust toward the One who made men, taking away what belongs to Him? How can the Lord be just if He proceeds from another Father, yet accepts this human condition, confessing the bread to be His body and confirming the cup's mixture to be His blood? Why did He confess Himself to be the Son of Man if He did not undergo the generation that comes from man? How could He forgive us the sins we owe to our Maker and God? How could He be crucified when He was not flesh but only appeared as a man, and blood and water flowed from His side? What was that body which the buriers buried? And what was it that rose from the dead?
He will also judge all those who follow Valentinus, because with their tongues they confess one God the Father, from whom are all things, yet they say the One who made all things is the fruit of defection or lapse. They likewise confess one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, with their tongues, but according to their opinion they assign their own 'emission' to the Only-begotten, another to the Word, another to Christ, and another to the Savior. Thus they claim all things are virtually one, yet each is understood separately with its own emission according to their system. Their tongues alone have fallen into unity, but their opinion and deep sense, falling away from unity, will be scrutinized and incur the multiform judgment of God when they are questioned by Christ about the things they devised for themselves. Their own prophet Homer will accuse them, from whom they learned such things, saying: 'For he is an enemy to me, even as the gates of Hades, who hides one thing in his heart but declares another.' He will also judge the empty talk of the wicked Gnostics, showing them to be disciples of Simon Magus. How will they be judged who presumptuously say they are gods?
Let us also examine the Ebionites: how can they be saved unless God is the One who worked their salvation on earth? How can man pass into God unless God first passed into man? How can he escape the generation of death unless he enters a new generation, wonderfully and unexpectedly given by God as a sign of salvation—that regeneration from the Virgin through faith? What adoption will they receive from God while remaining in this generation according to man in this world? How did the Lord have 'more than Solomon' and 'more than Jonah' if He was merely David, who shared the same substance with them? How did He conquer the one strong against men, who alone conquered man and held him under his power—conquering the conqueror and releasing the conquered man—unless He was superior to the man who was conquered? Who is better than the man made in the likeness of God, and who is more excellent than the Son of God, after whose likeness man was made? For this reason, in the end He revealed the likeness: the Son of God became man, taking the ancient formation upon Himself, as we demonstrated in the preceding book.
Latin
Ta is discipulus spiritalis vere recipiens Spiritum Dei, qui ab initio in universis dispositionibus Dei adfuit hominibus, et futura annuntiavit et preesentia ostendit et preeterita enarrat, judicat quidem omnes, ipse autem a nemine judicatur. Nam judicat gentes, creature magis quam Oreatori servientes, et reprobabili mente universam suam operationem in vanum consumentes. Judicat autem etiam Judos, non percipientes verbum libertatis, neque volentes abire liberos, cum habeant preesentem liberatorem ; sed intempestive extra legem servire simulantes nihil indigenti Deo, et Christi adventum, quem propter salutem hominum fecit, non cognoseentes, neque intelligere volentes, quoniam duos adventus ejus omnes annuntiaverunt prophetee: unum quidem, in homo in plaga factus est, sciens ferre imbecillitatem, et in pullo asinee sedens, et reprobatus lapis ab eedificantibus, et sicut ovis ad victimam adductus, et per extensionem manuum dissolvens quidem Amalech; congregans autem dispersos filios a terminis terre in ovile Patris, et recommemoratus mortuorum suorum qui dormierant, et descendens ad eos, uti erueret eos®; secundum autem, in quo super nubes veniet, superducens diem que est sicut clibanus ardens, et percutiens terram verbo oris sui, et spiritu per labia sua interficiens impios, et ventilabrum in manu habens, et’ emundans aream suam, et triticum quidem in horreum comburens autem paleas igne inexstinguibili. 1. Examrnasir autem et doctrinam Marcionis, quomodo accipiat duos deos esse, infinita distantia separatos ab invicem? Vel quemadmodum bonus erit, qui alienos homines abstrahit ab eo qui fecit, et ad suum advocat regnum? et quare bonitas ejus deficit, non omnes salyans? et quare circa homines quidem bonus videtur, in ipsum autem qui fecit homines injustissimus, auferens ab eo quee sunt ejus? Quomodo autem juste Dominus, si alterius patris exsistit, hujus conditionis que est secundum nos, accipiens panem suum corpus esse confitebatur, et temperamentum calicis suum sanguinem confirmavit? Et quare se Filium Hominis confitebatur, si non eam que ex homine est generationem sustinuisset? Quemadmodum autem et peccata nobis dimittere poterat, quee nostro debeamus factori et Deo? 4Quomodo autem et cum caro non esset, sed cum pareret quasi homo, crucifixus est, et e Jatere ejus puncto sanguis exiit et aqua? Quod autem corpus sepelierunt sepultores? et quid illud erat quod surrexit a mortuis ? Judicabit autem et eos qui sunt a Valentino omnes, quia lingua quidem confitentur unum Deum Patrem, et ex hoe omnia; ipsum autem qui fecit omnia, defectionis sive labis fructum esse dicunt: et unum Dominum Jesum Christum Filium Dei similiter lingua confitentes, propriam quidem emissionem sententia sua Unigenito donantes, propriam vero ® Verbo, et alteram Christo, alteram vero Salvatori; ita ut secundum eos dicantur“quidem omnia esse quasi unum, unumquemque autem ipsorum separatim intelligi, et propriam habere emissionem, secundum suam 3. Linguas itaque eorum videlicet solas in unitatem cessisse; sententiam vero eorum et sensum que profunda sunt scrutari decidentem ab unitate, incidere in multiforme Dei judicium, cum de his que sibimetipsi adinvenerunt, interrogabuntur a Christo: quem et postea natum quam Pleroma /Honum dicunt, et emissionem ejus post diminutionem sive defectionem, et propter passionem que facta est in Sophia, semetipsos obstetricatos esse affirmant. Accusabit autem eos Homerus proprius ipsorum propheta, a quo eruditi talia invenerunt, ipso dicente heee: Lnimicus est enim ille mihi similiter atque fores inferorum, qui aliud quidem abscondit in corde suo, aliud autem enarrat. Judicabit autem et vaniloquia pravorum Gnosticorum, Simonis eos !! Magi discipulos ostendens. Quemadmodum judicabuntur qui putative dicunt Do1. Jupicaxsrr autem et Ebionitas: quomodo possunt salvari, nisi Deus est qui salutem illorum super terram operatus est? Et quemadmodum homo transiet in Deum, si non Deus in hominem? Quemadmodum autem Telinquet mortis generationem, si non in novam generationem mire et inopinate a Deo, in signum autem Salutis, datam, que est ex Virgine per fidem regenerationem? Vel quam adoptionem accipient- a Deo, permanentes in hac genesi, quee est secundum hominem in hoe mundo? Quomodo autem plus quam Salomon, aut plus quam Jona habebat, Set Dominus erat David, qui ejusdem cum ipsis fuit substantize? isQuomodo autem ®eum qui adversus homines fortis erat, qui solum vicit hominem, sed et detinebat eum sub sua potestate, devicit, et eum quidem qui vicerat vicit, eum vero qui victus fuerat hominem dimisit, nisi superior fuisset eo homine qui fuerat victus? Melior autem eo homine qui secundum similitudinem Dei factus est, et precellentior quisnam sit alius nisi Filius Dei, ad cujus similitudinem factus est homo? Et propter hoc in fine ipse ostendit similitudinem, Filius Dei factus est homo, antiquam plasmationem in semetipsum suscipiens, quemadmodum ostendimus in eo libro qui est hoe superior.