Tertullian — Against Marcion 4.2
You have this reply ready from us to the Antitheses. I now pass to showing the gospel—not Jewish but Pontic—meanwhile adulterated, which will first build the order we approach. We establish first that the gospel instrument has apostles as authors, on whom the Lord himself laid the office of promulgating the gospel.
If also apostolics, yet not alone but with the apostles—and after-apostolics—because disciples’ preaching could become suspect of glory-seeking if teachers’ authority did not stand by it, or rather Christ’s, which made the teachers apostles. Finally John and Matthew introduce faith to us from the apostles; Luke and Mark renew it from the apostolics, starting from the same rules as far as concerns one God the Creator and his Christ born of a virgin, the fulfillment of law and prophets.
For it may be that the arrangement of narratives varied, provided they agree on the head of faith, about which there is no agreement with Marcion. Against that, Marcion ascribes to his gospel—his own, of course—no author, as if he who did not shrink from overturning the body itself might not also have been allowed to invent a title.
I could already plant my foot here, contending that a work is not to be acknowledged that does not raise its face, that prefers no constancy, that promises no faith from fullness of title and the author’s due profession. But we prefer to engage through everything, and we do not hide what can be understood from ours: for from these commentators we have, Marcion seems to have chosen Luke to cut.
Now Luke is not an apostle but apostolic, not a master but a disciple, of course lesser than the master, certainly as much later as a follower of a later apostle—Paul’s without doubt—so that even if Marcion had brought in a gospel under Paul’s own name, the singularity of an instrument destitute of predecessors’ patronage would not suffice for faith. For that gospel too would be demanded which Paul found, to which he gave faith, with which he soon desired his own to agree—since for that reason he went up to Jerusalem to know and consult the apostles lest he had run in vain, that is lest he had not believed and evangelized according to them. Having conferred with the authors and agreed on the rule of faith, they mixed right hands and thence distinguished preaching offices. Therefore if Luke’s illuminator himself wanted predecessors’ authority for his own faith and preaching, how much more must I demand it for Luke’s gospel which was necessary for his master’s gospel?
Latin
Habes hanc (ad) \'Antithesis\' expeditam a nobis responsionem. transeo nunc ad euangelii, sane non Iudaici sed Pontici, interim adulterati, demonstrationem, praestructuram ordinem. quem adgredimur. constituimus inprimis euangelicum instrumentum apostolos auctores habere, quibus hoc munus euangelii promulgandi ab ipso domino sit impositum. si et apostolicos, non tamen solos, sed cum apostolis, [et postapostolicos] quoniam praedicatio discipulorum suspecta fieri posset de gloriae studio, si non adsistat illi auctoritas magistrorum. immo Christi, quae magistros apostolos fecit. denique nobis fidem ex apostolis Iohannes et Matheus insinuant, ex apostolicis Lucas et Marcus instaurant, isdem regulis exorsi, quantum ad unicum deum attinet creatorem et Christum eius, natum ex uirgine, subplementum legis et prophetarum. uiderit enim. si narrationum dispositio uariauit, dummodo de capite fidei conueniat, de quo cum Marcione non conuenit. contra Marcion euangelio, scilicet suo, nullum adscribit auctorem, quasi non licuerit illi titulum quoque adfingere, cui nefas non fuit ipsum corpus euertere. et possem hic iam gradum figere, non agnoscendum contendens opus, quod non erigat frontem, quod nullam constantiam praeferat, nullam fidem repromittat de plenitudine tituli et professione debita auctoris. sed per omnia congredi, malumus, nec dissimulamus quod ex nostro intellegi potest nam ex his commentatoribus, quos habemus, Lucam uidetur Marcion elegisse, quem caederet. porro Lucas non apostolus, sed apostolicus, non magister, sed discipulus, utique magistro minor, certe tanto posterior, quanto posterioris apostoli sectator, Pauli sine dubio, ut et si sub ipsius Pauli nomine euangelium Marcion intulisset, non sufficeret ad fidem singularitas instru-, menti destituta patrocinio antecessorum. exigeretur enim id quoque euangelium, quod Paulus inuenit, cui fidem dedit, cui mox suum congruere gestiit, siquidem propterea Hierosolymam ascendit ad cognoscendos apostolos et consultandos, ne forte in uacuum cucurrisset, id est ne non secundum illos credidisset et non secundum illos euangelizaret. denique ut cum auctoribus contulit et conuenit de regula fidei, dexteras miscuerunt et exinde officia praedicandi distinxerunt, ut illi in Iudaeos, Paulus in Iudaeos et in nationes. igitur si ipse inluminator Lucae auctoritatem antecessorum et fidei et praedicationi suae optauit; quanto magis eam euangelio Lucae expostulem, quae euangelio magistri eius fuit necessaria?