Tertullian — Against Marcion 4.30
How did he again settle a question about a healing done on the sabbath? ‘Which of you on the sabbath does not loose his donkey or ox from the manger and lead it to drink?’ Therefore according to the law’s condition he worked and confirmed the law, not dissolved it—the law ordering no work to be done except what would be done for every life, how much more for a human life?
I recognize that congruence of parables is to be demanded everywhere. ‘The kingdom of God,’ he says, ‘is like a mustard seed which a man received and sowed in his garden.’ Who is to be understood in the man’s person? Surely Christ, who—though Marcion’s—is called Son of Man, who received from the Father the seed of the kingdom, namely the word of the gospel, and sowed it in the garden, in this world of course.
Suppose now in a man; but when he said ‘in his garden,’ and neither the world nor the man is that other’s but the Creator’s, therefore he who sowed in what is his is shown to be the Creator’s.
Or if, to escape this snare, they turn the man’s person from Christ to a man receiving the kingdom’s seed and sowing in his heart’s garden, not even that material will fit another.
Sabbath mercy to beasts confirms the Creator’s law; the mustard garden is his world—so the sower is his Christ.
Latin
Quaestionem rursus de curatione sabbatis facta quomodo discussit? unusquisque uestrum sabbatis non soluits asinum aut bouem suum a praesepi et ducit ad potum? ergo secundum condicionem legis operatus legem confirmauit, non dissoluit, iubentem nullum opus fieri, nisi quod fieret omni animae, quanto potius humanae? Parabolarum congruentiam ubique recognoscor exigere. simile est regnum dei, inquit, grano sinapis, quod accepit homo et seminauit in horto suo. quis in persona hominis intellegendus? utique Christus, qui, licet Marcionis, filius hominis est dictus, qui accepit a patre semen regni, sermonem scilicet euangelii, et seminauit in horto, isto utique in mundo. puta nunc in homine, sed cum in (suo) horto dixerit nec mundus autem nec homo illius sit, sed creatoris, ergo qui in suum seminarit creatoris ostenditur. aut si, ut hunc laqueum euadant, conuerterint hominis personam a Christo in hominem accipientem semen regni et seminantem in horto cordis sui, nec ipsa materia alii conueniet quam creatori. De sequenti plane similitudine uereor, ne forte alterius dei regnum portendat. fermento enim comparauit illud, non azymis, quae familiariora sunt creatori. congruit et haec coniectura mendicantibus argumenta. itaque et ego uanitatem uanitate depellam, fermentationem quoque congruere dicens regno creatoris, quia post illam clibanus uel furnus gehennae sequatur. quale est enim, ut (sit) lenissimi dei regnum quod etiam iudicii feruor lacrimosa austeritate subsequitur? Quotiens adhuc se iudicem ostendit et in iudice creatorem! quotiens utique reicit et damnat reiciendo! sicut hic quoque: cum surrexerit, inquit, pater familiae — quo? nisi quo dixit Esaias: cum surrexerit comminuere terram - et cluserit ostium — utique excludendis iniquis, quibus pulsantibus respondebit: nescio unde sitis, et rursus, enumerantibus quod coram illo ederint et biberint et in plateis eorum docuerit [adiciet]: recedite a me omnes, operarii iniquitatis —, illic erit fletus et dentium frendor, — ubi? foris scilicet, ubi erunt exclusi ostio cluso; ab eo ergo erit poena, a quo fit exclusio in poenam — \'cum uidebunt iustos introeuntes in regnum dei, se uero detineri foris\'. a quo? si a creatore, quis ergo erit intus recipiens iustos in regnum? deus bonus? quid ergo illic creatori? ut foris detineat in poenam quos aduersarius eius exclusit? suscipiendos a se, si utique, magis in aduersarii bilem. sed et ille, exclusurus iniquos, sciat utique creatorem illos detenturum in poenam aut non sciat oportet. ergo aut nolente eo detinebuntur, et minor est illo, qui detinet, cedens ei nolens, aut si uult ita fieri, ipse ita faciendum iudicauit. et non erit melior creatore ipse auctor infamiae creatoris. haec si nulla ratione consistunt, ut alius punire alius liberare credatur, unius erit tam iudicium quam et regnum, et dum unius est utrumque, qui et iudicat, creatoris est.