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Tertullian on Traditional Christian Practices related to Baptism and the Eucharist - Latin Text with English translation
from De Corona, 3.
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And how long shall we draw the saw to and fro through
this line, when we have an ancient practice, which by anticipation has made
for us the state, i.e., of the question? If no passage of Scripture has
prescribed it, assuredly custom, which without doubt flowed from tradition,
has confirmed it. For how can anything come into use, if it has not first
been handed down? Even in pleading tradition, written authority, you say,
must be demanded. Let us inquire, therefore, whether tradition, unless it be
written, should not be admitted. Certainly we shall say that it ought not to
be admitted, if no cases of other practices which, without any written
instrument, we maintain on the ground of tradition alone, and the
countenance thereafter of custom, affords us any precedent. To deal with
this matter briefly, I shall begin with baptism. When we are going to enter
the water, but a little before, in the presence of the congregation and
under the hand of the president, we solemnly profess that we disown the
devil, and his pomp, and his angels. Hereupon we are thrice immersed, making
a somewhat ampler pledge than the Lord has appointed in the Gospel. Then
when we are taken up (as new-born children), we taste first of all a
mixture of milk and honey, and from that day we refrain from the daily bath
for a whole week. We take also, in congregations before daybreak, and from
the hand of none but the presidents, the sacrament of the Eucharist, which
the Lord both commanded to be eaten at meal-times, and enjoined to be taken
by all alike. As often as the anniversary comes round, we make offerings for
the dead as birthday honours. We count fasting or kneeling in worship on the
Lord’s day to be unlawful. We rejoice in the same privilege also from Easter to
Whitsunday. We feel pained should any wine or bread, even though our own, be
cast upon the ground. At every forward step and movement, at every going in and
out, when we put on our clothes and shoes, when we bathe, when we sit at table,
when we light the lamps, on couch, on seat, in all the ordinary actions of daily
life, we trace upon the forehead the sign. |
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Tertullian
Baptism
Eucharist
On the Crown
Migne Latin
Patrologiae Latinae Cursus Completus
Patrologia Latina