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540 means to say only that “we Montanists” have always so believed. The language, however, will not lend itself to this interpretation. Tertullian does say that since he became a Montanist his belief has been strengthened, and elsewhere (chap, xiii) he intimates that the Montanists were especially clear as to the “economy,” as he calls the distinction within the unity of the Godhead. Perhaps he means that special prophetic deliverances expounding the Trinity in unity had among the Montanists been added to the traditionary faith. Perhaps he means only that the emphasis laid by the Montanistic movement, in distinction from the Father and Son, on the activity and personality of the Paraclete as the introducer of a new dispensation, had conduced to clearer views of the distinctions included in the unity of the Godhead. But the very adduction of this clearer or fuller view as consequent upon his defection to Montanism, only throws into prominence the fact that the doctrine itself belonged to his pre-Montanistic period also. “We as always, so now especially,” contrasts two periods and can only mean that this doctrine dated in his consciousness from a day earlier than his Montanism. We must understand Tertullian then as affirming that the doctrine of the Trinity in unity which he is teaching belongs to the traditionary lore of the Church. His testimony, in this case, is express that what he teaches in this tract is nothing new, but only a part of his original faith.

This testimony is supported by the occurrence in earlier treatises by Tertullian—notably in his great Apology —of passages in which essential elements of his doctrine are given expression in his characteristic forms. And it is still further supported by the preservation of such a treatise by the hand of another, as Hippolytus’ fragment against Noëtus in which something similar to the same doctrine is enunciated. It has been contended indeed that Tertullian borrowed from Hippolytus, or that Hippolytus borrowed from Tertullian. And there may be little decisive to urge against either hypothesis if otherwise commended. But in the absence of such further commendation it seems much more probable that the two treatises independently embody a point of view already traditional in the Church. In any case Hippolytus must be believed to be stating in essence no other doctrine than that which