Talk:Tertullian

General
ISTM that this article gushes overmuch (for an encyclopedia article) when describing the qualities of Tertullian's writing. (Just a suggestion... I'm not watching the page.) &mdash; B.Bryant 23:53, 16 Feb 2005 (UTC)

Latin unitas means "oneness, sameness, agreement." Thus, there seems to be a misunderstanding in the article, becuase tri + unitas = "three in agreement / three in oneness / three in agreement", unless this is what is meant by the phrase "tri (three) and unitas (one), tri-unitas (three in one) pointed to God as one God in substance and nature, but three in person — the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. " —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)

The Latin "trinitas" does NOT come from "tri" + "unitas." It comes from the Latin "trini" "three each" or simply "three" and the suffix "-tas" = the English "-ty," as in "unity," "corporeality," etc.

There is inconsistency among the dates for birth and death among the different languages, including a difference between the English language article and the "Simple English" article. Perhaps they should all agree?

POV rewording help
The following sentence seems POV and ackward and was wondering if anyone could rewrite it. I'm having a hard time trying to change it:
 * "If Tertullian went to an unhealthy extreme in his counsels of asceticism, he is easily forgiven when one recalls his own moral vigor and his great services as an ingenuous and intrepid defender of the Christian religion, which with him, as later with Martin Luther, was first and chiefly an experience of his own heart. " —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Andrew c (talk • contribs).

I fiddled with it a little. What do you think?--Okieinexile 20:24, 9 December 2006 (UTC)

Married Presbyters
The phrase "In the church of Carthage he was ordained a presbyter, though he was married" (section: Life) suggests that presbyters should be celibate, which is counter to the doctrine prevalent over all christianity at his time (i.e. presbyters were required to be married as per 1Tim.3:2 and Tit.1:6) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)

The sentence says at the end that it was not unusual at the time to be a married presbyter. I think the "though he was married" was added to accentuate the difference between now and then, not that it was an unusual thing in that age. Coppcar (talk) 06:55, 3 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Presbyters were not required to be married, as this would contradict Paul's 1 Cor 7. Rather, the requirement for one wife was a maximal requirement; i.e. presbyters should have one wife is not to be interpreted as that they must marry, but that they should only marry one wife and no more. Otherwise 4th century mainstream Christianity would find itself in contradiction with a Bible passage.  Gabr-  el  23:51, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Biographical Notes
This articles seems to ignore a lot of recent academic scholarship in favour of turn a distinct flavour of early 20th century theology. This is particularly pronounced concerning Tertullian's education in classical rheteoric (Sider 1971). The biographical information is very tradition rendition, it takes Jerome's claims about Tertullian much less critically than they should be. E.G. the title ascribed to Tertullians' father "Centurio Proconsularis" is rather dubious, it is not apparent if that ever was a legitimate roman military title. (Barnes 1971) In a similar way, we really can't say for certain about his being a presybter, his break with the Church or anything else mentioned in Jerome's 'biography'. We might think that Tertullian's own writing seem to be more authoritative on personal details in which case he was most likely married layman. (Dunn 2004)This article could really do with work over that takes into account the more recent information available. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Special:Contributions/ (talk)
 * As someone currently studying Tertullian for a university course, I strongly endorse these comments. The article needs a thorough working over in lots of ways, though it does rejoice in a lot reference to primary sources available online, which makes it useful for that alone. Ender&#39;s Shadow Snr (talk) 23:31, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

Death penality
From : "Even if conviction resulted, there could be no capital sentence, a practice dating back to Tertullian's fourth century belief that the church did not have the authority to impose the death penalty on believers." Other mentions of this? --Ann O'nyme 23:55, 15 January 2007 (UTC)

WikiProject class rating
This article was automatically assessed because at least one WikiProject had rated the article as start, and the rating on other projects was brought up to start class. BetacommandBot 21:54, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

Suggested edit
The Section on Tertullian's life cites Augustine (De Haeresibus, lxxxvi)claiming that he, improbably, asserts that Tertullian returned to the Catholic Church before his death. I read the citation and Augustine makes no such claim, though he does say that the Tertullianists, members of the sect he founded, disappeared by the 4th century, returning to the Catholic Church, and that they surrendered their basillica which is "even now a very famous one, to the Catholic Church." Nowhere does he suggest that Tertullian himself converted back to the Church before his death. (SEE http://www.tertullian.org/tertullianistae/de_haeresibus.htm) Calvinwang (talk) 19:35, 9 July 2008 (UTC)


 * Make the change. You're right.  Roger Pearse 20:20, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * Change applied. Roger Pearse 13:51, 2 September 2008 (UTC)

Quality query
The article has been worked over by someone with rather a lot of enthusiasm and not a lot of knowledge. It contains a great deal of stuff that skews it. There is not the slightest evidence that Tertullian was of Berber descent for instance, four 'references' notwithstanding. I don't know how to improve this article except by chopping a lot of it. Suggestions? Roger Pearse 20:20, 15 August 2008 (UTC)


 * In the absence of suggestions, I have chopped that piece of misinformation. I've done a bit of revision, but it needs much more.  It also needs some decent references. Roger Pearse 13:50, 2 September 2008 (UTC)  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Roger Pearse (talk • contribs)
 * Well someone has restored that "piece of misinformation" with a footnote to the Works of Tertullian in French (http://www.tertullian.org/french/french.htm), which seems to provide no support for him being a Berber. I have deleted it based upon the lack of support, and potentially fraudulent footnote. --Bejnar (talk) 17:17, 19 November 2008 (UTC)

"Berber origin"?
There's an odd entry appended to the first sentence, that reads "...Tertullian was Berber origin." This is incorrect English (unlike the rest of the first paragraph), so I suspect it comes from a different author. Regardless, there is no mention in the rest of the entry about Tertullian being of Berber origin, nor is its source cited, so I doubt its veracity. Any objection to its removal? Bricology (talk) 19:58, 18 December 2008 (UTC)


 * There is no evidence that he was a Berber. The source cited does not address the issue, but merely makes an offhand comment, perhaps even a joke, about Berbers. This lame mis-information should be deleted. Rwflammang (talk) 14:44, 15 April 2010 (UTC)
 * Several in-line citations are now in the aritcle on this point.50.111.24.85 (talk) 09:55, 22 December 2018 (UTC)

Biased
The following quote seems biased to me, even though I am a Protestant. "In later life he became a Montanist and has been seen by some as the first Protestant[3]."

It doesn't matter if some people view this, because Tertullian was not a Protestant. Wikipedia is supposed to be a source for correct and unbiased information,and the last part of the quote should be removed. Grailknighthero (talk) 04:44, 3 January 2009 (UTC)


 * I have checked on the book by Timothy David Barnes, and can't find a single mentioning of the word "protestant" and only one mention of the word "protest" on page 248. Take a look here for whoever wants to see for themselves:

http://books.google.com/books?id=eH-BNqfc8iMC&dq=Barnes,+Tertullian&printsec=frontcover&source=bl&ots=esYTbMCKDH&sig=jwxUDubpdGkmoOsBWLFjs5eC89U&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=1&ct=result#PPA3,M1

I am going to remove this.  Gabr-  el  23:32, 14 January 2009 (UTC)

Martyred or not?
Nothing is mentioned whether he was martyred or not. Its important to know, since Tertullian himself condemned those who denied their faith upon the threat of death.  Gabr-  el  23:53, 26 April 2009 (UTC) There is no suggestion anywhere that he was martyred. Jerome indicates that he lived to a very old age. There is no reason to believe that he was. Ender&#39;s Shadow Snr (talk) 23:27, 25 November 2009 (UTC)

"Other Latin formulations that first appear in his work etc."
In the general introduction of the article we read:"Other Latin formulations that first appear in his work are 'three Persons, one Substance' as the Latin 'tres Personae, una Substantia' (itself from the Koine Greek 'treis Hypostases, Homoousios')."Due to the strong claims, unsupported by specific quotations, I have appended to the sentence the following inline warnings.

Unless the needed citations are provided and correspond to the text of the sentence, I am going to edit it or remove it altogether. Miguel de Servet (talk) 13:53, 17 August 2010 (UTC)

I don't know whether Tertullian was first to use the Latin phrase, but I do know that it could not have come from the Greek at that time: the combination of hypostasis and homoousias were only applied to Trinitarian questions in an orthodox way in the 4th century; in the controversy surrounding Paul of Samosata, the term homoousias was actually condemned in the 3rd century (see Ratzinger, Introduction to Christianity, 2004, p. 172). 173.64.150.186 (talk) 18:37, 6 October 2010 (UTC)Anonymous

Unnecessary Asceticism
Under the section "Moral Beliefs", a line is quoted out of context in regards to male ejaculation. The quote makes it seem as if he is arguing against sexual functions, but if you look at the passage, it's clear that he was drawing an analogy to the nature of body and soul. I believe this should be removed. GrimmC (talk) 10:11, 13 October 2010 (UTC)

Vague doubts cast on Jerome's Accuracy as a Reference
"Jerome claimed that Tertullian's father held the position of 'centurio proconsularis' ("aide-de-camp") in the Roman army in Africa.[9] However, it is unclear whether any such position in the Roman military ever existed.[10]" In what way is it unclear? If there is no other mention of such a post in other documents, then state that. That is an argument from silence, and can and should be made, but the current wording is a bit weaselly as the words "it is unclear" suggests some greater level of uncertainty and seems to cast general doubt on Jerome's account through uncertainty. If we have detailed listings of military positions that do not include this position, then we should state that, but it should be stated where and when those positions were listed. After all, Jerome is a source, and he could be correct and others be wrong. The reader should be presented with enough information to make their own choice as to which source to believe. Muchado (talk) 04:34, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
 * I see now from an earlier comments that this is probably a reworked quote from Barnes, 1971. If so, then it would be better to simply quote it explicitly, instead of leaving it as a vague comment. Muchado (talk) 04:46, 7 August 2013 (UTC)
 * Slammed in another cite, which might be a derivation from the one already there. I understand the problem. I don't know how to resolve it. As the old phrase goes, "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence." Student7 (talk) 20:41, 11 August 2013 (UTC)
 * There's really no reason to include it unless it's a more widely acknowledged issue. There's often overlap and ambiguity in official Roman titles. I've removed it for now. AlphabeticThing9 (talk) 22:34, 9 March 2020 (UTC)

Caps in Latin
I have capitalized Trinity where changed. Partly from current use. Partly from WP:UE. Yes, Latin in not English, but "modern" Latin may have evolved. We need to employ current usage here. Note that Trinity is universally capitalized in its' own article. Student7 (talk) 18:30, 26 December 2014 (UTC)

The pictures of Tertullian
These are, of course, of a date long after his death, and their appearance does not suggest the Roman citizen that he was. What is the basis for choosing them, and are they actually appropriate, giving a misleading impression which is surely worse than none? Ender&#39;s Shadow Snr (talk) 18:14, 3 April 2016 (UTC)

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The Link for reading Froom doesn't work.
Meaning I have no means to fact check anything claimed about his Eschatology here since Tertullian's own writings aren't cited directly at all. And I've seen contradictory claims made about what he taught. --JaredMithrandir (talk) 14:49, 4 December 2018 (UTC)
 * Now that I've read Froom and what Froom quotes, Tertulian does not say The Antichrist comes from The Church, Froom is imagining him to have made a connection on the Temple of God issue he didn't make. --JaredMithrandir (talk) 08:38, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

List of works
The list of works is taken from Patrologia Latina and includes prefaces or commentaries by later writers, which of course are not Tertullian's works. For example: Dissertatio D. Le Nourry in Apologet. libr. II ad Nat. et libr. ad Scapulam, which is a commentary by Le Nourry (whoever that was) on Tertullian's Apologeticus. I'm removing them. Wgrommel (talk) 17:05, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

Ethnicity
Hello, do you seriously consider these sources as reliable to use for the ethnicity of a historical figure? First of all, all of these French sources' authors are theologians, priests, economic specialists that holds no degree in history to make such statements.
 * 1) Le Berbère-- lumière de l'Occident by Vincent Serralda: A catholic priest who lived in Algeria definitely NOT a historian!
 * 2) Les Berbères face à leur destin by Lahcen Brouski: Again NOT a historian and the book is not even a history book.
 * 3) L'Algérie et son passé by André Berthier: This guy is the only one who might be credible although modern sources contradicts his views.
 * 4) Présence berbère et nostalgie païenne by Mohammed-Saâd Zemmouri: Not notable and not even a historian either.
 * 5) Intellectual Traditions of Pre-colonial Africa by Constance B. Hilliard: provide me a quote from this source because I was unable to find such statement regarding his Berber origin.
 * There are better sources available from notable academic publishers who emphasize his ethnic dispute, yet these decades-old sources just mention the word 'Berber' without even giving more details on the matter. By the way, it is unbelievable how these sources has been added by an inactive user 4 years ago across many articles without anyone verifying them for 4 years! So I have been checking these sources for the past 3 days. Also I sincerely doubt that you even read or verified them. --MWahaiibii (talk) 23:04, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I haven't read them and they could be discussed, but I cannot ignore the fact that you deleted them without explanation, just like you deleted the mention of the word Berber from other articles where it took me all of 30 seconds to find the relevant sources. M.Bitton (talk) 23:11, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
 * No where did I remove any well-sourced claims, I removed the word Berber and the sources from articles with these same French sources backing them. These unreliable French-language sources with typical Non-neutral POV titles like The Berbers light of the West added by the same user across the African saints articles unnoticed. Now of course you can use these sources for other religious matters but as a proof of the disputed origin of historical figures? --MWahaiibii (talk) 23:20, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
 * That's not what I said. Here, for instance, you removed what is easily attributable. Why would you do that? M.Bitton (talk) 23:25, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I told you, the source provided was AGAIN Le Berbère-- lumière de l'Occident by Vincent Serralda, and yes I checked it, it does not even state in an explicit manner that Adrian was Berber. If you meant by "easily attributable" Adrian's Berberness, then sure go ahead add the correct reliable citation. I did not take the time to check in other sources if he was Berber or not, all I did was remove the unreliable source and the claim it supported. --MWahaiibii (talk) 23:32, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
 * You just confirmed what I said about not even trying to find a suitable source before deleting the content. Anyway, while I'm not expected to provide you with a quote from the last source (since I'm not the editor who added it), here's what I managed to extract from the source: Unfortunately, far too little scholarly attention appears to have been paid to the cultural influences of Tertullian, Cyprian , and Augustine ' s African Berber backgrounds. M.Bitton (talk) 23:59, 28 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I'm not obliged to find sources for each unsourced addition, the burden of proof is on the one who added it, not me. Refer to PROVEIT. Moving on, the main issue here is your desire to keep the unreliable sources and treat them as "most of the sources", when all I did is remove them and replace them with sources that actually goes into details about his origins and not just throw in the ethnic background in the text; saying "Berber saint...", "Of Berber backgorund..." with no further reasoning. Besides, they literally do not pass RS at all, except Intellectual Traditions of Pre-colonial Africa (It looks reliable to me, but then again it only refer to his background in a shallow passing mention as per your quote above). On the other hand, notable reliable sources either simply don't bring up the ethnic issue (knowing that it's disputed and unknown) Check: Britannica, or they discuss the ethnic dispute without affixing one to him, check: Tertullian the African. So, I still think my previous wording is way more neutral and based on reliability than your current biased one.
 * Tertullian's origins are disputed; He was either a Punic or Berber African, and he referred to himself as Poenicum inter Romanos (lit. 'Punic among Romans') in his book De Pallio.
 * What you think? --MWahaiibii (talk) 11:39, 29 May 2021 (UTC)
 * You are not obliged to do anything, just like I wasn't obliged to cite the above quote, but I did it for reasons that I don't expect you to understand.
 * Nope, the main issue is the fact that you removed the sources without explanation.
 * There are two sources (Berthier and Constance B) that pass RS easily and will be kept.
 * Contrary to what you seem to think, Wilhite's source attributes the Punic claim to "René Braun", who happens to be a linguist (and not a historian) and is probably less reliable than "Dr Zemmouri Mohamed Saad".
 * I will reword it to comply with what the sources say. M.Bitton (talk) 14:02, 29 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "Nope, the main issue is the fact that you removed the sources without explanation."
 * My edit summary says that they were unreliable, in my first response here, I listed reasons why they are not reliable. If this is not an explanation, then I really don't know what's your definition of an "explanation" that you keep on repeating.
 * "There are two sources (Berthier and Constance B) that pass RS easily and will be kept."
 * Exactly what I said. Check my responses again, since I'm starting to doubt that you even pay attention when reading them. I said "This guy is the only one who might be credible, although modern sources contradicts his views." while regarding Constance B, "It looks reliable to me, but then again it only refer to his background in a shallow passing mention as per your quote above". Regardless, I'm willing to compromise here for the sake of not wasting more time on this issue and accept this new wording, which actually seems better than your previous biased one. And I'm sure you already went through it, but please take a second look at NEUTRAL. Cheers --MWahaiibii (talk) 22:24, 29 May 2021 (UTC)

Alleged Montanism; priesthood of all believers
Many modern scholars point out a lack of direct evidence for Tertullian's Montanism. The current article correctly points this out and mentions that the sources are Jerome and Augustine, who were active 200 years later. (Some good references here.)

However, the well has been polluted: so many Protestant and Catholic sources write of it as an established fact: it is likely that Protestant writers have done so in order to find some proto-Protestant for polemical reasons, and Catholic writers have done so because Jerome and Augustine have some authority as saints or Doctors. (Some of the problems are that some of Tertullian's even late views do not match with the Montanists, some of his views are getting cast anachronistically and supply in the light of Protestant doctrines, ... and there may be some circular thinking where if Tertullian was a Montanist, and T said X then the Montanists must say X too and vice versa.)

So I think editors need to be careful to note and write that there is this controversy and polemic intentions that should cause WP:RS problems with many sources. I think the article needs to be re-researched. Editors need to be quite clear-eyed that Sources older than 50 years or so, or which are not informed by modern scholarship, may have information that no longer reflects academic consensus.

And another problem I see: faulty understanding of what different denominations teach: the article (and a citation in another article about Tertullian) says that Tertullian was like a Protestant because he held that if a priest was not available, anyone could baptize. However, this is standard Catholic doctrine. (It is not, however, the case for sacramental confession and sacramental eucharist, where an (ordained) ministerial priest is needed.) So things, it seems to me, are not a simple as "late Tertullian was a Montanist and therefore a proto-Protestant". Rick Jelliffe (talk) 14:31, 7 March 2024 (UTC)