Testament god the god of the
flesh. In point of fact, Marcion seems to have given such a turn to the
good God's attributes of love, and incapability of wrath, as to make Him
the apathetic, infinitely exalted Being, free from all affections. The
contradiction in which Marcion is here involved is evident, because he
taught expressly that the spirit of man is in itself just as foreign to
the good God as his body. But the strict asceticism which Marcion
demanded as a Christian, could have had no motive, without the Greek
assumption of a metaphysical contrast of flesh and Spirit, which in fact
was also apparently the doctrine of Paul.

3. The relation in which Marcion placed the two Gods, appears at first
sight to be one of equal rank.[387] Marcion himself, according to the
most reliable witnesses, expressly asserted that both were uncreated,
eternal, etc. But if we look more closely we shall see that in Marcion's
mind there can be no thought of equality. Not only did he himself
expressly declare that the creator of the world is a self-contradictory
being of limited knowledge and power, but the whole doctrine of
redemption shews that he is a power subordinate to the good God. We need
not stop to enquire about the details, but it is certain that the
creator of the world formerly knew nothing of the existence of the good
God, that he is in the end completely powerless against him, that he is
overcome by him, and that history in its issue with regard to man, is
determined solely by its relation to the good God. The just god appears
at the end of history, not as an independent being, hostile to the good
God, but as one subordinate to him,[388] so that some scholars, such as
Neander, have attempted to claim for Marcion a doctrine of one
principle, and to deny that he ever held the complete independence of
the creator of the world, the creator of the world being simply an angel
of the good God. This inference may certainly be drawn with little
trouble, as the result of various considerations, but it is forbidden by
reliable testimony. The characteristic of Marcion's teaching is just
this, that as soon as we seek to raise his ideas from the sphere of
practical considerations to that of a consistent theory, we come upon a
tangled knot of contradictions. The theoretic contradictions are
explained by the different interests which here cross each other in
Marcion. In the first place, he was consciously dependent on the Pauline
theolog