Novatian

Fish with rough scales are considered clean, just as persons with austere, rough, unpolished, steadfast and grave traits are commended. Fish without scales are considered unclean, just as loose, fickle, insincere and effeminate traits are censured. What does the law mean when it states, “You shall not eat the camel”? From the example of an animal, it censures an unruly life and one distorted by unpleasantness. What does the law mean when it forbids one to partake of the flesh of swine? It condemns, you can be sure, a foul and filthy life—one that delights in sordid vices by placing its supreme good not in nobility of spirit but in the flesh alone. What does the law want to indicate when it forbids the hare? It denounces nervous, effeminate men. Who would use as food the flesh of the weasel? In it the law condemns theft.Who would dare partake of the skink? The law abhors a capricious and fickle life. Who would eat the newt? The law detests aberrations of the mind. Who would dare partake of the hawk, the kite or the eagle? The law hates marauders and those who live by violence. Who does not loathe the vulture? The law execrates those who look for booty in someone else’s death. Who would eat the crow? The law detests immoral and shady intentions. When the law prohibits ostrich, it disapproves of intemperance. When it condemns the nightjar, it hates those who shun the light of truth. When it bans the swan, it loathes stiff-necked pride. When it excludes the heron, it dislikes a garrulous and undisciplined tongue. When it detests the bat, it condemns those who seek out the darkness of error that is like night. The law execrates these and similar characteristics in animals. Since the animals, however, are born with such characteristics, they are without reproach. Conversely such qualities are reprehensible in humanity, which was not created with them but learns from them by comparison with contrary nature, through the exercise of their own error.

He is always therefore equal to himself; he never changes or transforms himself into other forms, lest through change he should appear to be also mortal. For the modification implied in change from one thing to another involves a share in the death of some sort. Therefore there is never any addition of parts or of glory in him, lest anything should seem to have ever been wanting to the perfect one. Nor can there be any question of diminution in him, for that would imply that some degree of mortality is in him. On the contrary, what he is, he always is; who he is, he always is; such as he is, he always is. For increase in growth indicates a beginning, whereas any wasting away evidences death and destruction. And therefore he says, “I am God and have not changed.” He always retains his manner of being, because what is not born is not subject to change. For—whatever that being may be that is God—this must always be true of him, that he always is God, preserving himself by his own powers. And therefore he says, “I am who I am.” That which is has this name because it always preserves its same manner of being. Change takes away the name “that which is”; for whatever changes at all is shown to be mortal by the very fact that it changes. It ceases to be what it was and consequently begins to be what it was not. Of necessity, then, God always retains his manner of being, because he is always like unto himself, always equal to himself without any loss arising from change. For that which is not born cannot change, since only those things undergo change which are made or which are begotten; whereas things which at one time were not experience existence by coming into being, and by coming into being they undergo change. On the contrary, things which have neither birth nor maker are exempt from change because they have not a beginning, the cause of change.

He it is who “comes forth as a bridegroom from his bridal chamber.” For he [returns] even to the height; “since no one has ascended into heaven except him who has descended from heaven, the Son of man who is in heaven.” He repeats this very same fact when he says, “Father, glorify me with the glory that I had with you before the world existed.” If this Word descended from heaven as a bridegroom to take on our flesh, so that in taking flesh he might ascend again as Son of man to that place where, as Son of God, the Word had descended, then assuredly, because of a mutual bond, the flesh bears the Word of God, and the Son of God assumes the weakness of the flesh. He ascends with his spouse, the flesh, to the same place from which he had descended without the flesh and receives now that glory that he is shown to have had before the creation of the world. This proves, without the least doubt, that he is God. Nevertheless, since the world itself is said to have been created after him, it is evident that it was created through him. This fact itself gives proof of the glory and the authority of the divinity that is in him, through whom the world was made.

Although heavenly Scripture frequently changes the divine countenance to human form when it says “the eyes of the Lord are on the just”; or “the Lord God smelled the scent of a good fragrance” or “tables written with the finger of God” are given to Moses; or the children of Israel are delivered from the land of Egypt “with a mighty hand and uplifted arm.” Again Scripture asserts, "The mouth of the Lord has spoken these things"; or when the earth is considered “the footstool of God”; or when it says, “Incline your ear, and hear.” We who say “that the law is spiritual” do not confine the measure or form of the divine Majesty within these outlines of our own bodily frame. On the contrary, we extend it infinitely over the field, if I may use the expression, of its own illimitable greatness. For it is written, “If I ascend into heaven, you are there; if I descend into hell, you are present; and if I take my wings and depart across the sea, there shall your hand take hold of me and your right hand hold me fast.” We know the meaning of holy Scripture from the unfolding of the divine dispensation. The prophet, at that time, was still speaking about God in parables according to the faith of the times, not as God really was but as the people were able to comprehend him. The use of such language to describe God must be attributed to the people, not to God. Thus the people were permitted to erect the tabernacle, although God cannot be contained within a tabernacle. The temple was constructed, although God cannot possibly be enclosed within the narrow limits of a temple. God is not finite, but the people’s faculty of perceiving is finite. God is not restricted, but rather the understanding of people’s minds is limited. Accordingly, our Lord said in the Gospel, “The hour shall come when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father,” and he gave the reason: “God is spirit, and therefore they who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.” Thus it is the divine powers that are represented there by means of bodily members, and neither any external appearance nor bodily features of God are set before us.