Ante-Nicene Fathers (Volume 3) - XXVII - On the resurrection of the flesh commenced

Required reading
Ante-Nicene Fathers (Volume 3) (Available from Amazon or free here) - Commence 'On the resurrection of the flesh' by reading Chapters 1 to 32.

My summary
Today Tertullian defends the resurrection of the dead.

After discounting the testimony of heathens against the resurrection, Tertullian affirms the bodily resurrection because of:
(i) God's creation of flesh in the beginning;
(ii) man's soul in relation to the flesh;
(iii) Christianity's provision for the flesh;
(iv) Christ's taking on flesh;
(v) Scripture's testimony about the goodness of flesh;
(vi) the power of God to raise the flesh;
(vii) the testimony of nature;
(viii) the flesh's role in human behaviour;
(ix) the final judgement;
(x) Scripture's statement of the 'resurrection of the dead';
(xi) Paul's testimony;
(xii) John's testimony;
(xiii) the testimony of the prophets.

What grabbed me
I liked how Tertullian defended God's power to raise the dead: 'For if God produced all things whatever out of nothing, He will be able to draw forth from nothing even the flesh which had fallen into nothing; or if He moulded other things out of matter, He will be able to call forth the flesh too from somewhere else, into whatever abyss it may have been engulphed. And surely He is most competent to re-create who created, inasmuch as it is a far greater work to have produced than to have reproduced, to have imparted a beginning, than to have maintained a continuance. On this principle, you may be quite sure that the restoration of the flesh is easier than its first formation. '

God is certainly powerful enough to raise the dead if he chooses.

Next week's reading
Conclude 'On the resurrection of the flesh'.

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.