On Idolatry 8
Summary: Craftsmen who build or furnish temples share the guilt of idolatry, but they can earn a living through the many other uses of their skills, and must refuse knowingly to make anything for idols.
Latin text · CSEL 20:36–38
Sunt et aliae conplurium artium species, quae, etsi non contingunt idolorum fabricationem, tamen ea, sine quibus idola nil possunt, eodem crimine expediunt. nec enim differt, an extruas uel exornes, si templum, si aram, si aediculam eius instruxeris, si bratteam expresseris aut insignia aut etiam domum fabricaueris. maior est eiusmodi opera, quae non effigiem confert, sed auctoritatem. si ita necessitas exhibitionis extenditur, habent et alias species, quae sine exorbitatione disciplinae id est sine idoli confictura opem uictus praestent. scit albarius tector et tecta sarcire et tectoria inducere et cisternam liare et cymatia distendere et multa alia ornamenta praeter simulacra parietibus incrispare. scit et pictor et marmorarius et aerarius et quicumque caelator latitudines suas et utique multo faciliores. nam qui signum describit, quanto facilius abacum linit? qui de tilia Martem exculpit, quanto citius armarium compingit? nulla ars non alterius artis aut mater aut propinqua est: nihil alterius uacat. tot sunt artium uenae, quot hominum concupiscentiae. sed de mercedibus et manus pretiis interest. perinde interest et de labore. minor merces frequentiore actu repensatur. quot parietes signa desiderant? quot templa et aedes idolis aedificantur? domus uero et praetoria et balnea et insulae quantae? soccus et baxa quotidie deauratur, Mercurius et Serapis non quotidie. sufficiat ad quaestum artificiorum. frequentior est omni superstitione luxuria et ambitio. lances et scyphos facilius ambitio quam superstitio desiderabit. coronas quoque magis luxuria quam sollemnitas erogat. cum igitur ad haec artificiorum genera cohortemur, quae idolum quidem et quae idolo competunt non adtingant, sint autem et hominibus communia saepe quae et idolis, hoc quoque cauere debemus, ne quid scientibus nobis ab aliquibus de manibus nostris in rem idolorum postuletur. quod si concesserimus et non remediis iam usitatis egerimus, non puto nos a contagio idololatriae uacare, quorum manus non ignorantium in officio uel in honore et usu daemoniorum deprehenduntur.
English · Claude translation
There are also kinds of many other arts which, even if they do not touch the making of idols, yet furnish, with the same guilt, the things without which idols have no power. For it makes no difference whether you build or adorn, if you have furnished an idol's temple, its altar, or its shrine, if you have beaten out its gold leaf or its insignia, or even built its house. Such work is greater, which confers on the idol not its image but its authority. If the need of a livelihood is pleaded so far, such men have other kinds of work too, which provide the means of living without departing from discipline, that is, without fashioning an idol. The plasterer knows how to mend roofs, lay on stucco, line a cistern, run moldings, and work many other ornaments besides images in relief on walls. The painter too knows his wider scope, and the marble-mason, the bronze-worker, and every engraver, and their other work is certainly far easier. For if a man can draw a statue, how much more easily can he paint a sideboard? If he can carve a Mars out of lime-wood, how much more quickly can he put together a cupboard? There is no art that is not either the mother or a relative of another art; none stands apart from another. There are as many veins of the arts as there are desires of men. “But there is a difference in wages and in the price of handiwork.” Likewise there is a difference in labor too. A smaller wage is made up by more frequent work. How many walls want statues? How many temples and shrines are built for idols? But how many houses, official residences, baths, and apartment blocks? Slippers and sandals are gilded every day; Mercury and Serapis not every day. Let that suffice for the profit of the crafts. Luxury and ambition are more common than all superstition. Ambition will more readily want dishes and cups than superstition will. Luxury too spends more on garlands than festivals do. Since, then, we urge men to those kinds of crafts which do not touch an idol or the things that belong to an idol, and since the things that men use are often also used for idols, we must take care of this too, that nothing be demanded from our hands by anyone, with our knowledge, for the service of idols. If we allow this, and do not act with the remedies now customary, I do not think we are free from the contagion of idolatry, whose hands are found, not unknowingly, in the service, honor, and use of demons.
About this passage
Notes
Notes on the original text
- Digital text corrected (stray hyphen in the digital text; word split in the digital text): tectoria- inducere → tectoria inducere; superstit io → superstitio; sollemnit as → sollemnitas.
Cite this passage
Tertullian, Idol. 8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-idololatria/8/).
Plain text
Tertullian, Idol. 8 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-idololatria/8/).
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