On Prayer 28 · Sophia Scriptura

Latin text · CSEL 20:198–199

Haec est enim hostia spiritalis quae pristina sacrificia deleuit. quo mihi, inquit, multitudinem sacrificiorum uestrorum? plenus sum holocaustomatum arietum et adipem agnorum et sanguinem taurorum et hircorum nolo. quis enim requisiuit ista de manibus uestris? quae ergo quaesierit deus euangelium docet. ueniet hora, inquit, cum ueri adoratores adorabunt patrem in spiritu et ueritate. deus enim spiritus est, et adoratores itaque tales requirit. nos sumus ueri adoratores et ueri sacerdotes, qui spiritu orantes spiritu sacrificamus orationem hostiam dei propriam et acceptabilem, quam scilicet requisiuit, quam sibi prospexit. hanc de toto corde deuotam, fide pastam, ueritate curatam, innocentia integram, castitate mundam, agapen coronatam cum pompa operum bonorum inter psalmos et hymnos deducere ad dei altare debemus omnia nobis a deo impetraturam.

English · Claude translation

For this is the spiritual victim which has done away with the former sacrifices. “What to me,” he says, “is the multitude of your sacrifices? I am full of burnt offerings of rams, and I do not want the fat of lambs and the blood of bulls and goats. For who has required these from your hands?” What, then, God has required, the gospel teaches: “The hour will come,” he says, “when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth. For God is spirit,” and so he requires worshipers of this kind. We are the true worshipers and the true priests, who, praying in the spirit, offer in the spirit the sacrifice of prayer, a victim proper and acceptable to God, which he has required, which he has provided for himself. This, devoted from the whole heart, fed by faith, tended by truth, whole in innocence, clean in chastity, crowned with love, we ought to lead to God's altar with a procession of good works amid psalms and hymns, and it will obtain everything for us from God.

About this passage

Source

CSEL 20:198–199 · August Reifferscheid and Georg Wissowa, eds., Quinti Septimi Florentis Tertulliani Opera, Pars 1, CSEL 20 (Prague: Tempsky; Vienna: Tempsky; Leipzig: Freytag, 1890), 180–200 · Latin text: August Reifferscheid and Georg Wissowa (CSEL 20), digitized by Open Greek and Latin, University of Leipzig (csel-dev), CC BY-SA 4.0

Text

As printed in CSEL 20. Manuscript variants and the editor's apparatus are not reproduced; no textual problem is noted in this passage.

Translation

Claude translation (claude-opus-5-5), 2026-09-27 · Translated by Claude from the Latin text of CSEL 20; made independently of existing English translations.

Compare

Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 3 (1885) (an older public-domain English translation, whole volume at CCEL; checked against ours only after ours was made)

Scripture

Isa 1:11 · quotation, high confidence
Isa 1:12 · quotation, high confidence
John 4:23 · quotation, high confidence
John 4:24 · quotation, high confidence
1 Pet 2:5 · allusion, high confidence
Eph 5:19 · allusion, medium confidence

Topics

Prayer

Notes

Translation notes

The quotations are Isa 1:11–12 and John 4:23–24; the allusions are 1 Pet 2:5 and Eph 5:19. “Love” renders agape.

Notes on the original text

Digital text corrected (stray punctuation in the digital text): uestris?. → uestris?.

Cite this passage

Tertullian, Or. 28 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-oratione/28/).

Plain text

Tertullian, Or. 28 (trans. Sophia Scriptura, https://sophiascriptura.com/fathers/tertullian-oratione/28/).