On the Crown

Contents

Reading pages: 1–12 · 13–15

1. 1A Christian soldier refused to wear the laurel crown at a donative, confessed “I am a Christian,” and was imprisoned; Tertullian defends him against Christians who called him reckless and asked where Scripture forbids the crown.
2. 2All the faithful refrain from crowns; those who ask where Scripture forbids it must equally show where Scripture commands it, and what is not expressly permitted is forbidden.
3. 3Many church practices rest on tradition and custom rather than written Scripture: the baptismal renunciation, triple immersion, milk and honey, the dawn Eucharist, offerings for the dead, not kneeling on Sundays and at Eastertide, and the sign of the cross.
4. 4Tradition, confirmed by custom and supported by reason, binds even without a written law, as the veiling of Jewish women shows; Paul himself gave counsel with the Spirit's authority where he had no command of the Lord.
5. 5Nature itself forbids the crown: God gave flowers to be enjoyed by sight and smell, and to wear them on the head, where they cannot be perceived, is against nature.
6. 6Paul appeals to nature as God's law, and creation is to be used as nature directs, since the devil has corrupted its use, as in the public shows.
7. 7Secular literature shows that crowns were invented by, and dedicated to, those the heathen worshipped as gods, so the crown belongs to idolatry and to the demons behind it.
8. 8Some inventions credited to pagan gods, such as letters, music, medicine, ships, and clothing, are rightly used by the saints and by Christ because they serve real human needs; things beyond such needs, like the crown, are not.
9. 9No patriarch, prophet, priest, apostle, or bishop, nor the temple or its furnishings, was ever crowned; Christ's crown of thorns was a Roman soldiers' insult, and Scripture never mentions crowns among Israel's festivities.
10. 10The crown belongs to idols and to the dead; created things are clean, but using them with the rites and dress of idolatry defiles them, and Christians must flee idolatry in every form.
11. 11Tertullian argues that military service itself is incompatible with the Christian's oath to Christ, since it involves the sword, executions, guarding temples, and pagan rites; soldiers converted in service must leave, avoid sin by every means, or suffer martyrdom.
12. 12The military laurel, myrtle, and olive are sacred to pagan gods, and the crown is worn at vows to Jupiter, donatives, and triumphs; to wear it is to deny Christ, as Judas sold him for silver.
13. 13Every occasion for crowns, civic offices, public festivals, pagan weddings, manumission, and the games, belongs to the world and to idolatry, which Christians renounced at baptism; their citizenship, freedom, and honours are in Christ.
14. 14A man's head belongs to Christ and a woman's is veiled, so neither may be crowned; Christ wore thorns for us, and the Christian should not wear flowers where he wore thorns.
15. 15Christians should keep their heads for the crown God gives the faithful, seen in the visions of Revelation; even initiates of Mithras refuse a crown for their god's sake, to the shame of crowned Christians.