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Fragment number Vinzent 3
Klostermann 43
Rettb. 37
Ancient source used Eusebius, Against Marcellus 1.2
Modern edition M. Vinzent, Markell von Ankyra: Die Fragmente (Leiden, 1997).
Translator’s Note Basically, Marcellus is arguing that “Logos” is the original name and title of the one who is normally referred to as “Jesus Christ,” and that other names such as “Jesus,” “Christ,” “the way,” “the life,” “the bread,” “the door,” etc., were added to him only when he assumed human form. Marcellus makes his argument from the opening of John’s Gospel: “In the beginning was the Logos” (1.1). Since this Divine Person is called the Logos from the very beginning, “Logos” is his first and therefore preeminent title. All other names are merely temporary; they apply only to the Logos’s “human dispensation,” which lasts as long as the current age. Once this dispensation has ended, all names except “Logos” will cease to be used in eternity.

… so that it is clear in every way that no other name corresponds with the eternity of the Logos than that which the holiest disciple of the Lord, the Apostle John, used at the beginning of his Gospel. For since the assumption of the flesh, he was proclaimed as “Christ” as well as “Jesus,” as “the life” as well as “the way” (John 14.6) and “the day” (6.39, 40, 44, 54; 8.56; 12.48; 14.20) and “the resurrection” (11.5) and “the door” (10.7, 9) and “the bread” (6.35, 48, 51), and if the Divine Scriptures call him by any other name, we should not forget that the first name that belonged to him was “the Logos.” For this reason, the most holy evangelist and disciple of the Lord, at the very start of his Gospel, being greatly awakened by the Spirit, does not call to mind more recent names, but the original one, saying, “In the beginning was the Logos, and the Logos was with God, and the Logos was God” (1.1). He said this to show that if there is any new or more recent name, it belongs to his human dispensation since it is new and recent.

Translated by Daniel Noonan under the supervision of Prof. Glen L. Thompson

Last updated: 12-6-2010

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