Heresy in the Cloak of Scripture

“For as by man came death,” you say, “so by man came also the resurrection of the dead.” Do you really try to prove your wrong and impious notion by the witness of the apostle? Do you bring the “chosen vessel” into disgrace by mixing him up with your wicked ideas? What I mean is this: because you cannot understand the author of your salvation, the apostle must be made out to have denied God. And yet, if you wanted to use the apostle as a witness, why were you content with one passage and passed over all the others in silence? Why did you not at once add this: “Paul, an apostle not from men nor through man, but through Jesus Christ”? Or this: “We speak wisdom among the perfect,” and soon after, “which none of the rulers of this world knew; for if they had known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory”? Or this: “For in him dwells all the fullness of the Godhead bodily”? And this: “One Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things”? Or do you partly agree and partly disagree with the apostle, accepting him only so far as he calls Christ man because of the incarnation, and rejecting him where he speaks of him as God? Paul does not deny that Jesus is man, but he still confesses that this man is God. He declares that the resurrection came to mankind by man in such a way that he shows that in that man God rose. For see whether he declares that the one who rose was God, just as he bears witness that the one who was crucified was the Lord of glory. [a]