Commentary on Zechariah
Tertullian (155–240)
And therefore this question must at once be determined, whether the discipline of patience is enjoined by the Creator? When by Zechariah he commanded, "Let none of you imagine evil against his brother," he did not expressly include his "neighbor;" but then in another passage he says, "Let none of you imagine evil in your hearts against his neighbor." He who counseled that an injury should be forgotten was still more likely to counsel the patient endurance of it.
We must after all this turn our attention to those scriptures also which forbid our belief in such a resurrection as is held by your Animalists (for I will not call them Spiritualists), that it is either to be assumed as taking place now, as soon as men come to the knowledge of the truth, or else that it is accomplished immediately after their departure from this life... Who has yet beheld Jesus descending from heaven in like manner as the apostles saw Him ascend, according to the appointment of the two angels? [Acts 1:11] Up to the present moment they have not, tribe by tribe, smitten their breasts, looking on Him whom they pierced. [John 19:37; Zechariah 12:10] No one has as yet fallen in with Elias; [Malachi 4:5] no one…
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