Prescription
Tertullian, Prescription against Heretics
Tertullian of Carthage
Not an argument with the heretics. A motion to have them thrown out before the argument starts.
- Catch rate
- 105 / 255
- Base research
- 100
- Stat total
- 246
Base stats
Every stat is a checkable fact about the actual book, not a designer's mood. Bars are drawn against the highest value any book reaches.
Why these numbers
The game's own explanation, as a reader sees it in the backpack.
A short, tightly argued treatise — complete, but not a long book. Middling Stamina.
Tertullian does not out-argue the heretics here; he rules them out of court before they can start. Borrowing a rule of Roman property law, he shows the church has held these Scriptures since the apostles, so a newcomer has no standing to dispute them. Devastating, and high Contend.
It comes down to us through three independent manuscript traditions that agree — the ninth-century Codex Agobardinus, the Cluny collection, and the Corbie collection. Well secured, if not quite as well as the Apology.
Remembered mostly for one sentence about Athens and Jerusalem — usually misquoted, and usually by people who have not read the rest.
Cited for this book
Praescriptio longi temporis was a term of Roman real-estate law: hold a property long enough and a newcomer with a deed cannot even open a case about it. Tertullian applies it to the Bible — the church has held these writings since the apostles, so the heretics are barred from the court before they begin. Case dismissed.
Development
A book develops as it is read — the fragment becomes the work, the work becomes the corpus.
Moves learned
By levelling up. A book that develops keeps what it knew and learns the rest on its new schedule.
| Lv | Move | Type | Cat. | Pwr | Acc | PP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Rule of Faith | Christology | Argument | 55 | 100% | 15 |
| 1 | Random Verse | Bible | Argument | 10 | 100% | 30 |
| 8 | Chapter… | Bible | Scripture | — | — | 15 |
| 12 | Case Dismissed | Rationality | Argument | 65 | 100% | 10 |
| 16 | Athens and Jerusalem | Rationality | Argument | 60 | 100% | 15 |
| 19 | Seek Until You Find | Rationality | Argument | 60 | 100% | 15 |
| 21 | Produce the Records | Ecclesiology | Argument | 70 | 100% | 10 |