Tertullian, the “father of Latin theology,” was born in Carthage around AD 150. After his conversion to Christianity, he began writing books to promote the Christian faith. The large number he wrote in Greek are now lost, but thirty-one surviving in Latin are highly significant. Tertullian’s Apology underlined the legal and moral absurdity of the persecution directed against Christians. Some of his other books offered encouragement to those facing martyrdom. He attacked the heretics, explained the Lord’s Prayer and the meaning of baptism, and helped develop the orthodox understanding of the
...more
