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CHURCH HISTORY.
BY
PROFESSOR KURTZ.
_AUTHORIZED TRANSLATION FROM LATEST REVISED EDITION BY THE_
REV. JOHN MACPHERSON, M.A.
IN THREE VOLUMES. VOL. I.
_SECOND EDITION._
London:
HODDER AND STOUGHTON,
27, PATERNOSTER ROW.
MDCCCXCI.
BUTLER & TANNER,
THE SELWOOD PRINTING WORKS,
FROME, AND LONDON.
PREFACE.
The English reader is here presented with a translation of the ninth
edition of a work which first appeared in 1849, and has obtained a most
distinguished place, it might be said almost a monopoly, as a text-book
of Church History in the German Universities. Since 1850, when the
second edition was issued, an English translation of which has been
widely used in Britain and America, Dr. Kurtz has given great attention
to the improvement of his book. The increase of size has not been caused
by wordy amplification, but by an urgent necessity felt by the author as
he used the vast materials that recent years have spread out before the
historical student. In 1870 Dr. Kurtz retired from his professorship,
and has conscientiously devoted himself to bring up each successive
edition of his text-book to the point reached by the very latest
scholarship of his own and other lands. In his Preface to the ninth
edition of 1885 he claims to have made very special improvements on
the presentation of the history of the first three centuries, where
ample use is made of the brilliant researches of Harnack and other
distinguished scholars of the day.
In the exercise of that discretion which has been allowed him, the
translator has ventured upon an innovation, which he trusts will be
generally recognised as a very important improvement. The German edition
has frequently pages devoted to the literature of the larger divisions,
and a considerable space is thus occupied at the beginning of most of
the ordinary sections, as well as at the close of many of the sub-
sections. The books named in these lists are almost exclusively German
works and articles that have appeared in German periodicals. Experience
has shown that the reproduction of such lists in an English edition is
utterly useless to the ordinary student and extremely repulsive to the
reader, as it seriously interferes with the continuity of the text. The
translator has therefore ventured wholly to cancel these lists,
substituting carefully selected standard English works known to himself
from which detailed information on the subjects treated of in the
several paragraphs may be obtained. These he has named in footnotes at
the places where such references seemed to be necessary and most likely
to be useful. Those students who know German so thoroughly as to be able
to refer to books and articles by German specialists will find no
difficulty in using the German edition of Kurtz, in which copious lists
of such literature are given.
The first English volume is a reproduction without retrenchment of the
original; but in the second volume an endeavour has been made to render
the text-book more convenient and serviceable to British and American
students by slightly abridging some of those paragraphs which give
minute details of the Reformation work in various German provinces.
But even there care has been taken not to omit any fact of interest or
importance. No pains have been spared to give the English edition a form
that may entitle it to occupy that front rank among students’ text-books
of Church History which the original undoubtedly holds in Germany.
JOHN MACPHERSON.
FINDHORN, _July, 1888_.
CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION.
§ 1. IDEA AND TASK OF CHURCH HISTORY.
§ 2. DISTRIBUTION OF CHURCH HISTORY ACCORDING TO CONTENTS.
(1) The Various Branches Included in a Complete Course
of Church History.
(2) The Separate Branches of Church History.
§ 3. DISTRIBUTION OF CHURCH HISTORY ACCORDING TO PERIODS.
§ 4. SOURCES AND AUXILIARIES OF CHURCH HISTORY.
(1) Literature of the Sources.
(2) Literature of the Auxiliary Sciences.
§ 5. HISTORY OF GENERAL CHURCH HISTORY.
(1) Down to the Reformation.
(2) The 16th and 17th Centuries.
(3) The 18th Century.
(4) The 19th Century.
(5) The 19th Century--Continued.
(6) The 19th Century--Continued.
HISTORY OF THE PREPARATION FOR CHRISTIANITY.
The pre-Christian World preparing the way
of the Christian Church.
§ 6. THE STANDPOINT OF UNIVERSAL HISTORY.
§ 7. HEATHENISM.
(1) The Religious Character of Heathenism.
(2) The Moral Character of Heathenism.
(3) The Intellectual Culture in Heathenism.
(4) The Hellenic Philosophy.
(5) The Heathen State.
§ 8. JUDAISM.
(1) Judaism under special Training of God through the
Law and Prophecy.
(2) Judaism after the Cessation of Prophecy.
(3) The Synagogues.
(4) Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes.
§ 9. SAMARITANISM.
§ 10. INTERCOURSE BETWEEN JUDAISM AND HEATHENISM.
(1) Influence of Heathenism upon Judaism.
(2) Influence of Judaism upon Heathenism.
§ 11. THE FULNESS OF TIME.
THE HISTORY OF THE BEGINNINGS.
The Founding of the Church by Christ and His Apostles.
§ 12. CHARACTER OF THE HISTORY OF THE BEGINNINGS.
I. THE LIFE OF JESUS.
§ 13. JESUS CHRIST, THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD.
(1) Year of Birth and Year of Death of Jesus.
(2) Earliest Non-Biblical Witnesses to Christ.
II. THE APOSTOLIC AGE.
A.D. 30-70.
§ 14. THE MINISTRY OF THE APOSTLES BEFORE PAUL.
Beginning and Close of Apostolic Age.
§ 15. THE MINISTRY OF THE APOSTLE PAUL.
Details of Paul’s Life.
§ 16. THE OTHER APOSTLES AFTER THE APPEARANCE OF THE APOSTLE PAUL.
(1) The Roman Episcopate of Peter.
(2) The Apostle John.
(3) James, the brother of the Lord.
(4) The Later Legends of the Apostles.
§ 17. CONSTITUTION, WORSHIP, AND DISCIPLINE.
(1) The Charismata of the Apostolic Age.
(2) The Constitution of the Mother Church at Jerusalem.
(3) The Constitution of the Pauline Churches.
(4) The Church in the Pauline Epistles.
(5) Congregational and Spiritual Offices.
(6) The Question about the Original Position of the
Episcopate and Presbyterate.
(7) Christian Worship.
(8) Christian Life and Ecclesiastical Discipline.
§ 18. HERESIES IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE.
(1) Jewish Christianity and the Council of Apostles.
(2) The Apostolic Basis of Doctrine.
(3) False Teachers.
FIRST DIVISION.
History of the Development of the Church during the
Græco-Roman and Græco-Byzantine Periods.
§ 19. CONTENT, DISTRIBUTION AND BOUNDARIES OF THOSE PERIODS.
FIRST SECTION.
History of the Græco-Roman Church during the
Second and Third Centuries (A.D. 70-323).
§ 20. CONTENT, DISTRIBUTION AND BOUNDARIES OF THIS PERIOD.
(1) The Post-Apostolic Age.
(2) The Age of the Old Catholic Church.
(3) The Point of Transition from the One Age to the Other.
I. THE RELATIONSHIP OF EXTRA-CHRISTIAN PAGANISM AND
JUDAISM TO THE CHURCH.
§ 21. THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY.
§ 22. PERSECUTIONS OF THE CHRISTIANS IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE.
(1) Claudius, Nero and Domitian.
(2) Trajan and Hadrian.
(3) Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius.
(4) Septimius Severus and Maximinus Thrax.
(5) Decius, Gallus and Valerian.
(6) Diocletian and Galerius.
(7) Maximinus Daza, Maxentius and Licinius.
§ 23. CONTROVERSIAL WRITINGS OF PAGANISM.
(1) Lucian’s Satire _De Morte Peregrini_.
(2) Worshippers of an Ass.
(3) Polemic properly so-called.
§ 24. Attempted Reconstruction of Paganism.
(1) Apollonius of Tyana.
(2) Neo-platonism.
§ 25. Jewish and Samaritan Reaction.
(1) Disciples of John.
(2) The Samaritan Heresiarchs.
a. Dositheus.
b. Simon Magus.
c. Menander.
II. DANGER TO THE CHURCH FROM PAGAN AND JEWISH
ELEMENTS WITHIN ITS OWN PALE.
§ 26. GNOSTICISM IN GENERAL.
(1) Gnosticism.
(2) The Problems of Gnostic Speculation.
(3) Distribution.
(4) Sources of Information.
§ 27. THE GENTILE CHRISTIAN GNOSTICISM.
(1) Cerinthus.
(2) The Gnosticism of Basilides.
(3) Irenæus’ Sketch of Basilideanism.
(4) Valentinian Gnosticism.
(5) Two Divisions of the Valentinian School.
(6) The Ophites and related Sects.
(7) The Gnosis of the Ophites.
(8) Antinomian and Libertine Sects.
a. The Nicolaitans.
b. The Simonians.
c. The Carpocratians.
d. The Prodicians.
(9) Saturninus.
(10) Tatian and the Encratites.
(11) Marcion and the Marcionites.
(12) Marcion’s Disciples.
(13) Hermogenes.
§ 28. EBIONISM AND EBIONITIC GNOSTICISM.
(1) Nazareans and Ebionites.
(2) The Elkesaites.
(3) The Pseudo-Clementine Series of Writings.
a. Homiliæ XX Clementis.
b. Recognitiones Clementis.
c. Epitomæ.
(4) The Pseudo-Clementine Doctrinal System.
§ 29. MANICHÆISM.
(1) The Founder.
(2) The System.
(3) Constitution, Worship, and Missionarizing.
III. THE DOCTRINAL DEVELOPMENT AND APOLOGETICAL
ACTIVITY OF THE CHURCH.
§ 30. THE THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC AGE,
A.D. 70-170.
(1) The Beginnings of Patristic Literature.
(2) The Theology of the Post-Apostolic Age.
(3) The so-called Apostolic Fathers.
a. Clement of Rome.
(4) b. Barnabas.
c. Pastor Hermas.
(5) d. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch.
(6) e. Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna.
f. Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis.
g. Epistle to Diognetus.
(7) The Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles.
(8) The Writings of the Earliest Christian Apologists.
(9) Extant Writings of Apologists of the
Post-Apostolic Age.
a. Justin Martyr.
(10) b. Tatian.
c. Athenagoras.
d. Theophilus, Bishop of Antioch.
e. Hermias.
§ 31. THE THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE OF THE OLD CATHOLIC AGE,
A.D. 170-323.
(1) The Theological Schools and Tendencies.
1. CHURCH FATHERS WRITING IN GREEK.
(2) Church Teachers of the Asiatic Type.
a. Irenæus.
(3) b. Hippolytus.
(4) The Alexandrian Church Teachers.
a. Pantænus.
b. Titus Flavius Clement.
(5) c. Origen.
(6) d. Dionysius of Alexandria.
e. Gregory Thaumaturgus.
f. Pamphilus.
(7) Greek-speaking Church Teachers in other Quarters.
a. Hegesippus.
b. Caius of Rome.
(8) c. Sextus Julius Africanus.
(9) d. Methodius.
e. Lucian of Samosata.
2. CHURCH FATHERS WRITING IN LATIN.
(10) The Church Teachers of North Africa.
Tertullian.
(11) Cyprian.
(12) Various Ecclesiastical Writers using the Latin Tongue.
a. Minucius Felix.
b. Commodus.
c. Novatian.
d. Arnobius.
e. Victorinus of Pettau.
f. Lucius Lactantius.
§ 32. THE APOCRYPHAL AND PSEUDEPIGRAPHICAL LITERATURE.
(1) Professedly Old Heathen Prophecies.
(2) Old Testament Pseudepigraphs.
a. Book of Enoch.
b. Assumptio Mosis.
c. Fourth Book of Ezra.
d. Book of Jubilees.
(3) Pseudepigraphs of Christian Origin.
a. History of Assenath.
b. The Testaments of the XII. Patriarchs.
c. _Ascensio Isaiæ_ and _Visio Isaiæ_.
d. _Spelunca thesaurorum._
(4) New Testament Apocrypha and Pseudepigraphs.
I. Apocryphal Gospels.
(5) II. Apocryphal Histories and Legends of the Apostles.
(6) ---- Apocryphal Monographs.
(7) III. Apostolic Epistles.
IV. Apocryphal Apocalypses.
V. Apostolical Constitutions.
(8) The Acts of the Martyrs.
§ 33. THE DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES OF THE OLD CATHOLIC AGE.
(1) The Trinitarian Questions.
(2) The Alogians.
(3) The Theodotians and Artemonites.
(4) Praxeas and Tertullian.
(5) The Noëtians and Hippolytus.
(6) Beryllus and Origen.
(7) Sabellius; Dionysius of Alexandria; Dionysius of Rome.
(8) Paul of Samosata.
(9) Chiliasm.
IV. CONSTITUTION, WORSHIP, LIFE AND DISCIPLINE.
§ 34. THE INNER ORGANIZATION OF THE CHURCH.
(1) The Continuation of Charismatic Endowments into
Post-Apostolic Times.
(2) The Development of the Episcopal Hierarchy.
(3) The Regular Ecclesiastical Offices of the Old
Catholic Age.
(4) Clergy and Laity.
(5) The Synods.
(6) Personal and Epistolary Intercourse.
(7) The Unity and Catholicity of the Church.
(8) The Roman Primacy.
§ 35. THE ADMINISTRATION OF BAPTISM.
(1) The Preparation for Receiving Baptism.
(2) The Baptismal Formula.
(3) The Administration of Baptism.
(4) The Doctrine of Baptism.
(5) The Controversy about Heretics’ Baptism.
§ 36. PUBLIC WORSHIP AND ITS VARIOUS PARTS.
(1) The Agape.
(2) The _Missa Catechumenorum_.
(3) The _Missa Fidelium_.
(4) The _Disciplina Arcani_.
(5) The Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper.
(6) The Sacrificial Theory.
(7) The Use of Scripture.
(8) Formation of a New Testament Canon.
(9) The Doctrine of Inspiration.
(10) Hymnology.
§ 37. FEASTS AND FESTIVAL SEASONS.
(1) The Festivals of the Christian Year.
(2) The Paschal Controversies.
(3) The Ecclesiastical Institution of Fasting.
§ 38. THE CHURCH BUILDINGS AND THE CATACOMBS.
(1) The Catacombs.
(2) The Antiquities of the Catacombs.
(3) Pictorial Art and the Catacombs.
(4) Pictorial and Artistic Representations.
a. Significant Symbols.
b. Allegorical Figures.
c. Parabolic Figures.
d. Historical Pictures of O. T. Types.
e. Figures from the Gospel History.
f. Liturgical Figures.
§ 39. LIFE, MANNERS, AND DISCIPLINE.
(1) Christian Morals and Manners.
(2) The Penitential Discipline.
(3) Asceticism.
(4) Paul of Thebes.
(5) Beginning of Veneration of Martyrs.
(6) Superstition.
§ 40. THE MONTANIST REFORMATION.
(1) Montanism in Asia Minor.
(2) Montanism at Rome.
(3) Montanism in Proconsular Africa.
(4) The Fundamental Principle of Montanism.
(5) The Attitude of Montanism toward the Church.
§ 41. SCHISMATIC DIVISIONS IN THE CHURCH.
(1) The Schism of Hippolytus at Rome about A.D. 220.
(2) The Schism of Felicissimus at Carthage in A.D. 250.
(3) The Schism of the Presbyter Novatian at Rome in
A.D. 251.
(4) The Schism of Meletius in Egypt in A.D. 306.
SECOND SECTION.
The History of the Græco-Roman Church from
the 4th-7th centuries.
A.D. 323-692.
I. CHURCH AND STATE.
§ 42. THE OVERTHROW OF PAGANISM IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE.
(1) The Romish Legend of the Baptism of Constantine.
(2) Constantine the Great and his Sons.
(3) Julian the Apostate (A.D. 361-363).
(4) The Later Emperors.
(5) Heathen Polemics and Apologetics.
(6) The Religion of the Hypsistarians.
§ 43. THE CHRISTIAN EMPIRE AND THE ECCLESIASTICAL LAW.
(1) The _Jus Circa Sacra_.
(2) The Institution of Œcumenical Synods.
(3) Canonical Ordinances.
(4) Pseudepigraphic Church Ordinances.
(5) The Apostolic Church Ordinances.
II. MONASTICISM, CLERICALISM AND HIERARCHISM.
§ 44. MONASTICISM.
(1) The Biography of St. Anthony.
(2) The Origin of Christian Monasticism.
(3) Oriental Monasticism.
(4) Western Monasticism.
(5) Institution of Nunneries.
(6) Monastic Asceticism.
(7) Anti-Ecclesiastical and Heretical Monasticism.
§ 45. THE CLERGY.
(1) Training of the Clergy.
(2) The Injunction of Celibacy.
(3) Later Ecclesiastical Offices.
(4) Church Property.
§ 46A. THE PATRIARCHAL CONSTITUTION AND THE PRIMACY.
(1) The Patriarchal Constitution.
(2) The Rivalry between Rome and Byzantium.
§ 46B. HISTORY OF THE ROMAN CHAIR AND ITS CLAIMS TO THE PRIMACY.
(3) From Melchiades to Julius I., A.D. 310 to A.D. 352.
(4) From Liberius to Anastasius, A.D. 352 to A.D. 402.
(5) From Innocent I. to Zosimus, A.D. 402 to A.D. 418.
(6) From Boniface I. to Sixtus III., A.D. 419 to A.D. 440.
(7) From Leo the Great to Simplicius, A.D. 440 to A.D. 483.
(8) From Felix III. to Boniface II., A.D. 483 to A.D. 532.
(9) From John II. to Pelagius II., A.D. 532 to A.D. 590.
(10) From Gregory I. to Boniface V., A.D. 590 to A.D. 625.
(11) From Honorius I. to Gregory III., A.D. 625 to A.D. 741.
III. THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND LITERATURE.
§ 47. THE THEOLOGICAL SCHOOLS AND THEIR MOST CELEBRATED
REPRESENTATIVES.
(1) The Theological Schools and Tendencies.
a. In the 4th and 5th centuries.
b. Of the 6th and 7th Centuries.
1. THE MOST IMPORTANT TEACHERS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH.
(2) The Most Celebrated Representative of the Old
Alexandrian School----Eusebius.
(3) Church Fathers of the New Alexandrian School.
a. Athanasius.
(4) ---- The Three Great Cappadocians.
b. Basil the Great.
c. Gregory Nazianzen.
d. Gregory of Nyssa.
(5) e. Apollinaris.
f. Didymus the Blind.
(6) g. Macarius Magnes.
h. Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria.
i. Isidore of Pelusium.
(7) ---- Mystics and Philosophers.
k. Macarius the Great or the Elder.
l. Marcus Eremita.
m. Synesius of Cyrene.
n. Nemesius, Bishop of Emesa.
o. Æneas of Gaza.
(8) The Antiocheans.
a. Eusebius of Emesa.
b. Diodorus of Tarsus.
c. John of Antioch (Chrysostom).
(9) d. Theodore, Bishop of Mopsuestia.
e. Polychronius, Bishop of Apamea.
f. Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrus.
(10) Other Teachers of the Greek Church during the 4th
and 5th Centuries.
a. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem.
b. Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis.
c. Palladius.
d. Nilus.
(11) Greek Church Fathers of the 6th and 7th Centuries.
a. Johannes Philoponus.
b. Dionysius the Areopagite.
(12) c. Leontius Byzantinus.
d. Maximus Confessor.
e. Johannes Climacus.
f. Johannes Moschus.
g. Anastasius Sinaita.
(13) Syrian Church Fathers.
a. Jacob of Nisibis.
b. Aphraates.
c. Ephraim the Syrian.
d. Ibas, Bishop of Edessa.
e. Jacob, Bishop of Edessa.
2. THE MOST IMPORTANT TEACHERS OF THE WESTERN CHURCH.
(14) f. During the Period of the Arian Controversy.
a. Jul. Firmicus Maternus.
b. Lucifer of Calaris.
c. Marius Victorinus.
d. Hilary of Poitiers.
e. Zeno, Bishop of Verona.
f. Philaster, Bishop of Brescia.
g. Martin of Tours.
(15) g. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan.
h. Ambrosiaster.
i. Pacianus, Bishop of Barcelona.
(16) During the Period of Origenistic Controversy.
a. Jerome.
(17) b. Tyrannius Rufinus.
c. Sulpicius Severus.
d. Peter Chrysologus, Bishop of Ravenna.
(18) The Hero of the Soteriological Controversy--Augustine.
(19) Augustine’s Works.
a. Philosophical Treatises.
b. Dogmatic Treatises.
c. Controversial Treatises.
d. Apologetical Treatises.
e. Exegetical Works.
(20) Augustine’s Disciples and Friends.
a. Paulinus, Deacon of Milan.
b. Paul Orosius.
c. Marius Mercator.
d. Prosper Aquitanicus.
e. Cæsarius, Bishop of Arelate.
f. Fulgentius, Bishop of Ruspe.
(21) Pelagians and semi-Pelagians.
I. Pelagius.
II. Semi-Pelagians or Massilians.
a. Johannes Cassianus.
b. Vincent Lerinensis.
c. Eucherius, Bishop of Lyons.
d. Salvianus, Presbyter at Marseilles.
e. Faustus of Rhegium.
f. Arnobius the Younger.
(22) The Most Important Church Teachers among the Roman Popes.
a. Leo the Great.
b. Gelasius I.
c. Gregory the Great.
(23) The Conservators and Continuators of Patristic Culture.
a. Boëthius.
b. Magnus Aurelius Cassiodorus.
c. Dionysius Exiguus.
§ 48. BRANCHES OF THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND CHRISTIAN POETRY.
(1) Exegetical Theology.
(2) Historical Theology.
(3) Systematic Theology.
a. Apologetics.
b. Polemics.
c. Positive Dogmatics.
d. Morals.
(4) Practical Theology.
(5) Christian Poetry.
(6) Christian Latin Poetry.
(7) Poetry of National Syrian Church.
(8) The Legendary History of Cyprian.
IV. DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES AND HERESIES.
§ 49. THE DEVELOPMENT OF DOCTRINE GENERALLY.
Heretical Developments.
§ 50. THE TRINITARIAN CONTROVERSY, A.D. 318-381.
(1) Preliminary Victory of the Homoousia, A.D. 318-325.
(2) Victory of Eusebianism, A.D. 328-356.
(3) Victory of Homoiousianism, A.D. 357-361.
(4) Final Victory of the Nicene Creed, A.D. 361-381.
(5) The Pneumatomachians, A.D. 362-381.
(6) The Literature of the Controversy.
(7) Post-Nicene Development of the Dogma.
(8) Schisms in consequence of the Arian Controversy.
I. The Meletian Schism at Antioch.
II. The Schism of the Luciferians.
III. The Schism of Damasus and Ursacius at Rome.
§ 51. THE ORIGENIST CONTROVERSIES, A.D. 394-438.
(1) The Monks of the Scetic and Nitrian Deserts.
(2) The Controversy in Palestine and Italy, A.D. 394-399.
(3) The Controversy in Alexandria and Constantinople,
A.D. 399-438.
§ 52. THE CHRISTOLOGICAL CONTROVERSY.
(1) The Apollinarian Controversy, A.D. 362-381.
(2) Christology of the Opposing Theological Schools.
(3) The Dyoprosopic or Nestorian Controversy, A.D. 428-444.
(4) The Monophysite Controversy.
I. Eutychianism, A.D. 444-451.
(5) II. Imperial Attempts at Union, A.D. 451-519.
(6) III. Justinian’s Decrees, A.D. 527-553.
(7) IV. The Monophysite Churches.
(8) The Monothelite Controversy, A.D. 633-680.
(9) The Case of Honorius.
§ 53. THE SOTERIOLOGICAL CONTROVERSIES, A.D. 412-529.
(1) Preliminary History.
(2) The Doctrine of Augustine.
(3) Pelagius and his Doctrine.
(4) The Pelagian Controversy, A.D. 411-431.
(5) The Semi-Pelagian Controversy, A.D. 427-529.
§ 54. REAPPEARANCE AND REMODELLING OF EARLIER HERETICAL SECTS.
(1) Manichæism.
(2) Priscillianism, A.D. 383-563.
V. WORSHIP, LIFE, DISCIPLINE AND MORALS.
§ 55. WORSHIP IN GENERAL.
The Age of Cyril of Alexandria.
§ 56. FESTIVALS AND SEASONS FOR PUBLIC WORSHIP.
(1) The Weekly Cycle.
(2) Hours and Quarterly Fasts.
(3) The Reckoning of Easter.
(4) The Easter Festivals.
(5) The Christmas Festivals.
(6) The Church Year.
(7) The Church Fasts.
§ 57. WORSHIP OF SAINTS, RELICS AND IMAGES.
(1) The Worship of Martyrs and Saints.
(2) The Worship of Mary and Anna.
(3) Worship of Angels.
(4) Worship of Images.
(5) Worship of Relics.
(6) The Making of Pilgrimages.
§ 58. THE DISPENSATION OF THE SACRAMENTS.
(1) Administration of Baptism.
(2) The Doctrine of the Supper.
(3) The Sacrifice of the Mass.
(4) The Administration of the Lord’s Supper.
§ 59. PUBLIC WORSHIP IN WORD AND SYMBOL.
(1) The Holy Scriptures.
(2) The Creeds of the Church.
I. The Nicæno-Constantinopolitan Creed.
II. The Apostles’ Creed.
III. The Athanasian Creed.
(3) Bible Reading in Church and Preaching.
(4) Hymnology.
(5) Psalmody and Hymn Music.
(6) The Liturgy.
(7) Liturgical Vestments.
(8) Symbolical Acts in Worship.
(9) Processions.
§ 60. PLACES OF PUBLIC WORSHIP, BUILDINGS AND WORKS OF ART.
(1) The Basilica.
(2) Secular Basilicas.
(3) The Cupola Style.
(4) Accessory and Special Buildings.
(5) Church furniture.
(6) The Graphic and Plastic Arts.
§ 61. LIFE, DISCIPLINE AND MORALS.
(1) Church Discipline.
(2) Christian Marriage.
(3) Sickness, Death and Burial.
(4) Purgatory and Masses for Souls.
§ 62. HERETICAL REFORMERS.
(1) Audians and Apostolics.
(2) Protests against Superstition and External Observances.
(3) Protests against the Over-Estimation of Doctrine.
§ 63. SCHISMS.
(1) The Donatist Schism, A.D. 311-415.
(2) The _Concilium Quinisextum_, A.D. 692.
VI. THE CHURCH OUTSIDE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.
§ 64. MISSIONARY OPERATIONS IN THE EAST.
(1) The Ethiopic-Abyssinian Church.
(2) The Persian Church.
(3) The Armenian Church.
(4) The Iberians.
§ 65. THE COUNTER-MISSION OF THE MOHAMMEDANS.
(1) The Fundamental Principle of Islam.
(2) The Providential Place of Islam.
THIRD SECTION.
HISTORY OF THE GRÆCO-BYZANTINE CHURCH
IN THE 8TH-15TH CENTURIES
(A.D. 692-1453).
I. Developments of the Greek Church in Combination
with the Western.
§ 66. ICONOCLASM OF THE BYZANTINE CHURCH (A.D. 726-842).
(1) Leo III., the Isaurian, A.D. 717-741.
(2) Constantine V. A.D. 741-775.
(3) Leo IV., Chazarus, A.D. 775-780.
(4) Leo V., the Armenian, A.D. 813-820.
§ 67. DIVISION BETWEEN GREEK AND ROMAN CHURCHES AND ATTEMPTS
AT UNION, A.D. 857-1453.
(1) Foundation of the Schism, A.D. 867.
(2) Leo VI., the Philosopher, A.D. 886-911.
(3) Completion of the Schism, A.D. 1054.
(4) Attempts at Reunion.
(5) Andronicus III. Palæologus and Barlaam.
(6) Council of Florence.
(7) Decay of Byzantine Empire.
II. Developments in the Eastern Church without the
Co-operation of the Western.
§ 68. THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND LITERATURE.
(1) Revival of Classical Studies.
(2) Aristotle and Plato.
(3) Scholasticism and Mysticism.
(4) The Branches of Theological Science.
(5) Distinguished Theologians.
(6) Barlaam and Josaphat.
§ 69. DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES IN THE 12TH-14TH CENTURIES.
(1) Dogmatic Questions.
(2) The Hesychast Controversy, A.D. 1341-1351.
§ 70. CONSTITUTION, WORSHIP AND LIFE.
(1) The Arsenian Schism, A.D. 1262-1312.
(2) Public Worship.
(3) Monasticism.
(4) Endeavours at Reformation.
§ 71. DUALISTIC HERETICS.
(1) The Paulicians.
(2) The Children of the Sun.
(3) The Euchites.
(4) The Bogomili.
§ 72. THE NESTORIAN AND MONOPHYSITE CHURCHES OF THE EAST.
(1) The Persian Nestorians.
(2) Monophysite Churches.
(3) The Maronites.
(4) The Legend of Prester John.
§ 73. THE SLAVONIC CHURCHES ADHERING TO THE ORTHODOX GREEK
CONFESSION.
(1) Slavs in the Greek Provinces.
(2) The Chazari.
(3) The Bulgarians.
(4) The Russian Church.
(5) Russian Sects.
(6) Romish Efforts at Union.
SECOND DIVISION.
THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE GERMAN AND ROMAN CHURCH
DURING THE MIDDLE AGES.
§ 74. CHARACTER AND DIVISIONS OF THIS PERIOD OF THE DEVELOPMENT.
(1) The Character of Mediæval History.
(2) Periods in the Church History of the German-Roman
Middle Ages.
FIRST SECTION.
HISTORY OF THE GERMAN-ROMAN CHURCH FROM THE 4TH TO
THE 9TH CENTURY (DOWN TO A.D. 911).
I. Founding, Spread, and Limitation of the German Church.
§ 75. CHRISTIANITY AND THE GERMANS.
(1) The Predisposition of the Germans for Christianity.
(2) Unopposed Adoption of Christianity.
(3) Mode of Conversion in the Church of these Times.
§ 76. THE VICTORY OF CATHOLICISM OVER ARIANISM.
(1) The Goths in the lands of the Danube.
(2) The Visigoths in Gaul and Spain.
(3) The Vandals in Africa.
(4) The Suevi.
(5) The Burgundians.
(6) The Rugians.
(7) The Ostrogoths.
(8) The Longobards in Italy.
(9) The Franks in Gaul.
§ 77. VICTORY OF THE ROMISH OVER THE OLD BRITISH CHURCH.
(1) The Conversion of the Irish.
(2) The Mission to Scotland.
(3) The Peculiarities of the Celtic Church.
(4) The Romish Mission to the Anglo-Saxons.
(5) Celtic Missions among the Anglo-Saxons.
(6) The Celtic Element Driven out of the Anglo-Saxon
Church.
(7) Spread and Overthrow of the British Church on the
Continent.
(8) Overthrow of the Old British System in the
Iro-Scottish Church.
§ 78. THE CONVERSION AND ROMANIZING OF GERMANY.
(1) South-Western Germany.
(2) South-Eastern Germany.
(3) North-Western Germany.
(4) The Missionary Work of Boniface.
(5) The Organization Effected by Boniface.
(6) Heresies Confronted by Boniface.
(7) The End of Boniface.
(8) An Estimate of Boniface.
(9) The Conversion of the Saxons.
§ 79. THE SLAVS IN GERMAN COUNTRIES.
(1) The Carantanians and Avars.
(2) The Moravian Church.
(3) The Beginnings of Christianity in Bohemia.
§ 80. THE SCANDINAVIAN NATIONS.
(1) Ansgar.
(2) Ansgar’s Successor--Rimbert.
§ 81. CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM.
(1) Islam in Spain.
(2) Islam in Sicily.
II. THE HIERARCHY, THE CLERGY AND THE MONKS.
§ 82. THE PAPACY AND THE CAROLINGIANS.
(1) The Period of the Founding of the States of the Church.
(2) Stephen III., A.D. 768-772.
Hadrian I., A.D. 772-795.
(3) Charlemagne and Leo III., A.D. 795-816.
(4) Louis the Pious and the Popes of his Time.
(5) The Sons of Louis the Pious and the Popes of their Days.
(6) The Legend of the Female Pope Joanna.
(7) Nicholas I. and Hadrian II.
(8) John VIII. and his Successors.
(9) The Papacy and the Nationalities.
§ 83. THE RANK OF METROPOLITAN.
(1) The Position of Metropolitans in General.
(2) Hincmar of Rheims.
(3) Metropolitans in other lands.
§ 84. THE CLERGY IN GENERAL.
(1) The Superior Clergy.
(2) The Inferior Clergy.
(3) Compulsory Celibacy.
(4) Canonical life.
§ 85. MONASTICISM.
(1) Benedict of Nursia.
(2) Benedict of Aniane.
(3) Nunneries.
(4) The Greater Monasteries.
(5) Monastic Practices among the Clergy.
(6) The Stylites.
§ 86: THE PROPERTY OF CHURCHES AND MONASTERIES.
(1) The Revenues of Churches and Monasteries.
(2) The Benefice System.
§ 87. ECCLESIASTICAL LEGISLATION.
(1) Older Collections of Ecclesiastical Law.
(2) The Collection of Decretals of the Pseudo-Isidore.
(3) Details of the History of the Forgery.
(4) The Edict and Donation of Constantine.
III. THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE.
§ 88. PUBLIC WORSHIP AND ART.
(1) Liturgy and Preaching.
(2) Church Music.
(3) The Sacrifice of the Mass.
(4) The Worship of Saints.
(5) Times and Places for Public Worship.
(6) Ecclesiastical Architecture and Painting.
§ 89. NATIONAL CUSTOMS, SOCIAL LIFE AND CHURCH DISCIPLINE.
(1) Superstition.
(2) Popular Education.
(3) Christian Popular Poetry.
(4) Social Condition.
(5) Practice of Pubic Law.
(6) Church Discipline and Penitential Exercises.
IV. THEOLOGY AND ITS BATTLES.
§ 90. SCHOLARSHIP AND THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE.
(1) Rulers of the Carolingian Line.
Charlemagne, A.D. 768-814.
Louis the Pious, A.D. 814-840.
Charles the Bald, A.D. 840-877.
(2) The most distinguished Theologians of the
Pre-Carolingian Age.
1. Merovingian France.
2. South of the Pyrenees.
3. England.
(3) The most distinguished Theologians of the Age of
Charlemagne.
1. Alcuin.
2. Paulus Diaconus.
3. Theodulf, Bishop of Orleans.
4. Paulinus, Patriarch of Aquileia and
Bishop Leidrad of Lyons.
5. Hatto, Abbot of Reichenau.
(4) The most distinguished Theologians of the Age of
Louis the Pious.
1. Agobard of Lyons.
2. Claudius, Bishop of Turin.
3. Jonas of Orleans.
4. Amalarius of Metz.
5. Christian Druthmar.
6. Rabanus Magnentius Maurus.
7. Walafrid Strabo.
(5) The Most Distinguished Theologians of the Age of
Charles the Bald.
1. Hincmar of Rheims.
2. Paschasius Radbertus.
3. Ratramnus.
4. Florus Magister.
5. Haymo, Bishop of Halberstadt.
6. Servatus Lupus.
7. Remigius of Auxerre.
8. Regius of Prüm.
(6) 9. Anastasius Bibliothecarius.
10. Eulogius of Cordova.
(7) 11. Joannes Scotus Erigena.
(8) The Monastic and Cathedral Schools.
(9) Various Branches of Theological Science.
1. Exegesis.
2. Systematic Theology.
3. Practical Theology.
4. Historical Theology.
(10) Anglo-Saxon Culture under Alfred the Great,
A.D. 871-901.
§ 91. DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES.
(1) The Adoptionist Controversy, A.D. 782-799.
(2) Controversy about the Procession of the Holy Spirit.
(3) The Eucharistic Controversy, A.D. 844.
(4) Controversy about the Conception of the Virgin.
(5) The Predestinarian Controversy A.D. 847-868.
(6) The Trinitarian Controversy, A.D. 857.
§ 92. ENDEAVOURS AFTER REFORMATION.
(1) The Carolingian Opposition to Image Worship,
A.D. 790-825.
(2) Agobard of Lyons and Claudius of Turin.
INTRODUCTION.
§ 1. IDEA AND TASK OF CHURCH HISTORY.
The Christian Church is to be defined as the one, many-branched
communion, consisting of all those who confess that Jesus of Nazareth
is the Christ who in the fulness of time appeared as the Saviour of
the world. It is the Church’s special task to render the saving work of
Christ increasingly fruitful for all nations and individuals, under all
the varying conditions of life and stages of culture. It is the task
of Church History to describe the course of development through which
the Church as a whole, as well as its special departments and various
institutions, has passed, from the time of its foundation down to our
own day; to show what have been the Church’s advances and retrogressions,
how it has been furthered and hindered; and to tell the story of its
deterioration and renewal.
§ 2. DISTRIBUTION OF CHURCH HISTORY ACCORDING TO CONTENTS.
The treatment of Church History, on account of its manifold
ramifications, demands a distribution of its material, on the one hand,
according to definite periods, during which the end hitherto aimed at in
the whole course of development has been practically attained, so that
either entirely new phenomena gain prominence, or else the old go forth
in an altogether different direction; on the other hand, according to
the various phases of endeavour and development, which in respect of
time are evolved alongside of one another. When this last-mentioned
method of division is adopted, we may still choose between two different
modes of treatment. First, we may deal with national churches, in so
far as these are independent and have pursued some special direction;
or with particular churches, which have originated from the splitting
up of the church universal over some important difference in doctrine,
worship, and constitution. Secondly, we may group our material according
to the various departments of historical activity, which are essential
to the intellectual and spiritual life of all national churches and
denominations, and are thus common to all, although in different
churches in characteristic ways and varying degrees. It follows however
from the very idea of history, especially from that of the universal
history of the church, that the distribution according to periods must
be the leading feature of the entire exposition. At the same time,
whatever may now and again, in accordance with the other principles of
arrangement, be brought into prominence will be influenced materially
by the course of the history and formally by the facility afforded for
review by the mode of treatment pursued.
§ 2.1. =The Various Branches Included in a Complete Course of
Church History.=--The Christian Church has undertaken the task
of absorbing all peoples and tongues. Hence it is possessed of
an eager desire to enlarge its borders by the conversion of all
non-Christian races. The description of what helps or hinders
this endeavour, the history of the spread and limitation of
Christianity, is therefore an essential constituent of church
history. Since, further, the church, in order to secure its
continued existence and well-being, must strive after a legally
determined position outwardly, as well as a firm, harmonious
articulation, combination and order inwardly, it evidently also
belongs to our science to give the history of the ecclesiastical
constitution, both of the place which the church has in the state,
and the relation it bears to the state; and also of its own
internal arrangements by superordination, subordination, and
co-ordination, and by church discipline and legislation. Not
less essential, nay, even more important for the successful
development of the church, is the construction and establishment
of saving truth. In Holy Scripture the church indeed has
possession of the fountain and standard, as well as the
all-sufficient power and fulness, of all saving knowledge.
But the words of Scripture are spirit and life, living seeds of
knowledge, which, under the care of the same Spirit who sows them,
may and shall be developed so as to yield a harvest which becomes
ever more and more abundant; and therefore the fulness of the
truth which dwells in them comes to be known more simply, clearly,
fully, and becomes always more fruitful for all stages and
forms of culture, for faith, for science, and for life. Hence
church history is required to describe the construction of the
doctrine and science of the church, to follow its course and the
deviations from it into heresy, whenever these appear. The church
is, further, in need of a form of public worship as a necessary
expression of the feelings and emotions of believers toward
their Lord and God, as a means of edification and instruction.
The history of the worship of the church is therefore also an
essential constituent of church history. It is also the duty of
the church to introduce into the practical life and customs of
the people that new spiritual energy of which she is possessor.
And thus the history of the Christian life among the people comes
to be included in church history as a further constituent of the
science. Further, there is also included here, in consequence of
the nature and aim of Christianity as a leaven (Matt. xiii. 33),
an account of the effects produced upon it by the development of
art (of which various branches, architecture, sculpture, painting,
music, have a direct connexion with Christian worship), and
likewise upon national literature, philosophy, and secular
science generally; and also, conversely, an estimate of the
influence of these forms of secular culture upon the condition
of the church and religion must not be omitted. The order of
succession in the historical treatment of these phases under
which the life of the church is manifested, is not to be rigidly
determined in the same way for all ages after an abstract logical
scheme. For each period that order of succession should be
adopted which will most suitably give prominence to those matters
which have come to the front, and so call for early and detailed
treatment in the history of that age.
§ 2.2. =The Separate Branches of Church History.=--The
constituent parts of church history that have been already
enumerated are of such importance that they might also be treated
as independent sciences, and indeed for the most part they have
often been so treated. In this way, not only is a more exact
treatment of details rendered possible, but also, what is more
important, the particular science so limited can be construed in
a natural manner according to principles furnished by itself. The
history of the spread and limitation of Christianity then assumes
a separate form as the History of Missions. The separate history
of the ecclesiastical constitution, worship, and customs is
known by the name of Christian Archæology, which is indeed,
in respect of title and contents, an undefined conglomeration
of heterogeneous elements restricted in a purely arbitrary way
to the early ages. The treatment of this department therefore
requires that we should undertake the scientific task of
distinguishing these heterogeneous elements, and arranging them
apart for separate consideration; thus following the course of
their development down to the present day, as the history of the
constitution, of the worship, and of the culture of the church.
The history of the development of doctrine falls into four
divisions:
a. The History of Doctrines in the form of a regular historical
sketch of the doctrinal development of the church.
b. Symbolics, which gives a systematic representation of the
relatively final and concluded doctrine of the church as
determined in the public ecclesiastical confessions or
symbols for the church universal and for particular sects:
these again being compared together in Comparative Symbolics.
c. Patristics, which deals with the subjective development of
doctrine as carried out by the most distinguished teachers
of the church, who are usually designated church Fathers,
and confined to the first six or eight centuries.
d. And, finally, the History of Theology in general, or the
History of the particular Theological Sciences, which treats
of the scientific conception and treatment of theology
and its separate branches according to its historical
development; while the History of Theological Literature,
which when restricted to the age of the Fathers is called
Patrology, has to describe and estimate the whole literary
activity of the church according to the persons, motives,
and tendencies that are present in it.
As the conclusion and result of church history at particular
periods, we have the science of Ecclesiastical Statistics, which
describes the condition of the church in respect of all its
interests as it stands at some particular moment, “like a slice
cut cross-wise out of its history.” The most important works in
these departments are the following:
a. =History of Missions.=--
Brown, “Hist. of Propag. of Christ. among Heathen since
Reformation.” 3rd Ed., 3 vols., Edin., 1854.
Warneck, “Outlines of Hist. of Prot. Miss.” Edin., 1884.
Smith, “Short Hist. of Christ. Miss.” Edin., 1884.
b. =History of the Papacy.=--
Ranke, “History of Papacy in 16th and 17th Cent.” 2 vols.,
Lond., 1855.
Platina (Lib. of Vatican), “Lives of Popes.” (1481). Trans.
by Rycaut, Lond., 1685.
Bower, “Hist. of Popes.” 7 vols., Lond., 1750.
Bryce, “Holy Rom. Empire.” Lond., 1866.
Creighton, “Hist. of Papacy during the Reformation.”
Vols. I.-IV., from A.D. 1378-1518, Lond., 1882-1886.
Janus, “Pope and the Council.” Lond., 1869.
Pennington, “Epochs of the Papacy.” Lond., 1882.
c. =History of Monasticism.=--
Hospinianus [Hospinian], “De Monachis.” Etc., Tigur., 1609.
Maitland, “The Dark Ages.” Lond., 1844.
d. =History of Councils.=--
Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” Vols. I.-III., to A.D. 451,
Edin., 1871-1883. (Original German work brought down
to the Council of Trent exclusive.)
e. =Church law.=--
Haddan and Stubbs, “Councils and Eccl. Documents illust.
Eccl. Hist. of Gr. Brit. and Ireland.” 3 vols.,
Lond., 1869 ff.
Phillimore, “Eccl. Law.” Lond., 1873.
f. =Archæology.=--
By Cath. Didron, “Christ. Iconography; or, Hist. of Christ.
Art in M. A.” Lond., 1886.
By Prot. Bingham, “Antiq. of Christ. Church.” 9 vols.,
Lond., 1845.
“Dictionary of Christ. Antiquities.” Ed. by Smith &
Cheetham, 2 vols., Lond., 1875 ff.
g. =History of Doctrines.=--
Neander, “Hist. of Christ. Doct.” 2 vols., Lond.
Hagenbach, “Hist. of Christ. Doctrines.” 3 vols.,
Edin., 1880 f.
Shedd, “Hist. of Christ. Doc.” 2 vols., Edin., 1869.
h. =Symbolics and Polemics.=--
Winer, “Confessions of Christendom.” Edin., 1873.
Schaff, “Creeds of Christendom.” 3 vols., Edin., 1877 ff.
Möhler, “Symbolism: an Expos. of the Doct. Differences
between Catholics and Protestants.” 2 vols., Lond.,
1843.
i. =Patrology and History of Theolog. Literature.=--
Dupin, “New History of Ecclesiastical Writers.”
Lond., 1696.
Cave, “Script. Eccl. Hist. Lit.” 2 vols., Lond., 1668.
Fabricii, “Biblioth. Græca.” 14 vols., Hamb., 1705;
“Biblioth. Mediæ et infinæ Latin.” 6 vols.,
Hamb., 1734.
Teuffel, “Hist. of Rom. Lit.” 2 vols., Lond., 1873.
k. =History of the Theological Sciences.=--
Buddæus, “Isagoge Hist. Theol. ad Theol. Univ.” Lps., 1727.
Räbiger, “Encyclopædia of Theology.” 2 vols., Edin., 1884.
Dorner, “Hist. of Prot. Theol.” 2 vols., Edin., 1871.
=History of Exegesis.=--
Davidson, “Sacred Hermeneutics; including Hist. of Biblical
Interpretation from earliest Fathers to Reformation.”
Edin., 1843.
Farrar, “Hist. of Interpretation.” Lond., 1886.
=History of Morals.=--
Wuttke’s “Christian Ethics.” Vol. I., “Hist. of Ethics.”
Edin., 1873.
l. =Biographies.=--
“Acta Sanctorum.” 63 vols. fol., Ant., 1643 ff.
Mabillon, “Acta Ss. ord. S. Bened.” 9 vols. fol.,
Par., 1666 ff.
Flaccius [Flacius], “Catalog. Testium Veritatis.” 1555.
Piper, “Lives of Leaders of Church Universal.” 2 vols.,
Edin.
Smith and Wace, “Dict. of Chr. Biog.” etc., 4 vols.,
Lond., 1877 ff.
§ 3. DISTRIBUTION OF CHURCH HISTORY ACCORDING TO PERIODS.
In the history of the world’s culture three historical stages
of universal development succeed each other: the Oriental, the
Franco-German, and the Teutono-Romanic. The kingdom of God had to enter
each of these and have in each a distinctive character, so that as
comprehensive a development as possible might be secured. The history
of the preparation for Christianity in the history of the Israelitish
theocracy moves along the lines of Oriental culture. The history of
the beginnings of Christianity embraces the history of the founding of
the church by Christ and His Apostles. These two together constitute
Biblical history, which, as an independent branch of study receiving
separate treatment, need be here treated merely in a brief, introductory
manner. This holds true also of the history of pagan culture alongside
of and subsequent to the founding of the church. Church history,
strictly so-called, the development of the already founded church,
begins therefore, according to our conception, with the Post-Apostolic
Age, and from that point pursues its course in three principal divisions.
The ancient church completes its task by thoroughly assimilating
the elements contributed by the Græco-Roman forms of civilization.
In the Teutono-Romanic Church of the middle ages the appropriation
and amalgamation of ancient classical modes of thought with modern
tendencies awakened by its immediate surroundings were carried out and
completed. On the other hand, the development of church history since
the Reformation has its impulse given it by that Teutono-Christian
culture which had maturity and an independent form secured to it by the
Reformation. This distribution in accordance with the various forms of
civilization seems to us so essential, that we propose to borrow from
it our principle for the arrangement of our church history.
The chronological distribution of the material may be represented in
the following outline:
I. =History of the Preparation for Christianity=: Preparation
for Redemption during the Hebraic-Oriental stage of
civilization, and the construction alongside of it in the
universalism of classical culture of forms that prepared the
way for the coming salvation.
II. =History of the Beginnings of Christianity=: a sketch of the
redemption by Christ and the founding of the Church through
the preaching of it by the Apostles.
III. =History of the Development of Christianity=, on the basis
of the sketch of the redemption given in the history of the
Beginnings:
A. =In the Græco-Roman and Græco-Byzantine Period, under
Ancient Classical Forms of Civilization.=
_First Section_, A.D. 70 to A.D. 323,--down to
the final victory of Christianity over the Græco-Roman
paganism; the Post-Apostolic and Old Catholic Ages.
_Second Section_, from A.D. 323 to A.D. 692,--down
to the final close of œcumenical development of doctrine
in A.D. 680, and the appearance of what proved a lasting
estrangement between the Eastern and the Western Churches
in A.D. 692, which was soon followed by the alliance of
the Papacy with the Frankish instead of the Byzantine
empire; the Œcumenico-Catholic Church, or the Church of
the Roman-Byzantine Empire.
_Third Section_, from A.D. 692 to A.D. 1453,--down
to the overthrow of Constantinople. Languishing and decay
of the old church life in the Byzantine Empire; complete
breach and futile attempts at union between East and West.
The Church of the Byzantine Empire.
B. =In the Mediæval Period, under Teutono-Romanic Forms of
Civilization.=
_First Section_, 4-9th cent.--from the first
beginnings of Teutonic church life down to the end of the
Carlovingian Age, A.D. 911. The Teutonic Age.
_Second Section_, 10-13th cent.--down to
Boniface VIII., A.D. 1294; rise of mediæval
institutions--the Papacy, Monasticism, Scholasticism;
Germany in the foreground of the ecclesiastico-political
movement.
_Third Section_, the 14-15th cent.--down to the
Reformation in A.D. 1517; deterioration and collapse of
mediæval institutions; France in the foreground of the
ecclesiastico-political movement.
C. =In the Modern Period, under the European Forms of
Civilization.=
_First Section_, the 16th cent. Age of
Evangelical-Protestant Reformation and Roman Catholic
Counter-Reformation.
_Second Section_, the 17th cent. Age of Orthodoxy
on the Protestant side and continued endeavours after
restoration on the side of Catholicism.
_Third Section_, the 18th cent. Age of advancing
Illuminism in both churches,--Deism, Naturalism,
Rationalism.
_Fourth Section_, the 19th cent. Age of re-awakened
Christian and Ecclesiastical life. Unionism,
Confessionalism, and Liberalism in conflict with
one another on the Protestant side; the revival of
Ultramontanism in conflict with the civil power on the
Catholic side. In opposition to both churches, widespread
pantheistic, materialistic, and communistic tendencies.
§ 4. SOURCES AND AUXILIARIES OF CHURCH HISTORY.[1]
=The sources of Church history= are partly original, in the shape of
inscriptions and early documents; partly derivative, in the shape of
traditions and researches in regard to primitive documents that have
meanwhile been lost. Of greater importance to church history than the
so-called dumb sources, _e.g._ church buildings, furniture, pictures,
are the inscriptions coming down from the earliest times; but of the
very highest importance are the extant official documents, _e.g._
acts and decisions of Church Councils, decrees and edicts of the
Popes,--decretals, bulls, briefs,--the pastoral letters of bishops,
civil enactments and decrees regarding ecclesiastical matters, the rules
of Spiritual Orders, monastic rules, liturgies, confessional writings,
the epistles of influential ecclesiastical and civil officers, reports
by eye witnesses, sermons and doctrinal treatises by Church teachers,
etc. In regard to matters not determined by any extant original
documents, earlier or later fixed traditions and historical researches
must take the place of those lost documents.--=Sciences Auxiliary
to Church History= are such as are indispensable for the critical
estimating and sifting, as well as for the comprehensive understanding
of the sources of church history. To this class the following branches
belong: _Diplomatics_, which teaches how to estimate the genuineness,
completeness, and credibility of the documents in question; _Philology_,
which enables us to understand the languages of the sources; _Geography
and Chronology_, which make us acquainted with the scenes and periods
where and when the incidents related in the original documents were
enacted. Among auxiliary sciences in the wider sense, the history of the
_State_, of _Law_, of _Culture_, of _Literature_, of _Philosophy_, and
of _Universal Religion_, may also be included as indispensable owing to
their intimate connection with ecclesiastical development.
§ 4.1. =Literature of the Sources.=--
a. =Inscriptions=:
de Rossi, “Inscriptt. chr. urbis Rom.” Vols. I. II.,
Rome, 1857.
b. =Collections of Councils=:
Harduin [Hardouin], “Conc. coll.” (to A.D. 1715),
12 vols., Par., 1715.
Mansi, “Conc. nova et ampl. coll.” 31 vols., Flor., 1759.
c. =Papal Acts=:
Jaffe, “Regesta pont. Rom.” (to A.D. 1198), 2 ed.,
Brl., 1881.
Potthast, “Regesta pont. Rom.” (A.D. 1198-1304), 2 Vols.,
Brl., 1873.
The Papal Decretals in “Corp. jur. Canonici.” ed.,
Friedberg, Lips., 1879.
“Bullarum, diplom. et privil. SS. rom. pont.” Taurenensis
editio, 24 vols., 1857 ff.
Nussi, “Conventiones de reb. eccl. inter s. sedem et civ.
pot. initæ.” Mogunt., 1870.
d. =Monastic Rules=:
Holstenii, “Cod. regul. mon. et. can.” 6 vols., 1759.
e. =Liturgies=:
Daniel, “Cod. liturg. eccl. univ.” 4 vols., Leipz.,
1847 ff.
Hammond, “Ancient Liturgies.” Oxf., 1878.
f. =Symbolics=:
Kimmel, “Ll. Symb. eccl. Orient.” Jena., 1843.
Danz, “Ll. Symb. eccl. Rom. Cath.” Weimar, 1835.
Hase, “Ll. Symb. eccl. evang.” Ed. iii., Leipz., 1840.
Niemeyer, “Coll. Conf. eccl. Ref.” Leipz., 1840.
Schaff, “Creeds of Christendom.” 3 vols., Lond., 1882.
g. =Martyrologies=:
Ruinart, “Acta prim. Mart.” 3 vols., 1802.
Assemanni [Assemani], “Acta SS. Mart. orient. et occid.”
2 vols., Rome, 1748.
h. =Greek and Latin Church Fathers and Teachers=:
Migne, “Patrologiæ currus completus.” Ser. I., Eccl. Græc.,
162 vols., Par., 1857 ff.; Ser. II., Eccl. Lat.,
221 vols., Par., 1844 ff.
Horoy, “Media ævi biblioth. patrist.” (from A.D. 1216 to
1564), Paris, 1879.
“Corpus Scriptorum eccl. lat.” Vindob., 1866 ff.
Grabe, “Spicilegium SS. Pp. et Hærett.” Sæc. I.-III.,
3 vols., Oxford, 1698.
Routh, “Reliquiæ sac.” 4 vols., Oxford, 1814 ff.
“Ante-Nicene Christian Library; a collection of all the
works of the Fathers of the Christian Church prior to
the Council of Nicæa.” 24 vols., Edin., 1867 ff.
i. =Ancient Writers of the East=:
Assemanus [Assemani], “Biblioth. orient.” 4 vols.,
Rome, 1719.
k. =Byzantine Writers=:
Niebuhr, “Corp. scr. hist. Byz.” 48 vols., Bonn, 1828 ff.
Sathas, “Biblioth. Græc. Med. ævi.” Vols. I.-VI., Athens,
1872 ff.
§ 4.2. =Literature of the Auxiliary Sciences.=--
a. =Diplomatics=:
Mabillon, “De re diplomatic.” Ed. ii., Par., 1709.
b. =Philology=:
Du Fresne (du Cange), “Glossarium ad scriptt. med. et
infim. Latin.” 6 vols., Par., 1733; New ed., Henschel
and Favre, in course of publication.
Du Fresne, “Glossarium, ad scriptt. med. et infim. Græc.”
2 vols., Leyden, 1688.
Suiceri, “Thesaurus ecclesiast. e patribus græcis.”
Ed. ii., 2 vols., Amst., 1728.
c. =Geography and Statistics=:
Mich. le Quien, “Oriens christianus in quatuor
patriarchatus digestus.” 3 vols., Par., 1704.
d. =Chronology=:
Nicolas, “The Chronology of History.” 2 ed., Lond., 1838.
“L’art de verifier les dates, by d’Antine.” Etc., ed. by
Courcelles, 19 vols., Par., 1821-1824.
§ 5. HISTORY OF GENERAL CHURCH HISTORY.
The earliest writer of church history properly so called is Eusebius,
Bishop of Cæsarea, † 340. During the fifth century certain members
of the Greek Church continued his work. The Western Church did not
so soon engage upon undertakings of that sort, and was contented with
translations and reproductions of the materials that had come down from
the Greeks instead of entering upon original investigations. During the
middle ages, in consequence of the close connection subsisting between
Church and State, the Greek _Scriptores historiæ Byzantinæ_, as well as
the Latin national histories, biographies, annals, and chronicles, are
of the very utmost importance as sources of information regarding the
church history of their times. It was the Reformation, however, that
first awakened and inspired the spirit of true critical research and
scientific treatment of church history, for the appeal of the Reformers
to the pure practices and institutions of the early days of the church
demanded an authoritative historical exposition of the founding of the
church, and this obliged the Catholic church to engage upon the studies
necessary for this end. The Lutheran as well as the Catholic Church,
however, down to the middle of the 17th century, were satisfied with
the voluminous productions of the two great pioneers in Church history,
Flacius and Baronius. Afterwards, however, emulation in the study of
church history was excited, which was undoubtedly, during the 17th
century, most successfully prosecuted in the Catholic Church. In
consequence of the greater freedom which prevailed in the Gallican
Church, these studies flourished conspicuously in France, and were
pursued with exceptional success by the Oratorians and the Order
of St. Maur. The Reformed theologians, especially in France and the
Netherlands, did not remain far behind them in the contest. Throughout
the 18th century, again, the performances of the Lutheran Church came to
the front, while a laudable rivalry leads the Reformed to emulate their
excellencies. In the case of the Catholics, on the other hand, that
zeal and capacity which, during the 17th century, had won new laurels in
the field of honour, were now sadly crippled. But as rationalism spread
in the domain of doctrine, pragmatism spread in the domain of church
history, which set for itself as the highest ideal of historical writing
the art of deducing everything in history, even what is highest and
most profound in it, from the co-operation of fortune and passion,
arbitrariness and calculation. It was only in the 19th century, when a
return was made to the careful investigation of original authorities,
and it came to be regarded as the task of the historian, to give a
conception and exposition of the science as objective as possible, that
this erroneous tendency was arrested.
§ 5.1. =Down to the Reformation.=--The church history of
=Eusebius=, which reaches down to A.D. 324, was to some extent
continued by his _Vita Constantini_, down to A.D. 337 (§ 47, 2).
The church history of =Philostorgius=, which reaches from
A.D. 318-423, coming down to us only in fragments quoted by
Photius, was an Arian party production of some importance.
During the 5th century, however, the church history of Eusebius
was continued down to A.D. 439 by the Catholic =Socrates=, an
advocate at Constantinople, written in a simple and impartial
style, yet not altogether uncritical, and with a certain measure
of liberality; and down to A.D. 423, by =Sozomen=, also an
advocate at Constantinople, who in large measure plagiarizes from
Socrates, and is, in what is his own, uncritical, credulous, and
fond of retailing anecdotes; and down to A.D. 428 by =Theodoret=,
Bishop of Cyrus in Syria, who produces much useful material in
the shape of original authorities, confining himself, however,
like both of his predecessors, almost exclusively to the affairs
of the Eastern Church. In the 6th century, =Theodorus=, reader at
Constantinople, made a collection of extracts from these works,
continuing the history down to his own time in A.D. 527. Of this
we have only fragments preserved by Nicephorus Callisti. The
continuation by =Evagrius= of Antioch, reaching from A.D. 431-594,
is characterized by carefulness, learning, and impartiality,
along with zealous orthodoxy, and an uncritical belief in the
marvellous. Collected editions of all these works have been
published by Valesius (Par., 1659), and Reading (Cantab., 1720),
in each case in 3 vols. folio.--In the Latin Church =Rufinus= of
Aquileia translated the work of Eusebius and enlarged it before
the continuations of the three Greek historians had appeared,
carrying it down to his own time in A.D. 395 in an utterly
uncritical fashion. =Sulpicius Severus=, a presbyter of Gaul,
wrote about the same time his _Historia Sacra_, in two books,
from the creation of the world down to A.D. 400. In the 6th
century, =Cassiodorus= fused together into one treatise in
12 books, by means of extracts, the works of the three Greek
continuators of Eusebius, under the title _Hist. ecclesiastica
tripartita_, which, combined with the history of Rufinus,
remained down to the Reformation in common use as a text-book.
A church history written in the 6th century in Syriac, by the
monophysite bishop, =John of Ephesus=, morbidly fond of the
miraculous, first became known to us in an abridged form of
the third part embracing the history of his own time. (Ed.
Cureton, Oxf., 1853. Transl. into Engl. by Payne Smith, Oxford,
1859.)--Belonging to the Latin church of the middle ages, =Haymo=
of Halberstadt deserves to be named as a writer of universal
history, about A.D. 850, leaning mainly upon Rufinus and
Cassiodorus. The same too may be said about the work entitled,
_Libri XIII. historiæ ecclesiasticæ_ written by the Abbot
=Odericus Vitalis= in Normandy, about A.D. 1150, which forms
upon the whole the most creditable production of the middle
ages. In the 24 books of the Church history of the Dominican and
Papal librarian, =Tolomeo of Lucca=, composed about A.D. 1315,
church history is conceived of as if it were simply a historical
commentary on the ecclesiastical laws and canons then in force,
as an attempt, that is, to incorporate in the history all the
fictions and falsifications, which Pseudo-Isidore in the 9th
century (§ 87, 2-4), Gratian in the 12th century, and Raimundus
[Raimund] de Penneforti [Pennaforte] in the 13th century
(§ 99, 5), had wrought into the Canon law. Toward the end of
the 15th century, under the influence of humanism there was an
awakening here and there to a sense of the need of a critical
procedure in the domain of church history, which had been
altogether wanting throughout the middle ages. In the Greek
Church again, during the 14th century, =Nicephorus Callisti=
of Constantinople, wrote a treatise on church history, reaching
down to A.D. 610, devoid of taste and without any indication of
critical power.
§ 5.2. =The 16th and 17th Centuries.=--About the middle of the
16th century the Lutheran Church produced a voluminous work in
church history, the so-called =Magdeburg Centuries=, composed
by a committee of Lutheran theologians, at the head of which was
=Matthias Flacius=, of Illyria in Magdeburg. This work consisted
of 13 folio vols., each of which embraced a century. (_Eccles.
Hist., integram eccl. ideam complectens, congesta per aliquot
studiosos et pios viros in urbe Magdb._ Bas., 1559-1574.) They
rest throughout on careful studies of original authorities,
produce many documents that were previously unknown, and, with
an unsparingly bitter polemic against the Romish doctrinal
degeneration, address themselves with special diligence to the
historical development of dogma. In answer to them the Romish
Oratorian, =Cæsar Baronius=, produced his _Annales ecclesiastici_,
in 12 vols. folio, reaching down to A.D. 1198 (Rome, 1588-1607).
This work moves entirely along Roman Catholic lines and is quite
prejudiced and partial, and seeks in a thoroughly uncritical
way, by every species of ingenuity, to justify Romish positions;
yet, as communicating many hitherto unknown, and to others
inaccessible documents, it must be regarded as an important
production. It secured for its author the cardinal’s hat,
and had wellnigh raised him to the chair of St. Peter. In the
interests of a scholarly and truth-loving research, it was
keenly criticised by the Franciscan Anthony Pagi (_Critica
hist-chronol._ 4 vols., Antw., 1705), carried down in the 17th
century from A.D. 1198-1565, in 9 vols. by Oderic. Raynaldi, in
the 18th century from A.D. 1566-1571, in 3 vols. by de Laderchi,
and in the 19th century down to A.D. 1585 in 3 vols. by August
Theiner. A new edition was published by Mansi (43 vols., 1738
ff.), with Raynaldi’s continuation and Pagi’s criticism.--During
the 17th century the French Catholic scholars bore the palm
as writers of Church history. The course was opened in general
church history by the Dominican =Natalis Alexander=, a learned
man, but writing a stiff scholastic style (_Selecta hist. eccl.
capita et diss. hist. chron. et dogm._ 24 vols., Par., 1676 ff.).
This first edition, on account of its Gallicanism was forbidden
at Rome; a later one by Roncaglia of Lucca, with corrective notes,
was allowed to pass. Sebast. le Nain de =Tillemont=, with the
conscientiousness of his Jansenist faith, gave an account of
early church history in a cleverly grouped series of carefully
selected authorities (_Memoires pour servir à l’hist. eccl. des
six premiers siècles, justifiés par les citations des auteurs
originaux._ 16 vols., Par., 1693 ff.). =Bossuet= wrote, for
the instruction of the Dauphin, what Hase has styled “an
ecclesiastical history of the world with eloquent dialectic
and with an insight into the ways of providence, as if the wise
Bishop of Meaux had been in the secrets not only of the king’s
but also of God’s councils” (_Discours sur l’hist. universelle
depuis le commencement du monde jusqu’à l’empire de Charles M._
Par., 1681). =Claude Fleury=, aiming at edification, proceeds in
flowing and diffuse periods (_Histoire ecclst._ 20 vols., Par.,
1691 ff.).--The history of the French Church (A.D. 1580) ascribed,
probably erroneously, to Theodore Beza, the successor of Calvin,
marks the beginning of the writing of ecclesiastical history
in the Reformed Church. During the 17th century it secured an
eminence in the department of church history, especially on
account of learned special researches (§ 160, 7), but also to
some extent in the domain of general church history. =J. H.
Hottinger= overloaded his _Hist. ecclst. N. T._ (9 vols., Fig.,
1651 ff.) by dragging in the history of Judaism, and Paganism,
and even of Mohammedanism, with much irrelevant matter of that
sort. Superior to it were the works of =Friedr. Spanheim= (_Summa
hist. eccl._ Leyd., 1689) =Jas. Basnage= (_Hist. de l’égl._
2 vols., Rotd., 1699). Most important of all were the keen
criticism of the Annals of Baronius by =Isaac Casaubon=
(_Exercitt. Baronianæ._ Lond., 1614), and by =Sam. Basnage=
(_Exercitt. hist. crit._ Traj., 1692; and _Annales polit. ecclst._
3 vols., Rotd., 1706).
§ 5.3. =The 18th Century.=--After the publication of the
Magdeburg _Opus palmare_ the study of church history fell
into the background in the Lutheran Church. It was George
Calixtus († A.D. 1658) and the syncretist controversies which
he occasioned that again awakened an interest in such pursuits.
=Gottfr. Arnold’s= colossal party-spirited treatise entitled
“Unparteiische Kirchen- und Ketzerhistorie” (2 vols. fol., Frkf.,
1699), which scarcely recognised Christianity except in heresies
and fanatical sects, gave a powerful impulse to the spirit of
investigation and to the generous treatment of opponents. This
bore fruit in the irenical and conciliatory attempts of =Weismann=
of Tübingen (_Introd. in memorabilia ecclst._ 2 vols., Tüb.,
1718). The shining star, however, in the firmament of church
history during the 18th century was =J. Lor. v. Mosheim= in
Helmstedt [Helmstadt] and Göttingen, distinguished alike for
thorough investigation, with a divinatory power of insight, and
by a brilliant execution and an artistic facility in the use
of a noble Latin style (_Institutionum hist. ecclst. Libri IV._
Helmst., 1755; transl. into English by Murdock, ed. by Reid,
11th ed., Lond., 1880). =J. A. Cramer=, in Kiel, translated
Bossuet’s _Einl. in die Gesch. d. Welt u. d. Relig._, with a
continuation which gave a specially careful treatment of the
theology of the middle ages (7 vols., Leipz., 1757 ff.). =J. Sal.
Semler=, in Halle, shook, with a morbidly sceptical criticism,
many traditional views in Church history that had previously been
regarded as unassailable (_Hist. eccl. selecta capita._ 3 vols.,
Halle, 1767 ff.; _Versuch e. fruchtb. Auszugs d. K. Gesch._
3 vols., Halle, 1773 ff.). On the other hand, =Jon. Matt. Schröckh
of Wittenberg= produced a gigantic work on church history, which
is characterized by patient research, and gives, in so far as
the means within his reach allowed, a far-sighted, temperate, and
correct statement of facts (_Christl. K. G._ 45 vols., Leipz.,
1772 ff., the last two vols. by Tzschirner). The Würtemburg
[Württemberg] minister of state, Baron =von Spittler=, sketched
a _Grundriss der K. Gesch._, in short and smartly expressed
utterances, which in many cases were no better than caricatures
(5th ed. by Planck, Gött., 1812). In his footsteps =Henke=
of Helmstedt [Helmstadt], followed, who, while making full
acknowledgment of the moral blessing which had been brought by
true Christianity to mankind, nevertheless described the “_Allg.
Gesch. der Kirche_” as if it were a bedlam gallery of religious
and moral aberrations and strange developments (6 vols.,
Brsweig., 1788 ff.; 5th ed. revised and continued by =Vater= in
9 vols.).--In the Reformed Church, =Herm. Venema=, of Franeker,
the Mosheim of this church, distinguished himself by the thorough
documentary basis which he gave to his exposition, written in
a conciliatory spirit (_Institutt. hist. eccl. V. et N. T._
7 vols., Leyd., 1777 ff.). In the Catholic Church, =Royko= of
Prague, favoured by the reforming tendencies of the Emperor
Joseph II., was able with impunity to give expression to his
anti-hierarchical views in an almost cynically outspoken statement
(_Einl. in d. chr. Rel. u. K. G._ Prague, 1788).
§ 5.4. =The 19th Century.= In his _Handb. d. chr. K. G._, publ.
in 1801 (in 2nd ed. contin. by Rettberg, 7 vols., Giessen, 1834),
=Chr. Schmidt= of Giessen expressly maintained that the supreme
and indeed the only conditions of a correct treatment of history
consisted in the direct study of the original documents, and a
truly objective exhibition of the results derived therefrom. By
objectivity, however, he understood indifference and coolness
of the subject in reference to the object, which must inevitably
render the representation hard, colourless, and lifeless.
=Gieseler= of Göttingen, † 1854, commended this mode of treatment
by his excellent execution, and in his _Lehrbuch_ (5 vols., Bonn,
1824-1857; Engl. transl. “Compendium of Church History.” 5 vols.,
Edinb., 1846-1856), a master-piece of the first rank, which
supports, explains and amplifies the author’s own admirably
compressed exposition by skilfully chosen extracts from the
documents, together with original and thoughtful criticism under
the text. A temperate, objective, and documentary treatment of
church history is also given in the _Handbuch_ of =Engelhardt=
of Erlangen (5 vols., Erlang., 1832 ff.). Among the so-called
_Compendia_ the most popular was the _Universalgeschichte d. K._
by =Stäudlin=, of Göttingen (Hann., 1807; 5th ed. by Holzhausen,
1833). It was superseded by the _Lehrbuch_ of =Hase=, of Jena
(Leipz., 1834; 10th ed., 1877; Engl. transl. from 7th Germ. ed.,
New York, 1855), which is a generally pregnant and artistically
tasteful exposition with often excellent and striking features,
subtle perception, and with ample references to documentary
sources. The _Vorlesungen_ of =Schleiermacher=, † 1834, published
after his death by Bonell (Brl., 1840), assume acquaintance
with the usual materials, and present in a fragmentary manner
the general outlines of the church’s course of development.
=Niedner’s= _Lehrbuch_ (2nd ed., Brl., 1866), is distinguished by
a philosophical spirit, independent treatment, impartial judgment,
and wealth of contents with omission of customary matter, but
marred by the scholastic stiffness and awkwardness of its style.
=Gfrörer’s= († 1861) _Kirchengeschichte_ (7 vols. reaching down
to A.D. 1000, Stuttg., 1840) treats early Christianity as purely
a product of the culture of the age, and knows of no moving
principles in the historical development of the Christian church
but clerical self-seeking, political interests, machinations
and intrigues. Nevertheless the book, especially in the portion
treating of the middle ages, affords a fresh and lively account
of researches among original documents and of new results,
although even here the author does not altogether restrain his
undue fondness for over subtle combinations. After his entrance
into the Catholic Church his labours in the domain of church
history were limited to a voluminous history of Gregory VII.,
which may be regarded as a continuation of his church history,
the earlier work having only reached down to that point. =Baur=
of Tübingen began the publication of monographical treatises on
particular periods, reaching down to the Reformation (3 vols.,
2nd ed., Tüb., 1860 ff.), a continuation to the end of the 18th
cent. (published by his son F. Baur, 1863), and also a further
volume treating of the 19th cent. (publ. by his son-in-law Zeller,
2nd ed., 1877). These works of this unwearied investigator show
thorough mastery of the immense mass of material, with subtle
criticism and in many cases the first establishment of new views.
=Böhringer’s= massive production (_Die Kirche Christi und ihre
Zeugen, oder Kirchengeschichte in Biographien_. 24 vols., Zur.,
1842; 2nd ed., Zur., 1873), upon the basis of an independent
study of the several ages down to the Reformation, characterizes
by means of detailed portraiture the personalities prominent
during these periods. In the second edition, thoroughly recast
with the assistance of his two sons, there is evidence of a more
strictly critical research and a judicial frame of mind, so that
the predominantly panegyrical character of the first edition is
considerably modified. =Rothe’s= lectures, edited after his death,
with additions from his literary remains, by Weingarten (2 vols.,
Hdlb., 1875) are quite fragmentary because the usual historical
matter was often supplied from Gieseler, Neander, or Hase. The
work is of great value in the departments of the Constitution
and the Life of the Church, but in other respects does not at
all satisfy the expectations which one might entertain respecting
productions bearing such an honoured name; thoroughly solid and
scholarly, however, are the unfortunately only sparse and short
notes of the learned editor.
§ 5.5. Almost contemporaneously with Gieseler, =Aug. Neander=
of Berlin, † 1850, began the publication of his _Allg. Gesch. d.
chr. Kirche_ in xi. divisions down to A.D. 1416 (Ham., 1824-1852.
Engl. Transl. 9 vols., Edin., 1847-1855), by which ground
was broken in another direction. Powerfully influenced by the
religious movement, which since the wars of independence had
inspired the noblest spirits of Germany, and sympathizing with
Schleiermacher’s theology of feeling, he vindicated the rights of
subjective piety in the scientific treatment of church history,
and sought to make it fruitful for edification as a commentary
of vast proportions on the parable of the leaven. With special
delight he traces the developments of the inner life, shows what
is Christian in even misconceived and ecclesiastically condemned
manifestations, and feels for the most part repelled from
objective ecclesiasticism, as from an ossification of the
Christian life and the crystallization of dogma. In the same way
he undervalues the significance of the political co-efficients,
and has little appreciation of esthetic and artistic influences.
The exposition goes out too often into wearisome details and
grows somewhat monotonous, but is on every side lighted up by
first hand acquaintance with the original sources. His scholar,
=Hagenbach= of Basel, † 1874, put together in a collected form
his lectures delivered before a cultured public upon several
periods of church history, so as to furnish a treatise dealing
with the whole field (7 vols., Leipz., 1868). These lectures are
distinguished by an exposition luminous, interesting, sometimes
rather broad, but always inspired by a warm Christian spirit and
by circumspect judgment, inclining towards a mild confessional
latitudinarianism. What, even on the confessional and
ecclesiastical side, had been to some extent passed over by
Neander, in consequence of his tendency to that inwardness that
characterizes subjective and pectoral piety, has been enlarged
upon by =Guericke= of Halle, † 1878, another of Neander’s
scholars, in his _Handbuch_ (2 vols., Leipz., 1833; 9th ed.,
3 vols., 1866; Eng. transl. “Manual of Ch. Hist.” Edinb., 1857),
by the contribution of his own enthusiastic estimate of the
Lutheran Church in a strong but clumsy statement; beyond this,
however, the one-sidedness of Neander’s standpoint is not
overcome, and although, alongside of Neander’s exposition, the
materials and estimates of other standpoints are diligently used,
and often the very words incorporated, the general result is not
modified in any essential respect. Written with equal vigour,
and bearing the impress of a freer ecclesiastical spirit, the
_Handbuch_ of =Bruno Lindner= (3 vols., Leipzig, 1848 ff.)
pursues with special diligence the course of the historical
development of doctrine, and also emphasizes the influence
of political factors. This same end is attempted in detailed
treatment with ample production of authoritative documents in
the _Handbuch_ of the author of the present treatise (vol. I.
in three divisions, in a 2nd ed.; vol. II. 1, down to the end
of the Carlovingian Era. Mitau, 1858 ff.). =Milman= (1791-1868)
an English church historian of the first rank (“Hist. of Chr.
to Abolit. of Pag. in Rom. Emp.” 3 vols., London, 1840; “History
of Latin Christianity to the Pontificate of Nicholas V.” 3 vols.,
London, 1854), shows himself, especially in the latter work,
learned, liberal and eloquent, eminently successful in sketching
character and presenting vivid pictures of the general culture
and social conditions of the several periods with which he deals.
The _Vorlesungen_ of =R. Hasse [Hase]=, published after his death
by Köhler (2nd ed., Leipz., 1872), form an unassuming treatise,
which scarcely present any trace of the influence of Hegel’s
teaching upon their author. =Köllner= of Giessen writes an
_Ordnung und Uebersicht der Materien der chr. Kirchengeschichte_,
Giess., 1864, a diligent, well-arranged, and well packed, but
somewhat dry and formless work. =H. Schmid= of Erlangen has
enlarged his compendious _Lehrbuch_ (2nd ed., 1856), into a
_Handbuch_ of two bulky volumes (Erlang., 1880); and =O. Zöckler=
of Greifswald has contributed to the _Handbuch d. theolog.
Wissenschaften_ (Erlang., 1884; 2nd ed., 1885) edited by him an
excellent chronological summary of church history. =Ebrard’s=
_Handbuch_ (4 vols., Erlang., 1865 ff.) endeavours to give
adequate expression to this genuine spirit of the Reformed
conception of historical writing by bringing church history and
the history of doctrines into organic connection. The attempt is
there made, however, as Hase has expressed it, with a paradoxical
rather than an orthodox tendency. The spirit and mind of the
Reformed Church are presented to us in a more temperate, mild
and impartial form, inspired by the pectoralism of Neander, in
the _Handbuch_ of =J. J. Herzog= of Erlangen, † 1882 (3 vols.,
Erlang., 1876), which assumes the name of _Abriss_ or Compendium.
This work set for itself the somewhat too ambitious aim
of supplying the place of the productions of Gieseler and
Neander,--which, as too diffuse, have unfortunately repelled many
readers--by a new treatise which should set forth the important
advances in the treatment of church history since their time,
and give a more concise sketch of universal church history.
The _Histoire du Christianisme_ of Prof. =Chastel= of Geneva,
(5 vols., Par., 1881 ff.) in its earlier volumes occupies the
standpoint of Neander, and we often miss the careful estimation of
the more important results of later research. In regard to modern
church history, notwithstanding every effort after objectivity
and impartiality, theological sympathies are quite apparent. On
the other hand, in the comprehensive _History of the Christian
Church_ by =Philip Schaff= (in 8 vols., Edinb., 1885, reaching
down to Gregory VIII., A.D. 1073), the rich results of research
subsequent to the time of Neander are fully and circumspectly
wrought up in harmony with the general principles of Neander’s
view of history. Herzog’s _ Realencyclopædie für protest. Theol.
u. Kirche_, especially in its 2nd ed. by Herzog and Plitt, and
after the death of both, by Hauck (18 vols., Leipz., 1877 ff.),
has won peculiar distinction in the department of church history
from the contributions of new and powerful writers. Lichtenberger,
formerly Prof. of Theol. in Strassburg, now in Paris, in his
_Encyclopédie des sciences relig. _ has produced a French work
worthy of a place alongside that of Herzog. _The Dictionary of
Christian Biography, Literature, Sects, and Doctrines during
the first eight centuries_, edited with admirable circumspection
and care by Dr. Wm. Smith and Prof. Wace, combines with a
completeness and richness of contents never reached before,
a thoroughgoing examination of the original sources. (4 vols.,
Lond., 1877 ff.) =Weingarten’s= Chronological Tables for Church
History (_Zeittafeln z. K.G._ 2nd ed., Brl., 1874) are most
useful to students as the latest and best helps of that kind.
§ 5.6. In the Catholic Church of Germany too a great activity has
been displayed in the realm of church history. First of all in
general Church history we have the diffuse work of the convert
=von Stolberg= (_Gesch. d. Rel. Jesu_, 15 vols., down to A.D. 430,
Hamb., 1806 ff., continued by von Kerz, vols. 16-45, and by
Brischar, vols. 46-52, Mainz, 1825-1859), spreading out into
hortatory and uncritical details. The elegant work of =Katerkamp=
(_K.G._, 5 vols., down to 1153, Münst., 1819 ff.) followed it,
inspired by a like mild spirit, but conceived in a more strictly
scientific way. Liberal, so far as that could be without breaking
with the hierarchy, is the _Handbuch der K.G._ (3 vols., Bonn,
1826 ff.; 6th ed. by Ennen, 2 vols., 1862), by =I. Ign. Ritter=.
The ample and detailed _Gesch. d. Chr. Rel. u. d. K._ (8 vols.,
down to 1073, Ravensb., 1824 ff.) of =Locherer= reminds one of
Schröckh’s work in other respects than that of its voluminousness.
A decidedly ultramontane conception of church history, with
frequent flashes of sharp wit, first appears in =Hortig’s=
_Handbuch_ (2 vols., Landsh., 1826). =Döllinger= in 1828 publ. as
a 3rd vol. of this work a _Handbuch d. Neuern K.G._, which, with
a similar tendency, assumed a more earnest tone. This theologian
afterwards undertook a thoroughly new and independent work of a
wider range, which still remains incomplete (_Gesch. d. chr. K._,
I. 1, 2, partially down to A.D. 630, Landsh., 1833-1835). This
work with ostensible liberality exposed the notorious fables
of Romish historical literature; but, on the other hand, with
brilliant ingenuity, endeavoured carefully to preserve intact
everything which on ultramontane principles and views might seem
capable of even partial justification. His _Lehrbuch_ (I. II. 1.,
Rgsb., 1836 ff.), reaching down only to the Reformation, treats
the matter in a similar way, and confines itself to a simple
statement of acknowledged facts. In the meantime =J. A. Möhler=,
by his earlier monographical works, and still more decidedly
by his far-reaching influence as a Professor at Tübingen, gave
rise to an expectation of the opening up of a new epoch in the
treatment of Catholic church history. He represented himself
as in spiritual sympathy with the forms and means of Protestant
science, although in decided opposition and conflict with its
contents, maintaining his faithful adhesion to all elements
essential to Roman Catholicism. This master, however, was
prevented by his early death, † 1838, from issuing his complete
history. This was done almost thirty years after his death by
Gams, who published the work from his posthumous papers (_K. G._,
3 vols., Rgsb., 1867 ff.), with much ultramontane amendment. It
shows all the defects of such patchwork, with here and there,
but relatively, very few fruitful cases. Traces of his influence
still appear in the spirit which pervades the _Lehrbücher_
proceeding from his school, by Alzog († 1878) and Kraus. The
_Universalgeschichte d. K._, by =J. Alzog= (Mainz, 1841; 9th ed.,
2 vols., 1872; transl. into Engl., 3 vols., Lond., 1877), was,
in its earlier editions, closely associated with the lectures of
his teacher, not ashamed even to draw from Hase’s fresh-sparkling
fountains something at times for his own yet rather parched
meadows, but in his later editions he became ever more
independent, more thorough in his investigation, more fresh and
lively in his exposition, making at the same time a praiseworthy
endeavour at moderation and impartiality of judgment, although
his adhesion to the Catholic standpoint grows more and more
strict till it reaches its culmination in the acceptance of the
dogma of Papal Infallibility. The 10th ed. of his work appeared
in 1882 under the supervision of Kraus, who contributed much to
its correction and completion. The _Lehrbuch_ of =F. Xav. Kraus=
of Freiburg (2nd ed., Trier, 1882) is without doubt among all
the Roman Catholic handbooks of the present the most solid from
a scientific point of view, and while diplomatically reserved
and carefully balanced in its expression of opinions, one of
the most liberal, and it is distinguished by a clever as well as
instructive mode of treatment. On the other hand, the Würzburgian
theologian, =J. Hergenröther= (since 1879 Cardinal and Keeper of
the Papal Archives at Rome), who represents the normal attitude
of implicit trust in the Vatican, has published a _Handbuch_
(2 vols. in 4 parts, Freib., 1876 ff.; 2nd ed., 1879, with a
supplement: Sources, Literat., and Foundations). In this work
he draws upon the rich stores of his acknowledged scholarship,
which, however, often strangely forsakes him in treating of the
history of Protestant theology. It is a skilful and instructive
exposition, and may very fitly be represented as “a history of
the church, yea, of the whole world, viewed through correctly set
Romish spectacles.” Far beneath him in scientific importance, but
in obstinate ultramontanism far above him, stands the _Lehrbuch_
of =H. Bruck [Brück]= (2nd ed., Mainz, 1877). A far more solid
production is presented in the _Dissertatt. selectæ in hist.
ecclst._ of Prof. =B. Jungmann= of Louvain, which treat in
chronological succession of parties and controversies prominent
in church history, especially of the historical development of
doctrine, in a thorough manner and with reference to original
documents, not without a prepossession in favour of Vaticanism
(vols. i.-iii., Ratisb., 1880-1883, reaching down to the end
of the 9th cent.). The _Kirchenlexikon_ of Wetzer and Wette
(12 vols., Freib., 1847 ff.) gained a prominent place on account
of the articles on church history contributed by the most eminent
Catholic scholars, conceived for the most part in the scientific
spirit of Möhler. The very copious and of its kind admirably
executed 2nd ed. by Kaulen (Freib., 1880 ff.), under the
auspices of Card. Hergenröther, is conceived in a far more
decidedly Papistic-Vatican spirit, which often does not
shrink from maintaining and vindicating even the most glaring
productions of mediæval superstition, illusion and credulity,
as grounded in indubitable historical facts. Much more
important is the historical research in the _Hist. Jahrbuch
der Görres-Gesellschaft_, edited from 1880 by G. Hüffer, and
from 1883 by B. Gramich, which presents itself as “a means of
reconciliation for those historians with whom Christ is the
middle point of history and the Catholic Church the God-ordained
institution for the education of the human race.”--In the French
Church the following are the most important productions: the
_Hist. de l’égl._ of =Berault-Bercastel= (24 vols., Par., 1778
ff.), which have had many French continuators and also a German
translator (24 vols., Vienna, 1784 ff.); the _Hist. ecclst.
depuis la création_, etc., of =Baron Henrion=, ed. by Migne
(25 vols., Par., 1852 ff.); and the very diffuse compilation,
wholly devoted to the glorification of the Papacy and its
institutions, _Hist. universelle de l’égl. Cath._ of the Louvain
French Abbé Rohrbacher (29 vols., Par., 1842 ff.; of which an
English transl. is in course of publication). Finally, the
scientifically careful exposition of the Old Catholic =J. Rieks=,
_Gesch. d. chr. K. u. d. Papstthums_, Lahr., 1882, though in some
respects onesided, may be mentioned as deserving of notice for its
general impartiality and love of the truth.
HISTORY OF THE PREPARATION FOR CHRISTIANITY.
The pre-Christian World preparing the way
of the Christian Church.
§ 6. THE STANDPOINT OF UNIVERSAL HISTORY.
The middle point of the epochs and developments of the human race is
the incarnation of God in Christ. With it begins, upon it rests, the
fulness of the time (Gal. iv. 4), and toward it the whole pre-Christian
history is directed as anticipatory or progressive. This preparation has
its beginning in the very cradle of humanity, and is soon parted in the
two directions of Heathenism and Judaism. In the former case we have the
development of merely human powers and capacities; in the latter case
this development is carried on by continuous divine revelation. Both
courses of development, distinguished not only by the means, but also by
the task undertaken and the end aimed at, run alongside of one another,
until in the fulness of the time they are united in Christianity and
contribute thereto the fruits and results of what was essential and
characteristic in their several separate developments.
§ 7. HEATHENISM.
The primitive race of man, surrounded by rich and luxuriant forms
of nature, put this abundance of primeval power in the place of the
personal and supramundane God. Surrounded by such an inexhaustible
fulness of life and pleasures, man came to look upon nature as more
worthy of sacrifice and reverence than a personal God removed far off
into supramundane heights. Thus arose heathenism as to its general
features: a self-absorption into the depths of the life of nature,
a deification of nature, a worshipping of nature (Rom. i. 21 ff.),
therefore, the religion of nature, in accordance with which, too,
its moral character is determined. Most conspicuously by means of its
intellectual culture has heathenism given preliminary aid to the church
for the performing of her intellectual task. And even the pagan empire,
with its striving after universal dominion, as well as the active
commercial intercourse in the old heathen world, contributed in
preparing the way of the church.
§ 7.1. =The Religious Character of Heathenism.=--The hidden
powers of the life of nature and the soul, not intellectually
apprehended in the form of abstract knowledge, but laid hold of
in immediate practice, and developed in speculation and mysticism,
in natural magic and soothsaying, and applied to all the
relations of human life, seemed revelations of the eternal spirit
of nature, and, mostly by means of the intervention of prominent
personalities and under the influence of various geographical
and ethnographical peculiarities, produced manifold systems of
the religion of nature. Common to all, and deeply rooted in the
nature of heathenism, is the distinction between the _esoteric_
religion of the priests, and the _exoteric_ religion of the
people. The former is essentially a speculative ideal pantheism;
the latter is for the most part a mythical and ceremonial
polytheism. The religious development of heathenism has
nevertheless been by no means stripped of all elements of truth.
Apart from casual remnants of the primitive divine revelation,
which, variously contorted on their transmission through heathen
channels, may lie at the foundation or be inwrought into its
religious systems, the hothouse-like development of the religion
of nature has anticipated many a religious truth which, in the
way of divine revelation, could only slowly and at a late period
come to maturity, but has perverted and distorted it to such a
degree that it was little better than a caricature. To this class
belong, for example, the pantheistic theories of the Trinity and
the Incarnation, the dualistic acknowledgment of the reality of
evil, etc. To this also especially belongs the offering of human
victims which has been practised in all religions of nature
without exception,--a terrible and to some extent prophetic cry
of agony from God-forsaken men, which is first toned down on
Golgotha into hymns of joy and thanksgiving. Witness is given to
the power and energy, with which the religions of nature in the
time of their bloom took possession of and ruled over the minds
and emotions of men, by the otherwise unexampled sacrifices
and self-inflictions, such as hecatombs, offerings of children,
mutilation, prostitution, etc., to which its votaries submitted,
and not less the almost irresistible charm which it exercised
again and again upon the people of Israel during the whole course
of their earlier history. It also follows from this that the
religion of heathenism does not consist in naked lies and pure
illusions. There are elements of truth in the lies, which gave
this power to the religion of nature. There are anticipations
of redemption, though these were demoniacally perverted, which
imparted to it this charm. There are mysterious phenomena of
natural magic and soothsaying which seemed to establish their
divine character. But the worship of nature had the fate of all
unnatural, precocious development. The truth was soon swallowed
up by the lies, the power of development and life, of which more
than could possibly be given was demanded, was soon consumed and
used up. The blossoms fell before the fruit had set. Mysteries
and oracles, magic and soothsaying, became empty forms, or organs
of intentional fraud and common roguery. And so it came to pass
that one harauspex could not look upon another without laughing.
Unbelief mocked everything, superstition assumed its most absurd
and utterly senseless forms, and religions of an irrational
mongrel type sought in vain to quicken again a nerveless and
soulless heathenism.
§ 7.2. =The Moral Character of Heathenism.=--Religious character
and moral character go always hand in hand. Thus, too, the moral
life among heathen peoples was earnest, powerful, and true,
or lax, defective, and perverse, in the same proportion as was
the religious life of that same period. The moral faults of
heathenism flow from its religious faults. It was a religion of
the present, to whose gods therefore were also unhesitatingly
ascribed all the imperfections of the present. In this way
religion lost all its power for raising men out of the mire and
dust surrounding them. The partly immoral myths sanctioned or
excused by the example of the gods the grossest immoralities. As
the type and pattern of reproductive power in the deified life
of nature, the gratification of lust was often made the central
and main point in divine service. The idea of pure humanity was
wholly wanting in heathenism. It could only reach the conception
of nationality, and its virtues were only the virtues of citizens.
In the East despotism crushed, and in the West fierce national
antipathies stifled the acknowledgment of, universal human rights
and the common rank of men, so that the foreigner and the slave
were not admitted to have any claims. As the worth of man was
measured only by his political position, the significance of
woman was wholly overlooked and repudiated. Her position was at
most only that of the maid of the man, and was degraded to the
lowest depths in the East by reason of the prevalent polygamy.
Notwithstanding all these great and far-reaching moral faults,
heathenism, in the days of its bloom and power, at least in those
departments of the moral life, such as politics and municipal
matters, in which pantheism and polytheism did not exert
their relaxing influence, had still preserved much high moral
earnestness and an astonishing energy. But when the religion of
their fathers, reduced to emptiness and powerlessness, ceased to
be the soul and bearer of those departments of life, all moral
power was also withdrawn from them. The moral deterioration
reached its culminating point in the dissolute age of the Roman
Emperors. In this indescribable state of moral degeneration, the
church found heathenism, when it began its spiritual regeneration
of the world.
§ 7.3. =The Intellectual Culture in Heathenism.=--The
intellectual culture of heathenism has won in regard to the
church a twofold significance. On the one hand it affords a
pattern, and on the other it presents a warning beacon. Pagan
science and art, in so far as they possess a generally culturing
influence and present to the Christian church a special type
for imitation, are but the ultimate results of the intellectual
activity which manifested itself among the Greeks and Romans
in philosophy, poetry and historical writing, which have in two
directions, as to form and as to contents, become the model for
the Christian church, preparing and breaking up its way. On the
one side they produced forms for the exercise of the intellectual
life, which by their exactness and clearness, by their variety
and many-sidedness, afforded to the new intellectual contents of
Christianity a means for its formal exposition and expression.
But, on the other side, they also produced, from profound
consideration of and research into nature and spirit, history
and life, ideas and reflections which variously formed an
anticipation of the ideas of redemption and prepared the soil
for their reception. The influence, however, on the other hand,
which oriental forms of culture had upon the development and
construction of the history of redemption, had already exhausted
itself upon Judaism. What the symbolism of orientalism had
contributed to Judaism, namely the form in which the divine
contents communicated by Old Testament prophesy should be
presented and unfolded, the dialectic of classical heathenism was
to Christianity, in which the symbolic covering of Judaism was to
be torn off and the thought of divine redemption to be manifested
and to be laid hold of in its purely intellectual form. The
influence of heathenism upon the advancing church in the other
direction as affording a picture of what was to be avoided, was
represented not less by Eastern culture than by the classical
culture of the Greeks and Romans. Here it was exclusively the
contents, and indeed the ungodly anti-Christian contents, the
specifically heathen substance of the pagan philosophy, theosophy,
and mysteriosophy, which by means of tolerated forms of culture
sought to penetrate and completely paganize Christianity. To
heathenism, highly cultured but pluming itself in the arrogance
of its sublime wisdom, Christianity, by whose suggestive
profundity it had been at first attracted, appeared altogether
too simple, unphilosophical, unspeculative, to satisfy the
supposed requirements of the culture of the age. There was needed,
it was thought, fructification and enriching by the collective
wisdom of the East and the West before religion could in truth
present itself as absolute and perfect.
§ 7.4. =The Hellenic Philosophy.=--What is true of Greek-Roman
culture generally on its material and formal sides, that it
powerfully influenced Christianity now budding into flower,
is preeminently true of the Greek Philosophy. Regarded as
a prefiguration of Christianity, Greek philosophy presents
a negative side in so far as it led to the dissolution of
heathenism, and a positive side in so far as it, by furnishing
form and contents, contributed to the construction of
Christianity. From its very origin Hellenic philosophy
contributed to the negative process by undermining the people’s
faith in heathenism, preparing for the overthrow of idolatry, and
leading heathenism to take a despondent view of its own future.
It is with =Socrates=, who died in B.C. 399, that the positive
prefiguring of Christianity on the part of Greek philosophy comes
first decidedly into view. His humble confession of ignorance,
his founding of the claim to wisdom on the Γνῶθι σεαυτόν,
the tracing of his deepest thoughts and yearnings back to
divine suggestions (his Δαιμόνιον), his grave resignation to
circumstances, and his joyful hope in a more blessed future,
may certainly be regarded as faint anticipations and prophetic
adumbrations of the phenomena of Christian faith and life.
=Plato=, who died B.C. 348, with independent speculative and
poetic power, wrought the scattered hints of his teacher’s wisdom
into an organically articulated theory of the universe, which
in its anticipatory profundity approached more nearly to the
Christian theory of the universe than any other outside the range
of revelation. His philosophy leads men to an appreciation of his
God-related nature, takes him past the visible and sensible to
the eternal prototypes of all beauty, truth and goodness, from
which he has fallen away, and awakens in him a profound longing
after his lost possessions. In regard to matter =Aristotle=, who
died B.C. 322, does not stand so closely related to Christianity
as Plato, but in regard to form, he has much more decidedly
influenced the logical thinking and systematizing of later
Christian sciences. In these two, however, are reached the
highest elevation of the philosophical thinking of the Greeks,
viewed in itself as well as in its positive and constructive
influence upon the church. As philosophy down to that time,
consciously or unconsciously, had wrought for the dissolution
of the religion of the people, it now proceeded to work its own
overthrow, and brought into ever deeper, fuller and clearer
consciousness the despairing estimate of the world regarding
itself. This is shown most significantly in the three schools
of philosophy which were most widely spread at the entrance of
the church into the Græco-Roman world, Epicureanism, Stoicism,
and Scepticism. =Epicurus=, who died B.C. 271, in his philosophy
seeks the highest good in pleasure, recognises in the world only
a play of fortune, regards the soul as mortal, and supposes that
the gods in their blissful retirement no longer take any thought
about the world. =Stoicism=, founded by Zeno, who died in B.C.
260, over against the Epicurean deism set up a hylozoistic
pantheism, made the development of the world dependent upon the
unalterable necessity of fate, which brings about a universal
conflagration, out of which again a new world springs to follow
a similar course. To look on pleasure with contempt, to scorn
pain, and in case of necessity to end a fruitless life by
suicide--these constitute the core of all wisdom. When he has
reached such a height in the mastery of self and of the world the
wise man is his own god, finding in himself all that he needs.
Finally, in conflict with Stoicism arose the =Scepticism= of the
_New Academy_, at the head of which were Arcesilaus who died B.C.
240 and Carneades who died B.C. 128. This school renounced all
knowledge of truth as something really unattainable, and in the
moderation (ἐποχή) of every opinion placed the sum of theoretic
wisdom, while it regarded the sum of all practical wisdom to
consist in the evidence of every passionate or exciting effort.
§ 7.5. =The Heathen State.=--In the grand endeavour of heathenism
to redeem itself by its own resources and according to its own
pleasure, the attempt was finally made by the concentration of
all forces into one colossal might. To gather into one point all
the mental and bodily powers of the whole human race, and through
them also all powers of nature and the products of all zones
and lands, and to put them under one will, and then in this
will to recognise the personal and visible representation of the
godhead--to this was heathenism driven by an inner necessity.
Hence arose a struggle, and in consequence of the pertinacity
with which it was carried on, one kingdom after another was
overthrown, until the climax was reached in the Roman empire.
Yet even this empire was broken and dissolved when opposed by the
spiritual power of the kingdom of God. Like all the endeavours
of heathenism, this struggle for =absolute sovereignty= had a
twofold aspect; there are thereby made prominent men’s own ways
and God’s ways, the undivine aims of men, and the blessed results
which God’s government of the world could secure for them. We
have here to do first of all simply with the Roman universal
empire, but the powers that rose in succession after it are only
rejuvenations and powerful continuations of the endeavour of the
earlier power, and so that is true of every state which is true
of the Roman. Its significance as a preparer of the way for the
church is just this, that in consequence of the articulation of
the world into one great state organisation, the various stages
and elements of culture found among the several civilized races
hitherto isolated, contributed now to one universal civilization,
and a rapid circulation of the new life-blood driven by the
church through the veins of the nations was made possible and
easy. With special power and universal success had the exploits
of Alexander the Great in this direction made a beginning, which
reached perfection under the Roman empire. The ever advancing
prevalence of one language, the Greek, which at the time of the
beginning of the church was spoken and understood in all quarters
of the Roman empire, which seemed, like a temporary suspension
of the doom of the confusion of languages which accompanied the
rise of heathenism (Gen. xi.), to celebrate its return to the
divine favour, belongs also pre-eminently to those preparatory
influences. And as the heathen state sought after the
concentration of all might, =Industry= and =Trade=, moved by
the same principle, sought after the concentration of wealth and
profit. But as worldly enterprise for its own ends made paths for
universal commerce over wastes and seas, and visited for purposes
of trade the remotest countries and climes, it served unwittingly
and unintentionally the higher purposes of divine grace by
opening a way for the spread of the message of the gospel.
§ 8. JUDAISM.
In a land which, like the people themselves, combined the character
of insular exclusiveness with that of a central position in the ancient
world, Israel, on account of the part which it was called to play in
universal history, had to be the receiver and communicator of God’s
revelations of His salvation, had to live quiet and apart, taking
little to do with the world’s business; having, on the other hand, the
assurance from God’s promise that disasters threatened by heathenish
love of conquest and oppression would be averted. This position and
this task were, indeed, only too often forgotten. Only too often did
the Israelites mix themselves up in worldly affairs, with which they
had no concern. Only too often by their departure from their God did
they make themselves like the heathen nations in religion, worship,
and conversation, so that for correction and punishment they had
often to be put under a heavy yoke. Yet the remnant of the holy seed
(Isa. iv. 3; vi. 13) which was never wholly wanting even in times of
general apostasy, as well as the long-suffering and faithfulness of
their God, ensured the complete realisation of Israel’s vocation, even
though the unspiritual mass of the people finally rejected the offered
redemption.
§ 8.1. =Judaism under special Training of God through the Law and
Prophecy.=--Abraham was chosen as a single individual (Isa. li. 2),
and, as the creator of something new, God called forth from an
unfruitful womb the seed of promise. As saviour and redeemer
from existing misery He delivered the people of promise from the
oppression of Egyptian slavery. In the Holy Land the family must
work out its own development, but in order that the family might
be able unrestrainedly to expand into a great nation, it was
necessary that it should first go down into Egypt. Moses led the
people thus disciplined out of the foreign land, and gave them
a theocratic constitution, law, and worship as means for the
accomplishment of their calling, as a model and a schoolmaster
leading on to future perfection (Gal. iii. 24; Heb. x. 1). The
going out of Egypt was the birth of the nation, the giving of
the law at Sinai was its consecration as a holy nation. Joshua
set forth the last condition for an independent people, the
possession of a country commensurate with the task of the nation,
a land of their own that would awaken patriotic feelings. Now the
theocracy under the form of a purely popular institution under
the fostering care of the priesthood could and should have borne
fruit, but the period of the Judges proves that those two factors
of development were not sufficient, and so now two new agencies
make their appearance; the Prophetic order as a distinct and
regular office, constituted for the purpose of being a mouth
to God and a conscience to the state, and the Kingly order for
the protecting of the theocracy against hurt from without and
for the establishment of peace within her borders. By David’s
successes the theocracy attained unto a high degree of political
significance, and by Solomon’s building of the temple the typical
form of worship reached the highest point of its development.
In spite, however, of prophecy and royalty, the people, ever
withdrawing themselves more and more from their true vocation,
were not able outwardly and inwardly to maintain the high level.
The division of the kingdom, internal feuds and conflicts,
their untheocratic entanglement in the affairs of the world, the
growing tendency to fall away from the worship of Jehovah and
to engage in the worship of high places, and calves, and nature,
called down incessantly the divine judgments, in consequence of
which they fell a prey to the heathen. Yet this discipline was
not in vain. Cyrus decreed their return and their independent
organization, and even prophecy was granted for a time to the
restored community for its establishment and consolidation. Under
these political developments has prophecy, in addition to its
immediate concern with its own times in respect of teaching,
discipline, and exhortation, given to the promise of future
salvation its fullest expression, bringing a bright ray of
comfort and hope to light up the darkness of a gloomy present.
The fading memories of the happy times of the brilliant victories
of David and the glorious peaceful reign of Solomon formed the
bases of the delineations of the future Messianic kingdom, while
the disasters, the suffering and the humiliation of the people
during the period of their decay gave an impulse to Messianic
longings for a Messiah suffering for the sins of the people
and taking on Himself all their misery. And now, after it
had effected its main purpose, prophecy was silenced, to be
reawakened only in a complete and final form when the fulness
of time had come.
§ 8.2. =Judaism after the Cessation of Prophecy.=--The time had
now come when the chosen people, emancipated from the immediate
discipline of divine revelation, but furnished with the results
and experiences of a rich course of instruction, and accompanied
by the law as a schoolmaster and by the light of the prophetic
word, should themselves work out the purpose of their calling.
The war of extermination which Antiochus Epiphanes in his heathen
fanaticism waged against Judaism, was happily and victoriously
repelled, and once more the nation won its political independence
under the Maccabees. At last, however, owing to the increasing
corruption of the ruling Maccabean family, they were ensnared by
the craft of the Roman empire. The Syrian religious persecution
and the subsequent oppression of the Romans roused the national
spirit and the attachment to the religion of their fathers to the
most extreme exclusiveness, fanatical hatred, and proud scorn of
everything foreign, and converted the Messianic hope into a mere
political and frantically carnal expectation. True piety more
and more disappeared in a punctilious legalism and ceremonialism,
in a conceited self-righteousness and boastful confidence in
their own good works. Priests and scribes were eagerly bent
on fostering this tendency and increasing the unsusceptibility
of the masses for the spirituality of the redemption that was
drawing nigh, by multiplying and exaggerating external rules
and by perverse interpretation of scripture. But in spite of all
these perverting and far-reaching tendencies, there was yet in
quiet obscurity a sacred plantation of the true Israel (John i. 47;
Luke i. 6; ii. 25, 38, etc.), as a garden of God for the first
reception of salvation in Christ.
§ 8.3. =The Synagogues.=--The institution of the =Synagogues=
was of the greatest importance for the spread and development of
post-exilian Judaism. They had their origin in the consciousness
that, besides the continuance of the symbolical worship of the
temple, a ministry of the word for edification by means of the
revelation of God in the law and the prophets was, after the
withdrawal of prophecy, all the more a pressing need and duty.
But they also afforded a nursery for the endeavour to widen and
contract the law of Moses by Rabbinical rules, for the tendency
to external legalism and hypocrisy, for the national arrogance
and the carnal Messianic expectations, which from them passed
over into the life of the people. On the other hand, the
synagogues, especially outside of Palestine, among the dispersion,
won a far-reaching significance for the church by reason of
their missionary tendency. For here where every Sabbath the holy
scripture of the Old Testament was read in the Greek translation
of the Septuagint and expounded, a convenient opportunity was
given to heathens longing for salvation to gain acquaintance with
the revelations and promises of God in the Old Covenant, and here
there was already a place for the first ministers of the gospel,
from which they could deliver their message to an assembled
multitude of people from among the Jews and Gentiles. (Schürer,
“Hist. of the Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ.” Div. ii.,
vol. 2., “The School and Synagogue.” pp. 44-89, Edin., 1885.)
§ 8.4. =Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes.=--The strict,
traditionally legalistic, carnally particularistic tendency
of Post-Exilian Judaism had its representatives and supporters
in the sect of the =Pharisees= (פְרוּשִׁים, ἀφωρισμένοι), so called
because their main endeavour was to maintain the strictest
separation from everything heathenish, foreign, and ceremonially
unclean. By their ostentatious display of zeal for the law, their
contempt for everything not Jewish, their democratic principles
and their arrogant patriotism, they won most completely the
favour of the people; they shared the evil fortunes of the
Maccabean princes, and became the bitterest enemies of the
Herodians, and entertained a burning fanatical hatred to the
Romans. They held sway in the synagogues to such an extent
that the names Scribes and Pharisees were regarded as almost
synonymous, and even in the Sanhedrim they secured many seats.
In the times of Jesus the schools of Hillel and Shammai contended
with one another, the former pleading for somewhat lax views,
especially in reference to divorce and the obligation of oaths,
while the latter insisted upon the most rigorous interpretation
of the law. Both, however, were agreed in the recognition of oral
tradition, the παραδόσεις τῶν πατέρων, as a binding authority and
an essential supplement to the law of Moses. In direct opposition
to them stand the =Sadducees=, out of sympathy with the
aspirations of the people, and abandoning wholly the sacred
traditions, and joining themselves in league with the Herodians
and Romans. The name originally designated them as descendants of
the old temple aristocracy represented by the family of the high
priest Zadok, and, in consequence of the similarity in sound
between צַדּוּקיִם and צַדּיִקיִם, gave expression to their claim to be
regarded as essentially and truly righteous because of their
outward adherence to the Mosaic law. Proceeding on the principle
that virtue as a free act of man has in it its own worth and
reward, just as vice has in it its own punishment, they rejected
the doctrine of a future judgment, denied the doctrine of a
resurrection, the existence of angels and spirits, and the
doctrine of the divine foreknowledge.[2] The =Essenes=, not
mentioned in the Bible, but named by Philo, Josephus, and the
elder Pliny, form a third sect. Their name was probably derived
from חֲסֵא, pious. The original germ of their society is found
in distinct colonies on the banks of the Dead Sea, which kept
apart from the other Jews, and recognised even among themselves
four different grades of initiation, each order being strictly
separated from the others. A member was received only after
a three years’ novitiate, and undertook to keep secret the
mysteries of the order. Community of goods in the several
communities and clans, meals in common accompanied by religious
ceremonies, frequent prayers in the early morning with the face
directed to the rising sun, oft repeated washings and cleansings,
diligent application to agriculture and other peaceful
occupations, abstaining from the use of flesh and wine, from
trade and every warlike pursuit, from slavery and taking of
oaths, perhaps also abstinence from marriage in the higher orders,
were the main conditions of membership in their association.
The Sabbath was observed with great strictness, but sacrifices
of blood were abolished, and all anointing with oil was regarded
as polluting. They still, however, maintained connection with
Judaism by sending gifts to the temple. So far the order may
fairly be regarded, as it is by Ritschl, as a spiritualizing
exaggeration of the Mosaic idea of the priestly character that
had independently grown up on Jewish soil, and indeed especially
as an attempt to realize the calling set forth in Exod. xix. 5, 6,
and repudiated in Exod. xx. 19, 20, unto all Israelites to be a
spiritual priesthood. But when, on the other hand, the Essenes,
according to Josephus, considered the body as a prison in which
the soul falling from its ethereal existence is to be confined
until freed from its fetters by death it returns again to heaven,
this can scarcely be explained as originating from any other than
a heathen source, especially from the widely spread influences
of Neo-Pythagoreanism (§ 24). Lucius (1881) derives the name
and seeks their origin from the Asidæans, Chasidim, or Pious,
in 1 Macc. ii. 42; vii. 13; and 2 Macc. xiv. 6. Very striking
too is Hilgenfeld’s carefully weighed and ably sustained theory
(_Ketzergesch._, pp. 87-149), that their descent is to be traced
from the Kenite Rechabites (Jer. xxxv.; Judg. i. 16), and their
name from the city Gerasa, west of the Dead Sea, called in
Josephus also Essa, where the Rechabites, abandoning their tent
life, formed a settlement. In the time of Josephus the Essenes
numbered about four thousand. In consequence of the Jewish war,
which brought distress upon them, as well as upon the Christians,
they were led into friendly relations with Christianity; but even
when adopting the Christian doctrines, they still carried with
them many of their earlier tenets (§ 28, 2, 3).[3]
§ 9. SAMARITANISM.
The Samaritans, who came into existence at the time of the overthrow
of the kingdom of Israel, from the blending of Israelitish and
heathenish elements, desired fellowship with the Jewish colony that
returned from the Babylonish captivity, but were repelled on account
of their manifold compromises with pagan practice. And although an
expelled Jew named Manasseh purified their religion as far as possible
of heathenish elements, and gave them a temple and order of worship on
Mount Gerizim, this only increased the hatred of the Jews against them.
Holding fast to the Judaism taught them by Manasseh, the Samaritans
never adopted the refinements and perversions of later Judaism. Their
Messianic expectations remained purer, their particularism less severe.
While thus rendered capable of forming a more impartial estimate of
Christianity, they were also inclined upon the whole, because of the
hatred and contempt which they had to endure from Pharisaic Judaism,
to look with favour upon Christianity despised and persecuted as they
themselves had been (John iv. 41; Acts viii. 5 ff.). On the other hand,
the syncretic-heathen element, which still flourished in Samaritanism,
showed its opposition to Christianity by positive reactionary attempts
(§ 25, 2).[4]
§ 10. INTERCOURSE BETWEEN JUDAISM AND HEATHENISM.
Alexander the Great’s conquest of the world brought into connection
with one another the most diverse elements of culture in antiquity.
Least of all could Judaism outside of Palestine, the _diaspora_, living
amid the influences of heathen or Hellenic culture and ways of viewing
things, withdraw itself from the syncretic current of the age. The Jews
of Eastern Asia maintained a closer connection and spiritual affinity
with the exclusive Palestinian Rabbinism, and the heathen element,
which here penetrated into their religious conceptions, became, chiefly
through the Talmud, the common property of post-Christian Judaism. But
heathenism also, contemptible as Judaism appeared to it, was susceptible
to Jewish influences, impressed by the deeper religious contents of
Judaism, and though only sporadic, instances of such influence were by
no means rare.
§ 10.1. =Influence of Heathenism upon Judaism.=--This reached
its greatest strength in Egypt, the special centre and source of
the syncretic tendencies of the age. Forming for itself by means
of the adoption of Greek culture and especially of the Platonic
philosophy a more universal basis of culture, Jewish Hellenism
flourished in Alexandria. After Aristobulus, who wrote Ἐξηγήσεις
τῆς Μωυσέως, about B.C. 170, now only found in a fragment
of doubtful authority, and the author of the Book of Wisdom,
the chief representative of this tendency was the Alexandrian
Jew Philo, a contemporary of Christ. His Platonism enriched
by elements drawn from Old Testament revelation and from
the doctrines of the Essenes has on many points carried its
speculation to the very borders of Christianity, and has formed
a scaffolding for the Christian philosophy of the Church Fathers.
He taught that all nations have received a share of divine truth,
but that the actual founder and father of all true philosophy
was Moses, whose legislation and teaching formed the source of
information for even the Greek Philosophy and Mysteriosophy.
But it is only by means of allegorical interpretation that such
depths can be discovered. God is τὸ ὄν, matter τὸ μὴ ὄν. An
intermediate world, corresponding to the Platonic world of ideas,
is the κόσμος νοητός, consisting of innumerable spirits and
powers, angels and souls of men, but bound together into a unity
in and issuing from the Word of God, who as the λόγος ἐνδιαθετός
was embraced in God from eternity, coming forth from God as the
λόγος προφορικός for the creation of the world (thought and word).
The visible world, on account of the physical impotence of matter,
is an imperfect representation of the κόσμος νοητός, etc. On the
ground of the writing _De vita contemplativa_ attributed to Philo,
the =Therapeutæ=, or worshippers of God, mentioned therein, had
been regarded as a contemplative ascetic sect related to the
Essenes, affected by an Alexandrian philosophical spirit, living
a sort of monastic life in the neighbourhood of Alexandria, until
Lucius (Strassb., 1879) withdrew them from the domain of history
to that of Utopian romance conceived in support of a special
theory. This scholar has proved that the writing referred to
cannot possibly be assigned to Philo, but must have been composed
about the end of the third century in the interest of Christian
monasticism, for which it presented an idealizing apology. This,
however, has been contested by Weingarten, in Herzog, x. 761, on
good grounds, and the origin of the book has been assigned to a
period soon after Philo, when Hellenistic Judaism was subjected
to a great variety of religious and philosophical influences.[5]
§ 10.2. =Influence of Judaism upon Heathenism.=--The heathen
state showed itself generally tolerant toward Judaism. Alexander
the Great and his successors, the Ptolemies, to some extent
also the Seleucidæ, allowed the Jews the free exercise of
their religion and various privileges, while the Romans allowed
Judaism to rank as a _religio licita_. Nevertheless the Jews were
universally despised and hated. Tacitus calls them _despectissima
pars servientium, teterrima gens_; and even the better class of
writers, such as Manetho, Justin, Tacitus, gave currency to the
most absurd stories and malicious calumnies against them. In
opposition to these the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus took
pains to overcome the prejudices of Greeks and Romans against
his nation, by presenting to them its history and institutions
in the most favourable light. But on the other side, the Greek
translation of the Old Testament, called the Septuagint, as well
as the multitude of Jewish synagogues, which during the Roman
period were scattered over the whole world, afforded to every
heathen interested therein the opportunity of discovering by
personal examination and inquiry the characteristic principles
of Judaism. When, therefore, we consider the utterly corrupt
condition of heathenism, we cannot wonder that Judaism, in spite
of all the contempt that was thrown upon it, would attract,
by reason of its hoary antiquity and the sublime simplicity of
its creed, the significance of its worship, and its Messianic
promises, many of the better aspiring heathens, who were no
longer satisfied with their sorely degraded forms of religion.
And though indeed only a few enrolled themselves as “_Proselytes
of Righteousness_,” entering the Jewish community by submitting
to the rite of circumcision, the number of the “_Proselytes of
the Gate_” who without observing the whole of the ceremonial law
undertook to abandon their idols and to worship Jehovah, in all
ranks of society, mostly women, was very considerable, and it
was just among them that Christianity found the most hearty and
friendly acceptance.
§ 11. THE FULNESS OF TIME.
The fulness of the olden time had come when the dawn of a new era
burst forth over the mountains of Judea. All that Judaism and heathenism
had been able to do in preparing the way for this new era had now been
done. Heathenism was itself conscious of its impotence and unfitness
for satisfying the religious needs of the human spirit, and wherever it
had not fallen into dreary unbelief or wild superstition, it struggled
and agonized, aspiring after something better. In this way negatively
a path was prepared for the church. In science and art, as well as in
general intellectual culture, heathenism had produced something great
and imperishable; and ineffectual as these in themselves had proved to
restore again to man the peace which he had lost and now sought after,
they might become effectually helpful for such purposes when made
subservient to the true salvation. And so far heathenism was a positive
helper to the church. The impression that a crisis in the world’s
history was near at hand was universal among Jews and Gentiles. The
profound realization of the need was a presage of the time of fulfilment.
All true Israelites waited for the promised Messiah, and even in
heathenism the ancient hope of the return of the Golden Age was again
brought to the front, and had, from the sacred scriptures and synagogues
of the Jews, obtained a new holding ground and a definite direction.
The heathen state, too, made its own contribution toward preparing the
way of the church. One sceptre and one language united the whole world,
a universal peace prevailed, and the most widely extended commercial
intercourse gave opportunity for the easy and rapid spread of saving
truth.
THE HISTORY OF THE BEGINNINGS.
The Founding of the Church by Christ and His Apostles.
§ 12. CHARACTER OF THE HISTORY OF THE BEGINNINGS.
The propriety in a treatise on general church history of separating
the Times of Jesus and the Times of the Apostles, closely connected
therewith, from the History of the Development of the Church, and
giving to them a distinct place under the title of the History of the
Beginnings, rests on the fact that in those times we have the germs and
principles of all that follows. The unique capacity of the Apostles,
resulting from special enlightenment and endowment, makes that which
they have done of vital importance for all subsequent development. In
our estimation of each later form of the church’s existence we must
go back to the doctrine and practice of Christ and His Apostles as the
standard, not as to a finally completed form that has exhausted all
possibilities of development, and made all further advance and growth
impossible or useless, but rather as to the authentic fresh germs and
beginnings of the church, so that not only what in later development is
found to have existed in the same form in the beginning is recognised as
genuinely Christian, but also that which is seen to be a development and
growth of that primitive form.
I. THE LIFE OF JESUS.
§ 13. JESUS CHRIST, THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD.
“But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son,
made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the
law, that we might receive the adoption of sons” (Gal. iv. 4, 5). In
accordance with prophetic announcements, He was born in Bethlehem as the
Son of David, and, after John the Baptist, the last of the prophets of
the Old Covenant, had prepared His way by the preaching of repentance
and the baptism of repentance, He began in the thirtieth year of His age
His fulfilment by life and teaching of the law and the prophets. With
twelve chosen disciples He travelled up and down through the land of the
Jews, preaching the kingdom of God, helping and healing, and by miracles
and signs confirming His divine mission and doctrine. The Pharisees
contradicted and persecuted Him, the Sadducees disregarded Him, and
the people vacillated between acclamations and execrations. After
three years’ activity, amid the hosannas of the multitude, He made His
royal entry into the city of His kingly ancestors. But the same crowd,
disappointed in their political and carnal Messianic expectations, a
few days later raised the cry: Crucify Him, crucify Him! Thus then He
suffered according to the gracious good pleasure of the Father the death
of the cross for the sins of the world. The Prince of life, however,
could not be holden of death. He burst the gates of Hades, as well as
the barriers of the grave, and rose again the third day. For forty days
He lingered here below, promised His disciples the gift of His Holy
Spirit, and commissioned them to preach the gospel to all nations. Then
upon His ascension He assumed the divine form of which He had emptied
Himself during His incarnation, and sits now at the right hand of power
as the Head of His church and the Lord of all that is named in heaven
and on earth, until visibly and in glory, according to the promise, He
returns again at the restitution of all things.
§ 13.1. In regard to the =year of the birth= and the =year of the
death= of the Redeemer no absolutely certain result can now be
attained. The usual Christian chronology constructed by Dionysius
Exiguus in the sixth century, first employed by the Venerable
Bede, and brought into official use by Charlemagne, assumes the
year 754 A.U.C. as the date of Christ’s birth, which is evidently
wrong, since, in A.D. 750 or 751, Herod the Great was already
dead. Zumpt takes the seventh, others the third, fourth, or fifth
year before our era. The length of Christ’s public ministry was
fixed by many Church Fathers, in accordance with Isaiah lxi. 1, 2,
and Luke iv. 19, at one year, and it was consequently assumed
that Christ was crucified when thirty years of age (Luke iii. 21).
The synoptists indeed speak only of one passover, the last,
during Christ’s ministry; but John (ii. 13; vi. 4; xii. 1) speaks
of three, and also besides (v. 1) of a ἑορτὴ τῶν Ἰουδαίων.
§ 13.2. Among the non-biblical =witnesses to Christ= the earliest
is probably a Syrian Epistle of =Mara= to his son Serapion,
written, according to Cureton (“_Spicileg. Syriacum_.” Lond.,
1855), about A.D. 73. The father, highly cultured in Greek wisdom
but dissatisfied with it, writes from exile words of comfort
and exhortation to his son, in which he places Christ alongside
of Socrates and Pythagoras, and honours him as the wise King,
by whose death the Jews had brought upon themselves the swift
overthrow of their kingdom, who would, however, although slain,
live for ever in the new land which He has given. To this period
also belongs the witness of the Jewish historian =Josephus=,
which in its probably genuine portions praises Jesus as a worker
of miracles and teacher of wisdom, and testifies to His death on
the cross under Pilate, as well as the founding of the church in
His name. Distinctly and wholly spurious is the =Correspondence
of Christ with Abgar=, Prince of Edessa, who entreats Christ
to come to Edessa to heal him and is comforted of the Lord by
the sending of one of His disciples after His ascension. This
document was first communicated by Eusebius (_Hist. Eccl._, i. 13)
from the Archives of Edessa in a literal translation from the
Syriac, and is also to be found in the Syrian book _Doctrina
Addæi_ (§ 32, 6). Of a similar kind are the apocryphal =Acta
Pilati=, as well the heathen form which has perished (§ 22, 7),
as the Christian form which is still extant (§ 32, 4). An
=Epistle of Lentulus,= pretending to be from a Roman resident
in Palestine on terms of intimacy with Pilate, containing a
description of the appearance of Christ, is quoted, and even then
as a forgery, by Laurentius Valla in his writing on the _Donation
of Constantine_. Since in many particulars it agrees with the
description of the person of Christ given in the Church History
by Nicephorus Callisti (§ 5, 1), in accordance with the type then
prevailing among Byzantine painters, it may fairly be regarded
as an apocryphal Latin retouching of that description originating
in the fifteenth century. At Edessa a picture of Christ was known
to exist in the fourth century (according to the _Doctr. Addæi_),
which must have been brought thither by the messengers of Abgar,
who had picked it up in Jerusalem. During the fourth century
mention is made of a statue of Christ, first of all by Eusebius,
who himself had seen it. This was said to have been set up in
Paneas by the woman cured of the issue of blood (Matt. ix. 20).
It represents a woman entreating help, kneeling before the lofty
figure of a man who stretches out his hand to her, while at his
feet a healing herb springs up. In all probability, however,
it was simply a votive figure dedicated to the god of healing,
Æsculapius. The legend that has been current since the fifth
century of the sweat-marked handkerchief of =Veronica=--this name
being derived either from _vera icon_, the true likeness, or from
Bernice or Beronice, the name given in apocryphal legends to the
woman with the issue of blood,--on which the face of the Redeemer
which had been wiped by it was imprinted, probably arose through
the transferring to other incidents the legendary story of Edessa.
On the occurrence of similar transferences see § 57, 5.
II. THE APOSTOLIC AGE.
A.D. 30-70.
§ 14. THE MINISTRY OF THE APOSTLES BEFORE PAUL.
After the Apostolate had been again by means of the lot raised to the
significant number of twelve, amid miraculous manifestations, the Holy
Spirit was poured out on the waiting disciples as they were assembled
together on the day of Pentecost, ten days after the Ascension of the
Lord. It was the birthday of the church, and its first members were
won by the preaching of Peter to the wondering multitude. By means of
the ministry of the Apostles, who at first restricted themselves to
Jerusalem, the church grew daily. A keen persecution, however, on the
part of the Jews, beginning with the execution of the deacon Stephen,
scattered them apart, so that the knowledge of the gospel was carried
throughout all Palestine, and down into Phœnicia and Syria. Philip
preached with peculiarly happy results in Samaria. Peter soon began a
course of visitation through the land of Jews, and at Cæsarea received
into the church by baptism the first Gentile family, that of Cornelius,
having been prepared for this beforehand by a vision. At the same time
there arose independently at Antioch in Syria a Christian congregation,
composed of Jews and Gentiles, through the great eagerness of the
Gentiles for salvation. The Levite Barnabas, a man of strong faith, was
sent down from Jerusalem, took upon himself the care of this church, and
strengthened his own ministry by securing Paul, the converted Pharisee,
as his colleague. This great man, some years before, by the appearing of
Christ to him on the way to Damascus, had been changed from a fanatical
persecutor into a zealous friend and promoter of the interests of the
church. Thus it came about that the Apostolic mission broke up into
two different sections, one of which was purely Jewish and had for its
centre and starting point the mother church at Jerusalem, while the
other, issuing from Antioch, addressed itself to a mixed audience, and
preeminently to the Gentiles.
It is difficult to determine with chronological exactness
either the =beginning= (§ 13, 1) or the =close of the Apostolic
Age=. Still we cannot be far wrong in taking A.D. 30 as the
beginning and A.D. 70 as the close of that period. The last
perfectly certain and uncontested date of the Apostolic Age is
the martyrdom of the Apostle Paul in A.D. 64, or perhaps A.D. 67,
see § 15, 1. We have it on good evidence that James the elder
died about A.D. 44, and James the Just about A.D. 63 (§ 16, 3),
that Peter suffered martyrdom contemporaneously with Paul
(§ 16, 1), that about the same time or not long after the most of
the other Apostles had been in all probability already taken home,
at least in regard to their life and work after the days of Paul,
we have not the slightest information that can lay any claim
to be regarded as historical. The Apostle John forms the only
exception to this statement. According to important witnesses
from the middle and end of the second century (§ 16, 2), he
entered upon his special field of labour in Asia Minor after
the death of Paul, and continued to live and labour there, with
the temporary interruption of an exile in Patmos, down to the
time of Trajan, A.D. 98-117. But the insufficient data which
we possess regarding the nature, character, extent, success,
and consequences of his Apostolic activity there are partly,
if not in themselves altogether incredible, interesting only
as anecdotes, and partly wholly fabulous, and therefore little
fitted to justify us, simply on their account, in assigning the
end of the first or the beginning of the second century as the
close of the Apostolic Age. We are thus brought back again to
the year of Paul’s death as indicating approximately the close of
that period. But seeing that the precise year of this occurrence
is matter of discussion, the adoption of the round number 70 may
be recommended, all the more as with this year, in which the last
remnant of Jewish national independence was lost, the opposition
between Jewish and Gentile Christianity, which had prevailed
throughout the Apostolic Age, makes its appearance under a new
phase (§ 28).
§ 15. THE MINISTRY OF THE APOSTLE PAUL.
Set apart to the work by the church by prayer and laying on of hands,
Paul and Barnabas started from Antioch on their =first= missionary
journey to Asia Minor, A.D. 48-50. Notwithstanding much opposition
and actual persecution on the part of the enraged Jews, he founded
mixed churches, composed principally of Gentile Christians, comprising
congregations at Antioch in Pisidia, Iconium, Lystra, and Derbe. When
Paul undertook his =second= missionary journey, A.D. 52-55, Barnabas
separated himself from him because of his refusal to accept the company
of his nephew John Mark, who had deserted them during their first
journey, and along with Mark embarked upon an independent mission,
beginning with his native country Cyprus; of the success of this mission
nothing is known. Paul, on the other hand, accompanied by Silas and
Luke, with whom at a later period Timothy also was associated, passed
through Asia Minor, and would thereafter have returned to Antioch had
not a vision by night at Troas led him to take ship for Europe. There he
founded churches at Philippi, Thessalonica, Berea, Athens, and Corinth,
and then returned through Asia Minor to Syria. Without any lengthened
interval he entered upon his =third= missionary journey, A.D. 55-58,
accompanied by Luke, Titus, and Timothy. The centre of his ministerial
activity during this period was Ephesus, where he founded a church with
a large membership. His success was extraordinary, so that the very
existence of heathenism in Asia Minor was seriously imperilled. Driven
away by the uprising of a heathen mob, he travelled through Macedonia,
pressed on to Illyricum, visited the churches of Greece, and then went
to Jerusalem, for the performance of a vow. Here his life, threatened
by the excited Jews, was saved by his being put in prison by the Roman
captain, and then sent down to Cæsarea, A.D. 58. An appeal to Cæsar, to
which as a Roman citizen he was entitled, resulted in his being sent to
Rome, where he, beginning with the spring of A.D. 61, lived and preached
for several years, enduring a mild form of imprisonment. The further
course of his life and ministry remains singularly uncertain. Of the
later labours and fortunes of Paul’s fellow-workers we know absolutely
nothing.
It may be accepted as a well authenticated and incontestable
fact that =Paul= suffered =martyrdom= at Rome under Nero. This
is established by the testimony of Clement of Rome--μαρτυρήσας
ἐπὶ τῶν ἡγουμένων οὕτως ἀπηλλάγη τοῦ κοσμοῦ,--and is further
explained and confirmed by Dionysius of Corinth, quoted in
Eusebius, and by Irenæus, Tertullian, Caius of Rome (§ 16, 1). On
the other hand it is disputed whether it may have happened during
the imprisonment spoken about in the Acts of the Apostles, or
during a subsequent imprisonment. According to the tradition of
the church given currency to by Eusebius (_Hist. Eccl._, ii. 22),
which even in our own time has been maintained by many capable
scholars, Paul was released from his first Roman imprisonment
shortly before the outburst of Nero’s persecution of the
Christians in A.D. 64 (§ 22, 1), and made a fourth missionary
journey which was brought to a close by his being a second
time arrested and subsequently beheaded at Rome in A.D. 67. The
proofs, however, that are offered in support of this assertion
are of a very doubtful character. Paul certainly in A.D. 58
had the intention (Rom. xv. 24, 28) after a short visit to Rome
to proceed to Spain; and when from his prison in Rome he wrote
to Philemon (v. 22) and to the Philippians (i. 25; ii. 24), he
believed that his cherished hope of yet regaining his liberty
would be realised; but there is no further mention of a journey
into Spain, for apparently other altogether different plans of
travel are in his mind. And indeed circumstances may easily be
conceived as arising to blast such hopes and produce in him that
spirit of hopeless resignation, which he gives expression to
in 2 Tim. iv. 6 ff. But the words of Clement of Rome, chap. 5:
δικαιοσύνην διδάξας ὅλον τὸν κόσμον καὶ ἐπὶ τὸ τέρμα τῆς δύσεως
ἐλθών, etc., are too indefinite and rhetorical to be taken as
a certain testimony on behalf of a Spanish missionary journey.
The incomplete reference in the Muratorian Fragment (§ 36, 8)
to a _profectio Pauli ab Urbe ad Spaniam proficiscentis_ may
be thought to afford more direct testimony, but probably it is
nothing more than a reminiscence of Rom. xv. 24, 28. Much more
important, nay almost conclusive, in the opposite direction, is
the entire absence, not only from all the patristic, but also
from all the apocryphal, literature of the second and third
centuries, of any allusion to a fourth missionary journey or a
second imprisonment of the Apostle. The assertion of Eusebius
introduced by a vague λόγος ἔχει can scarcely be regarded as
outweighing this objection. Consequently the majority of modern
investigators have decided in favour of the theory of one
imprisonment. But then the important question arises as to
whether the Epistles to Timothy and Titus, claiming to be Pauline,
with the journeys referred to or presupposed in them, and the
residences of the Apostle and his two assistants, can find
a place in the framework of the narrative in the Acts of the
Apostles, and if so, what that place may be. In answering this
question those investigators take diverse views. Of those who
cannot surrender their conviction that the Pastoral Epistles
are genuine, some assign them to the Apostle’s residence of
almost three years in Ephesus, others to the imprisonment in
Cæsarea which lasted two years and a half, and others to the
Roman imprisonment of almost three years. Others again, looking
upon such expedients as inadmissible, deny the authenticity of
the Pastoral Epistles, these having appeared to them worthy of
suspicion on other grounds.
§ 16. THE OTHER APOSTLES AFTER THE APPEARANCE
OF THE APOSTLE PAUL.
Only in reference to the most distinguished of the Apostles have any
trustworthy accounts reached us. James the brother of John, at an early
period, in A.D. 44, suffered a martyr’s death at Jerusalem. Peter was
obliged by this persecution to quit Jerusalem for a time. Inclination
and his special calling marked him out as the Apostle of the Jews
(Gal. ii. 7-9). His ministry outside of Palestine was exercised,
according to 1 Pet. i. 1, in the countries round about the Black Sea,
and, according to chap. v. 13, extended to Babylon. The legend that,
contemporaneously with the beheading of Paul, he suffered death by
crucifixion under Nero at Rome (John xxi. 18, 19), is doubtful; and
it is also questionable whether he ever went to Rome, while the story
of his having down to the time of his death been Bishop of Rome for
twenty-five years is wholly fabulous. John, according to the tradition
of the church, took up Asia Minor as his special field of labour after
it had been deprived of its first Apostle by the martyr death of Paul,
fixing his residence at Ephesus. At the head of the mother church of
Jerusalem stood James the Just, the brother of the Lord. He seems never
to have left Jerusalem, and was stoned by the Jews between A.D. 63-69.
Regarding the rest of the Apostles and their fellow-workers we have only
legendary traditions of an extremely untrustworthy description, and even
these have come down to us in very imperfect and corrupt forms.
§ 16.1. =The Roman Episcopate of Peter.=--The tradition that
Peter, after having for some years held the office of bishop
at Antioch, became first Bishop of Rome, holding the office for
twenty-five years (A.D. 42-67), and suffered martyrdom at the
same time with Paul, had its origin in the series of heretical
apocryphal writings, out of which sprang, both the romance of the
Clementine Homilies and Recognitions (§ 28, 3), and the Ebionite
Acts of Peter; but it attained its complete form only at the end
of the fourth century, after it had been transplanted into the
soil of the church tradition through the _Acta Petri et Pauli_
(§ 32, 6). What chiefly secured currency and development to this
tradition was the endeavour, ever growing in strength in Rome,
to vindicate on behalf of the Roman Episcopate as the legitimate
successor and heir to all the prerogatives alleged to have been
conferred on Peter in Matt. xvi. 18, a title to primacy over all
the churches (§ 34, 8; 46, 3 ff.). But that Peter had not really
been in Rome as a preacher of the gospel previous to the year
A.D. 61, when Paul came to Rome as a prisoner, is evident from the
absence of any reference to the fact in the Epistle to the Romans,
written in A.D. 58, as well as in the concluding chapter of the
Acts of the Apostles. According to the Acts, Peter in A.D. 44
lay in prison at Jerusalem, and according to Gal. ii., he was
still there in A.D. 51. Besides, according to the unanimous
verdict of tradition, as expressed by Irenæus, Eusebius, Rufinus,
and the Apostolic Constitutions, not Peter, but Linus, was the
first Bishop of Rome, and it is only in regard to the order of
his successors, Anacletus and Clement, that any real uncertainty
or discrepancy occurs. This, indeed, by no means prevents us
from admitting an appearance of Peter at Rome resulting in his
martyrdom. But the testimonies in favour thereof are not of such
a kind as to render its historical reality unquestionable. That
Babylon is mentioned in 1 Pet. v. 13 as the place where this
Epistle was composed, can scarcely be used as a serious argument,
since the supposition that Babylon is a symbolical designation
of Rome as the centre of anti-Christian heathenism, though quite
conceivable and widely current in the early church, is not by any
means demonstrable. Toward the end of the first century, Clement
of Rome relates the martyrdom of Peter as well as of Paul, but
he does not even say that it took place at Rome. On the other
hand, clear and unmistakable statements are found in Dionysius
of Corinth, about A.D. 170, then in Caius of Rome, in Irenæus
and Tertullian, to the effect that Peter and Paul exercised
their ministry together and suffered martyrdom together at Rome.
These statements, however, are interwoven with obviously false
and fabulous dates to such a degree that their credibility is
rendered extremely doubtful. Nevertheless they prove this much,
that already about the end of the second century, the story
of the two Apostles suffering martyrdom together at Rome was
believed, and that some, of whom Caius tells us, professed to
know their graves and to have their bones in their possession.
§ 16.2. =The Apostle John.=--Soon after the death of Paul, the
Apostle John settled in Ephesus, and there, with the temporary
break caused by his exile to Patmos (Rev. i. 9), he continued
to preside over the church of Asia Minor down to his death in
the time of Trajan (A.D. 98-117). This rests upon the church
tradition which, according to Polycrates of Ephesus (Eus., _Hist.
Eccl._, v. 24) and Irenæus, a scholar of Polycarp’s (Eus., iv. 14),
was first set forth during the Easter controversies (§ 37, 2)
in the middle of the second century by Polycarp of Smyrna, and
has been accepted as unquestionable through all ages down to our
own. According to Irenæus (Eus., iii. 18), his exile occurred
under Domitian; the Syrian translation of the Apocalypse, which
was made in the sixth century, assigned it to the time of Nero.
But seeing that, except in Rev. i. 11, neither in the New
Testament scriptures, nor in the extant writings and fragments
of the Church Fathers of the second century before Irenæus, is
a residence of the Apostle John at Ephesus asserted or assumed,
whereas Papias (§ 30, 6), according to Georgius Hamartolus, a
chronicler of the 9th cent., who had read the now lost work of
Papias, expressly declares that the Apostle John was slain “by
Jews” (comp. Matt. xx. 23), which points to Palestine rather
than to Asia Minor, modern critics have denied the credibility
of that ecclesiastical tradition, and have attributed its origin
to a confusion between the Apostle John and a certain John the
Presbyter, with whom we first meet in the Papias-Fragment quoted
in Eusebius as μαθητὴς τοῦ κυρίου. Others again, while regarding
the residence of the Apostle at Ephesus as well established, have
sought, on account of differences in style standpoint and general
mode of thought in the Johannine Apocalypse on the one hand, and
the Johannine Gospel and Epistles on the other hand, to assign
them to two distinct μαθηταὶ τοῦ κυρίου of the same name, and
by assigning the Apocalypse to the Presbyter and the Gospel and
Epistles to the Apostle, they would in this way account for the
residence at Ephesus. This is the course generally taken by the
Mediation theologians of Schleiermacher’s school. The advanced
liberal critics of the school of Baur assign the Apocalypse to
the Apostle and the Gospel and Epistles to the Presbyter, or else
instead of the Apostle assume a third John otherwise unknown.
Conservative orthodox theology again maintains the unity of
authorship of all the Johannean writings, explains the diversity
of character discernible in the different works by a change on
the part of the Apostle from the early Judæo-Christian standpoint
(Gal. ii. 9), which is still maintained in the Apocalypse, to
the ideal universalistic standpoint assumed in the Gospel and
the Epistles, and is inclined to identify the Presbyter of Papias
with the Apostle. Even in Tertullian we meet with the tradition
that under Nero the Apostle had been thrown into a vat of boiling
oil, and in Augustine we are told how he emptied a poisoned cup
without suffering harm. It is a charming story at least that
Clement of Alexandria tells of the faithful pastoral care which
the aged Apostle took in a youth who had fallen so far as to
become a bandit chief. Of such a kind, too, is the story told of
the Apostle by Jerome, how in the extreme weakness of old age he
had to be carried into the assemblies of the congregation, and
with feeble accents could only whisper, Little children, love one
another. According to Irenæus, when by accident he met with the
heretic Cerinthus (§ 27, 1) in the bath, he immediately rushed
out to avoid any contact with him.
§ 16.3. =James, the brother of the Lord.=--The name of James was
borne by two of the twelve disciples of Jesus: James, the son of
Zebedee and brother of John, who was put to death by the command
of Herod Agrippa I. (Acts xii. 2) about A.D. 44, and James,
son of Alphæus, about whom we have no further information. A
third James, designated in Gal. i. 19 the brother of the Lord,
who according to Hegesippus (Euseb., _Hist. Eccl._, ii. 23) on
account of his scrupulous fulfilment of the law received the
title of the Just, is met with in Acts xii. 17; xv. 13; xxi. 18,
and is recognised by Paul (Gal. i. 19; ii. 9-12) as the President
of the church in Jerusalem. According to Hegesippus (§ 31, 7),
he was from his childhood a Nazirite, and shortly before the
destruction of Jerusalem, the Jews at the Passover having desired
of him a testimony against Christ, and he having instead given
a powerful testimony on His behalf, he was hurled down from a
pinnacle of the temple, stoned, and at last, while praying for
his enemies, slain by the blows of a fuller’s club. According
to Josephus, however, Ananus, the high priest, after the recall
of the Proconsul Festus and before the arrival of his successor
Albinus, along with other men hostile to James, hastily condemned
him and had him stoned, about A.D. 63. In regard to the person of
this last-named James three different theories have been proposed.
a. In the ancient church, the brothers of Jesus, of whom besides
James other three, Joses, Simon, and Judas, are named, were
regarded undoubtedly as step-brothers of Jesus, sons of
Joseph and Mary (Matt. i. 25), and even Tertullian argues
from the existence of brothers of the Redeemer according to
the flesh against the Docetism of the Gnostics.
b. Soon, however, it came to be felt that the idea that Joseph
had conjugal intercourse with Mary after the birth of Jesus
was in conflict with the ascetic tendency now rising into
favour, and so to help themselves out of this embarrassment,
it was assumed that the brothers of Jesus were sons of
Joseph by a former wife.
c. The want of biblical foundation for this view was the
occasion of its being abandoned in favour of a theory,
first hinted at by Jerome, according to which the expression
brothers of Jesus is to be taken in a wider sense as meaning
cousins, and in this way James the brother of the Lord was
identified with James the son of Alphæus, one of the twelve
disciples, and the four or five Jameses named in the New
Testament were reduced to two, James the son of Zebedee
and James son of Alphæus. It was specially urged from
John xix. 25 that James the son of Alphæus was the sister’s
son of Jesus’ mother. This was done by a purely arbitrary
identification of the name Clopas or Cleophas with the
Alphæus of the Synoptists, the rendering of the words Μαρία
τοῦ Κλωπᾶ by the wife of Clopas, and also the assumption,
which is scarcely conceivable, that the sister of the mother
of Jesus was also called Mary. We should therefore in this
passage regard the sister of the mother of Jesus and Mary
wife of Clopas as two distinct persons. In that case the
wife of Alphæus may have been called Mary and have had two
sons who, like two of the four brothers of Jesus, were named
James and Joses (Matt. xxvii. 56; Mark xv. 40; Luke xxiv. 10);
but even then, in the James here mentioned, we should meet
with another James otherwise unknown, different from the
James son of Alphæus in the list of the Apostles, whose name
occurs in Luke xv. 16 and Acts i. 13 in the phrase Judas of
James, where the genitive undoubtedly means brother of James
son of Alphæus. And though in Gal. i. 19, James the brother
of the Lord seems to be called an Apostle, when this is
compared with Acts xiv. 14, it affords no proof that he
belonged to the number of the twelve.
But the fact that the brothers of Jesus are all and always
expressly distinguished from His twelve Apostles, and form a
group outwardly and inwardly apart from them (Matt. xii. 46;
Mark iii. 31; Luke viii. 19; John ii. 12), tells decidedly against
that idea. In John vii. 3, 5, they are, at a time when James
son of Alphæus and Judas brother of James were already in the
Apostolate, described as unbelieving, and only subsequently to
the departure of the Lord, who after His resurrection appeared
to James (1 Cor. xv. 7), do we meet them, though even then
distinguished from the twelve, standing in the closest fellowship
with the Christian believing community (Acts i. 14; 1 Cor. ix. 5).
Besides, in accordance with Matt. xxviii. 19, none of the twelve
could assume the permanent presidency of the mother church, and
Hegesippus not only knows of πολλοὶ Ἰάκωβοι, and so surely of
more than two, but makes James enter upon his office in Jerusalem
first μετὰ τῶν ἀποστόλων.
§ 16.4. =The Later Legends of the Apostles.=--The tradition that
after the Lord’s ascension His disciples, their number having
been again made up to twelve (Acts i. 13), in fulfilment of
their Lord’s command (Matt. xxviii. 18), had a special region
for missionary labour assigned by lot to each, and also the other
tradition, according to which, before their final departure from
Jerusalem, after a stay there for seven or twelve years, they
drew up by common agreement rules for worship, discipline and
constitution suited to the requirements of universal Christendom,
took shape about the middle of the second century, and gave
occasion to the origin of many apocryphal histories of the
Apostles (§ 32, 5, 6), as well as apocryphal books of church
order (§ 43, 4, 5). Whether any portion at all, and if so, how
much, of the various contradictory statements of the apocryphal
histories and legends of the Apostles about their mission
fields and several fortunes can be regarded as genuine tradition
descending from the Apostolic Age, must be left undecided. In any
case, the legendary drapery and embellishment of casual genuine
reminiscences are in the highest degree fantastic and fabulous.
Ancient at least, according to Eusebius, are the traditions
of Thomas having preached in Parthia, Andrew in Scythia, and
Bartholomew in India; while in later traditions Thomas figures
as the Apostle of India (§ 32, 5). The statement by Eusebius,
supported from many ancient authorities, that the Apostle Philip
exercised his ministry from Hierapolis in Phrygia to Asia Minor,
originated perhaps from the confounding of the Apostle with the
Evangelist of the same name (Acts xxi. 8, 9). A history of the
Apostle Barnabas, attributed to John Mark, but in reality dating
only from the fifth century, attaching itself to Acts xv. 39,
tells how he conducted his mission and suffered martyrdom in his
native country of Cyprus; while another set of legends, probably
belonging to the same period, makes him the founder of the church
of Milan. John Mark, sister’s son of Barnabas, who appears in
Col. iv. 10; 2 Tim. iv. 11; and Philem. 24, as the fellow-labourer
of the Apostle Paul, in 1 Pet. v. 13 as companion of Peter at
Babylon, and, according to Papias, wrote his gospel at Rome as
the amanuensis of Peter, is honoured, according to another very
widely received tradition, quoted by Eusebius from a Chronicle
belonging to the end of the second century, from which also
Julius Africanus drew information, as the founder and first
bishop of the church of Alexandria, etc., etc.
§ 17. CONSTITUTION, WORSHIP, AND DISCIPLINE.[6]
Bound under Christ its one head into an articulated whole, the church
ought by the co-operation of all its members conditioned and determined
by position, talent, and calling, to build itself up and grow (1 Cor.
xii. 12 ff.; Eph. i. 22 f.). Development will thus be secured to natural
talent and the spiritual calling through the bestowment of special gifts
of grace or charismata. The first form of Christian church fellowship,
in the Jewish as well as the Gentile Christian churches, was of a
thoroughly free character; modelled upon, and attached to, forms of
organization already existing and legitimized, or, at least, tolerated
by the state, but all the while inspired and leavened by a free
Christian spirit. Compelled by the necessity which is felt in all social
federations for the recognised ranking of superiority, inferiority, and
equality, in which his own proper sphere and task would be assigned to
each member, and encroachment and disorderliness prevented, a collegial
church council was soon formed by a free compact, the members of which,
all possessed of equal rights, were called πρεσβύτεροι in consideration
of their personal character, and ἐπίσκοποι in consideration of their
official duties. Upon them devolved especially attention and care in
regard to all outward things that might affect the common interests
of the church, management of the property which had to be realised
and spent on the religious services, and of the means required for the
support of the poor, as well as the administration of justice and of
discipline. But alongside of these were other more independent offices,
the holders of which did not go forth like the members of the eldership
as the choice of the churches, but rather had the spiritual edification
of the church assigned them as their life work by a special divine
call and a charismatic endowment of the gift of teaching. To this class
belong, besides Apostles and helpers of the Apostles, Prophets, Pastors,
and Teachers.
§ 17.1. =The Charismata= of the Apostolic Age are presented to us
in 1 Cor. xii. 4 ff. as signs (φανερώσεις, v. 7) of the presence
of the Spirit of God working in the church, which, attaching
themselves to natural endowment and implying a free personal
surrender to their influence, and manifesting themselves in
various degrees of intensity from the natural to the supernatural,
qualified certain members of the church with the powers necessary
and desirable for the upbuilding and extension of the Christian
community. In verses 8-11, the Charismata are arranged in three
classes by means of the twice-repeated ἑτέρω.
1. Gifts of Teaching, embracing the λόγος σοφίας and the λόγος
γνώσεως.
2. Completeness of Faith, or πίστις with the possession of
supernatural powers for healing the sick, working miracles,
and prophesying, and alongside of the latter, for sifting
and proving it, διάκρισις πνευμάτων.
3. Ecstatic speaking with tongues, γένη γλωσσῶν, γλώσσαις
λαλεῖν, alongside of which is placed the interpretation of
tongues necessary for the understanding thereof ἑρμενεία
γλωσσῶν.
In addition to these three are mentioned, in verse 28, ἀντιλήψεις,
care of the poor, the sick and strangers, and κυβερνήσεις, church
government. The essential distinction between speaking with
tongues and prophesying consists, according to 1 Cor. xiv. 1-18,
in this, that whereas the latter is represented as an inspiration
by the Spirit of God, acting upon the consciousness, the νοῦς of
the prophet, and therefore requiring no further explanation to
render it applicable for the edification of the congregation,
the former is represented as an ecstatic utterance, wholly
uncontrolled by the νοῦς of the human instrument, yet employing
the human organs of speech, γλῶσσαι, which leaves the assembled
congregation out of view and addresses itself directly to God,
so that in ver. 13-15 it is called a προσεύχεσθαι, being made
intelligible to the audience only by means of the charismatic
interpretation of men immediately acted upon for the purpose by
the Spirit of God. In Rom. xii. 6-8, although there the charisms
are enumerated in even greater details, so as to include even
the showing of mercy with cheerfulness, the γλώσσαις λαλεῖν is
wanting. It would thus seem that this sort of spiritual display,
if not exclusively (Acts ii. 4; x. 46; xix. 6; Mark xvi. 17), yet
with peculiar fondness, which was by no means commended by the
Apostle, was fostered in the church of Corinth. The thoroughly
unique speaking with tongues which took place on the first
Pentecost (Acts ii. 6, 11) is certainly not to be understood
as implying that the Apostles had been either temporarily
or permanently qualified to speak in the several languages
and dialects of those present from all the countries of the
dispersion. It probably means simply that the power was conferred
upon the speakers of speaking with tongues and that at the same
time an analogous endowment of the interpretation of tongues
was conferred upon those who heard (Comp., Acts ii. 12, 15, with
1 Cor. xiv. 22 f. ).
§ 17.2. =The Constitution of the Mother Church at
Jerusalem.=--The notion which gained currency through Vitringa’s
learned work “_De synagoga vetere_,” publ. 1696, that the
constitution of the Apostolic church was moulded upon the pattern
of the synagogues, is now no longer seriously entertained. Not
only in regard to the Pauline churches wholly or chiefly composed
of Gentile Christians, but also in regard to the Palestinian
churches of purely Jewish Christians, no evidence in support
of such a theory can be found. There is no sort of analogy
between any office bearers in the church and the ἀρχισυνάγωγοι
who were essentially characteristic of all the synagogues
both in Palestine and among the dispersion (Mark v. 22;
Luke viii. 41, 49; Acts xiii. 15; xviii. 8, 17), nor do we find
anything to correspond to the ὑπήρεται or inferior officers of
the synagogue (Luke iv. 20). On the other hand, the office bearers
of the Christian churches, who, consisting, according to Acts vi.,
of deacons, and also afterwards, according to Acts xi. 30, of
πρεσβύτεροι, or elders of the church at Jerusalem, occupied a
place alongside of the Apostles in the government of the church,
are without any analogy in the synagogues. The Jewish πρεσβύτεροι
τοῦ λαοῦ mentioned in Matt. xxi. 23; xxvi. 3; Acts iv. 5; xxii. 5,
etc., did not exercise a ministry of teaching and edification in
the numerous synagogues of Jerusalem, but a legislatory, judicial
and civil authority over the whole Jewish commonwealth as members
of the Sanhedrim, of chief priest, scribes and elders. Between
even these, however, and the elders of the Christian church a
far-reaching difference exists. The Jewish elders are indeed
representatives of the people, and have as such a seat and vote
in the supreme council, but no voice is allowed to the people
themselves. In the council of the Christian church, on the other
hand, with reference to all important questions, the membership
of all believers is called together for consultation and
deliverance (Acts vi. 2-6; xv. 4, 22). A complaint on the part
of the Hellenistic members of the church that their poor were
being neglected led to the election of seven men who should care
for the poor, not by the Apostles, but by the church. This is
commonly but erroneously regarded as the first institution of
the deaconship. To those then chosen, for whom the Acts (xxi. 8)
has no other designation than that of “the seven,” the διακονεῖν
τραπέζαις is certainly assigned: but they were not and were not
called Deacons in the official sense any more than the Apostles,
who still continued, according to v. 4, to exercise the διακονία
τοῦ λόγου. When the bitter persecution that followed the stoning
of Stephen had scattered the church abroad over the neighbouring
countries, they also departed at the same time from Jerusalem
(Acts viii. 1), and Philip, who was now the most notable of their
number, officiated henceforth only as an evangelist, that is, as
an itinerant preacher of the gospel, in the region about his own
house in Cæsarea (Acts viii. 5; xxi. 8; comp. Eph. iv. 11; 2 Tim.
iv. 5). Upon the reorganization of the church at Jerusalem, the
Apostles beginning more clearly to appreciate their own special
calling (Matt. xxviii. 19), gave themselves more and more to the
preaching of the gospel even outside of Jerusalem, and thus the
need became urgent of an authoritative court for the conducting
of the affairs of the church even during their absence. In these
circumstances it would seem, according to Acts xi. 30, that those
who ministered to the poor, chosen probably from among the most
honourable of the first believers (Acts ii. 41), passed over into
a self-constituted college of presbyters. At the head of this
college or board stood James, the brother of the Lord (Gal. i. 19;
ii. 9; Acts xii. 17; xv. 13; xxi. 15), and after his death,
according to Hegesippus, a near relation of the Lord, Simeon,
son of Clopas, as a descendant of David, was unanimously chosen
as his successor. The episcopal title, however, just like that of
Deacon, is first met with in the New Testament in the region of
the Pauline missions, and in the terminology of the Palestinian
churches we only hear of presbyters as officers of the church
(Acts xv. 4, 6, 22; xxi. 18; James v. 14). In 1 Peter v. 2,
however, although ἐπίσκοπος does not yet appear as an official
title, the official duty of the ἐπισκοπεῖν is assigned to
presbyters (see § 17, 6). It is Hegesippus, about A.D. 180, who
first gives the title Bishop of Jerusalem to James, after the
Clementines (§ 28, 3) had already ten years previously designated
him ἐπισκόπων ἐπίσκοπος.
§ 17.3. =The Constitution of the Pauline Churches.= Founding upon
the works of Mommsen and Foucart, first of all Heinrici and soon
afterwards the English theologian Hatch[7] has wrought out the
theory that the constitution of the churches that were wholly
or mainly composed of Gentile Christians was modelled on those
convenient, open or elastic rules of associations under which
the various Hellenistic guilds prospered so well (θίασοι,
ἔρανοι),--associations for the naturalization and fostering of
foreign, often oriental, modes of worship. In the same way, too,
the Christian church at Rome, for social and sacred purposes,
made use of the forms of association employed in the Collegia or
Sodalicia, which were found there in large numbers, especially
of the funeral societies in which both of those purposes were
combined (_collegia funeraticia_). In both these cases, then,
the church, by attaching itself to modes of association already
existing, acknowledged by the state, or tolerated as harmless,
assumed a form of existence which protected it from the suspicion
of the government, and at the same time afforded it space and
time for independent construction in accordance with its own
special character and spirit. As in those Hellenic associations
all ranks, even those which in civil society were separated from
one another by impassable barriers, found admission, and then,
in the framing of statutes, the reception of fellow members, the
exercise of discipline, possessed equal rights; as, further, the
full knowledge of their mysteries and sharing in their exercise
were open only to the initiated (μεμυημένοι), yet in the exercise
of exoteric worship the doors were hospitably flung open even to
the ἀμυήτοι; as upon certain days those belonging to the narrow
circle joining together in partaking of a common feast; so too
all this is found in the Corinthian church, naturally inspired
by a Christian spirit and enriched with Christian contents. The
church also has its religious common feast in its Agape, its
mystery in the Eucharist, its initiation in baptism, by the
administration of which the divine service is divided into two
parts, one esoteric, to be engaged in only by the baptized,
the other exoteric, a service that is open to those who are
not Christians. All ranks (Gal. iii. 28) have the same claim
to admission to baptism, all the baptized have equal rights in
the congregation (see § 17, 7). It is evident, however, that
the connection between the Christian churches and those heathen
associations is not so to be conceived as if, because in the one
case distinctions of rank were abolished, so also they were in
the other; or that, because in the one case religious festivals
were observed, this gave the first hint as to the observance of
the Christian Agape; or that, because and in the manner in which
there a mysterious service was celebrated from which all outside
were strictly excluded, so also here was introduced an exclusive
eucharistic service. These observances are rather to be regarded
as having grown up independently out of the inmost being of
Christianity; but the church having found certain institutions
existing inspired by a wholly different spirit, yet outwardly
analogous and sanctioned by the state, it appropriated, as far
as practicable, their forms of social organization, in order to
secure for itself the advantages of civil protection. That even
on the part of the pagans, down into the last half of the second
century, the Christian congregational fellowship was regarded as
a special kind of the mystery-communities, is shown by Lucian’s
satire, _De morte Peregrini_ (§ 23, 1), where the description
of Christian communities, in which its hero for a time played
a part, is full of technical terms which were current in
those associations. “It is also,” says Weingarten, “expressly
acknowledged in Tertullian’s _Apologeticus_, c. 38, 39, written
about A.D. 198, that even down to the close of the second century,
the Christian church was organized in accordance with the rules
of the _Collegia funeraticia_, so that it might claim from the
state the privileges of the _Factiones licitæ_. The arrangements
for burial and the Christian institutions connected therewith are
shown to have been carefully subsumed under forms that were
admitted to be legal.”
§ 17.4. Confining ourselves meantime to the oldest and
indisputably authentic epistles of the Apostle, we find that
the autonomy of the church in respect of organization, government,
discipline, and internal administration is made prominent as
the very basis of the constitution. He never interferes in those
matters, enjoining and prescribing by his own authority, but
always, whether personally or in spirit, only as associated with
their assemblies (1 Cor. v. 3), deliberating and deciding in
common with them. Thus his Apostolic importance shows itself not
in his assuming the attitude of a lord (2 Cor. i. 24), but that
of a father (1 Cor. iv. 14 f.), who seeks to lead his children
on to form for themselves independent and manly judgments (1 Cor.
x. 15; xi. 13). Regular and fixed church officers do not seem to
have existed in Corinth down to the time when the first Epistle
was written, about A.D. 57. A diversity of functions (διαιρέσεις
διακονιῶν, 1 Cor. xii. 4) is here, indeed, already found, but
not yet definitely attached to distinct and regular offices
(1 Cor. vi. 1-6). It is always yet a voluntary undertaking of such
ministries on the one hand, and the recognition of peculiar piety
and faithfulness, leading to willing submission on the other hand,
out of which the idea of office took its rise, and from which
it obtained its special character. This is especially true of
a peculiar kind of ministry (Rom. xvi. 1, 2) which must soon
have been developed as something indispensable to the Christian
churches throughout the Hellenic and Roman regions. We mean
the part played by the patron, which was so deeply grounded in
the social life of classical antiquity. Freedmen, foreigners,
proletarii, could not in themselves hold property and had no
claim on the protection of the laws, but had to be associated
as _Clientes_ with a _Patronus_ or _Patrona_ (προστάτης and
προστάτις) who in difficult circumstances would afford them
counsel, protection, support, and defence. As in the Greek and
Roman associations for worship this relationship had long before
taken root, and was one of the things that contributed most
materially to their prosperity, so also in the Christian churches
the need for recognising and giving effect to it became all the
more urgent in proportion as the number of members increasing
for whom such support was necessary (1 Cor. i. 26-29). Phœbe
is warmly recommended in Rom. xvi. 1, 2, as such a Christian
προστάτις, at Cenchrea, the port of Corinth, among whose numerous
clients the Apostle himself is mentioned. Many inscriptions in
the Roman catacombs testify to the deep impress which this social
scheme made upon the organization, especially of the Roman church,
down to the end of the first century, and to the help which it
gave in rendering that church permanent. All the more are we
justified in connecting therewith the προϊστάμενος ἐν σπουδῇ
(Rom. xii. 8), and in giving this passage in connection with the
preceding and succeeding context the meaning: whoever represents
any one as patron let him do it with diligence.--The gradual
development of stated or independent =congregational offices=,
after privileges and duties were distinguished from one another,
was thus brought about partly by the natural course of events,
and partly by the endeavour to make the church organization
correspond with the Greek and Roman religious associations
countenanced by the state by the employment in it of the same
or similar forms and names. In the older communities, especially
those in capital cities, like Thessalonica, Corinth, Rome, etc.,
the heads of the families of the first believers attained an
authoritative position altogether unique, as at Corinth those of
the household of Stephanas, who, according to 1 Cor. xvi. 15, as
the ἀπαρχὴ τῆς Ἀχαΐας εἰς διακονίαν τοῖς ἁγίοις ἔταξαν ἑαυτούς.
Such honour, too, was given to the most serviceable of the
chosen patrons and others, who evidently possessed the gifts of
κυβερνήσεις and ἀντιλήψεις, and those who first in an informal
way had discharged official duties had amends made them even
after death by a formal election. On the other hand, the
churches that sprang up at a later period were probably provided
immediately with such offices under the direction and with the
consent of the Apostle or his apostolic assistants (1 Tim. v. 9;
Tit. i. 5).
§ 17.5. =Congregational and Spiritual Offices.=--While then, down
to A.D. 57 no ecclesiastical offices properly so called as yet
existed at Corinth, and no injunctions are given by the Apostle
for their definite introduction, it is told us in Acts xiv. 23
that, so early as A.D. 50, when Paul was returning from his first
missionary journey he ordained with prayer and fasting elders
or presbyters in those churches of Asia Minor previously founded
by him. Now it is indeed quite conceivable that in these cases
he adhered more closely to the already existing presbyterial
constitution of the mother church at Jerusalem (Acts xi. 30),
than he did subsequently in founding and giving a constitution
to the churches of the European cities where perhaps the
circumstances and requirements were entirely different. But
be this as it may, it is quite certain that the Apostle on his
departure from lately formed churches took care to leave them
in an organized condition, and the author of the Acts has given
expression to the fact proleptically in terms with which he was
himself conversant and which were current in his time.--Among the
Pauline epistles which are scarcely, if at all, objected to by
modern criticism the first to give certain information regarding
distinct and independent congregational offices, together
with the names that had been then assigned to these offices,
is the Epistle to the Philippians, written during the Roman
imprisonment of the Apostle. In chap. i. 1, he sends his apostolic
greeting and blessing πᾶσι τοῖς ἁγίοις τοῖς οὖσιν ἐν Φιλίπποις
σὺν ἐπισκόποις καὶ διακόνοις.[8] The =Episcopate= and the
=Diaconate= make their appearance here as the two categories
of congregational offices, of both of which there are several
representatives in each congregation. It is in the so-called
Pastoral Epistles that for the first time we find applied in
the Gentile Christian communities the title of =Presbyter= which
had been the usual designation of the president in the mother
church at Jerusalem. This title, just as in Acts xx. 17, 28, is
undoubtedly regarded as identical with that of bishop (ἐπίσκοπος)
and is used as an alternative (Tit. i. 5, 7; 1 Tim. iii. 1; iv. 14;
v. 17, 19). From the practical identity of the qualifications
of bishops (1 Tim. iii. 1) or of deacons (_v._ 12 f.), it follows
that their callings were essentially the same; and from the
etymological signification of their names, it would seem
that there was assigned to the bishops the duty of governing,
administrating and superintending, to the deacons that of serving,
assisting and carrying out details as subordinate auxiliaries. It
is shown by Rom. xvi. 1, that even so early as A.D. 58, the need
of a female order of helpers had been felt and was supplied. When
this order had at a later period assumed the rank of a regular
office, it became the rule that only widows above sixty years
of age should be chosen (1 Tim. v. 9).--We are introduced to
an altogether different order of ecclesiastical authorities in
Eph. iv. 11, where we have named in the first rank =Apostles=,
in the second =Prophets=, in the third =Evangelists=, and in the
fourth =Pastors= and =Teachers=. What is here meant by Apostles
and Prophets is quite evident (§ 34, 1). From 2 Tim. iv. 5 and
Acts xxi. 8 (viii. 5), it follows that Evangelists are itinerant
preachers of the gospel and assistants of the Apostles. It is
more difficult to determine exactly the functions of Pastors and
Teachers and their relation to the regular congregational offices.
Their introduction in Eph. iv. 11, as together constituting a
fourth class, as well as the absence of the term Pastor in the
parallel passage, 1 Cor. xii. 28, 29, presupposes such a close
connection of the two orders, the one having the care of souls,
the other the duties of preaching and catechizing, that we
unhesitatingly assume that both were, if not always, at least
generally, united in the same person. They have been usually
identified with the bishops or presbyters. In Acts xx. 17, 28,
and in 1 Pet. v. 2-4, presbyters are expressly called pastors.
The order of the ἡγούμενοι in Heb. xiii. 7, οἵτινες ἐλάλησαν ὑμῖν
τὸν λόγον τοῦ θεοῦ, has also been regarded as identical with that
of bishops. In regard to the last named order a confusion already
appears in Acts xv., where men, who in _v._ 22 are expressly
distinguished from the elders (presbyters) and in _v._ 32 are
ranked as prophets, are yet called ἡγούμενοι. We should also
be led to conclude from 1 Cor. xii. 28, that those who had
the qualifications of ἀντιλήψεις and κυβερνήσεις, functions
certainly belonging to bishops or presbyters as administrative
and diocesan officers, are yet personally distinguished from
Apostles, Prophets, and Teachers. Now it is explicitly enjoined
in Tit. i. 9 that in the choice of bishops special care should be
taken to see that they have capacity for teaching. In 1 Tim. v. 17
double honour is demanded for the καλῶς προεστῶτες πρεσβύτεροι,
if they also labour ἐν λόγῳ καὶ διδασκαλίᾳ. This passage, however,
shows teaching did not always and in all circumstances, or even
_ex professo_ belong to the special functions of the president
of the congregation; that it was rather in special circumstances,
where perhaps these gifts were not at all or not in sufficient
abundance elsewhere to be found, that these duties of teaching
were undertaken in addition to their own proper official work of
presidency (προϊστάναι). The dividing line between the two orders,
bishops and deacons on the one hand, and pastors and teachers
on the other, consists in the fundamentally different nature of
their calling. The former were congregational offices, the latter,
like those of Apostles and Prophets, were spiritual offices. The
former were chosen by the congregation, the latter had, like the
Apostles and Prophets, a divine call, though according to James
iii. 1 not without the consenting will of the individual, and
the charismatic capacity for teaching, although not in the
same absolute measure. The former were attached to a particular
congregation, the latter were, like the Apostles and Prophets,
first of all itinerant teachers and had, like them, the task of
building up the churches (Eph. iv. 12, εἰς οἰκοδομὴν τοῦ σώματος
τοῦ Χριστοῦ). But, while the Apostles and Prophets laid the
foundation of this building on Christ, the chief corner stone,
preachers and teachers had to continue building on the foundation
thus laid (Eph. ii. 20). A place and importance are undoubtedly
secured for these three spiritual offices, in so far as continued
itinerant offices, by the example of the Lord in His preliminary
sending forth of the twelve in Matt. x., and of the seventy
disciples in Luke x.--Continuation, § 34, 1.
§ 17.6. =The question about the original position of the
Episcopate and Presbyterate=, as well as their relation to one
another, has received three different answers. According to
the =Roman Catholic= theory, which is also that of the Anglican
Episcopal Church, the clerical, hierarchical arrangement of the
third century, which gave to each of the larger communities a
bishop as its president with a number of presbyters and deacons
subject to him, existed as a divine institution from the
beginning. It is unequivocally testified by the New Testament,
and, as appears from the First Epistle of Clement of Rome (ch. 42,
44, 57), the fact had never been disputed down to the close of
the first century, that bishops and presbyters are identical.
The force of this objection, however, is sought to be obviated by
the subterfuge that while all bishops were indeed presbyters, all
presbyters were not bishops. The ineptitude of such an evasion
is apparent. In Phil. i. 1 the Apostle, referring to this one
particular church greeted not one but several bishops. According
to Acts xx. 17, 28, all the presbyters of the one Ephesian
community are made bishops by the Holy Ghost. Also, Tit. i. 5, 7
unconditionally excludes such a distinction; and according to
1 Pet. v. 2, all such presbyters should be ἐπισκοποῦντες.--In
opposition to this theory, which received the sanction of the
Council of Trent, the =Old Protestant= theologians maintained the
original identity of the two names and offices. In support of
this they could refer not only to the New Testament, but also to
Clement of Rome and the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles (§ 34, 1),
where, just as in Phil. i. 1, only bishops and deacons are named
as congregational officers, and as appointed by the free choice
of the congregation. They can also point to the consensus of the
most respected church fathers and church teachers of later times.
Chrysostom (Hom. ix. in _Ep. ad Tim._) says: οἱ πρεσβύτεροι
τὸ παλαιὸν ἐκαλοῦντο ἐπίσκοποι καὶ διάκονοι Χριστοῦ, καὶ οἱ
ἐπίσκοποι πρεσβύτεροι. Jerome (_ad Tit._ i. 5) says: _Idem
est presbyter qui et episcopus et antequam diaboli instinctu
studia in religione fierent ... communi presbyterorum concilio
gubernantur ecclesiæ._ Augustine, and other church fathers of the
fourth and fifth centuries, as well as Urban II. in A.D. 1091,
Petrus [Peter] Lombardus and the Decree of Gratian, may all
be referred to as supporting the same view. After such an
identification of the person and office, the existence of the two
names must be explained from their meaning as words, by assuming
that the title ἐπίσκοπος, which arose among the Gentile-Christian
churches, pointed more to the duty officially required, while
the title πρεσβύτερος, which arose among the Jewish-Christian
churches, pointed more to the honourable character of the person
(1 Tim. v. 17, 19). The subsequent development of a monarchical
episcopacy is quite conceivable as having taken place in the
natural course of events (§ 34, 2).--A third theory is that
proposed by =Hatch=, of Oxford, in A.D. 1881, warmly approved of
and vigorously carried out by =Harnack=. According to this theory
the two names in question answer to a twofold distinction that
appears in the church courts: on the college of presbyters was
devolved the government of the community, with administration
of law and discipline; on the bishops and their assistants the
superintendence and management of the community in the widest
sense of the word, including its worship, and first of all and
chiefly the brotherly care of the poor, the sick and strangers,
together with the collecting, keeping, and dispensing of
money needful for those ends. In the course of time the two
organizations were combined into one, since the bishops, on
account of their eminently important place and work, obtained
in the presbytery not only a simple seat and vote, but by-and-by
the presidency and the casting vote. In establishing this theory
it is pointed out that in the government and management of
federations of that time for social and religious purposes
in country districts or in cities, in imitation of which the
organization of the Christian communities was formed, this
twofold distribution is also found, and that especially the
administrators of the finances in these societies had not only
the title of ἐπίσκοποι, but had also the president’s seat in
their assemblies (γερουσία, βουλή), which, however, is not
altogether conclusive, since it is demonstrable that this title
was also borne by judicial and political officials. It is also
pointed out on the other hand that, in accordance with the
modified view presented in the Pastoral Epistles, the Acts,
and the Epistle of Clement of Rome, the consciousness of the
original diversity of calling of the two offices were maintained
throughout the whole of the second century, inasmuch as often a
theoretical distinction between bishops and presbyters in the way
specified was asserted. Now, in the first place, it can scarcely
be matter of dispute as to whether the administration of property,
with the care of the poor (ἀντιλήψεις) as the principal task,
could actually have won a place so superior in respectability,
influence and significance to that of congregational government
(κυβερνήσεις), or whether the authority which embraced the
functions of a judicial bench, a court of discipline, and a court
of equity did not rather come to preponderate over that which was
occupied in the administration of property and the care of the
poor. But above all we shall have to examine the New Testament
writings, as the relatively oldest witnesses to the matter of
fact as well as to the usage of the language, and see what they
have to say on the subject. This must be done even by those who
would have the composition of the Pastoral Epistles and the Acts
removed out of the Apostolic Age. In these writings, however,
there is nowhere a firm and sure foundation afforded to that
theory. It has, indeed, been supposed that in Phil. i. 1 mention
is made only of bishops and deacons because by them the present
from the Philippians had been brought to the Apostle. But seeing
that, in the case of there actually existing in Philippi at this
time besides the bishops a college of presbyters, the omission
of these from the greeting in this epistle, the chief purpose
of which was to impart apostolic comfort and encouragement, and
which only refers gratefully at the close, ch. iv. 10, to the
contribution sent, would have been damaging to them, we must
assume that the bishops with their assistants the deacons were
the only office-bearers then existing in that community. Thus
this passage tells as much against as in favour of the limiting
of the episcopal office to economical administration. Often
as mention is made in the New Testament of an ἐπισκοπεῖν and
a διακονεῖν in and over the community, this never stands in
specific and exclusive relation to administration of property and
care of the poor. It is indeed assumed in Acts xi. 30 that care
of the poor is a duty of the presbyter; so also the charismatic
caring for the sick is required of presbyters in James v. 14;
and in 1 Pet. v. 2 presbyters are described as ἐπισκοποῦντες;
in 1 Pet. ii. 25 Christ is spoken of as ἐπίσκοπος τῶν ψυχῶν;
in Acts i. 20 the apostolic office is called ἐπισκοπή, while in
Acts i. 25 and often, especially in the Pauline epistles, it is
designated a διακονία.[9]--Continuation, § 34, 2.
§ 17.7. =Christian Worship.=--Even in Jerusalem, where the
temple ordinances were still observed, the religious needs of
the Christian community demanded that separate services of a
distinctly Christian character should be organized. But just
as the Jewish services of that day consisted of two parts--the
ministry of the word for purposes of instruction and edification
in the synagogues, and the symbolic service of a typical and
sacramental character in the temple,--the Christian service was
in like manner from the first divided into a homiletical-didactic
part, and a eucharistic-sacramental part.--=The Homiletical and
Didactic part=, on account of the presence of those who were
not Christians, must have had, just like the synagogue service,
alongside of its principal aim to instruct and edify the
congregation, a definite and deliberately planned missionary
tendency. The church in Jerusalem at the first held these
_morning_ services in one of the halls of the temple, where the
people were wont to assemble for prayer (Acts ii. 46; iii. 1, 11);
but at a later period they were held in private houses. In the
Gentile churches they seem from the first to have been held in
private houses or in halls rented for the purpose. The service
consisted in reading of portions of the Old Testament, and at a
later period, portions of the Apostolic Epistles and Gospels, and
in connection therewith, doctrinal and hortatory discourses, with
prayer and singing of psalms. It is more than probable that the
liberty of teaching, which had prevailed in the synagogues (Luke
ii. 46; iv. 16; Acts xiii. 15), was also permitted in the similar
assemblies of Jewish Christians (Acts viii. 4; xi. 19; James
iii. 1); and it may be concluded from 1 Cor. xiv. 34 that this
also was the practice in Gentile-Christian congregations. The
apparent contradiction of women as such being forbidden to
speak, while in 1 Cor. xi. 5 it seems to be allowed, can only be
explained by supposing that in the passage referred to the woman
spoken of as praying or prophesying is praying in an ecstasy,
that is, speaking with tongues (1 Cor. xiv. 13-15), or uttering
prophetic announcements, like the daughters of Philip (Acts
xxi. 9), and that the permission applies only to such cases, the
exceptional nature of which, as well as their temporary character,
as charismatic and miraculous gifts, would prevent their being
used as precedents for women engaging in regular public discourse
(1 Thess. v. 19). In 1 Cor. xiv. 24 the ἰδιῶται (synonymous with
the ἀμύητοι in the statutes of Hellenic religious associations)
are mentioned as admitted along with the ἀπίστοι to the didactic
services, and, according to _v._ 16, they had a place assigned
to them separate from the congregation proper. We are thus led to
see in them the uninitiated or not yet baptized believers, that
is, the _catechumens_.--=The Sacramental part of the service=,
the separation of which from the didactic part was rendered
necessary on account alike of its nature and purpose, and is
therefore found existing in the Pauline churches as well as
in the church of Jerusalem, was scrupulously restricted in its
observance, in Jewish and Gentile churches alike, to those who
were in the full communion of the Christian church (Acts ii. 46;
1 Cor. xi. 20-23). The celebration of the Lord’s Supper
(δεῖπνον κυριακόν, 1 Cor. xi. 21), after the pattern of the
meal of institution, consisting of a meal partaken of in common,
accompanied with prayer and the singing of a hymn, which at a
later period was named the Ἀγάπη, as the expression of brotherly
love (Jude _v._ 12), was the centre and end of these _evening_
services. The elements in the Lord’s Supper were consecrated to
their sacramental purpose by a prayer of praise and thanksgiving
(εὐχαριστία, 1 Cor. xi. 24; or εὐλογία, 1 Cor. x. 16), together
with a recital of the words of institution which contained
a proclamation of the death of Christ (1 Cor. xi. 26). This
prayer was followed by the kiss of brotherhood.[10] In the
service of song they used to all appearance besides the
psalms some Christian hymns and doxologies (Eph. v. 19;
Col. iii. 16).[11]--The homiletical as well as the eucharistic
services were at first held daily; at a later period at least
every Sunday.[12] For very soon, alongside of the Sabbath, and
among Gentile Christians, instead of it, the first day of the
week as the day of Christ’s resurrection began to be observed as
a festival.[13] But there is as yet no trace of the observance of
other festivals. It cannot be exactly proved that infant baptism
was an Apostolic practice, but it is not improbable that it
was so.[14] Baptism was administered by complete immersion
(Acts viii. 38) in the name of Christ or of the Trinity
(Matt. xxviii. 19). The charism of healing the sick was exercised
by prayer and anointing with oil (Jas. v. 14). On the other
hand, confession of sin even apart from the public service was
recommended (Jas. v. 16). Charismatic communication of the Spirit
and admission to office in the church[15] was accomplished by
prayer and laying on of hands.[16]
§ 17.8. =Christian Life and Ecclesiastical Discipline.=--In
accordance with the commandment of the Lord (John xiii. 34),
brotherly love in opposition to the selfishness of the natural
life, was the principle of the Christian life. The power of
youthful love, fostered by the prevalent expectation of the
speedy return of the Lord, endeavoured at first to find for
itself a fitting expression in the mother church of Jerusalem by
the voluntary determination to have their goods in common,--an
endeavour which without prejudice of its spiritual importance
soon proved to be impracticable. On the other hand the well-to-do
Gentile churches proved their brotherly love by collections for
those originally poor, and especially for the church at Jerusalem
which had suffered the special misfortune of famine. The three
inveterate moral plagues of the ancient world, contempt of
foreign nationalities, degradation of woman, and slavery, were
overcome, according to Gal. iii. 28, by gradual elevation of
inward feeling without any violent struggle against existing laws
and customs, and the consciousness of common membership in the
one head in heaven hallowed all the relationships of the earthly
life. Even in apostolic times the bright mirror of Christian
purity was no doubt dimmed by spots of rust. Hypocrisy (Acts v.)
and variance (Acts vi.) in single cases appeared very early in
the mother church; but the former was punished by a fearfully
severe judgment, the latter was overcome by love and sweet
reasonableness. In the rich Gentile churches, such as those
of Corinth and Thessalonica, a worldly spirit in the form of
voluptuousness, selfishness, pride, etc., made its appearance,
but was here also rooted out by apostolic exhortation and
discipline. If any one caused public scandal by serious departure
from true doctrine or Christian conduct, and in spite of pastoral
counsel persisted in his error, he was by the judgment of the
church cast out, but the penitent was received again after his
sincerity had been proved (1 Cor. v. 1; 2 Cor. ii. 5).
§ 18. HERESIES IN THE APOSTOLIC AGE.[17]
When Christianity began its career of world conquest in the preaching
of the Apostle Paul, the representatives of the intellectual culture
of the ancient world assumed toward it an attitude, either of utter
indifference, or of keen hostility, or of readiness to accept Christian
elements, while retaining along with these many of their old notions.
From this mixing of heterogeneous elements a fermentation arose which
was the fruitful mother of numerous heresies.
§ 18.1. =Jewish Christianity and the Council of Apostles.=--The
Lord had commanded the disciples to preach the gospel to all
nations (Matt. xxviii. 19), and so they could not doubt that the
whole heathen world was called to receive the church’s heritage;
but feeling themselves bound by utterances of the Old Testament
regarding the eternal validity of the law of Moses, and having
not yet penetrated the full significance of the saying of Christ
(Mark v. 17), they thought that incorporation into Judaism by
circumcision was still an indispensable condition of reception
into the kingdom of Christ. The Hellenist Stephen represented a
more liberal tendency (Acts vi. 14); and Philip, also a Hellenist,
preached at least occasionally to the Samaritans, and the
Apostles recognised his work by sending down Peter and John
(Acts viii. 14). On the other hand, it needed an immediate
divine revelation to convince Peter that a Gentile thirsting for
salvation was just as such fit for the kingdom of God (Acts x.).
And even this revelation remained without any decisive influence
on actual missionary enterprise. They were Hellenistic Jews who
finally took the bold step of devoting themselves without reserve
to the conversion of the Gentiles at Antioch (Acts xi. 19). To
foster the movement there the Apostles sent Barnabas, who entered
into it with his whole soul, and in Paul associated with himself
a yet more capable worker. After the notable success of their
first missionary journey had vindicated their claim and calling
as Apostles of the Gentiles, the arrival of Jewish zealots in
the Antiochean church occasioned the sending of Paul and Barnabas
to Jerusalem, about A.D. 51, in order finally to settle this
important dispute. At a Council of the Apostles convened there
Peter and James the Just delivered the decision that Gentile
converts should only be required to observe certain legal
restrictions, and these, as it would seem from the conditions
laid down (Acts xv. 20), of a similar kind to those imposed
upon proselytes of the gate. An arrangement come to at this
time between the two Antiochean Apostles and Peter, James, and
John, led to the recognition of the former as Apostles of the
Gentiles and the latter as Apostles of the Jews (Gal. ii. 1-10).
Nevertheless during a visit to Antioch Peter laid himself open
to censure for practical inconsistency and weak connivance with
the fanaticism of certain Jewish Christians, and had to have
the truth respecting it very pointedly told him by Paul (Gal.
ii. 11-14). The destruction of the temple and the consequent
cessation of the entire Jewish worship led to the gradual
disappearance of non-sectarian Jewish Christianity and its
amalgamation with Gentile Christianity. The remnant of Jewish
Christianity which still in the altered condition of things
continued to cling to its principles and practice assumed ever
more and more the character of a sect, and drifted into open
heresy. (Comp. § 28).
§ 18.2. =The Apostolic Basis of Doctrine.=--The need of fixing
the apostolically accredited accounts of the life of the
Redeemer by written documents, led to the origin of the Gospels.
The continued connection of the missionary Apostles with the
churches founded by them, or even their authority of general
superintendence, called forth the apostolic doctrinal epistles.
A beginning of the collection and general circulation of the New
Testament writings was made at an early date by the communication
of these being made by one church to another (Col. iv. 16). There
was as yet no confession of faith as a standard of orthodoxy, but
the way was prepared by adopting Matt. xxviii. 19 as a confession
by candidates for baptism. Paul set up justification through
faith alone (Gal. i. 8, 9), and John, the incarnation of God in
Christ (1 John iv. 3), as indispensable elements in a Christian
confession.
§ 18.3. =False Teachers.=--The first enemy from within its own
borders which Christianity had to confront was the ordinary
Pharisaic Judaism with its stereotyped traditional doctrine, its
lifeless work-righteousness, its unreasonable national prejudices,
and its perversely carnal Messianic expectations. Its shibboleth
was the obligation of the Gentiles to observe the Mosaic
ceremonial law, the Sabbath, rules about meats, circumcision,
as an indispensable condition of salvation. This tendency had
its origin in the mother church of Jerusalem, but was there
at a very early date condemned by the Apostolic Council. This
party nevertheless pursued at all points the Apostle Paul with
bitter enmity and vile calumnies. Traces of a manifestation of a
Sadducean or sceptical spirit may perhaps already be found in the
denial of the resurrection which in 1 Cor. xv. Paul opposes. On
the other hand, at a very early period Greek philosophy got mixed
up with Christianity. Apollos, a philosophically cultured Jew
of Alexandria, had at first conceived of Christianity from the
speculative side, and had in this form preached it with eloquence
and success at Corinth. Paul did not contest the admissibility
of this mode of treatment. He left it to the verdict of history
(1 Cor. iii. 11-14), and warned against an over-estimation of
human wisdom (1 Cor. ii. 1-10). Among many of the seekers after
wisdom in Corinth, little as this was intended by Apollos, the
simple positive preaching of Paul lost on this account the favour
that it had enjoyed before. In this may be found perhaps the
first beginnings of that fourfold party faction which arose
in the Corinthian church (1 Cor. i.). The Judaists appealed to
the authority of the Apostle Peter (οἱ τοῦ Κηφᾶ); the Gentile
Christians were divided into the parties of Apollos and of Paul,
or by the assumption of the proud name οἱ τοῦ Χριστοῦ, sought to
free themselves from the recognition of any Apostolic authority.
Paul successfully opposes these divisions in his Epistle to
the Corinthians. Apprehension of a threatened growth of gnostic
teachers is first expressed in the Apostle Paul’s farewell
addresses to the elders of Asia Minor (Acts xx. 29); and in the
Epistle to the Colossians, as well as in the Pastoral Epistles,
this ψευδώνυμος γνῶσις is expressly opposed as manifesting itself
in the adoption of oriental theosophy, magic, and theurgy, in an
arbitrary asceticism that forbade marriage and restricted the use
of food, in an imaginary secret knowledge of the nature and order
of the heavenly powers and spirits, and idealistic volatilizing
of concrete Christian doctrines, such as that of the resurrection
(2 Tim. ii. 18). In the First Epistle of John, again, that
special form of Gnosis is pointed out which denied the
incarnation of God in Christ by means of docetic conceptions; and
in the Second Epistle of Peter, as well as in the Epistle of Jude,
we have attention called to antinomian excrescences, unbridled
immorality and wanton lust in the development of magical and
theurgical views. It should not, however, be left unmentioned,
that modern criticism has on many grounds contested the
authenticity of the New Testament writings just named, and
has assigned the first appearance of heretical gnosis to
the beginning of the second century. The Nicolaitans of the
Apocalypse (iii. 5, 14, 15, 20) appear to have been an antinomian
sect of Gentile Christian origin, spread more or less through the
churches of Asia Minor, perhaps without any gnostic background,
which in direct and intentional opposition to the decision of the
Apostolic Council (Acts xv. 29) took part in heathen sacrificial
feasts (comp. 1 Cor. x.), and justified or at least apologized
for fleshly impurity.
FIRST DIVISION.
History of the Development of the Church during the
Græco-Roman and Græco-Byzantine Periods.
§ 19. CONTENT, DISTRIBUTION AND BOUNDARIES
OF THOSE PERIODS.
At the very beginning of the Apostolic Age the universalistic
spirit of Christianity had already broken through the particularistic
limitations of Judaism. When once the substantial truth of divine
salvation had cast off the Judaistic husk in which the kernel had
ripened, those elements of culture which had come to maturity in the
Roman-Greek world were appropriated as means for giving to Christian
ideas a fuller and clearer expression. The task now to be undertaken was
the development of Christianity on the lines of Græco-Roman culture, or
the expansion of the church’s apostolicity into catholicity. The ancient
church of the Roman and Byzantine world fulfilled this task, but in
doing so the sound evangelical catholic development encountered at every
point elements of a false, because an unevangelical, Catholicism. The
centre, then, of all the movements of Church History is to be found
in the Teutono-Roman-Slavic empire. The Roman church preserved and
increased her importance by attaching herself to this new empire, and
undertaking its spiritual formation and education. The Byzantine church,
on the other hand, falling into a state of inward stagnation, and
pressed from without by the forces of Islam, passes into decay as
a national church.
The history of this first stage of the development of the church falls
into =three periods=. The first period reaches down to Constantine the
Great, who, in A.D. 323, secured to Christianity and the church a final
victory over Paganism. The second period brings us down to the close of
the universal catholic or œcumenical elaboration of doctrine attained by
the church under its old classical form of culture, that is, down to the
close of the Monothelite controversy (§ 52, 8), by the Sixth Œcumenical
Council at Constantinople in A.D. 680. But inasmuch as the _Concilium
quini-sextum_ in A.D. 692 undertook simply the completion of the work of
the two previous œcumenical synods with reference to church constitution
and worship, and as here the first grounds were laid for the great
partition of the church into Eastern and Western (§ 63, 2), we prefer
to make A.D. 692 the closing limit of the second period. The conclusion
of the third period, is found in the overthrow of Constantinople
by the Turks in A.D. 1453. The first two periods are most evidently
distinguished from one another in respect of the outward condition of
the church. Before the times of Constantine, it lives and develops its
strength amid the oppression and persecution of the pagan state; under
Constantine the state itself becomes Christian and the church enjoys all
the advantages, all the care and furtherance, that earthly protection
can afford. Along with all this worldly splendour, however, a worldly
disposition makes its way into the church, and in exchange for its
protection of the church the state assumes an autocratic lordship over
it. Even in the inner, and pre-eminently doctrinal, development of the
church the two periods of this age are essentially distinguished from
one another. While it was the church’s endeavour to adopt only the forms
of culture of ancient paganism, while rejecting its godless substance,
it too often happened that pagan ideas got mixed up with Christianity,
and it was threatened with a similar danger from the side of Judaism. It
was therefore the special task of the church during the first period to
resist the encroachment of anti-Christian Jewish and Pagan elements. In
the first period the perfecting of its own genuinely Christian doctrinal
content was still a purely subjective matter, resting only on the
personal authority of the particular church teachers. In the second
period, on the other hand, the church universal, as represented by
œcumenical synods with full power, proceeds to the laying down and
establishing of an objective-ecclesiastical, œcumenical-catholic system
of doctrine, constituting an all-sided development of the truth in
opposition to the one-sided development of subjective heretical teaching.
In doing so, however, the culture of the old Græco-Roman world exhausted
its powers. The measure of development which these were capable of
affording the church was now completed, and its future must be looked
for among the new nationalities of Teutonic, Romanic, and Slavic origin.
While the Byzantine empire, and with it the glory of the ancient church
of the East was pressed and threatened by Islam, a new empire arose
in the West in youthful vigour and became the organ of a new phase of
development in the history of the church; and while the church in the
West struggled after a new and higher point in her development, the
Eastern church sank ever deeper down under outward oppression and inward
weakness. The partition of the church into an Eastern and a Western
division, which became imminent at the close of the second period, and
was actually carried out during the third period, cut off the church of
the East from the influence of those new vital forces, political as well
as ecclesiastical, and which it might otherwise, perhaps, have shared
with the West. By the overthrow of the East-Roman empire the last
support of its splendour and even of its vital activity was taken away.
Here too ends the history of the church on the lines of purely antique
classical forms of culture. The remnants of the church of the East were
no longer capable of any living historical development under the
oppression of the Turkish rule.
FIRST SECTION.
History of the Græco-Roman Church during the
Second and Third Centuries (A.D. 70-323).[18]
§ 20. CONTENT, DISTRIBUTION AND BOUNDARIES
OF THIS PERIOD.[19]
As the history of the beginnings of the church has been treated by
us under two divisions, so also the first period of the history of
its development may be similarly divided into the =Post-Apostolic Age=,
which reaches down to the middle of the second century, and the =Age
of the Old Catholic Church=, which ends with the establishment of the
church under and by Constantine, and at that point passes over into the
Age of the œcumenical Catholic or Byzantine-Roman Imperial Church.--As
the Post-Apostolic Age was occupied with an endeavour to appropriate
and possess in a fuller and more vigorous manner the saving truths
transmitted by the Apostles, and presents as the result of its struggles,
errors, and victories, the Old Catholic Church as a unity, firmly bound
from within, strictly free of all compulsion from without, so on the
basis thus gained, the Old Catholic Church goes forward to new conflicts,
failures, and successes, by means of which the foundations are laid for
the future perfecting of it through its establishment by the state into
the Œcumenical Catholic Imperial Church.[20]
§ 20.1. =The Post-Apostolic Age.=--The peril to which the church
was exposed from the introduction of Judaistic and Pagan elements
with her new converts was much more serious not only than the
Jewish spirit of persecution, crushed as it was into impotence
through the overthrow of Jewish national independence, but also
than the persecution of anti-Christian paganism which at this
time was only engaged upon sporadically. All the more threatening
was this peril from the peculiar position of the church during
this age. Since the removal of the personal guidance of the
Apostles that control was wanting which only at a subsequent
period was won again by the establishment of a New Testament
canon and the laying down of a normative rule of faith, as well
as by the formation of a hierarchical-episcopal constitution. In
all the conflicts, then, that occupied this age, the first and
main point was to guard the integrity and purity of traditional
Apostolic Christianity against the anti-Christian Jewish and
Pagan ideas which new converts endeavoured to import into it from
their earlier religious life. Those Judaic ideas thus imported
gave rise to Ebionism; those Pagan ideas gave rise to Gnosticism
(§§ 26-28). And just as the Pauline Gentile Christianity, in so
far as it was embraced under this period (§ 30, 2), secured the
victory over the moderate and non-heretical Jewish Christianity,
this latter became more and more assimilated to the former, and
gradually passed over into it (§ 28, 1). Add to this the need,
ever more pressingly felt, of a sifting of the not yet uniformly
recognised early Christian literature that had passed into
ecclesiastical use (§ 36, 7, 8) by means of the establishment
of a New Testament =canon=; that is, the need of a collection of
writings admitted to be of Apostolic origin to occupy henceforth
the first rank as a standard and foundation for the purposes of
teaching and worship, and to form a bulwark against the flood
of heretical and non-heretical =Pseudepigraphs= that menaced the
purity of doctrine (§ 32). Further, the no less pressing need for
the construction of a universally valid =rule of faith= (§ 35, 2),
as an intellectual bond of union and mark of recognition for
all churches and believers scattered over the earth’s surface.
Then again, in the victory that was being secured by Episcopacy
over Presbyterianism, and in the introduction of a Synodal
constitution for counsel and resolution, the first stage
in the formation of a hierarchical organization was reached
(§ 34). Finally, the last dissolving action of this age was the
suppression of the fanatical prophetic and fanatical rigorist
spirit, which, reaching its climax in =Montanism=, directed
itself mainly against the tendency already appearing on many
sides to tone down the unflinching severity of ecclesiastical
discipline, to make modifications in constitution, life and
conversation in accordance with the social customs of the world,
and to settle down through disregard of the speedy return of
the Lord, so confidently expected by the early Christians, into
an easy satisfaction in the enjoyment of earthly possessions
(§ 40, 5).
§ 20.2. =The Age of the Old Catholic Church.=--The designation
of the universal Christian church as Catholic dates from the time
of Irenæus, that is, from the beginning of this second part of
our first period. This name characterizes the church as the one
universally (καθ’ ὅλου) spread and recognised from the time of
the Apostles, and so stigmatizes every opposition to the one
church that alone stands on the sure foundation of holy scripture
and pure apostolic tradition, as belonging to the manifold
particularistic heretical and schismatical sects. The church
of this particular age, however, has been designated the Old
Catholic Church as distinguished from the œcumenical Catholic
church of the following period, as well as from the Roman
Catholic and Greek Catholic churches, into which afterwards the
œcumenical Catholic church was divided.
At the beginning of this age, the heretical as well as the
non-heretical Ebionism may be regarded as virtually suppressed,
although some scanty remnants of it might yet be found. The most
brilliant period of Gnosticism, too, when the most serious danger
from Paganism within the Christian pale in the form of Hellenic
and Syro-Chaldaic Theosophy and Mysteriosophy threatened the
church, was already past. But in Manichæism (§ 29) there appeared,
during the second half of the third century, a new peril of a
no less threatening kind, inspired by Parseeism and Buddhism,
which, however, the church on the ground of the solid foundations
already laid was able to resist with powerful weapons. On the
other hand the Pagan element within the church asserted itself
more and more decidedly (§ 39, 6) by means of the intrusion of
magico-theurgical superstition into the catholic doctrine of
the efficacy of the church sacraments and sacramental acts
(§ 58). But now also, with Marcus Aurelius, Paganism outside
of Christianity as embodied in the Roman state, begins the
war of extermination against the church that was ever more and
more extending her boundaries. Such manifestation of hostility,
however, was not able to subdue the church, but rather led, under
and through Constantine the Great, to the Christianizing of the
state and the establishment of the church. During the same time
the episcopal and synodal-hierarchical organization of the church
was more fully developed by the introduction of an order of
Metropolitans, and then in the following period it reached its
climax in the oligarchical Pentarchy of Patriarchs (§ 46, 1),
and in the institution of œcumenical Synods (§ 43, 2). By the
condemnation and expulsion of Montanism, in which the inner
development of the Post-Apostolic Age reached its special and
distinctive conclusion, the endeavour to naturalize Christianity
among the social customs of the worldly life was certainly
legitimized by the church, and could now be unrestrictedly
carried out in a wider and more comprehensive way. In the
Trinitarian controversies, too, in which several prominent
theologians engaged, the first step was taken in that
œcumenical-ecclesiastical elaboration of doctrine which occupied
and dominated the whole of the following period (§§ 49-52).
§ 20.3. =The Point of Transition from the One Age to the Other=
may unhesitatingly be set down at A.D. 170. The following are the
most important data in regard thereto. The death about A.D. 165
of Justin Martyr, who marks the highest point reached in the
Post-Apostolic Age, and forms also the transition to the Old
Catholic Age; and Irenæus, flourishing somewhere about A.D. 170,
who was the real inaugurator of this latter age. Besides these
we come upon the beginnings of the Trinitarian controversies
about the year 170. Finally, the rejection of Montanism from the
universal Catholic church was effected about the year 170 by means
of the Synodal institution called into existence for that very
purpose.
I. THE RELATIONSHIP OF EXTRA-CHRISTIAN PAGANISM AND
JUDAISM TO THE CHURCH.[21]
§ 21. THE SPREAD OF CHRISTIANITY.
Amid all the persecutions which the church during this period had to
suffer it spread with rapid strides throughout the whole Roman empire,
and even far beyond its limits. Edessa, the capital of the kingdom of
Osrhoëne in Mesopotamia, had, as early as A.D. 170, a Christian prince,
named =Abgar Bar Maanu=, whose coins were the first to bear the sign
of the cross. We find Christianity gaining a footing contemporaneously
in Persia, Media, Bactria, and Parthia. In the third century we find
traces of its presence in Armenia. Paul himself made his way into
Arabia (Gal. i. 17). In the third century Origen received an invitation
from a ἡγούμενος τῆς Ἀραβίας, who wished to receive information about
Christianity. At another time he accepted a call from that country in
order to settle an ecclesiastical dispute (§ 33, 6). From Alexandria,
where Mark had exercised his ministry, the Christian faith spread out
into other portions of Africa, into Cyrene and among the Coptic races,
neighbouring upon the Egyptians properly so-called. The church of
proconsular Africa, with Carthage for its capital, stood in close
connection with Rome. Mauretania and Numidia had, even in the third
century, so many churches, that Cyprian could bring together at Carthage
a Synod of eighty-seven bishops. In Gaul there were several flourishing
churches composed of colonies and teachers from Asia Minor, such as
the churches of Lyons, Vienne, etc. At a later period seven missionary
teachers of the Christian faith came out of Italy into Gaul, among whom
was Dionysius, known as St. Denis, the founder of the church at Paris.
The Roman colonies in the provinces of the Rhine and the Danube had
several flourishing congregations as early as the third century.
The emptiness and corruption of paganism was the negative, the divine
power of the gospel was the positive, means of this wonderful extension.
This divine power was manifested in the zeal and self-denial of
Christian teachers and missionaries (§ 34, 1), in the life and
walk of Christians, in the brotherly love which they showed, in
the steadfastness and confidence of their faith, and above all in
the joyfulness with which they met the cruellest of deaths by martyrdom.
The blood of the martyrs was the seed of the church, and it was not
an unheard-of circumstance that the executioners of those Christian
witnesses became their successors in the noble army of confessors.
§ 22. PERSECUTIONS OF THE CHRISTIANS IN THE
ROMAN EMPIRE.[22]
The Law of the Twelve Tables had already forbidden the exercise
of foreign modes of worship within the Roman empire (_Religiones
peregrinæ_, _Collegia illicita_), for religion was exclusively an affair
of the state and entered most intimately into all civil and municipal
relations, and on this account whatever endangered the national religion
was regarded as necessarily imperilling the state itself. Political
considerations, however, led to the granting to conquered nations
the free use of their own forms of worship. This concession did not
materially help Christianity after it had ceased, in the time of Nero,
to be regularly confounded by the Roman authorities with Judaism,
as had been the case in the time of Claudius, and Judaism, after
the destruction of Jerusalem, had been sharply distinguished from
it. It publicly proclaimed its intention to completely dislodge all
other religions, and the rapidity with which it spread showed how
energetically its intentions were carried out. The close fellowship
and brotherliness that prevailed among Christians, as well as their
exclusive, and during times of persecution even secret assemblies,
aroused the suspicion that they had political tendencies. Their
withdrawal from civil and military services on account of the pagan
ceremonies connected with them, especially their refusal to burn incense
before the statues of the emperor, also the steadfastness of their
faith, which was proof against all violence and persuasion alike, their
retiredness from the world, etc., were regarded as evidence of their
indifference or hostility to the general well-being of the state, as
invincible stiff-neckedness, as contumacy, sedition, and high treason.
The heathen populace saw in the Christians the sacrilegious enemies and
despisers of their gods; and the Christian religion, which was without
temples, altars and sacrifices, seemed to them pure Atheism. The most
horrible calumnies, that in their assemblies (_Agapæ_) the vilest
immoralities were practised (_Concubitus Œdipodei_), children slain
and human flesh eaten (_Epulæ Thyesteæ_, comp. § 36, 5), were readily
believed. All public misfortunes were thus attributed to the wrath
of the gods against the Christians, who treated them with contempt.
_Non pluit Deus, duc ad Christianos!_ The heathen priests also, the
temple servants and the image makers were always ready in their own
common interests to stir up the suspicions of the people. Under such
circumstances it is not to be wondered at that the fire of persecution
on the part of the heathen people and the heathen state continued to
rage for centuries.
§ 22.1. =Claudius, Nero and Domitian.=--Regarding the Emperor
=Tiberius= (A.D. 14-37), we meet in Tertullian with the
undoubtedly baseless tradition, that, impressed by the story
told him by Pilate, he proposed to the Senate to introduce Christ
among the gods, and on the rejection of this proposal, threatened
the accusers of the Christians with punishment. The statement
in Acts xviii. 2, that the Emperor =Claudius= (A.D. 41-54)
expelled from Rome all Jews and with them many Christians also,
is illustrated in a very circumstantial manner by Suetonius:
_Claudius Judæos impulsore Chresto assidue tumultuantes Roma
expulit_. The tumults, therefore, between the Jews and the
Christians, occurring about the year 51 or 52, gave occasion to
this decree. The first persecution of the Christians proceeding
from a Roman ruler which was directed against the Christians as
such, was carried out by the Emperor =Nero= (A.D. 54-68) in the
year 64, in consequence of a nine days’ conflagration in Rome,
the origin of which was commonly ascribed by the people to the
Emperor himself. Nero, however, laid the blame upon the hated
Christians, and perpetrated upon them the most ingeniously
devised cruelties. Sewn up in skins of wild animals they were
cast out to be devoured of dogs; others were crucified, or wrapt
in tow and besmeared with pitch, they were fixed upon sharp
spikes in the imperial gardens where the people gathered to
behold gorgeous spectacles, and set on fire to lighten up
the night (Tac., _Ann._, xv. 44). After the death of Nero the
legend spread among the Christians, that he was not dead but had
withdrawn beyond the Euphrates, soon to return as Antichrist.
Nero’s persecution seems to have been limited to Rome, and to
have ended with his death.--It was under =Domitian= (A.D. 81-96)
that individual Christians were for the first time subjected
to confiscation of goods and banishment for godlessness or the
refusal to conform to the national religion. Probably also, the
execution of his own cousin, the Consul Flavius Clemens [Clement],
on account of his ἀθεότης and his ἐξοκέλλειν εἰς τὰ τῶν Ἰουδαίων
ἔθη (Dio Cass., lxvii. 14), as well as the banishment of Clemens’
[Clement’s] wife, Flavia Domitilla (A.D. 93), was really on
account of their attachment to the Christian faith (§ 30, 3). The
latter at least is proved by two inscriptions in the catacombs to
have been undoubtedly a Christian. Domitian insisted upon having
information as to the political significance of the kingdom of
Christ, and brought from Palestine to Rome two relatives of Jesus,
grandsons of Jude, the brother of the Lord, but their hands horny
with labour satisfied him that his suspicions had been unfounded.
The philanthropic Emperor =Nerva= (A.D. 96-98) recalled the
exiles and did not listen to those who clamoured bitterly against
the Christians, but Christianity continued after as well as
before a _Religo illicita_, or rather was now reckoned such,
after it had been more distinctly separated from Judaism.[23]
§ 22.2. =Trajan and Hadrian.=--With =Trajan= (A.D. 98-117),
whom historians rightly describe as a just, earnest, and mild
ruler, the persecutions of the Christians enter upon a new
stage. He renewed the old strict prohibition of secret societies,
_hetæræ_, which could easily be made to apply to the Christians.
In consequence of this law the younger Pliny, as Governor
of Bithynia, punished with death those who were accused as
Christians, if they would not abjure Christianity. But his
doubts being awakened by the great number of every rank and age
and of both sexes against whom accusations were brought, and in
consequence of a careful examination, which showed the Christians
to be morally pure and politically undeserving of suspicion and
to be guilty only of stubborn attachment to their superstition,
he asked definite instructions from the Emperor. Trajan approved
of what he had done and what he proposed; the Christians were
not to be sought after and anonymous accusations were not to
be regarded, but those formally complained of and convicted, if
they stubbornly refused to sacrifice to the gods and burn incense
before the statues of the Emperor were to be punished with death
(A.D. 112). This imperial rescript continued for a long time
the legal standard for judicial procedure with reference to the
Christians. The persecution under Trajan extended even to Syria
and Palestine. In Jerusalem the aged bishop Simeon, the successor
of James, accused as a Christian and a descendant of David, after
being cruelly scourged, died a martyr’s death on the cross in
A.D. 107. The martyrdom, too, of the Antiochean bishop, Ignatius,
in all probability took place during the reign of Trajan (§ 30, 5).
An edict of toleration supposed to have been issued at a later
period by Trajan, a copy of which exists in Syriac and Armenian,
is now proved to be apocryphal.--During the reign of =Hadrian=
(A.D. 117-138), the people began to carry out in a tumultuous
way the execution of the Christians on the occasion of the
heathen festivals. On the representation of the proconsul of Asia,
Serenius Granianus, Hadrian issued a rescript addressed to his
successor, Minucius Fundanus, against such acts of violence, but
executions still continued carried out according to the forms of
law. The genuineness of the rescript, however, as given at the
close of the first Apology of Justin Martyr, has been recently
disputed by many. In Rome itself, between A.D. 135 and A.D. 137,
bishop Telesphorus, with many other Christians, fell as victims
of the persecution. The tradition of the fourth century, that
Hadrian wished to build a temple to Christ, is utterly without
historical foundation. His unfavourable disposition toward the
Christians clearly appears from this, that he caused a temple of
Venus to be built upon the spot where Christ was crucified, and a
statue of Jupiter to be erected on the rock of the sepulchre, in
order to pollute those places which Christians held most sacred.
§ 22.3. =Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius.=--Under =Antoninus
Pius= (A.D.138-161), the tumultuous charges of the people against
the Christians, on account of visitations of pestilence in many
places, were renewed, but the mildly disposed emperor sought to
protect them as much as possible from violence. The rescript,
however, _Ad Commune Asiæ_, which bears his name is very probably
of Christian authorship.--The persecutions again took a new turn
under =Marcus Aurelius= (A.D. 161-180) who was, both as a man and
a ruler, one of the noblest figures of antiquity. In the pride
of his stoical wisdom, however, despising utterly the enthusiasm
of the Christians, he not only allowed free scope to the popular
hatred, but also introduced the system of espionage, giving to
informers the confiscated property of the Christians, and even
permitting the use of torture, in order to compel them to recant,
and thus gave occasion to unexampled triumphs of Christian
heroism. At Rome, the noble Apologist Justin Martyr, denounced
by his opponent the philosopher Crescens, after cruel and bloody
scourging, died under the executioner’s axe about A.D. 165
(§ 30, 9).--In regard to a very severe persecution endured by
the church of Smyrna, we possess an original report of it sent
from that church to one closely related to it, embellished
with legendary details or interpolated, which Eusebius has
incorporated in his Church History. The substance of it is a
description of the glorious martyr death of their aged bishop
Polycarp (§ 30, 6), who, because he refused to curse the Lord
whom he had served for eighty-six years, was made to mount the
funeral pile, and while rejoicing in the midst of the flames,
received the crown of martyrdom. According to the story the
flames gathered around him like a wind-filled sail, and when a
soldier pierced him with his sword, suddenly a white dove flew
up; moreover the glorified spirit also appeared to a member of
the church in a vision, clothed in a white garment. Eusebius
places the date of Polycarp’s death shortly before A.D. 166.
But since it has been shown by Waddington, on the basis of
an examination of recently discovered inscriptions, that the
proconsul of Asia, Statius Quadratus, mentioned in the report
of the church of Smyrna, did not hold that office in A.D. 166,
but in A.D. 155-156, the most important authorities have come to
regard either A.D. 155 or A.D. 156 as the date of his martyrdom.
Still some whose opinions are worthy of respect refuse to
accept this view, pointing out the absence of that chronological
statement from the report in Eusebius and to its irreconcilability
with the otherwise well-supported facts, that Polycarp was on
a visit to Rome in A.D. 155 (§ 37, 2), and that the reckoning
of the day of his death in the report as ὄντος σαββάτου μεγάλου
would suit indeed the Easter of A.D. 155, as well as that of
A.D. 166, but not that of A.D. 156. [24] The legend of the _Legio
fulminatrix_, that in the war against the Marcomanni in A.D. 174
the prayers of the Christian soldiers of this legion called forth
rain and thunder, and thus saved the Emperor and his army from
the danger of perishing by thirst, whereupon this modified law
against the accusers of the Christians was issued, has, so far
as the first part is concerned, its foundation in history, only
that the heathen on the other hand ascribed the miracle to their
prayer to _Jupiter Pluvius_. [25]--Regarding the persecution
at Lyons and Vienne in A.D. 177, we also possess a contemporary
report from the Christian church of these places (§ 32, 8).
Bishop Pothinus, in his ninetieth year, sank under the effects
of tortures continued during many days in a loathsome prison.
The young and tender slave-girl Blandina was scourged, her
body scorched upon a red-hot iron chair, her limbs torn by wild
beasts and at last her life taken; but under all her tortures she
continued to repeat her joyful confession: “I am a Christian and
nothing wicked is tolerated among us.” Under similar agonies the
boy Ponticus, in his fifteenth year, showed similar heroism. The
dead bodies of the martyrs were laid in heaps upon the streets,
until at last they were burnt and their ashes strewn upon the
Rhone. =Commodus= (A.D. 180-192), the son of Marcus Aurelius, who
in every other respect was utterly disreputable, influenced by
his mistress Marcia, showed himself inclined, by the exercise
of his clemency, to remit the sentences of the Christians. The
persecution at Scillita in North Africa, during the first year
of the reign of Commodus, in which the martyr Speratus suffered,
together with eleven companions, was carried out in accordance
with the edict of Marcus Aurelius.
§ 22.4. =Septimius Severus and Maximinus Thrax.=--=Septimius
Severus= (A.D. 193-211), whom a Christian slave, Proculus,
had healed of a sickness by anointing with oil, was at first
decidedly favourable to the Christians. Even in A.D. 197, after
his triumphal entrance into Rome, he took them under his personal
protection when the popular clamour, which such a celebration
was fitted to excite, was raised against them. The judicial
persecution, too, which some years later, A.D. 200, his deputy
in North Africa carried on against the Christians on the basis
of existing laws because they refused to sacrifice to the genius
of the Emperor, he may not have been able to prevent. On the
other hand, he did himself, in A.D. 202, issue an edict which
forbade conversions to Judaism and Christianity. The storm of
persecution thereby excited was directed therefore first of all
and especially against the catechumens and the neophytes, but
frequently also, overstepping the letter of the edict, it was
turned against the older Christians. The persecution seems
to have been limited to Egypt and North Africa. At Alexandria
Leonidas, the father of Origen, was beheaded. The female slave,
Potamiæna, celebrated as much for her moral purity as for her
beauty, was accused by her master, whose evil passions she had
refused to gratify, as a Christian, and was given over to the
gladiators to be abused. She succeeded, however, in defending
herself from pollution, and was then, along with her mother
Marcella, slowly dipped into boiling pitch. The soldier,
Basilides by name, who should have executed the sentence himself
embraced Christianity, and was beheaded. The persecution raged
with equal violence and cruelty in Carthage. A young woman of
a noble family, Perpetua, in her twenty-second year, in spite
of imprisonment and torture, and though the infant in her arms
and her weeping pagan father appealed to her heart’s affections,
continued true to her faith, and was thrown to be tossed on the
horns of a wild cow, and to die from the dagger of a gladiator.
The slave girl Felicitas who, in the same prison, became a mother,
showed similar courage amid similar sufferings. Persecution
smouldered on throughout the reign of Septimius, showing itself
in separate sporadic outbursts, but was not renewed under his son
and successor =Caracalla= (A.D. 211-217), who in other respects
during his reign stained with manifold cruelties, did little to
the honour of those Christian influences by which in his earliest
youth he had been surrounded (“_lacte Christiano educatus_,”
Tert.).--That Christianity should have a place given it among the
senseless religions favoured by =Elagabalus= or =Heliogabalus=
(A.D. 218-222), was an absurdity which nevertheless secured for
it toleration and quiet. His second wife, Severina or Severa, to
whom Hippolytus dedicated his treatise Περὶ ἀναστάσεως, was the
first empress friendly to the Christians. =Alexander Severus=
(A.D. 222-235), embracing a noble eclecticism, placed among his
household gods the image of Christ, along with those of Abraham,
Orpheus, and Apollonius of Tyana, and showed himself well
disposed toward the Christians; while at the same time his mother,
Julia Mammæa, encouraged and furthered the scholarly studies of
Origen. The golden saying of Christ, Luke vi. 31, was inscribed
upon the gateway of his palace. His murderer, =Maximinus Thrax=
(A.D. 235-238), from very opposition to his predecessor, became
at once the enemy of the Christians. Clearly perceiving the
high importance of the clergy for the continued existence of the
church, his persecuting edict was directed solely against them.
The imperial position which he had usurped, however, was not
sufficiently secure to allow him to carry out his intentions
to extremities. Under =Gordianus= the Christians had rest, and
=Philip the Arabian= (A.D. 244-249) favoured them so openly and
decidedly, that it came to be thought that he himself had been a
Christian.
§ 22.5. =Decius, Gallus and Valerianus [Valerian].=--Soon after
the accession of =Decius= (A.D. 249-251), in the year 250, a new
persecution broke out that lasted without interruption for ten
years. This was the first general persecution and was directed at
first against the recognised heads of the churches, but by-and-by
was extended more widely to all ranks, and exceeded all previous
persecutions by its extent, the deliberateness of its plan,
the rigid determination with which it was conducted, and the
cruelties of its execution. Decius was a prudent ruler, an
earnest man of the old school, endued with an indomitable
will. But it was just this that drove him to the conclusion
that Christianity, as a godless system and one opposed to
the interests of the state, must be summarily suppressed. All
possible means, such as confiscation of goods, banishment, severe
tortures, or death, were tried in order to induce the Christians
to yield. Very many spoiled by the long peace that they had
enjoyed gave way, but on the other hand crowds of Christians,
impelled by a yearning after the crown of martyrdom, gave
themselves up joyfully to the prison and the stake. Those who
fell away, the _lapsi_, were classified as the _Thurificati_
or _Sacrificati_, who to save their lives had burnt incense or
sacrificed to the gods, and _Libellatici_, who without doing
this had purchased a certificate from the magistrates that they
had done so, and _Acta facientes_, who had issued documents
giving false statements regarding their Christianity. Those were
called _Confessores_ who publicly professed Christ and remained
steadfast under persecution, but escaped with their lives; those
were called _Martyrs_ who witnessing with their blood, suffered
death for the faith they professed. The Roman church could
boast of a whole series of bishops who fell victims to the storm
of persecution: Fabianus [Fabian] in A.D. 250, and Cornelius
in A.D. 253, probably also Lucius in A.D. 254, and Stephanus in
A.D. 257. And as in Rome, so also in the provinces, whole troops
of confessors and martyrs met a joyful death, not only from
among the clergy, but also from among the general members of
the church.--Then again, under =Gallus= (A.D. 251-253), the
persecution continued, excited anew by plagues and famine,
but was in many ways restricted by political embarrassment.
=Valerianus= [Valerian] (A.D. 253-260), from being a favourer of
the Christians, began from A.D. 257, under the influence of his
favourite Macrianus, to show himself a determined persecutor. The
Christian pastors were at first banished, and since this had not
the desired effect, they were afterwards punished with death. At
this time, too, the bishop of Carthage, Cyprian, who under Decius
had for a short season withdrawn by flight into the wilderness,
won for himself the martyr’s crown. So, likewise, in A.D. 258,
suffered Sixtus II. of Rome. The Roman bishop was soon followed
by his deacon Laurentius, a hero among Christian martyrs, who
pointed the avaricious governor to the sick, the poor and the
orphans of the congregation as the treasures of the church, and
was then burnt alive on a fire of glowing coal. But Valerian’s
son, =Gallienus= (A.D. 260-268), by an edict addressed to the
bishops, abolished the special persecuting statutes issued by his
father, without, however, as he is often erroneously said to have
done, formally recognising Christianity as a _Religio licita_.
The Christians after this enjoyed a forty years’ rest; for
the commonly reported cruel persecution of Christians under
=Claudius II.=, (A.D. 268-270) has been proved to be a pure
fable of apocryphal Acts of the Martyrs; and also the persecution
planned by =Aurelian= (A.D. 270-275), toward the close of his
reign, was prevented by his assassination committed by a pagan
officer.
§ 22.6. =Diocletian and Galerius.=--When =Diocletian=
(A.D. 284-305) was proclaimed Emperor by the army in Chalcedon, he
chose Nicomedia in Bithynia as his residence, and transferred the
conduct of the war to the general Maximianus [Maximian] Herculius
with the title of Cæsar, who, after the campaign had been closed
successfully in A.D. 286, was raised to the rank of Augustus or
joint-Emperor. New harassments from within and from without led
the two Emperors in A.D. 286 to name two Cæsars, or sub-Emperors,
who by their being adopted were assured of succession to imperial
rank. Diocletian assumed the administration of the East, and
gave up Illyricum as far as Pontus to his Cæsar and son-in-law
Galerius. Maximian undertook the government of the West, and
surrendered Gaul, Spain and Britain to his Cæsar, Constantius
Chlorus. According to Martyrologies, there was a whole legion,
called =Legio Thebaica=, that consisted of Christian soldiers.
This legion was originally stationed in the East, but was sent
into the war against the Gauls, because its members refused to
take part in the persecution of their brethren. After suffering
decimation twice over without any result, it is said that
=Maximian= left this legion, consisting of 6,600 men, along
with its commander St. Maurice, to be hewn down in the pass of
Agaunum, now called St. Moritz, in the Canton Valais. According to
Rettberg,[26] the historical germ of this consists in a tradition
reported by Theodoret as originating during the fifth or sixth
century, in a letter of Eucherius bishop of Lyons, about the
martyrdom of St. Maurice, who as _Tribunus Militum_ was executed
at Apamea along with seventy soldiers, by the orders of Maximian.
=Diocletian=, as the elder and supreme Emperor, was an active,
benevolent, clear-sighted statesman and ruler, but also a zealous
adherent of the old religion as regenerated by Neo-platonic
influences (§ 24, 2), and as such was inclined to hold
Christianity responsible for many of the internal troubles
of his kingdom. He was restrained from interfering with the
Christians, however, by the policy of toleration which had
prevailed since the time of Gallienus, as well as by his
own benevolent disposition, and not least by the political
consideration of the vast numbers of the Christian population.
His own wife Prisca and his daughter Valeria had themselves
embraced Christianity, as well as very many, and these the truest
and most trustworthy, of the members of his household. Yet the
incessant importunities and whispered suspicions of Galerius were
not without success. In A.D. 298 he issued the decree, that all
soldiers should take part in the sacrificial rites, and thus
obliged all Christian soldiers to withdraw from the army. During
a long sojourn in Nicomedia he finally prevailed upon the Emperor
to order a second general persecution; yet even then Diocletian
persisted, that in it no blood should be shed. This persecution
opened in A.D. 303 with the imperial command to destroy the
stately church of Nicomedia. Soon after an edict was issued
forbidding all Christian assemblies, ordering the destruction of
the churches, the burning of the sacred scriptures, and depriving
Christians of their offices and of their civil rights. A
Christian tore up the edict and was executed. Fire broke out
in the imperial palace and Galerius blamed the Christians for
the fire, and also charged them with a conspiracy against the
life of the Emperor. A persecution then began to rage throughout
the whole Roman empire, Gaul, Spain and Britain alone entirely
escaping owing to the favour of Constantius Chlorus who governed
these regions. All conceivable tortures and modes of death were
practised, and new and more horrible devices were invented from
day to day. Diocletian, who survived to A.D. 313, and Maximian,
abdicated the imperial rank which they had jointly held in
A.D. 305. Their places were filled by those who had been
previously their Cæsars, and Galerius as now the chief Augustus
proclaimed as Cæsars, =Severus= and =Maximinus Daza=, the most
furious enemies of the Christians that could be found, so that the
storm of persecution which had already begun in some measure to
abate, was again revived in Italy by Severus and in the East by
Maximinus. Then in order to bring all Christians into inevitable
contact with idolatrous rites, Galerius in A.D. 308 had all
victuals in the markets sprinkled with wine or water that
had been offered to idols. Seized with a terrible illness,
mortification beginning in his living body, he finally admitted
the uselessness of all his efforts to root out Christianity, and
shortly before his death, in common with his colleague, he issued
in A.D. 311, a formal =edict of toleration=, which permitted to
all Christians the free exercise of their religion and claimed in
return their intercession for the emperor and the empire.--During
this persecution of unexampled cruelty, lasting without
intermission for eight years, many noble proofs were given of
Christian heroism and of the joyousness that martyrdom inspired.
The number of the _Lapsi_, though still considerable, was in
proportion very much less than under the Decian persecution. How
much truth, if any, there may have been in the later assertion of
the Donatists (§ 63, 1), that even the Roman bishop, Marcellinus
[Marcellus] (A.D. 296-304), and his presbyters, Melchiades,
Marcellus and Sylvester, who were also his successors in the
bishopric, had denied Christ and sacrificed to idols, cannot
now be ascertained. Augustine denies the charge, but even
the Felician Catalogue of the Popes reports that Marcellinus
[Marcellus] during the persecution became a _Thurificatus_,
adding, however, the extenuation, that he soon thereafter, seized
with deep penitence, suffered martyrdom. The command to deliver
up the sacred writings gave rise to a new order of apostates,
the so-called _Traditores_. Many had recourse to a subterfuge by
surrendering heretical writings instead of the sacred books and
as such, but the earnest spirit of the age treated these as no
better than _traditors_.[27]
§ 22.7. =Maximinus Daza, Maxentius and Licinius.=--After the
death of Galerius his place was taken by the Dacian Licinius,
who shared with Maximinus the government of the East, the former
taking the European, the latter the Asiatic part along with
Egypt. Constantius Chlorus had died in A.D. 306, and Galerius
had given to the Cæsar Severus the empire of the West. But the
army proclaimed Constantine, son of Constantius, as Emperor.
He also established himself in Gaul, Spain and Britain. Then
also Maxentius, son of the abdicated emperor Maximian, claimed
the Western Empire, was proclaimed Augustus by the Prætorians,
recognised by the Roman senate, and after the overthrow of
Severus, ruled in Italy and Africa.--The pagan fanaticism of
=Maximinus= prevailed against the toleration edict of Galerian.
He heartily supported the attempted expulsion of Christians on
the part of several prominent cities, and commended the measure
on brazen tablets. He forbade the building of churches, punished
many with fines and dishonour, inflicted in some cases bodily
pains and even death, and gave official sanction to perpetrating
upon them all sorts of scandalous enormities. The _Acta Pilati_,
a pagan pseudepigraph filled with the grossest slanders about the
passion of Christ, was widely circulated by him and introduced as
a reading-book for the young in the public schools. =Constantine=,
who had inherited from his father along with his Neo-platonic
eclecticism his toleration of the Christians, secured to the
professors of the Christian faith in his realm the most perfect
quiet. =Maxentius=, too, at first let them alone; but the rivalry
and enmity that was daily increasing between him and Constantine,
the favourer of the Christians, drew him into close connection
with the pagan party, and into sympathy with their persecuting
spirit. In A.D. 312 Constantine led his army over the Alps.
Maxentius opposed him with an army drawn up in three divisions;
but Constantine pressed on victoriously, and shattered his
opponent’s forces before the gates of Rome. Betaking himself to
flight, Maxentius was drowned in the Tiber, and Constantine was
then sole ruler over the entire Western Empire. At Milan he had a
conference with Licinius, to whom he gave in marriage his sister
Constantia. They jointly issued an edict in A.D. 313, which
gave toleration to all forms of worship throughout the empire,
expressly permitting conversion to Christianity, and ordering the
restoration to the Christians of all the churches that had been
taken from them. Soon thereafter a decisive battle was fought
between Maximinus and Licinius. The former was defeated and took
to flight. The friendly relations that had subsisted between
=Constantine= and =Licinius= gave way gradually to estrangement
and were at last succeeded by open hostility. Licinius by
manifesting zeal as a persecutor identified himself with the
pagan party, and Constantine threw in his lot with the Christians.
In A.D. 323 a war broke out between these two, like a struggle
for life and death between Paganism and Christianity. Licinius
was overthrown and Constantine was master of the whole empire
(§ 42, 2). Eusebius in his _Vita Constantini_ reports, on the
basis probably of a sworn statement of the emperor, that during
the expedition against Maxentius in A.D. 312, after praying for
the aid of the higher powers, when the sun was going down, he saw
in heaven a shining cross in the sun with a bright inscription:
τούτῳ νίκα. During the night Christ appeared to him in a dream,
and commanded him to take the cross as his standard in battle
and with it to go into battle confident of victory. In his Church
History, Eusebius makes no mention of this tradition of the
vision. On the other hand there is here the fact, contested
indeed by critics, that after the victory over Maxentius the
emperor had erected his statue in the Roman Forum, with the
cross in his hand, and bearing the inscription: “By this sign of
salvation have I delivered your city from the yoke of the tyrant.
” This only is certain, that the imperial standard, which had the
unexplained name Labarum, bore the sign of the cross with the
monogram of the name of Christ.
§ 23. CONTROVERSIAL WRITINGS OF PAGANISM.
Pagan writers in their published works passed spiteful and
contemptuous judgments upon Christians and Christianity (Tacitus, Pliny,
Marcus Aurelius, and the physician Galen), or, like the rhetorician
Fronto, argued against them with violent invective; while popular wit
ran riot in representing Christianity by word and picture as the devout
worship of an ass. But even the talented satirist Lucian of Samosata was
satisfied with ridiculing the Christians as senseless fools. The first
and also the most important of all really pagan advocates was Celsus,
who in the second century, with brilliant subtlety and scathing sarcasm
sought to prove that the religion of the Christians was the very climax
of unreason. In respect of ability, keenness and bitterness of polemic
he is closely followed by the Neo-platonist Porphyry. Far beneath both
stands Hierocles, governor of Bithynia. Against such attacks the most
famous Christian teachers took the field as Apologists. They disproved
the calumnies and charges of the pagans, demanded fair play for the
Christians, vindicated Christianity by the demonstration of its inner
truth, the witness borne to it by the life and walk of Christians,
its establishment by miracles and prophecies, its agreement with the
utterances and longings of the most profound philosophers, whose wisdom
they traced mediately or immediately from the Old Testament, and on the
other hand, they sought to show the nothingness of the heathen gods, and
the religious as well as moral perversity of paganism.
§ 23.1. =Lucian’s Satire _De Morte Peregrini_= takes the form
of an account given by Lucian to his friend Cronius of the Cynic
Peregrinus Proteus’ burning of himself during the Olympic games
of A.D. 165, of which he himself was a witness. Peregrinus is
described as a low, contemptible man, a parricide and guilty
of adultery, unnatural vice and drunkenness, who having fled
from his home in Palestine joined the Christians, learnt their
θαυμαστὴ σοφία, became their prophet (§ 34, 1), Thiasarch (§ 17, 3)
and Synagogeus, and as such expounded their sacred writings,
even himself composed and addressed to the most celebrated Greek
cities many epistles containing new ordinances and laws. When
cast into prison he was the subject of the most extravagant
attentions on the part of the Christians. Their γραΐδια and χῆραι
(deaconesses) nursed him most carefully, δεῖπνα ποικίλα and λόγοι
ἱεροί (Agapæ) were celebrated in his prison, they loaded him with
presents, etc. Nevertheless on leaving prison, on account of his
having eaten a forbidden kind of meat (flesh offered to idols)
he was expelled by them. He now cast himself into the arms of
the Cynics, travelled as the apostle of their views through the
whole world, and ended his life in his mad thirst for fame by
voluntarily casting himself upon the funeral pile. Lucian tells
with scornful sneer how the superstitious people supposed that
there had been an earthquake and that an eagle flew up from
his ashes crying out: The earth I have lost, to Olympus I fly.
This fable was believed, and even yet it is said that sometimes
Peregrinus will be seen in a white garment as a spirit.--It is
undoubtedly recorded by Aulus Gellius that a Cynic Peregrinus
lived at this time whom he describes as _vir gravis et constans_.
This too is told by the Apologist Tatian, who in him mocks at the
pretension on the part of heathen philosophers to emancipation
from all wants. But neither of them knows anything about his
Christianity or his death by fire. It is nevertheless conceivable
that Peregrinus had for some time connection with Christianity;
but without this assumption it seems likely that Lucian in a
satire which, under the combined influence of personal and class
antipathies, aimed first and chiefly at stigmatizing Cynicism
in the person of Peregrinus, should place Christianity alongside
of it as what seemed to him with its contempt of the world and
self-denial to be a new, perhaps a nobler, but still nothing more
than a species of Cynicism. Many features in the caricature which
he gives of the life, doings and death of Peregrinus seem to have
been derived by him from the life of the Apostle Paul as well as
from the account of the martyrdom of Ignatius, and especially
from that of Polycarp (§ 22, 3).[28]
§ 23.2. =Worshippers of an Ass= (Asinarii) was a term of
reproach that was originally and from early times applied to the
Jews. They now sought to have it transferred to the Christians.
Tertullian tells of a picture publicly exhibited in Carthage
which represented a man clothed in a toga, with the ears and hoof
of an ass, holding a book in his hand, and had this inscription:
_Deus Christianorum Onochoetes_. This name is variously read. If
read as ὄνου χοητής it means _asini sacerdos_. Alongside of this
we may place the picture, belonging probably to the third century,
discovered in A.D. 1858 scratched on a wall among the ruins
of a school for the imperial slaves, that were then excavated.
It represents a man with an ass’s head hanging on a cross, and
beneath it the caricature of a worshipper with the words written
in a schoolboy’s hand; Alexamenos worships God (A. σεβετε θεον);
evidently the derision of a Christian youth by a pagan companion.
The scratching on another wall gives us probably the answer of
the Christian: _Alexamenos fidelis_.
§ 23.3. =Polemic properly so-called.=--
(a) The Λόγος ἀληθής of =Celsus= is in great part preserved in
the answer of Origen (§ 31, 5). He identifies the author
with that Celsus to whom Lucian dedicated the little work
_Alexander or Pseudomantis_ in which he so extols the
philosophy of Epicurus that it seems he must be regarded as
an Epicurean. Since, however, the philosophical standpoint
of our Celsus is that of a Platonist the assumption of the
identity of the two has been regarded as untenable. But
even our Celsus does not seem to have been a pure Platonist
but an Eclectic, and as such might also show a certain
measure of favour to the philosophy of Epicurus. Their
age is at least the same. Lucian wrote that treatise soon
after A.D. 180, and according to Keim, the Λόγος ἀληθής was
probably composed about A.D. 178. Almost everything that
modern opponents down to our own day have advanced against
the gospel history and doctrine is found here wrought out
with original force and subtlety, inspired with burning
hatred and bitter irony, and highly spiced with invective,
mockery, and wit. First of all the author introduces
a Jew who repeats the slanders current among the Jews,
representing Jesus as a vagabond impostor, His mother
as an adulteress, His miracles and resurrection as lying
fables; then enters a heathen philosopher who proves that
both Judaism and Christianity are absurd; and finally, the
conditions are set forth under which alone the Christians
might claim indulgence: the abandonment of their exclusive
attitude toward the national religion and the recognition
of it by their taking part in the sacrifices appointed by
the state.[29]
(b) The Neo-platonist Porphyry, about A.D. 270, as reported by
Jerome, in the XV. Book of his Κατὰ Χριστιανῶν points to a
number of supposed contradictions in holy scripture, calls
attention to the conflict between Paul and Peter (Gal. ii.),
explains Daniel’s prophecies as _Vaticinia post eventum_,
and censures the allegorical interpretation of the
Christians. Although even among the Christians themselves
Porphyry as a philosopher was highly esteemed, and
notwithstanding contact at certain points between his
ethical and religious view of the world and that of the
Christians, perhaps just because of this, he is the worst
and most dangerous of all their pagan assailants. Against
his controversial writings, therefore, the edict of
Theodosius II. ordering them to be burnt was directed
in A.D. 448 (§ 42, 4), and owing to the zeal with which
his works were destroyed the greater part of the treatises
which quoted from it for purposes of controversy also
perished with it--the writings of Methodius of Tyre
(§ 31, 9), Eusebius of Cæsarea (§ 47, 2), Philostorgius
(§ 5, 1) and Apollinaris the younger (§ 47, 5). Of these
according to Jerome those of the last named were the
most important. In the recently discovered controversial
treatise of Macarius Magnes (§ 47, 6) an unnamed pagan
philosopher is combated whose attacks, chiefly directed
against the Gospels, to all appearance verbally agree with
the treatise of Porphyry, or rather, perhaps, with that of
his plagiarist Hierocles.
(c) =Hierocles= who as governor of Bithynia took an active
part in the persecution of Galerius, wrote two books
Λόγοι φιλαλήθεις against the Christians, about A.D. 305,
which have also perished. Eusebius’ reply refers only
to his repudiation of the equality assigned to Christ
and Apollonius of Tyana (§ 24, 1). While the title of
his treatise is borrowed from that of Celsus, he has also
according to the testimony of Eusebius in great part copied
the very words of both of his predecessors.
§ 24. Attempted Reconstruction of Paganism.
All its own more thoughtful adherents had long acknowledged that
paganism must undergo a thorough reform and reconstruction if it were to
continue any longer in existence. In the Augustan Age an effort was made
to bolster up Neopythagoreanism by means of theurgy and magic. The chief
representative of this movement was Apollonius of Tyana. In the second
century an attempt was made to revivify the secret rites of the ancient
mysteries, of Dea Syra, and Mithras. Yet all this was not enough. What
was needed was the setting up of a pagan system which would meet the
religious cravings of men in the same measure as Christianity with its
supernaturalism, monotheism and universalism had done, and would have
the absurdities and impurities that had disfigured the popular religion
stripped off. Such a regeneration of paganism was undertaken in the
beginning of the third century by Neoplatonism. But even this was no
more able than pagan polemics had been to check the victorious career
of Christianity.
§ 24.1. =Apollonius of Tyana= in Cappadocia, a contemporary of
Christ and the Apostles, was a philosopher, ascetic and magician
esteemed among the people as a worker of miracles. As an earnest
adherent of the doctrine of Pythagoras, whom he also imitated
in his dress and manner of life, claiming the possession of the
gifts of prophecy and miracle working, he assumed the role of a
moral and religious reformer of the pagan religion of his fathers.
Accompanied by numerous scholars, teaching and working miracles,
he travelled through the whole of the then known world until
he reached the wonderland of India. He settled down at last in
Ephesus where he died at an advanced age, having at least passed
his ninety-sixth year. At the wish of the Empress Julia, wife
of Septimius Severus, in the third century, Philostratus the
elder composed in the form of a romance in eight books based upon
written and oral sources, a biography of Apollonius, in which
he is represented as a heathen counterpart of Christ, who is
otherwise completely ignored, excelling Him in completeness of
life, doctrine and miraculous powers.[30]
§ 24.2. In =Neo-platonism=, by the combination of all that was
noblest and best in the exoteric and esoteric religion, in the
philosophy, theosophy and theurgy of earlier and later times
in East and West, we are presented with a universal religion
in which faith and knowledge, philosophy and theology, theory
and practice, were so perfectly united and reconciled, and all
religious needs so fully met, that in comparison with its wealth
and fulness, the gnosis as well as the faith, the worship and
the mysteries of the Christians must have seemed one-sided,
commonplace and incomplete. The first to introduce and commend
this tendency, which was carried out in three successive schools
of philosophy, the Alexandrian-Roman, the Syrian and the Athenian,
was the Alexandrian =Ammonius Saccas=,--this surname being
derived from his occupation as a porter. He lived and taught in
Alexandria till about A.D. 250. He sought to combine in a higher
unity the Platonic and the Aristotelian philosophies, giving
to the former a normative authority, and he did not hesitate to
enrich his system by the incorporation of Christian ideas. His
knowledge of Christianity came from Clement of Alexandria and
from Origen, whose teacher in philosophy he had been. Porphyry
indeed affirms that he had previously been himself a Christian,
but had at a later period of life returned to paganism.--The most
distinguished of his scholars, and also the most talented and
profound of all the Neo-platonists, was =Plotinus=, who was in
A.D. 254 a teacher of philosophy at Rome, and died in A.D. 270.
His philosophico-theological system in its characteristic features
is a combination of the Platonic antithesis of the finite world
of sense and the eternal world of ideas with the stoical doctrine
of the world soul. The eternal ground of all being is the one
supramundane, unintelligible and indescribable good (τὸ ἕν, τὸ
ἀγαθόν), from which all stages of being are radiated forth; first;
spirit or the world of ideas (νοῦς, κόσμος νοητός), the eternal
type of all being; and then, from this the world soul (ψυχή);
and from this, finally, the world of phenomena. The outermost
fringe of this evolution, the forms of which the further they are
removed from the original ground become more and more imperfect,
is matter, just as the shadow is the outermost fringe of the
light. It is conceived of as the finite, the fleeting, even as
evil in itself. But imperfect as the world of sense is, it is
nevertheless the vehicle of the ideal world and in many ways
penetrated by the ideas, and the lighting up imparted by the
ideas affords it its beauty. In consequence of those rays shining
in from the realm of ideas, a whole vast hierarchy of divine
forms has arisen, with countless dæmons good and bad, which give
room for the incorporation of all the divine beings of the Greek
and oriental mythologies. In this way myths that were partly
immoral and partly fantastic can be rehabilitated as symbolical
coverings of speculative ideas. The souls of men, too, originate
from the eternal world soul. By their transition, however, into
the world of sense they are hampered and fettered by corporeity.
They themselves complete their redemption through emancipation
from the bonds of sense by means of asceticism and the practice
of virtue. In this way they secure a return into the ideal world
and the vision of the highest good, sometimes as moments of
ecstatic mystical union with that world, even during this earthly
life, but an eternally unbroken continuance thereof is only
attained unto after complete emancipation from all the bonds of
matter.[31]--Plotinus’ most celebrated scholar, who also wrote
his life, and collected and arranged his literary remains, was
=Porphyry=. He also taught in Rome and died there in A.D. 304.
His ἐκ τῶν λογίων φιλοσοφία, a collection of oracular utterances,
was a positive supplement to his polemic against Christianity
(§ 23, 3), and afforded to paganism a book of revelation, a
heathen bible, as Philostratus had before sought to portray a
heathen saviour. Of greater importance for the development of
mediæval scholasticism was his Commentary on the logical works
of Aristotle, published in several editions of the Aristotelian
Organon.--His scholar =Iamblichus= of Chalcis in Cœle-Syria,
who died A.D. 333, was the founder of the Syrian school. The
development which he gave to the Neo-platonic doctrine consisted
chiefly in the incorporation of a fantastic oriental mythology
and theurgy. This also brought him the reputation of being a
magician.--Finally, the Athenian school had in =Proclus=, who
died in A.D. 485, its most distinguished representative. While
on the one hand, he proceeded along the path opened by Iamblichus
to develop vagaries about dæmons and theurgical fancies, on the
other hand, he gave to his school an impulse in the direction of
scholarly and encyclopædic culture.--The Neo-platonic speculation
exercised no small influence on the development of Christian
philosophy. The philosophizing church fathers, whose darling
was Plato, got acquaintance with his philosophical views from
its relatively pure reproduction met with in the works of the
older Neo-platonists. The influence of their mystico-theosophic
doctrine, especially as conveyed in the writings of the
Pseudo-Dionysius (§ 47, 11), is particularly discernible in
the Christian mysticism of the middle ages, and has been thence
transmitted to modern times.[32]
§ 25. Jewish and Samaritan Reaction.
The Judaism of the Apostolic Age in its most characteristic form was
thoroughly hostile to Christianity. The Pharisees and the mass of the
people with their expectation of a political Messiah, took offence at a
Messiah crucified by the Gentiles (1 Cor. i. 13); their national pride
was wounded by the granting of equality to Samaritans and heathens,
while their legal righteousness and sham piety were exposed and censured
by the teachings of Christianity. On the other side, the Sadducees felt
no less called upon to fight to the death against Christianity with its
doctrine of the resurrection (Acts iv. 2; xxiii. 6). The same hostile
feeling generally prevailed among the dispersion. The Jewish community
at Berea (Acts xvii. 2) is praised as a pleasing exception to the
general rule. Finally, in A.D. 70 destruction fell upon the covenant
people and the holy city. The Christian church of Jerusalem, acting upon
a warning uttered by the Lord (Matt. xxiv. 16), found a place of refuge
in the mountain city of Pella, on the other side of Jordan. But when
the Pseudo-Messiah, Bar-Cochba (Son of a Star, Num. xxiv. 17), roused
all Palestine against the Roman rule, in A.D. 132, the Palestinian
Christians who refused to assist or recognise the false Messiah,
had again to endure a bloody persecution. Bar-Cochba was defeated in
A.D. 135. Hadrian now commanded that upon pain of death no Jew should
enter Ælia Capitolina, the Roman colony founded by him on the ruins
of Jerusalem. From that time they were deprived of all power and
opportunity for direct persecution of the Christians. All the greater
was their pleasure at the persecutions by the heathens and their zeal
in urging the pagans to extreme measures. In their seminaries they gave
currency to the most horrible lies and calumnies about Christ and the
Christians, which also issued thence among the heathens. On the other
hand, however, they intensified their own anti-Christian attitude
and sought protection against the advancing tide of Christianity
by strangling all spiritual movement under a mass of traditional
interpretations and judgments of men. The Schools of Tiberias and
Babylon were the nurseries of this movement, and the _Talmud_, the first
part of which, the _Mishna_, had its origin during this period, marks
the completion of this anti-Christian self-petrifaction of Judaism. The
disciples of John, too, assumed a hostile attitude toward Christianity,
and formed a distinct set under the name of Hemerobaptists.
Contemporaneously with the first successes of the Apostolic mission, a
current set in among the Samaritans calculated to checkmate Christianity
by the setting up of new religions. Dositheus, Simon Magus and Menander
here made their appearance with claims to the Messiahship, and were at a
later period designated heresiarchs by the church fathers, who believed
that in them they found the germs of the Gnostic heresy (§§ 26 ff.).
§ 25.1. =Disciples of John.=--Even after their master had been
beheaded the disciples of John the Baptist maintained a separate
society of their own, and reproached the disciples of Jesus
because of their want of strict ascetic discipline (Matt. ix. 14,
etc.). The disciples of John in the Acts (xviii. 25; xix. 1-7)
were probably Hellenist Jews, who on their visits to the feasts
had been pointed by John to Christ, announced by him as Messiah,
without having any information as to the further developments of
the Christian community. About the middle of the second century,
however, the Clementine Homilies (§ 28, 3), in which John the
Baptist is designated a ἡμεροβαπτίστης, speaks of gnosticizing
disciples of John, who may be identical with the =Hemerobaptists=,
that is, those who practise baptism daily, of Eusebius (_Hist.
Eccl._, iv. 22). They originated probably from a coalition of
Essenes (§ 8, 4) and disciples of the Baptist who when orphaned
by the death of John persistently refused to join the disciples
of Christ.--We hear no more of them till the Carmelite missionary
John a Jesu in Persia came upon a sect erroneously called
Christians of St. John or Nazoreans.[33] Authentic information
about the doctrine, worship and constitution of this sect that
still numbers some hundred families, was first obtained in the
19th century by an examination of their very comprehensive sacred
literature, written in an Aramaic dialect very similar to that of
the Babylonian Talmud. The most important of those writings the
so-called Great Book (_Sidra rabba_), also called _Ginza_, that
is, thesaurus, has been faithfully reproduced by Petermann under
the title _Thesaurus s. Liber magnus_, etc., 2 vols., Berl.,
1867.--Among themselves the adherents of this sect were styled
=Mandæans=, after one of their numerous divine beings or æons,
_Manda de chaje_, meaning γνῶσις τῆς ζωῆς. In their extremely
complicated religious system, resembling in many respects the
Ophite Gnosis (§ 27, 6) and Manicheism (§ 29), this Æon takes the
place of the heavenly mediator in the salvation of the earthly
world. Among those without, however, they called themselves
Subba, =Sabeans= from צבא or צבע to baptize. Although they
cannot be identified right off with the Disciples of John and
Hemerobaptists, a historical connection between them, carrying
with it gnostic and oriental-heathen influences, is highly
probable. The name Sabean itself suggests this, but still more
the position they assign to John the Baptist as the only true
prophet over against Abraham, Moses, Jesus, and Mohammed. As
adherents of John the Baptist rejected by the Jews the old
Disciples of John had an anti-Jewish character, and by their
own rejection of Christ an anti-Christian character. By shifting
their residence to Babylon, however, they became so dependent
on the Syro-Chaldean mythology, theosophy and theurgy, that they
sank completely into paganism, and so their opposition to Judaism
and Christianity increased into fanatical hatred and horrid
calumniation.[34]
§ 25.2. =The Samaritan Heresiarchs.=
(a) =Dositheus= was according to Origen a contemporary of
Jesus and the Apostles, and gave himself out as the
prophet promised in Deut. xviii. 18. He insisted upon a
curiously strict observance of the Sabbath, and according
to Epiphanius he perished miserably in a cave in consequence
of an ostentatiously prolonged fast. Purely fabulous are
the stories of the Pseudo-Clementine writings (§ 28, 3)
which bring him into contact with John the Baptist as his
scholar and successor, and with Simon Magus as his defeated
rival. More credible is the account of an Arabic-Samaritan
Chronicle,[35] according to which the sect of the
Dostanians at the time of Simon Maccabæus traced their
descent from a Samaritan tribe, while also the Catholic
heresiologies (§ 26, 4) reckon the Dositheans among the
pre-Christian sects. According to a statement of Eulogius
of Alexandria recorded by Photius, the Dositheans and
Samaritans in Egypt in A.D. 588 disputed as to the meaning
of Deut. xviii. 18.
(b) =Simon Magus=, born, according to Justin Martyr, at Gitta
in Samaria, appeared in his native country as a soothsayer
with such success that the infatuated people hailed him as
the δύναμις τοῦ θεοῦ ἡ καλουμένη μεγάλη. When Philip the
Deacon preached the gospel in Samaria, Simon also received
baptism from him, but was sternly denounced by Peter from
whom he wished to buy the gift of communicating the Spirit
(Acts viii). As to the identity of this man with Simon
the Magician, according to Josephus hailing from Cyprus,
who induced the Herodian Drusilla to quit her husband and
become the wife of the Governor Felix (Acts xxiv. 24), it
can scarcely claim to be more than a probability. A vast
collection of fabulous legends soon grew up around the
name of Simon Magus, not only from the Gentile-Christian
and Catholic side, but also from the Jewish-Christian and
heretical side; the latter to be still met with in the
_Pseudo-Clementine Homilies and Recognitions_, while in the
_Acta Petri et Pauli_, we have the Catholic revision and
reproduction of the no longer extant Ebionistic _Acts of
Peter_ (§ 32, 6). These Judaizing heretics particularly
amused themselves by making a very slightly veiled
vile caricature of the great Apostle of the Gentiles by
transferring to the name of the magician many distorted
representations of occurrences in the life and works of the
Apostle Paul. This representation, however, was recognised
in the Acts above referred to and by the church fathers
as originally descriptive of Simon Magus. On the basis of
this legendary conglomerate Irenæus, after the example of
Justin, describes him as _Magister ac progenitor omnium
hæreticorum_. From a house of ill fame in Tyre he bought
a slave girl Helena, to whom he assigned the role of the
world creating Ἔννοια of God. The angels born of her for
the purpose of creating the world had rebelled against her;
she was enslaved, and was imprisoned, sometimes in this,
sometimes in that, human body; at one time in the body of
Helen of Troy, and at last in that of the Tyrian prostitute.
In order to redeem her and with her the world enslaved by
the rebel angels, the supreme God (ὁ ἐστώς) Himself came
down and assumed the form of man, was born unbegotten of
man, suffered in appearance in Judea, and reveals Himself
to the Samaritans as Father, to the Jews as Son, and to the
Gentiles as the Holy Spirit. The salvation of man consists
simply in acknowledging Simon and his Helena as the supreme
gods. By faith only, not by works, is man justified. The
law originated with the evil angels and was devised by them
merely to keep men in bondage under them. This last point
is evidently transferred to the magician partly from the
Apostle Paul, partly from Marcion (§ 27, 11), and is copied
from Ebionite sources. The Simon myth is specially rich in
legends about the magician’s residence in Rome, to which
place he had betaken himself after being often defeated
in disputation by the Apostle Peter, and where he was so
successful that the Romans erected a column in his honour
on an island in the Tiber, which Justin Martyr himself is
said to have seen, bearing the inscription: _Simoni sancto
Deo_. The discovery in A.D. 1574 of the column dedicated
to the Sabine god of oaths, inscribed “_Semoni Sanco Deo
Fidio_,” explains how such a legend may have arisen out
of a misunderstanding. Although by a successful piece of
jugglery--decapitation and rising again the third day,
having substituted for himself a goat whom he had bewitched
to assume his appearance, whose head was cut off--he won
the special favour of Nero, he was thereafter in public
disputation before the emperor unmasked by Peter. In order
to rehabilitate himself he offered to prove his divine
power by ascending up into heaven. For this purpose he
mounted a high tower. Peter adjured the angel of Satan,
which carried him through the air, and the magician
fell with a crash to the ground. Probably there is here
transferred to one magician what is told by Suetonius
(_Nero_, xii.) and Juvenal (_Sat._ iii. 79 ff.) as
happening to a soothsayer in Nero’s time who made an
attempt to fly. The school of Baur (§ 182, 7), after Baur
himself had discovered in the Simon Magus of the Clementine
Homilies a caricature of the Apostle Paul, has come to
question the existence of the magician altogether, and
has attempted to account for the myth as originating from
the hatred of the Jewish Christians to the Apostle of the
Gentiles. Support for this view is sought from Acts viii.,
the offering of money by the magician being regarded as a
maliciously distorted account of the contribution conveyed
by Paul to the church at Jerusalem.[36] Recently, however,
Hilgenfeld, who previously maintained this view, has again
recognised as well grounded the tradition of the Church
Fathers, that Simon was the real author of the ψευδώνυμος
γνῶσις, and has carried out this idea in his
“Ketzergeschichte.”
(c) =Menander= was, according to Justin Martyr, a disciple of
Simon. Subsequently he undertook to play the part of the
Saviour of the world. In doing so, however, he was always,
as Irenæus remarks, modest enough not to give himself out
as the supreme god, but only as the Messiah sent by Him.
He taught, however, that any one who should receive his
baptism would never become old or die.[37]
II. DANGER TO THE CHURCH FROM PAGAN AND JEWISH
ELEMENTS WITHIN ITS OWN PALE.
§ 26. GNOSTICISM IN GENERAL.[38]
The Judaism and paganism imported into the church proved more
dangerous to it than the storm of persecution raging against it from
without. Ebionism (§ 28) was the result of the attempt to incorporate
into Christianity the narrow particularism of Judaism; Heretical Gnosis
or Gnosticism was the result of the attempt to blend with Christianity
the religious notions of pagan mythology, mysteriology, theosophy and
philosophy. These two tendencies, moreover, were combined in a Gnostic
Ebionism, in the direction of which Essenism may be regarded as a
transitional stage (§ 8, 4). In many respects Manichæism (§ 29), which
sprang up at a later period, is related to the Gnosticism of Gentile
Christianity, but also in character and tendency widely different from
it. The church had to employ all her powers to preserve herself from
this medley of religious fancies and to purify her fields from the
weeds that were being sown on every side. In regard to Ebionism and
its gnosticizing developments this was a comparatively easy task. The
Gnosticism of Gentile Christianity was much more difficult to deal with,
and although the church succeeded in overcoming the weed in her fields,
yet many of its seeds continued hidden for centuries, from which sprouts
grew up now and again quite unexpectedly (§§ 54, 71, 108). This struggle
has nevertheless led to the furtherance of the church in many ways,
awakening in it a sense of scientific requirements, stirring it up
to more vigorous battling for the truth, and endowing it with a more
generous and liberal spirit. It had learnt to put a Christian gnosis in
the place of the heretical, a right and wholesome use of speculation and
philosophy, of poetry and art, in place of their misuse, and thus
enabled Christianity to realise its universal destination.
§ 26.1. =Gnosticism= was deeply rooted in a powerful and
characteristic intellectual tendency of the first century. A
persistent conviction that the ancient world had exhausted itself
and was no longer able to resist its threatened overthrow, now
prevailed and drove the deepest thinkers to adopt the boldest and
grandest Syncretism the world has ever beheld, in the blending of
all the previously isolated and heterogeneous elements of culture
as a final attempt at the rejuvenating of that which had become
old (§ 25). Even within the borders of the church this Syncretism
favoured by the prevailing spirit of the age influenced those of
superior culture, to whom the church doctrine of that age did not
seem to make enough of theosophical principles and speculative
thought, while the worship of the church seemed dry and barren.
Out of the fusing of cosmological myths and philosophemes of
oriental and Greek paganism with Christian historical elements in
the crucible of its own speculation, there arose numerous systems
of a higher fantastic sort of religious philosophy, which were
included under the common name of Gnosticism. The pagan element
is upon the whole the prevailing one, inasmuch as in most Gnostic
systems Christianity is not represented as the conclusion and
completion of the development of salvation given in the Old
Testament, but often merely as the continuation and climax of
the pagan religion of nature and the pagan mystery worship.
The attitude of this heretical gnosis toward holy scripture was
various. By means of allegorical interpretation some endeavoured
to prove their system from it; others preferred to depreciate the
Apostles as falsifiers of the original purely gnostic doctrine
of Christ, or to remodel the apostolic writings in accordance
with their own views, or even to produce a bible of their own
after the principles of their own schools in the form of gnostic
pseudepigraphs. With them, however, for the most part the
tradition of ancient wisdom as the communicated secret doctrine
stood higher than holy scripture. Over against the heretical
gnosis, an ecclesiastical gnosis was developed, especially in the
Alexandrian school of theology (Clement and Origen, § 31, 4, 5),
which, according to 1 Cor. xii. 8, 9; xiii. 2, was esteemed
and striven after as, in contradistinction to faith, a higher
stage in the development of the religious consciousness. The
essential distinction between the two consisted in this, that
the latter was determined, inspired and governed by the believing
consciousness of the universal church, as gradually formulated in
the church confession, whereas the former, completely emancipated
therefrom, disported itself in the unrestricted arbitrariness of
fantastic speculation.
§ 26.2. =The Problems of Gnostic Speculation= are: the origin
of the world and of evil, as well as the task, means and end of
the world’s development. In solving these problems the Gnostics
borrowed mostly from paganism the theory of the world’s origin,
and from Christianity the idea of redemption. At the basis
of almost all Gnostic systems there lies the dualism of God
and matter (ὕλη); only that matter is regarded sometimes in a
Platonic sense as non-essential and non-substantial (=μὴ ὄν)
and hence without hostile opposition to the godhead, sometimes
more in the Parsee sense as inspired and dominated by an evil
principle, and hence in violent opposition to the good God.
In working out the theosophical and cosmological process it is
mainly the idea of emanation (προβολή) that is called into play,
whereby from the hidden God is derived a long series of divine
essences (αἰῶνες), whose inherent divine power diminishes in
proportion as they are removed to a distance from the original
source of being. These æons then make their appearance as
intermediaries in the creation, development and redemption of the
world. The substratum out of which the world is created consists
in a mixture of the elements of the world of light (πλήρωμα)
with the elements of matter (κένωμα) by means of nature, chance
or conflict. One of the least and weakest of the æons, who is
usually designated Δημιουργός, after the example of Plato in
the _Timæus_, is brought forward as the creator of the world.
Creation is the first step toward redemption. But the Demiurge
cannot or will not carry it out, and so finally there appears in
the fulness of the times one of the highest æons as redeemer, in
order to secure perfect emancipation to the imprisoned elements
of light by the communication of the γνῶσις. Seeing that matter
is derived from the evil, he appears in a seeming body or at
baptism identifies himself with the psychical Messiah sent by
the Demiurge. The death on the cross is either only an optical
illusion, or the heavenly Christ, returning to the pleroma,
quits the man Jesus, or gives His form to some other man
(Simon of Cyrene, Matt. xxvii. 32) so that he is crucified
instead of Him (Docetism). The souls of men, according as the
pleromatic or hylic predominates in them, are in their nature,
either _Pneumatic_, which alone are capable of the γνῶσις, or
_Psychical_, which can only aspire to πίστις, or finally, _Hylic_
(χοϊκοί, σαρκικοί), to which class the great majority belongs,
which, subject to Satanic influences, serve only their lower
desires. Redemption consists in the conquest and exclusion
of matter, and is accomplished through knowledge (γνῶσις) and
asceticism. It is therefore a chemical, rather than an ethical
process. Seeing that the original seat of evil is in matter,
sanctification is driven from the ethical domain into the
physical, and consists in battling with matter and withholding
from material enjoyments. The Gnostics were thus originally very
strict in their moral discipline, but often they rushed to the
other extreme, to libertinism and antinomianism, in consequence
partly of the depreciation of the law of the Demiurge, partly
of the tendency to rebound from one extreme to the other, and
justified their conduct on the ground of παραχρῆσθαι τῇ σαρκί.
§ 26.3. =Distribution.=--_Gieseler_ groups the Gentile Christian
Gnostics according to their native countries into Egyptian or
Alexandrian, whose emanationist and dualistic theories were
coloured by Platonism, and the Syrian, whose views were affected
by Parseeism.--_Neander_ divides Gnostic systems into Judaistic
and Anti-Jewish, subdividing the latter into such as incline to
Paganism, and such as strive to apprehend Christianity in its
purity and simplicity.--_Hase_ arranges them as Oriental, Greek
and Christian.--_Baur_ classifies the Gnostic systems as those
which endeavour to combine Judaism and paganism with Christianity,
and those which oppose Christianity to these.--_Lipsius_ marks
three stages in the development of Gnosticism: the blending
of Asiatic myths with a Jewish and Christian basis which took
place in Syria; the further addition to this of Greek philosophy
either Stoicism or Platonism which was carried out in Egypt;
and recurrence to the ethical principles of Christianity, the
elevation of πίστις above γνῶσις.--_Hilgenfeld_ arranges his
discussion of these systems in accordance with their place in
the early heresiologies.--But none of these arrangements can
be regarded as in every respect satisfactory, and indeed it
may be impossible to lay down any principle of distribution of
such a kind. There are so many fundamental elements and these
of so diverse a character, that no one scheme of division
may suffice for an adequate classification of all Gnostic
systems. The difficulty was further enhanced by the contradiction,
approximation, and confusion of systems, and by their
construction and reconstruction, of which Rome as the capital
of the world was the great centre.
§ 26.4. =Sources of Information.=--Abundant as the literary
productions were which assumed the name or else without the name
developed the principles of Gnosticism, comparatively little of
this literature has been preserved. We are thus mainly dependent
upon the representations of its catholic opponents, and to them
also we owe the preservation of many authentic fragments. The
first church teacher who _ex professo_ deals with Gnosticism is
Justin Martyr (§ 30, 9), whose controversial treatise, however,
as well as that of Hegesippus (§ 31, 7), has been lost. The most
important of extant treatises of this kind are those of Irenæus
in five books _Adv. hæreses_, and of Hippolytus Ἔλεγχος κατὰ
πασῶν αἱρέσεων, the so-called _Philosophoumena_ (§ 31, 3). The
Σύνταγμα κ. π. αἱρ. of Hippolytus is no longer extant in the
original; a Latin translation of it apparently exists in the
_Libellus adv. omnes hæreses_, which has been attributed to
Tertullian. Together with the work of Irenæus, it formed a
query for the later heresiologists, Epiphanius and Philaster
(§ 47, 10, 14), who were apparently unacquainted with the later
written but more important and complete _Elenchus_. Besides these
should be mentioned the writings of Tertullian (§ 31, 10) and
Theodoret (§ 47, 9) referring to this controversy, the _Stromata_
of Clement of Alexandria, and the published discussions of Origen
(§ 31, 4, 5), especially in his Commentary on John, also the five
Dialogues of the Pseudo-Origen (Adamantius) against the Gnostics
from the beginning of the fourth century;[39] and finally many
notices in the Church History of Eusebius. The still extant
fragments of the Gnostic Apocryphal historian of the Apostles
afford information about the teaching and forms of worship of
the later syncretic vulgar Gnosticism, and also from the very
defective representations of them in the works of their Catholic
opponents.
§ 27. THE GENTILE CHRISTIAN GNOSTICISM.
In the older heretical Gnosticism (§ 18, 3), Jewish, pagan,
and Christian elements are found, which are kept distinct, or are
amalgamated or after examination are rejected, what remains being
developed, consolidated and distributed, but in a confused blending.
This is the case with Cerinthus. In Basilides again, who attaches
himself to the doctrines of Stoicism, we have Gnosticism developed under
the influence of Alexandrian culture; and soon thereafter in Valentinus,
who builds on Plato’s philosophy, it attains its richest, most profound
and noblest expression. From the blending of Syro-Chaldæan mythology
with Greek and Hellenistic-Gnostic theories issue the divers Ophite
systems. Antinomian Gnosticism with loose practical morality was an
outgrowth from the contempt shown to the Jewish God that created the
world and gave the law. The genuinely Syrian Gnosticism with its
Parseeist-dualistic ruggedness was most purely represented by Saturninus,
while in Marcion and his scholars the exaggeration of the Pauline
opposition of law and grace led to a dualistic contrast of the God of
the Old Testament and of the New. From the middle of the second century
onwards there appears in the historical development of Gnosticism an
ever-increasing tendency to come to terms with the doctrine of the
church. This is shown by the founders of new sects, Marcion, Tatian,
Hermogenes; and also by many elaborators of early systems, by Heracleon,
Ptolomæus and Bardesanes who developed the Valentinian system, in the
so-called Pistis Sophia, as the exposition of the Ophite system. This
tendency to seek reconciliation with the church is also shown in a
kind of syncretic popular or vulgar Gnosticism which sought to attach
itself more closely to the church by the composition of apocryphal
and pseudepigraphic Gospels and Acts of Apostles under biblical names
and dates (§ 32, 4-6).--The most brilliant period in the history of
Gnosticism was the second century, commencing with the age of Hadrian.
At the beginning of the third century there was scarcely one of the
more cultured congregations throughout the whole of the Roman empire and
beyond this as far as Edessa, that was not affected by it. Yet we never
find the numbers of regular Gnostic congregations exceeding that of the
Catholic. Soon thereafter the season of decay set in. Its productive
power was exhausted, and while, on the one side, it was driven back by
the Catholic ecclesiastical reaction, on the other hand, in respect of
congregational organization it was outrun and outbidden by Manichæism,
and also by Marcionism.
§ 27.1. =Cerinthus=, as Irenæus says, resting on the testimony
of Polycarp, was a younger contemporary of the Apostle John in
Asia Minor; the Apostle meeting the heretic in a bath hastened
out lest the building should fall upon the enemy of the truth.
In his Gnosticism, resting according to Hippolytus on a basis
of Alexandrian-Greek culture, we have the transition from the
Jewish-Christian to a more Gentile than Jewish-Christian Gnostic
standpoint. The continued hold of the former is seen according
to Epiphanius in the maintaining of the necessity of circumcision
and of the observances by Christians of the law given by
disposition of angels, as also, according to Caius of Rome, who
regards him as the author of the New Testament Apocalypse, in
chiliastic expectations. Both of these, however, were probably
intended only in the allegorical and spiritual sense. At the
same time, according to Irenæus and Theodoret, the essentially
Gnostic figure of the Demiurge already appears in his writings,
who without knowing the supreme God is yet useful to Him as
the creator of the world. Even Jesus, the son of Joseph and
Mary, knew him not, until the ἄνω Χριστός descended upon him at
his baptism. Before the crucifixion, which was a merely human
mischance without any redemptive significance, the Christ had
again withdrawn from him.
§ 27.2. =The Gnosticism of Basilides.=--=Basilides= (Βασιλείδης)
was a teacher in Alexandria about A.D. 120-130. He pretends to
derive the gnostic system from the notes of the esoteric teaching
of Christ taken down by the Apostle Matthew and an amanuensis
of Peter called Glaucias. He also made use of John’s Gospel and
Paul’s Epistles to the Romans, Corinthians and Ephesians. He
himself left behind 24 books Ἐξηγητικά and his equally talented
son Isidorus has left a treatise under the title Ἠθικά. Fragments
of both are found in Clement of Alexandria, two passages from
the first are given also in the “Acts of Disputation,” by
Archelaus of Cascar (§ 29, 1). Irenæus, i. 24, who refers to him
as a disciple of Menander (§ 25, 2), and the Pseudo-Tertullian,
c. 41, Epiphanius, 21, and Theodoret, i. 4, describe his system
as grossly dualistic and decidedly emanationist. Hippolytus,
vii. 14 ff., on the other hand, with whom Clement seems
to agree, describes it as a thoroughly monistic system, in
which the theogony is developed not by emanation from above
downwards but by evolution from below upwards. This latter view
which undoubtedly presents this system in a more favourable
light,--according to Baur, Uhlhorn, Jacobi, Möller, Funk, etc.,
its original form: according to Hilgenfeld, Lipsius, Volkmar,
etc., a later form influenced by later interpolations of Greek
pantheistic ideas,--makes the development of God and the world
begin with pure nothing: ἦν ὅτε ἦν οὐδέν. The principle of all
development is ὁ οὐκ ὢν θεός, who out of Himself (ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων)
calls chaos into being. This chaos was still itself an οὐκ ὄν,
but yet also the πανσπερμία τοῦ κόσμου upon which now the οὐκ ὢν
θεός as ἀκίνητος κινητής operated attractively by his beauty. The
pneumatic element in the newly created chaos is represented in a
threefold sonship (υἱότης τριμερής) of which the first and most
perfect immediately after creation with the swiftness of thought
takes its flight to the happy realm of non-existence, the Pleroma.
The second less perfect sonship struggles after the first (hence
called, μιμητική), but must, on reaching the borders of the
happy realm, cast aside the less perfect part of its being, which
now as the Holy Spirit (μεθόριον πνεῦμα) forms the vestibule
(στερέωμα) or boundary line between the Pleroma (τὰ ὑπερκόσμια)
and the cosmos, and although severed from the sonship, still,
like a vessel out of which sweet ointment has been taken, it
bears to this lower world some of the perfume adhering to it.
The third sonship being in need of purifying must still remain in
the Panspermia, and is as such the subject of future redemption.
On the other hand, the greatest archon as the most complete
concentration of all wisdom, might and glory which was found
in the psychical elements of chaos, flew up to the firmament as
ἀῤῥητῶν ἀῤῥητότερος. He now fancied himself to be the Supreme God
and ruler of all things, and begot a son, who according to the
predetermination of the non-existing excelled him in insight and
wisdom. For himself and Son, having with them besides six other
unnamed principalities, he founded the higher heavens, the so-
called Ogdoas. After him there arose of chaos a second inferior
Archon with the predicate ἄῤῥητος, who likewise begat a son
mightier than himself, and founded a lower heavenly realm,
the so-called Hebdomas, the planetary heavens. The rest of the
Panspermia was the developed κατὰ φύσιν, that is, in accordance
with the natural principle implanted in it by the non-existent
“at our stage” (τὸ διάστημα τὸ καθ’ ἡμᾶς). As the time drew near
for the manifestation of the children of God, that is, of men
whose pneumatical endowment was derived from the third sonship,
the son of the great Archon through the mediation of the μεθόριον
πνεῦμα first devised the saving plan of the Pleroma. With fear
and trembling now the great Archon too acknowledged his error,
repented of this self-exaltation and with the whole Ogdoas
rejoiced in the scheme of salvation. Through him also the son of
the second Archon is enlightened, and he instructs his father,
who now as the God of the Old Testament prepares the way for the
development of salvation by the law and prophecy. The beginning
is made by Jesus, son of the virgin Mary, who first himself
absorbed the ray of the higher light, and as “the firstborn
of the children of God” became also the Saviour (σωτήρ) of
his brethren. His sufferings were necessary for removing the
psychical and somatical elements of the Panspermia adhering to
him. They were therefore actual, not mere seeming sufferings. His
bodily part returned to the formlessness out of which it sprang;
his psychical part arose from the grave, but in his ascension
returned into the Hebdomas, while his pneumatic being belonging
to the third sonship went up to the happy seat of the οὐκ ὢν θεός.
And as he, the firstborn, so also all the children of God, have
afterwards to perform their task of securing the highest possible
development and perfection of the groaning creation (Rom. viii.
19), that is, of all souls which by their nature are eternally
bound “to our stage.” Then finally, God will pour over all
ranks of being beginning from the lowest the great ignorance
(τὴν μεγάλην ἄγνοιαν) so that no one may be disturbed in their
blessedness by the knowledge of a higher. Thus the restitution of
all things is accomplished.--The mild spirit which pervades this
dogmatic system preserved from extravagances of a rigoristic or
libertine sort the ethical system resulting from it. Marriage was
honoured and regarded as holy, though celibacy was admitted to be
helpful in freeing the soul from the thraldom of fleshly lusts.
§ 27.3. The system set forth by Irenæus and others, as that of
Basilides, represents the Supreme God as _Pater innatus_ or θεὸς
ἄῤῥητος. From him emanates the Νοῦς, from this again the Λόγος,
from this the Φρόνησις, who brings forth Σοφία and Δύναμις. From
the two last named spring the Ἀρχαί, Ἐξουσίαι and Ἄγγελοι, who
with number seven of the higher gods, the primal father, at their
head, constitute the highest heaven. From this as its ἀντίτυπος
radiates forth a second spiritual world, and the emanation
continues in this way, until it is completed and exhausts itself
in the number of 365 spiritual worlds or heavens under the mystic
name Ἀβραξάς or Ἀβρασάξ which has in its letters the numerical
value referred to. This last and most imperfect of these
spiritual worlds with its seven planet spirits forms the heaven
visible to us. Through this three hundred and sixty-five times
repeated emanation the Pleroma approaches the borders of the hyle,
a seething mass of forces wildly tossing against one another.
These rush wildly against it, snatch from it fragments of light
and imprison them in matter. From this mixture the Archon of the
lowest heaven in fellowship with his companions creates the earth,
and to each of them apportions by lot a nation, reserving to
himself the Jewish nation which he seeks to raise above all other
nations, and so introduces envy and ambition into heaven, and
war and bloodshed upon earth. Finally, the Supreme God sends his
First-born, the Νοῦς, in order to deliver men from the power of
the angel that created the world. He assumes the appearance of a
body, and does many miracles. The Jews determined upon his death;
nevertheless they crucified instead of him Simon the Cyrenian,
who assumed his shape. He himself returned to his Father. By
means of the Gnosis which he taught men’s souls are redeemed,
while their bodies perish.--The development of one of these
systems into the other might be most simply explained by assuming
that the one described in the _Elenchus_ of Hippolytus is the
original and that its reconstruction was brought about by the
overpowering intrusion of current dualistic, emanationistic,
and docetic ideas. All that had there been said about the great
Archon must now be attributed to the Supreme God, the _Pater
innatus_, while the inferior archon might keep his place as ruler
of the lowest planetary heaven. The 365 spiritual worlds had
perhaps in the other system a place between the two Archons, for
even Hippolytus, vii. 26, mentions in addition the 365 heavens
to which also he gives the name of the great Archon Abrasax.--It
is a fact of special importance that even Irenæus and Epiphanius
distinguish from the genuine disciples of Basilides the so-called
=Pseudo-Basilideans= as representing a later development, easily
deducible from the second but hardly traceable from the first
account of the system. That with their Gnosis they blended magic,
witchcraft and fantastic superstition appears from the importance
which they attached to mystic numbers and letters. Their
libertine practice can be derived from their antinomian contempt
of Judaism as well as from the theory that their bodies are
doomed to perish. So, too, their axiom that to suffer martyrdom
for the crucified, who was not indeed the real Christ, is foolish,
may be deduced from the Docetism of their system. Abrasax gems
which are still to be met with in great numbers and in great
variety are to be attributed to these Basilideans; but these
found favour and were used as talismans not only among other
Gnostic sects but also among the Alchymists of the Middle Ages.
§ 27.4. =Valentinian Gnosticism.=--=Valentinus=, the most
profound, talented and imaginative of all the Gnostics, was
educated in Alexandria, and went to Rome about A.D. 140, where,
during a residence of more than twenty years, he presided over an
influential school, and exercised also a powerful influence upon
other systems. He drew the materials for his system partly from
holy scripture, especially from the Gospel of John, partly from
the esoteric doctrine of a pretended disciple of Paul, Theodades.
Of his own voluminous writings, in the form of discourses,
epistles and poems, only a few fragments are extant. The
reporters of his teaching, Irenæus, Hippolytus, Tertullian,
Epiphanius, differ greatly from one another in details, and leave
us in doubt as to what really belongs to his own doctrine and
what to its development by his disciples--The fundamental idea of
his system rests on the notion that according to a law founded in
the depths of the divine nature the æons by emanation come into
being as pairs, male and female. The pairing of these æons in
a holy marriage is called a Syzygy. With this is joined another
characteristic notion, that in the historical development of
the Pleroma the original types of the three great crises of the
earthly history, Creation, the Fall, and Redemption, are met with.
On the basis of this he develops the most magnificently poetic
epic of a Christian mythological Theogony and Cosmogony. From the
Βυθός or Αὐτοπάτωρ and its Ἔννοια or Σιγή, evolving his thought
hitherto only in silent contemplation of his own perfection,
emanates the first and highest pair of æons, the Νοῦς or
Μονογενής who alone of all æons can bear to look into the depths
of the perfection of the Father of all, and beside him his bride
Ἀλήθεια. From them spring the Λόγος and Ζωή as the second pair,
and from this pair again Ἄνθρωπος and Ἐκκλησία as the third pair.
The Αὐτοπάτωρ and his Ennoia, with the first and highest pair
of æons emanating for them, and these together with the second
Tetras, form the Ogdoas. The Logos then begets a further removed
circle of five pairs, the Decas, and finally the Anthropos begets
the last series of six pairs, the Dodecas. Therewith the =Pleroma=
attains a preliminary completion. A final boundary is fixed for
it by the Ὅρος emanating from the Father of all, who, being alone
raised above the operation of the law of the Syzygy, is endowed
with a twofold ἐνεργεία, an ἐνεργεία διοριστική, by means of
which he wards off all from without that would hurt, and an
ἐνεργεία ἑδραστική, the symbol of which is the cross, with which
he maintains inward harmony and order. How necessary this was is
soon made apparent. For the Σοφία, the last and least member of
the fourteen æon pairs, impelled by burning desire, tears herself
away from her partner, and seeks to plunge into the Bythos
in order to embrace the Father of All himself. She is indeed
prevented from this by the Horos; but the breach in the Pleroma
has been made. In order to restore the harmony that has thus been
broken, the Monogenes begets with Aletheia a new æon pair, the
Ἄνω Χριστός and the Πνεῦμα ἅγιον which emancipates the Sophia
from her disorderly, passionate nature (Ἐνθύμησις), cuts out this
latter from the Pleroma, but unites again the purified Sophia
with her husband, and teaches all the æons about the Father’s
unapproachable and incomprehensible essence, and about the reason
and end of the Syzygies. Then they all, amid hymns of praise
and thanksgiving, present an offering to the Father, each one of
the best that he has, and form thereof an indescribably glorious
æon-being, the Ἄνω Σωτήρ, and for his service myriads of august
angels, who bow in worship before him.--The basis for the
origination of the =sensible world=, the Ὑστέρημα, consist of
the Enthymesis ejected from the Pleroma into the desert, void
and substanceless Kenoma, which is by it for the first time
filled and vitalized. It is an ἔκτρωμα, an abortion, which however
retains still the æon nature of its divine present, and as such
bears the name of Ἔξω (κάτω) Σοφία or Ἀχαμώθ (הַחָכְמוֹת). Hence even
the blessed spirits of the Pleroma can never forsake her. They
all suffer with the unfortunate, until she who had sprung from
the Pleroma is restored to it purified and matured. Hence they
espouse her, the Ektroma of the last and least of the æons, to
the Ano-Soter, the noblest, most glorious and most perfect being
in the æon-heaven, as her redeemer and future husband. He begins
by comforting the despondent and casting out from her the baser
affections. Among the worst, fear, sorrow, doubt, etc., is found
the basis of the hylic stage of existence; among the better,
repentance, desire, hope, etc., that of the psychic stage of
existence (φύσεις). Over the beings issuing forth from the former
presides Satan; over the psychical forms of being, as their
highest development, presides the Demiurge, who prepares as
his dwelling-place the seven lower heavens, the Hebdomas.
But Achamoth had retired with the pneumatic substratum still
remaining in her into the Τόπος τῆς μεσότητος, between the
Pleroma and the lower world, whence she, inspired by the
Ano-Soter, operates upon the Demiurge, who, knowing nothing of
her existence, has no anticipation thereof. From the dust of the
earth and pneumatic seed, which unobserved she conveys into it,
he formed man, breathed into him his own psychical breath of
life, and set him in paradise, that is, in the third of his seven
heavens, but banished him to earth, when he disobeyed his command,
and instead of his first ethereal garment clothed him in a
material body. When men had spread upon the earth, they developed
these different natures: _Pneumatical_, which free from the
bondage of every outward law and not subject to the impulses of
the senses, a law unto themselves, travel toward the Pleroma;
next, the _Hylic_, which, hostile to all spirit and law, and
the sport of all lusts and passions, are doomed to irremediable
destruction; and finally, the _Psychical_, which under the
discipline of outward law attain not indeed to a perfect divine
life, but yet to outward righteousness, while on the other hand
they may sink down to the rank and condition of the Hylic natures.
The _Psychical_ natures were particularly numerous among the
Jews. Therefore the Demiurge chose them as his own, and gave
them a strict law and through his prophets promised them a
future Messiah. The _Hylic_ natures which were found mostly among
the heathens, were utterly hateful to him. The _Pneumatical_
natures with their innate longing after the Pleroma, he did not
understand and therefore disregarded; but yet, without knowing
or designing it, he chose many of them for kings, priests, and
prophets of his people, and to his amazement heard from their
lips prophecies of a higher soul, which originated from Achamoth,
and which he did not understand. When the time was fulfilled,
he sent his Messiah in the person of Jesus. When he was baptized
by John, the heaven opened over him and the Ano-Soter descended
upon him. The Demiurge saw it and was astonished, but submitted
himself awe-stricken to the will of the superior deities. The
Soter remained then a year upon the earth. The Jews, refusing to
receive him, nailed his organ, the psychical Messiah, to a cross;
but his sufferings were only apparent sufferings, since the
Demiurge had supplied him in his origin with an ethereal and
only seemingly material body. In consequence of the work of the
Ano-Soter the Pneumatical natures by means of the Gnosis taught
by him, but the Psychical natures by means of Pistis, attain unto
perfection after their kind. When once everything pneumatical and
psychical which was bound up in matter, has been freed from it,
the course of the world has reached its end and the longed-for
time of Achamoth’s marriage will have come. Accompanied by
myriads of his angels, the Soter leads the noble sufferer into
the Pleroma. The pneumatical natures follow her, and as the
Soter is married to Achamoth, the angels are married to them. The
Demiurge goes with his tried and redeemed saints into the Τόπος
τῆς μεσότητος. But from the depths of the Hyle breaks forth a
hidden fire which utterly consumes the Hylic natures and the Hyle
itself.[40]
§ 27.5. According to Hippolytus the Valentinian school split
up into two parties--an Italian party, the leaders of which,
Heracleon and Ptolemæus [Ptolemy], were at Rome, and an Eastern
party to which Axionicus and Bardesanes belonged. =Heracleon= of
Alexandria was a man of a profoundly religious temperament, who
in his speculation inclined considerably toward the doctrine of
the church, and even wrote the first commentary on the Gospel
of John, of which many fragments are preserved in Origen’s
commentary on that gospel. =Ptolemæus= [Ptolemy] drew even
closer than his master to the church doctrine. Epiphanius quotes
a letter of his to his pupil Flora in which, after Marcion’s
example (see § 27, 11), the distinction of the divine and the
demiurgical in the Old Testament, and the relation of the Old
Testament to the New, are discussed. A position midway between
that of the West and of the East is apparently represented
by Marcus and his school. He combined with the doctrine of
Valentinus the Pythagorean and cabbalistic mysticism of numbers
and letters, and joined thereto magical and soothsaying arts.
His followers, the Marcosians, had a form of worship full of
ceremonial observances, with a twofold baptism, a psychical
one in the Kato-Christus for the forgiveness of sins, and a
pneumatical one for affiance with the future heavenly syzygy.
Of the Antiochean Axionicus we know nothing but the name. Of far
greater importance was =Bardesanes=, who flourished according
to Eusebius in the time of Marcus Aurelius, but is assigned by
authentic Syrian documents to the beginning of the third century.
The chief sources of information about his doctrine are the
56 rhyming discourses of Ephraem [Ephraim] against the heretics.
Living at the court and enjoying the favour of the king of Edessa,
he never attacked in his sermons the doctrinal system of the
church, but spread his Gnostic views built upon a Valentinian
basis in lofty hymns of which, besides numerous fragments in
Ephraem [Ephraim], some are preserved in the apocryphal _Acta
Thomae_ (§ 32, 6). Among his voluminous writings there was a
controversial treatise against the Marcionites (see § 27, 11).
In a Dialogue, Περὶ εἱμαρμένης, attributed to him, but probably
belonging to one of his disciples named Philippus, from which
Eusebius (_Præp. Ev._ vi. 10) quotes a passage, the Syrian
original of which, “The Book of the Laws of the Land,” was only
recently discovered,[41] astrology and fatalism are combated
from a Christian standpoint, although the author is still himself
dominated by many Zoroastrian ideas. Harmonius, the highly gifted
son of Bardesanes, distinguished himself by the composition of
hymns in a similar spirit.
§ 27.6. =The Ophites and related Sects.=--The multiform Ophite
Gnosis is in general characterized by fantastic combinations of
Syro-Chaldaic myths and Biblical history with Greek mythology,
philosophy and mysteriosophy. In all its forms the serpent (ὄφις,
נָחָשׁ) plays an important part, sometimes as Kakodemon, sometimes
as Agathodemon. This arose from the place that the serpent
had in the Egyptian and Asiatic cosmology as well as in the
early biblical history. One of the oldest forms of Ophitism is
described by Hippolytus, who gives to its representatives the
name of =Naassenes=, from נָחָשׁ. The formless original essence, ὁ
προών, revealed himself in the first men, Ἀδάμας, Adam, Cadmon,
in whom the pneumatic, psychical and hylic principles were still
present together. As the instrument in creation he is called
Logos or Hermes. The serpent is revered as Agathodemon; it
proceeds from the Logos, transmitting the stream of life to all
creatures. Christ, the redeemer, is the earthly representative of
the first man, and brings peace to all the three stages of life,
because he, by his teaching, directs every one to a mode of life
in accordance with his nature.--The =Sethites=, according to
Hippolytus, taught that there were two principles: an upper one,
τὸ φῶς, an under one, τὸ σκότος, and between these τὸ πνεῦμα, the
atmosphere that moves and causes motion. From a blending of light
with darkness arose chaos, in which the pneuma awakened life.
Then from chaos sprang the soul of the world as a serpent, which
became the Demiurge. Man had a threefold development: hylic or
material in Cain, psychical in Abel, and pneumatical in Seth, who
was the first Gnostic.--The founders of the =Perates=, who were
already known to Clement of Alexandria, are called by Hippolytus
Euphrates and Celbes. Their name implies that they withdrew from
the world of sense in order to secure eternal life here below,
περᾶν τὴν φθοράν. The original divine unity, they taught, had
developed into a Trinity: τὸ ἀγέννητον, ἀυτογενές and γεννητόν,
the Father, the Son, and the Hyle. The Son is the world serpent
that moves and quickens all things (καθολικός ὄφις). It is his
task to restore everything that has sunk down from the two higher
worlds into the lower, and is held fast by its Archon. Sometimes
he turns himself serpent-like to his Father and assumes his
divine attributes, sometimes to the lower world to communicate
them to it. In the shape of a serpent he delivers Eve from the
law of the Archon. All who are outlawed by this Archon, Cain,
Nimrod, etc., belong to him. Moses, too, is an adherent of his,
who erected in the wilderness the healing brazen serpent to
represent him, while the fiery biting serpent of the desert
represent the demons of the Archon. The =Cainites=, spoken of by
Irenæus and Epiphanius, were closely connected with the Perates.
All the men characterized in the Old Testament as godless are
esteemed by them genuine pneumatical beings and martyrs for the
truth. The first who distinguished himself in conflict with the
God of the Jews was Cain; the last who led the struggle on to
victory, by bringing the psychical Messiah through his profound
sagacity to the cross, was Judas Iscariot. The Gnostic =Justin=
is known to us only through Hippolytus, who draws his information
from a _Book of Baruch_. He taught that from the original essence,
ὁ Ἀγαθός or Κύριος, יְהוָֹה, emanated a male principle, Ἐλωείμ, אֱלֹהִים,
which had a pneumatical nature, and a female principle, Ἐδέμ, עֵדֶן,
which was above man (psychical) and below the serpent (hylic).
From the union of this pair sprang twelve ἄγγελοι πατρικοί, who
had in them the father’s nature, and twelve ἄγγελοι μητρικοί,
on whom the mother’s nature was impressed. Together they formed
Paradise, in which Baruch, an angel of Elohim, represented the
tree of life, and Naas, an Edem-angel, represented the tree
of knowledge. The Elohim-angel formed man out of the dust
of Paradise; Edem gave him a soul, Elohim gave him a spirit.
Pressing upward by means of his pneumatical nature Elohim raised
himself to the borders of the realms of light. The Agathos took
him and set him at his right hand. The forsaken Edem avenged
himself by giving power to Naas to grieve the spirit of Elohim
in man. He tempted Eve to commit adultery with him, and got Adam
to commit unnatural vice with him. In order to show the grieved
spirit of man the way to heaven, Elohim sent Baruch first to
Moses and afterwards to other Prophets of the Old Testament;
but Naas frustrated all his efforts. Even from among the heathen
Elohim raised up prophets, such as Hercules whom he sent to fight
against the twelve Edem-angels (his twelve labours), but one of
them named Babel or Aphrodite robbed even this divine hero of his
power (a reminiscence of the story of Omphale). Finally, Elohim
sent Baruch to the peasant boy Jesus, son of Joseph and Mary.
He resisted all the temptations of Naas, who therefore got him
nailed upon the cross. Jesus commended his spirit into the hands
of the Father, into whose heaven he ascended, leaving his body
and soul with Edem. So, after his example, do all the pious.
§ 27.7. The Gnosis of the =Ophites=, described by Irenæus, etc.,
is distinguished from that of the earlier Naasenes [Naassenes]
by its incorporation of Valentinian and dualistic or Saturninian
(see § 27, 9) ideas. From the Bythos who, as the primary being,
is also called the first man, Adam Cadmon, emanates the thought,
ἔννοια, of himself as the second man or son of man, and from
him the Holy Spirit or the Ano-Sophia, who in turn bears the
Ano-Christus and Achamoth. The latter, an imperfect being of
light, who is also called Προύνικος, which according to Epiphanius
means πόρνη, drives about through the dark ocean of chaos, over
which the productive mother, the Holy Spirit, broods, in order
to found for himself in it an independent world of his own. There
dense matter unites with the element of light and darkens it to
such a degree that even the consciousness of its own divine origin
begins to fade away from it. In this condition of estrangement
from God she produces the Demiurge, Jaldabaoth, יַלְדָּא בָּהוּת, son
of chaos; and he, a wicked as well as limited being, full of
arrogance and pride, determines that he himself alone will be
lord and master in the world which he creates. This brings
Achamoth to penitent deliberation. By the vigorous exercise of
all the powers of light dwelling in her, and strengthened by a
gleam of light from above, she succeeds in raising herself from
the realm of chaos into the Τόπος τῆς μεσότητος. Nevertheless
Jaldabaoth brought forth six star spirits or planets after his
own image, and placed himself as the seventh at their head. But
they too think of rebelling. Enraged at this Jaldabaoth glances
wildly upon the deep-lying slime of the Hyle; his frightfully
distorted countenance is mirrored in this refuse of chaos; the
image there comes to life and forms Ophiomorphus or Satan. By
order of Jaldabaoth the star spirits make man; but they produce
only an awkward spiritless being that creeps along the ground. In
order to quicken it and make it stand erect the Demiurge breathes
into it his own breath, but thereby deprives himself of a great
part of that pneumatical element which he had from his mother.
The so-called fall, in which Ophiomorphus or the serpent was only
the unconscious instrument of Achamoth, is in truth the beginning
of the redemption of man, the advance to self-consciousness
and moral freedom. But as a punishment for his disobedience
Jaldabaoth drove him out of the higher material world, Paradise,
into the lower, where he was exposed to the annoyances of
Ophiomorphus, who also brought the majority of mankind, the
heathens, under his authority, while the Jews served Jaldabaoth,
and only a small number of pneumatical natures by the help
of Achamoth kept themselves free from both. The prophets whom
Jaldabaoth sent to his people, were at the same time unconscious
organs of Achamoth, who also sent down the Ano-Christus from the
Pleroma upon the Messiah, whose kingdom is yet to spread among
all nations. Jaldabaoth now let his own Messiah be crucified,
but the Ano-Christus was already withdrawn from him and had
set himself unseen at the right hand of the Demiurge, where he
deprives him and his angels of all the light element which they
still had in them, and gathers round himself the pneumatical
from among mankind, in order to lead them into the Pleroma.--The
latest and at the same time the noblest product of Ophite
Gnosticism is the =Pistis Sophia=,[42] appearing in the middle
of the third century, with a strong tincture of Valentinianism.
It treats mainly of the fall, repentance, and complaint of
Sophia, and of the mysteries that purify for redemption, often
approaching very closely the doctrine of the church.
§ 27.8. =Antinomian and Libertine Sects.=--The later
representatives of Alexandrian Gnosticism on account of the
antinomian tendency of their system fell for the most part into
gross immorality, which excused itself on the ground that the
pneumatical men must throw contempt upon the law of the Demiurge,
ἀντιτάσσεσθαι, (whence they were also called Antitactes), and
that by the practice of fleshly lusts one must weaken and slay
the flesh, παραχρῆσθαι τῇ σαρκί, so as to overcome the powers
of the Hyle. The four following sects may be mentioned as those
which maintained such views.--
a. =The Nicolaitans=, who in order to give themselves the
sanction of primitive Christianity sought to trace their
descent from Nicolaus [Nicolas] the Deacon (Acts vi. 5). But
while they have really no connection with him, they are just
as little to be identified with the Nicolaitans of the
Apocalypse (§ 18, 3).
b. In a similar way the =Simonians= sought to attach themselves
to Simon Magus (§ 25, 2). They gave to the fables associated
with the name of Simon a speculative basis borrowed from
the central idea of the philosophy of Heraclitus, that
the principle of all things (ἡ ἀπέραντος δύναμις) is fire.
From it in three syzygies, νοῦς and ἐπίνοια, φωνή and
ὄνομα, λογισμός and ἐνθύμησις, proceed the six roots of
the supersensible world, and subsequently the corresponding
six roots of the sensible world, Heaven and earth, Sun and
moon, Air and water, in which unlimited force is present
as ὁ ἐστώς, στάς, and στησόμενος. Justin Martyr was already
acquainted with this sect, and also Hippolytus, who quotes
many passages from their chief treatise, entitled, Ἀπόφασις
μεγάλη and reports scandalous things about their foul
worship.
c. =The Carpocratians.= In the system of their founder
Carpocrates, who lived at Alexandria in the first half of
the second century, God is the eternal Mould, the unity
without distinctions, from whom all being flows and to whom
all returns again. From Him the ἄγγελοι κοσμοποιοί revolted.
By the creation of the world they established a distinct
order of existence apart from God and consolidated it by the
law issuing from them and the national religions of Jews and
Gentiles founded by them. Thus true religion or the way of
return for the human spirit into the One and All consists
theoretically in Gnosis, practically in emancipation from
the commands of the Demiurge and in a life κατὰ φύσιν. The
distinction of good and bad actions rests merely on human
opinions. Man is redeemed by faith and love. In order to be
able to overcome the powers that created the world, he is
in need of magic which is intimately connected with Gnosis.
Every human spirit who has not fully attained to this end of
all religious endeavour, is subjected, until he reaches it,
to the assumption of one bodily form after another. Among
the heroes of humanity who with special energy and success
have assailed the kingdom of the Demiurge by contempt
of his law and spread of the true Gnosis, a particularly
conspicuous place is assigned to Jesus, the son of Joseph.
What he was for the Jews, Orpheus, Pythagoras, Plato, etc.,
were for the Gentiles. To the talented son of Carpocrates,
named Epiphanes, who died in his seventeenth year, after
impressing upon his father’s Gnostic system a boundless
communistic and libertine tendency with community of goods
and wives, his followers erected a temple at Cephalonia, in
which they set up for divine honours the statues of Christ
and the Greek philosophers. At the close of their Agapæ,
they indulged in _Concubitus promiscuus_.
d. =The Prodicians= flourished about the time of Clement of
Alexandria, and were connected, perhaps, through their
founder Prodicus, with the Carpocratians. In order to prove
their dominion over the sensible world they were wont to
appear in their assemblies naked, and hence are also called
=Adamites=. So soon as they succeeded in thus reaching
the state of innocence that had preceded the fall, they
maintained that as pneumatical king’s sons they were raised
above all law and entitled to indulge in unbridled lust.
§ 27.9. =Saturninus=, or Satornilus of Antioch, according to
Irenæus, a disciple of Menander, was one of the oldest Syrian
Gnostics, during the age of Hadrian, and the one in whose system
of Dualism the most decided traces of Parsee colouring is found.
From the θεὸς ἄγνωστος the spirit world of the kingdom of light
emanates in successive stages. On the lowest stage stand the
seven planet spirits, ἄγγελοι κοσμοκράτορες, at their head the
creator of the world and the god of the Jews. But from eternity
over against the realm of light stands the Hyle in violent
opposition under the rule of Satanas. The seven star spirits
think to found therein a kingdom free and independent of the
Pleroma, and for this purpose make an inroad upon the kingdom
of the Hyle, and seize upon a part of it. Therefore they form
the sensible world and create man as keeper thereof after a fair
model sent by the good God of which they had a dim vision. But
they could not give him the upright form. The supreme God then
takes pity upon the wretched creature. He sends down a spark
of light σπινθήρ into it which fills it with pneumatical life
and makes it stand up. But Satanas set a hylic race of men
over against this pneumatical race, and persecuted the latter
incessantly by demons. The Jewish god then plans to redeem the
persecuted by a Messiah, and inspires prophets to announce his
coming. But Satan, too, has his prophets, and the Jewish god is
not powerful enough to make his views prevail over his enemy’s.
Finally the good God sends to the earth the Aeon [Æon] Νοῦς, in
what has the appearance of a body, in order that he as σωτήρ may
teach the pneumatical how to escape, by Gnosis and asceticism,
abstaining from marriage and the eating of flesh, not only the
attacks of Satan, but also the dominion of the Jewish god and his
star spirits, how to emancipate themselves from all connection
with matter, and to raise themselves into the realm of light.
§ 27.10. =Tatian and the Encratites.=--The Assyrian Tatian,
converted to Christianity at Rome by Justin Martyr, makes his
appearance as a zealous apologist of the faith (§ 30, 10). In
his later years, however, just as in the case of Marcion, in
consequence of his exaggeration of the Pauline antithesis of
flesh and spirit, law and grace, he was led to propound a theory
of the dualistic opposition between the god of the law, the
Demiurge, and the god of the gospel, which found expression
in a Gnostic-ascetic system, completely breaking away from the
Catholic church, and reaching its conclusion in the hyperascetic
sect of the Encratites that arose in Rome about A.D. 172. He now
became head and leader of this sect, which, with its fanatical
demand of complete abstinence from marriage, from all eating of
flesh and all spirituous liquors, won his approval, and perhaps
from him received its first dogmatic Gnostic impress. Of Tatian’s
Gnostic writings, Προβλήματα and Περὶ τοῦ κατὰ τὸν σωτῆρα
καταρτισμοῦ, only some fragments, with scanty notices of his
Gnostic system, are preserved. His dualistic opposition of the
god of the Old Testament and the god of the New Testament cannot
have meant a thorough hostility, for he makes the Demiurge
sitting in darkness address himself to the supreme God in
the language of prayer, “Let there be light.” He declares,
however, that Adam, as the author of the fall, is incapable
of redemption.--His followers were also called Ὑδροπαραστάται,
Aquarii, because at the Supper they used water instead of wine.
See Lit. at § 30, 10.
§ 27.11. =Marcion and the Marcionites.=--Marcion of Sinope in
Pontus, who died about A.D. 170, was, according to Tertullian,
a rich shipmaster who, on his arrival in Rome, in his early
enthusiasm for the faith, bestowed upon the Church there a rich
present, but was afterwards excommunicated by it as a heretic.
According to the Pseudo-Tertullian and others he was the son of a
bishop who excommunicated him for incontinence with one under the
vow of virginity. The story may possibly be based upon a later
misunderstanding of the charge of corrupting the church as the
pure bride of Christ. He was a man of a fiery and energetic
character, but also rough and eccentric, of a thoroughly
practical tendency and with little speculative talent. He was
probably driven by the hard inward struggles of his spiritual
life, somewhat similar to those through which Paul had passed, to
a full and hearty conception of the free grace of God in Christ;
but conceived of the opposition between law and gospel, which the
Apostle brought into harmony by his theory of the pædogogical
office of the law, as purely hostile and irreconcileable.
At Rome in A.D. 140, the Syrian Gnostic =Cerdo=, who already
distinguished between the “good” God of Christianity and
the “just” God of Judaism, gained an influence over him.
He consequently developed for himself a Gnostic system, the
dominating idea of which was the irreconcilable opposition of
righteousness and grace, law and gospel, Judaism and Christianity.
He repudiated the whole of the Old Testament, and set forth
the opposition between the two Testaments in a special treatise
entitled _Antitheses_. He acknowledged only Paul as an Apostle,
since all the rest had fallen back into Judaism, and of the whole
New Testament he admitted only ten Pauline epistles, excluding
the Pastoral Epistles and the Epistles to the Hebrews, and
admitting the Gospel of Luke only in a mutilated form.[43]
Marcion would know nothing of a secret doctrine and tradition
and rejected the allegorical interpretation so much favoured
by the Gnostics, as well as the theory of emanation and the
subordination of Pistis under Gnosis. While other Gnostics
formed not churches but only schools of select bands of
thinkers, or at most only small gatherings, Marcion, after
vainly trying to reform the Catholic church in accordance with
his exaggerated Paulinism, set himself to establish a well
organised ecclesiastical system, the members of which were
arranged as _Perfecti_ or _Electi_ and _Catechumeni_. Of the
former he required a strict asceticism, abstinence from marriage,
and restriction in food to the simplest and least possible. He
allowed the Catechumens, however, in opposition to the Catholic
practice (§ 35, 1), to take part in all the services, which were
conducted in the simplest possible forms. The moral earnestness
and the practical tendency of his movement secured him many
adherents, of whom many congregations maintained their existence
for a much longer time than the members of other Gnostic sects,
even down to the seventh century. None of the founders of the old
Gnostic sects were more closely connected in life and doctrine
to the Catholic Church than Marcion, and yet, or perhaps just for
that reason, none of them were opposed by it so often, so eagerly
and so bitterly. Even Polycarp, on his arrival in Rome (§ 37, 2),
in reply to Marcion’s question whether he knew him, said:
Ἐπιγνώσκω τὸν πρωτότοκον τοῦ Σατανᾶ.--The general scope and
character of =the System of Marcion= have been variously
estimated. All older ecclesiastical controversialists, Justin,
Rhodon in Eusebius, Tertullian and Irenæus, in their description
and refutation of it seem to recognise only two principles
(ἀρχαί), which stand in opposition to one another, as θεὸς ἀγαθός
and θεὸς δίκαιος. The latter appears as creator of the world,
or Demiurge, the god of the Jews, the giver of the law, unable,
however, by his law to save the Jews and deter them from breaking
it, or to lead back the Gentiles to the observance of it. Then
of his free grace the “good” God, previously quite unknown,
determined to redeem men from the power of the Demiurge. For this
purpose he sends his Logos into the world with the semblance of a
body. By way of accommodation he gives himself out as the Messiah
of the Jewish god, proclaims the forgiveness of sins through free
grace, communicates to all who believe the powers of the divine
life, is at the instigation of the angry Demiurge nailed to the
cross to suffer death in appearance only, preaches to Gentiles
imprisoned in Hades, banishes the Demiurge to Hades, and
ordains the Apostle Paul as teacher of believers.--The later
heresiologists, however, Hippolytus, in his Elenchus, Epiphanius,
Theodoret, and especially the Armenian Esnig (§ 64, 3), are
equally agreed in saying that Marcion recognised three principles
(ἀρχαί); that besides the good God and the righteous God he
admitted an evil principle, the Hyle concentrated in Satan, so
that even the pre-Christian development of the world was viewed
from the standpoint of a dualistic conflict between divine powers.
The righteous God and the Hyle, as a _quasi_ female principle,
united with one another in creating the world, and when the
former saw how fair the earth was, he resolved to people it with
men created of his own likeness. For this purpose the Hyle at his
request afforded him dust, from which he created man, inspiring
him with his own spirit. Both divine powers rejoiced over man as
parents over a child, and shared in his worship. But the Demiurge
sought to gain undivided authority over man, and so commanded
Adam, under pain of death, to worship him alone, and the Hyle
avenged himself by producing a multitude of idols to whom the
majority of Adam’s descendants, falling away from the God of
the law, gave reverence.--The harmonizing of these two accounts
may be accomplished by assuming that the older Church Fathers,
in their conflict with Marcion had willingly restricted
themselves to the most important point in the Marcionite system,
its characteristic opposition of the Gods of the Old and New
Testaments, passing over the points in which it agreed more
or less with other Gnostic systems; or by assuming that later
Marcionites, such as Prepon (§ 27, 12), in consequence of the
palpable defectiveness and inadequacy of the original system of
two principles, were led to give it the further development that
has been described.[44]
§ 27.12. The speculative weakness and imperfection of his system
led =Marcion’s Disciples= to expand and remodel it in many ways.
Two of these, Lucanus and Marcus, are pre-eminent as remodellers
of the system, into which they imported various elements from
that of Saturninus. The Assyrian =Prepon= placed the “righteous”
Logos as third principle between the “good” God and the “evil”
Demiurge. Of all the more nameful Marcionites, =Apelles=, who
died about A.D. 180, inclined most nearly to the church doctrine.
Eusebius tells about a Disputation which took place in Rome
between him and Rhodon, a disciple of Tatian. At the head of his
essentially monistic system Apelles places the ἀγέννητος θεός
as the μία ἀρχή. This God, besides a higher heavenly world, had
created an order of angels, of whom the first and most eminent,
the so-called _Angelus inclytus_ or _gloriosus_ as Demiurge made
the earthly world after the image and to the glory of the supreme
God. But another angel, the ἄγγελος πυρετός, corrupted his
creation, which was already in itself imperfect, by bringing
forth the σὰρξ ἁμαρτίας, with which he clothed the souls enticed
down from the upper world. It was he, too, who spoke to Moses out
of the burning bush, and as the god of the Jews gave the law from
Sinai. The Demiurge soon repented of his ill-fated performance,
and prayed the supreme God to send his Son as redeemer. Christ
appeared, lived, wrought and suffered in a real body. It was not,
however, the σὰρξ ἁμαρτίας that he assumed, but a sinless body
composed out of the four elements which he gave back to the
elements on his ascension to heaven. Towards the close of his
life Apelles seems, under the influence of the mystic revelations
of a prophetess, Philoumena, whose φανερώσεις he published, to
have more and more renounced his Gnostic views. He had already
admitted in his Disputation with Rhodon, that even on the
Catholic platform one may be saved, for the main thing is faith
in the crucified Christ and the doing of his works. He would even
have been prepared to subscribe to the Monotheism of the church,
had he not been hindered by the opposition between the Old
Testament and the New.
§ 27.13. The painter =Hermogenes= in North Africa, about A.D. 200,
whom Tertullian opposed, took offence at the Catholic doctrine of
creation as well as at the Gnostic theory of emanation, because
it made God the author of evil. He therefore assumed an eternal
chaos, from whose striving against the creative and formative
influence of God he explained the origin of everything evil and
vile.
§ 28. EBIONISM AND EBIONITIC GNOSTICISM.[45]
The Jewish-Christianity that maintained separation from
Gentile-Christianity even after the overthrow of the Holy City and its
temple, assumed partly a merely separatist, partly a decidedly heretical
character. Both tendencies had in common the assertion of the continued
obligation to observe the whole of the Mosaic law. But while the former
limited this obligation to the Christians of Jewish descent as the
peculiar stem and kernel of the new Messianic community, and allowed the
Gentile Christians as Proselytes of the Gate to omit those observances,
the latter would tolerate no such concession and outran the Old
Testament monotheism by a barren monarchianism that denied the
divinity of Christ (§ 33, 1). At a later period the two parties were
distinguished as Nazareans and Ebionites. On the other hand, in the
Ebionites described to us by Epiphanius we have a form of Jewish
Christianity permeated by Gnostic elements. These Ebionites, settling
along with the Essenes (§ 8, 4) on the eastern shores of the Dead Sea,
came to be known under the name of Elkesaites. In the Pseudo-Clementine
scheme of doctrine, this Ebionitic Gnosis was carried out in detail and
wrought up into a comprehensive and richly developed system.
§ 28.1. =Nazareans and Ebionites.=--Tertullian and with him most
of the later Church Fathers derive the name Ebionite from Ebion,
a founder of the sect. Since the time of Gieseler, however, the
name has generally been referred to the Hebrew word אֶבְיוֹן meaning
poor, in allusion partly to the actual poverty of the church of
Jerusalem (Gal. ii. 10), partly to the association of the terms
poor and pious in the Psalms and Prophets (comp. Matt. v. 3).
Minucius Felix, c. xxxvi. testifies that the Gentile Christians
were also so designated by those without: _Ceterum quod plerique
“Pauperes” dicimur, non est infamia nostra, sed gloria_. Recently,
however, Hilgenfeld has recurred to the patristic derivation of
the name.--In Irenæus the name Ebionæi makes its first appearance
in literature, and that as a designation of Jewish Christians
as heretics who admitted only a Gospel according to Matthew,
probably the so-called Gospel according to the Hebrews (§ 32, 4),
branded the Apostle Paul as an apostate, insisted upon the
strict observance of the Jewish law, and taught on Christological
questions “_consimiliter ut Cerinthus et Carpocrates_”
(§ 27, 1, 8), while they denied that Christ was born of a virgin,
and regarded Him as a mere man. Origen († A.D. 243) embraced all
Jewish Christians under the name Ἐβιωναῖοι but did not deny the
existence of two very different parties among them (διττοὶ and
ἀμφότεροι Ἐβιωναῖοι). Eusebius does the same. Jerome again is
the first to distinguish the more moderate party by the name
Nazareans (Acts xxiv. 5) from the more extreme who are designated
Ebionites. This too is the practice of Augustine and Theodoret.
The former party acknowledged the virgin birth of Christ and
so His divine origin, assigned to Paul his place as Apostle
to the Gentiles, and made no demand of Gentile Christians that
they should observe the ceremonial law of Moses, although they
believed that they themselves were bound thereby. The latter
again regarded it as absolutely necessary to salvation, and also
held that Christ was the Messiah, but only a man, son of Joseph
by Mary, endowed with divine powers in His baptism. His Messianic
work, according to them, consisted in His fulfilling by His
teaching the Mosaic law. His death was an offence to them, but
they took comfort from the promise of His coming again, when they
looked for the setting up of an earthly Messianic kingdom. Paul
was depreciated by them and made of little account. Ebionites
of both parties continued to exist in small numbers down to the
fifth century, especially in Palestine and Syria. Both however
had sunk by the middle of the second century into almost utter
insignificance. The scanty remains of writings issuing from the
party prove that especially the non-heretical Jewish Christianity
before the close of this century had in great part abandoned its
national Jewish character, and therewith its separate position
as a religious sect, and by adopting the views of the Pauline
Gentile Christianity (§ 30, 2) became gradually amalgamated
with it.[46]
§ 28.2. =The Elkesaites.=--Independent accounts of this sect in
substantial agreement with one another are given by Hippolytus
in his _Elenchus_, by Origen as quoted in Eusebius, and by
Epiphanius. Their designation has also led the Church Fathers
to assume a sect founder of the name of Elxai or Elchasai,
who is said to have lived in the time of Hadrian. The members
of the sect themselves derived their name from חֵיל כְּסָי, δύναμις
κεκαλυμμένη, the hidden power of God operating in them, that is,
the Holy Spirit, the δύναμις ἄσαρκος of the Clementine Homilies.
Probably it was the title of a book setting forth their esoteric
doctrine, which circulated only among those bound under oath to
secrecy. Origen says that the book was supposed to have fallen
down from heaven; Hippolytus says that it was held to have been
revealed by an angel who was the Son of God himself. Elxai
obtained it from the Serians in Parthia and communicated it to
the Sobiai, probably from שֹׁבְעַ; then the Syrian Alcibiades brought
it from Apamea to Rome in the third century. The doctrinal
system of the Elkesaites was very variable, and is represented
by the Church Fathers referred to as a confused mixture of
Christian elements with the legalism of Judaism, the asceticism
of Essenism, and the naturalism of paganism, and exhibiting a
special predilection for astrological and magical fancies. The
law was regarded as binding, especially the precepts concerning
the Sabbath and circumcision, but the sacrificial worship was
abandoned, and the portions of the Old Testament referring to
it as well as other parts. Their doctrine of baptism varied from
that of baptism once administered to that of a baptism by oft
repeated washings on days especially indicated by astrological
signs. Baptism was for the forgiveness of sins and also for the
magical cure of the sick. It was administered in the name of the
Father and the Son, and in addition there were seven witnesses
called, the five elements, together with oil and salt, the latter
as representative of the Lord’s Supper, which was celebrated
with salt and bread without wine. Eating of flesh was forbidden,
but marriage was allowed and highly esteemed. Their Christology
presented the appearance of unsettled fermentation. On the one
hand Christ was regarded as an angel, and indeed as the μέγας
βασιλεύς, of gigantic size, 96 miles high, and 24 miles broad;
but on the other hand, they taught also a repeated incarnation of
Christ as the Son of God, the final One being the Christ born of
the virgin. He represents the male principle, and by his side, as
the female principle, stands the Holy Spirit. Denial of Christ in
times of persecution seemed to them quite allowable. At the time
of Epiphanius,--who identifies them with the _Sampseans_, whose
name was derived from שֶׁמֶשׁ the sun, because in prayer they turned
to the sun, called also Ἡλιακοί,--they had for the most part
their residence round about the Dead Sea, where they got mixed
up with the Essenes of that region.--More recently the Elkesaites
have been brought into connection with the still extant sect
of the Sabeans or Mandeans (§ 25, 1). These Sabeans, from צבע
meaning טבע, βαπτίζειν, are designated by the mediæval Arabic
writers _Mogtasilah_, those who wash themselves, and _Elchasaich_
is named as their founder, and as teaching the existence of two
principles a male and a female. [47]
§ 28.3. =The Pseudo-Clementine Series of Writings= forms a
literature of a romantic historico-didactic description which
originated between A.D. 160 and 170.
a. The so-called =Homiliæ XX Clementis=[48] were prefaced by
two letters to the Apostle James at Jerusalem. The first
of these is from Peter enjoining secrecy in regard to the
“Kerugma” sent therewith. The second is from Clement of Rome
after the death of Peter, telling how he as the founder and
first bishop of the church of Rome had ordained Clement as
his successor, and had charged him to draw up those accounts
of his own career and of the addresses and disputations
of Peter which he had heard while the Apostle pursued and
contended with Simon Magus, and to send them to James as
head of the church, “bishop of bishops, who ruled the church
of Jerusalem and all the churches,” that they might be
certified by him. The historical framework of the book
represents a distinguished Roman of philosophical culture
and of noble birth, named Clement, as receiving his first
acquaintance with Christianity at Rome, and then as going
forth on his travels to Judea as an eager seeker after the
truth. At Alexandria (§ 16, 4) Barnabas convinces him of the
truth of Christianity, and Clement follows him to Cæsarea
where he listens to a great debate between Peter and Simon
Magus (§ 25, 2). Simon defeated betakes himself to flight,
but Peter follows him, accompanied by Clement and two who
had been disciples of the magician, Niceta and Aquila.
Though he goes after him from place to place, Peter does not
get hold of Simon, but founds churches all along his route.
On the way Clement tells him how long before his mother,
Mattidia, and his two brothers had gone on a journey to
Athens, and how his father, Faustus, had gone in search of
them, and no trace of any of them had ever been found. Soon
thereafter the mother is met with, and then it is discovered
that Niceta and Aquila are the lost brothers Faustinus and
Faustinianus. At the baptism of the mother the father also
is restored. Finally at Laodicea Peter and Simon engage a
second time in a four-days’ disputation which ends as the
first. The story concludes with Peter’s arrival at Antioch.
b. The ten books of the so-called =Recognitiones Clementis=,[49]
present us again with the Clement of the historical romance,
the historical here overshadowing the didactic, and a closer
connection with church doctrine being here maintained.
Critical examinations of the relations between the two sets
of writings have more and more established the view that
an older Jewish-Christian Gnostic work lay at the basis
of both. This original document seems to have been used
contemporaneously, but in a perfectly independent manner in
the composition of both; the Homilies using the materials
in an anti-Marcionite interest (§ 27, 11), the Recognitions
using them in such a way as to give as little offence as
possible to their Catholic readers. Still it is questionable
whether this original document, which probably bore the
title of Κηρύγματα Πέτρου, embraced in its earliest form
the domestic romance of Clement, or only treated of the
disputation of Peter with Simon at Cæsarea, and was first
enlarged by addition of the Ἀναγνωρισμοί Κλήμεντος giving
the story of Peter’s travels (Περίοδοι).
c. Finally, extracts from the Homilies, worthless and of
no independent significance, are extant in the form of
two Greek =Epitomæ= (ed. Dressel, Lps., 1859). Equally
unimportant is the Syrian Epitome, edited by Lagarde, Lps.,
1861, a compilation from the Recognitions and the Homilies.
All the three writers of the Epitomes had an interest only
in the romantic narrative.
§ 28.4. =The Pseudo-Clementine Doctrinal System= is represented
in the most complete and most original manner in the Homilies.
In the conversations, addresses, and debates there reported the
author develops his own religious views, and by putting them
in the mouth of the Apostle Peter seeks to get them recognised
as genuine unadulterated primitive Christianity, while all the
doctrines of Catholic Paulinism which he objects to, as well
as those of heretical Gnosticism and especially of Marcionism,
are put into the mouth of Simon Magus, the primitive heretic;
and then an attempt is made at a certain reconciliation and
combination of all these views, the evil being indeed contended
against, but an element of truth being recognised in them all. He
directs his Polemics against the polytheism of vulgar paganism,
the allegorical interpretation by philosophers of pagan myths,
the doctrine of the creation of the world out of nothing and
the sacrificial worship of Judaism, against the hypostatic
Trinity of Catholicism, the chiliasm of the Ebionites, the pagan
naturalistic element in Elkesaism, the dualism, the doctrine
of the Demiurge, the Docetism and Antinomianism of the Gentile
Christian Gnostics. He attempts in his Ironies to point out the
Ebionitic identity of genuine Christianity with genuine Judaism,
emphasizes the Essenic-Elkesaitic demand to abstain from eating
flesh, to observe frequent fasts, divers washings and voluntary
poverty (through a recommendation of early marriages), as well
as the Catholic doctrine of the necessity of baptism for the
forgiveness of sins, and justifies the Gnostic tendency of his
times by setting up a system of doctrine of which the central
idea is the connection of Stoical Pantheism with Jewish Theism,
and is itself thoroughly dualistic: God the eternal pure Being
was originally a unity of πνεῦμα and σῶμα, and his life consisted
in extension and contraction, ἔκτασις and συστολή, the symbol
of which the human heart was a later copy. The result of such
an ἔκτασις was the separation of πνεῦμα and σῶμα, wherewith a
beginning of the development of the world was made. The πνεῦμα is
thus represented as Υἱός, also called Σοφία or Ἄρχων τοῦ αἰῶνος
τοῦ μέλλοντος; the Σῶμα is represented as Οὐσία or Ὕλη which four
times parts asunder in twofold opposition of the elements. Satan
springs from the mixing of these elements, and is the universal
soul of the Ἄρχων τοῦ αἰῶνος τούτου. The Σῶμα has thereby become
ἔμψυχον and ζῶον. Thus the Monas has unfolded itself into a Dyas,
as the first link of a long chain of contrasted pairs or Syzygies,
in the first series of which the large and male stands opposite
the small and female, heaven and earth, day and night, etc. The
last Syzygy of this series is Adam as the true male, and Eve as
the false female prophet. In the second series that relation had
come to be just reversed, Cain and Abel, Ishmael and Isaac, etc.
In the protoplasts this opposition of truth and falsehood, of
good and evil, was still a physical and necessary one; but in
their descendants, because both elements of their parents are
mixed up in them, it becomes an ethical one, conditioning and
requiring freedom of self-determination. Meanwhile Satan tempted
men to error and sin; but the true prophet (ὁ ἀληθὴς προφήτης) in
whom the divine Πνεῦμα dwelt as ἔμφυτον and ἀένναον, always leads
them back again into the true way of Gnosis and the fulfilment of
the law. In Adam, the original prophet, who had taught whole and
full truth, he had at first appeared, returning again after every
new obscuration and disfigurement of his doctrine under varying
names and forms, but always anew proclaiming the same truth. His
special manifestations were in Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob,
Moses, and finally, in Christ. Alongside of them all, however,
stand false prophets inspired by the spirit of lies, to whom even
John the Baptist belongs, and in the Old Testament many of their
doctrines and prophecies have slipped in along with the true
prophecy. The transition from the original pantheistic to the
subsequent theistic standpoint, in which God is represented as
personal creator of the world, lawgiver, and governor, seems
to have been introduced by means of the primitive partition of
the divine being into Πνεῦμα and Σῶμα. In vain, however, do we
seek an explanation of the contradiction that, on the one hand,
the end of the development of the world is represented as the
separation of the evil from the good for the eternal punishment
of the former, but on the other hand, as a return, through the
purification of the one and the destruction of the other, of all
into the divine being, the ἀνάπαυσις. Equally irreconcilable is
the assertion of the unconditional necessity of Christian baptism
with the assertion of the equality of all stages of revelation.
§ 29. MANICHÆISM.
Manichæism makes its appearance in Persia about the middle of the
third century, independently of the Gentile-Christian Gnosticism of the
Roman empire, which was more or less under the influence of the Greek
philosophy of the second century, but bearing undoubted connection with
Mandæism (§ 25, 1), and Elkesaism (§ 28, 2). In principle and tendency,
it was at various points, as _e.g._ in its theory of emanation, its
doceticism, etc., connected with Gnosticism, but was distinguished
therefrom pre-eminently by using Christian soteriological ideas
and modes of thought as a mere varnish for oriental pagan or
Babylonian-Chaldaic theosophy, putting this in place of Platonic or
Stoical notions which are quite foreign to it, basing the system on
Persian dualism and impregnating it with elements from Buddhist ethics.
Another point in which it is distinguished from Gnosticism is that it
does not present itself as an esoteric form of religion meant only for
the few specially gifted spirits, but distinctly endeavours to build up
a community of its own with a regularly articulated constitution and a
well organized ritual.
§ 29.1. =The Founder.=--What the Greek and Latin Fathers (Titus
of Bostra, Epiphanius, Augustine, etc.) say about the person and
history of the founder of this sect is derived mainly from an
account of a disputation which a bishop Archelaus of Cascar in
Mesopotamia is said to have held with Manes or Manichæus. This
document is written in Syriac and dates about A.D. 320, but it
is simply a polemical work under the guise of a debate between
men with historical names. These “Acts” have come down to us in
a very corrupt Latin version, and contain, especially in their
historical allusions, much that is incredible and legendary,
while in their representation of the doctrine of Manes they are
much more deserving of confidence. According to them the origin
of Manichæism is to be attributed to a far travelled Saracen
craftsman, named Scythianus, who lived in the age of the Apostles.
His disciple, Terebinthus, who subsequently in Babylon took
the name Buddas, and affirmed that he had been born of a
virgin, wrote at the master’s dictation four books, _Mysteria_,
_Capitula_, _Evangelium_, _Thesaurus_, which after his death
came into the possession of a freed slave, Cubricus or Corbicus.
This man made the wisdom taught therein his own, developed it
more fully, appeared in Persia as the founder of a new religion,
and called himself Manes. He was even received at court, but
his failure to heal a prince was used by the jealous magicians
to secure his overthrow. He escaped, however, from prison,
and found a safe hiding place in Arabion, an old castle in
Mesopotamia. Meanwhile he had got access to the sacred writings
of the Christians and borrowed much from them for the further
development of his system. He now gave himself out as the
Paraclete promised by Christ, and by means of letters and
messengers developed a great activity in the dissemination of his
views, especially among Christians. This led to the disputation
of Archelaus above referred to, in which Manes suffered utter
defeat. He was soon thereafter seized by order of the Persian
king, flayed alive, and his stuffed skin publicly exhibited as
a warning.
The reports in Persian documents of the ninth and tenth centuries
though later seem much more credible, and the dates derivable
from Manes’ own writings and those of his disciples quoted in
Arabic documents of the tenth and eleventh centuries, are quite
worthy of acceptance.[50] According to them Fatak the father
of Manes, called Πατέκιος in a Greek oath formula still extant,
was descended from a noble Persian family in Hamadan or Ecbatana,
married a princess of the Parthian Asarcidae, not long before
this, in A.D. 226, driven out by the Persian Sassanidæ, and
settled down with her at Ctesiphon, the Parthian capital. Here
he met with the Mogtasilah, Mandeans or Elkesaites (§ 28, 2),
then removed to Southern Chaldea, and trained his son, born in
A.D. 216, with great care in this faith. But even in his twelfth
year Manes received a divine revelation, which ordained him to
be the founder of a new religion, and in his twenty-fourth year
he was commissioned to preach this religion publicly. On his first
appearance in Persia, on the coronation day of king Sapor I.,
in A.D. 242, he met with so little support that he found it
necessary to keep away from the Persian empire for several
decades, which he spent in foreign lands developing his system
and successfully prosecuting missionary work. It was only about
the end of Sapor’s reign († A.D. 272) that he ventured again to
return. He won over to his views the king’s brother Peroz and
through him found favour temporarily with Sapor, which, however,
soon again turned into dislike. Sapor’s successor, Hormuz or
Hormisdas I., seemed inclined to be tolerant toward him. For
this very reason Bahram or Baranes I. showed himself all the more
hostile, and had him crucified in A.D. 276, his body flayed, and
the skin stuffed with straw thrown out at the gate of the city.
The two accounts may, according to Kessler, be brought into
harmony thus. The name Scythianus was given to Fatak as coming
from Parthia or Scythia. Terebinthus, a corruption of the Aramaic
_tarbitha_, sapling, was given originally as _Nomen appell._ to
the son of Fatak, and was afterwards misunderstood and regarded
as _Nomen propr._ of an additional member of the family,
intermediate between Fatak and Manes. In the Latin Cubricus,
however, we meet with a scornful rendering of his original name,
which he, on his entering independently on his work, exchanged
for the name Manes.[51] The name Buddas seems to indicate some
sort of connection with Buddhism. We also meet with the four
Terebinthus books among the seven chief works of Manes catalogued
in the Fihrist. According to a Persian document the _Evangelium_
bore the title _Ertenki Mani_, was composed by Manes in a cave
in Turkestan, in which he stayed for a long time during his
banishment, and was adorned with beautiful illustrations, and
passed for a book sent down to him direct from heaven.
§ 29.2. =The System.=--The different sets of documents give very
different accounts of the religious system of Manichæism. This is
not occasioned so much by erroneous tradition or misconception as
by the varying stages through which the doctrine of Manes passed.
In Western and Christian lands it took on a richer Christian
colouring than in Eastern and pagan countries. In all its forms,
however, we meet with a groundwork of magical dualism. As in
Parseeism, Ahriman and his Devas stand opposed to Ormuzd and
his Ameshaspentas and Izeds, so also here from all eternity a
luminous ether surrounding the realm of light, the _Terra lucida_,
of the good God, with his twelve æons and countless beings
of light, stands opposed to the realm of darkness, the _Terra
pestifera_, with Satan and his demons. Each of the two kingdoms
consists of five elements: the former of bright light, quickening
fire, clear water, hot air, soft wind; the latter of lurid flame,
scorching fire, grimy slime, dark clouds, raging tempest. In
the one, perfect concord, goodness, happiness, and splendour
prevail; in the other, wild, chaotic and destructive waves dash
confusedly about. Clothing himself in a borrowed ray of light,
Satan prepared himself for a robber campaign in the realm of
light. In order to keep him off the Father of Lights caused to
emanate from him the “Mother of Life,” and placed her as a watcher
on the borders of his realm. She brought forth the first man
(ὁ πρῶτος ἄνθρωπος), who armed with the five pure elements engaged
in battle with the demons. When he sank before their furious
onslaught, God sent a newly emanated æon for his deliverance, the
“living spirit” (ζῶον πνεῦμα), who freed him and vanquished the
demons. But a portion of the ethereal substance of the first man,
his armour of light, had been already devoured by the demoniac
Hyle, and as the _Jesus patibilis_, υἱὸς ἀνθρώπου ἐμπαθής,
remains imprisoned in it. Out of the elements of light which he
saved the living Spirit now forms the Sun and Moon, and settles
there the first man as _Jesus impatibilis_, υἱὸς ἀνθρώπου ἀπαθής,
while out of the Hyle impregnated with elements of light he
constructs the present earthly world, in order gradually to
deliver the fragments of light bound up in it, the _Jesus
patibilis_ or the soul of the world, and to fit them for
restoration to their eternal home. The first man dwelling in
the sun and the Holy Spirit enthroned in the luminous ether have
to further and direct this process of purification. The sun and
moon are the two light-ships, _lucidæ naves_, which the light
particles wrenched out of the world further increase. The zodiac
with its twelve signs operates in this direction like a revolving
wheel with twelve buckets, while the smaller ship, as new moon,
receives them, and as full moon empties them again into the sun,
which introduces them into the realm of light. In order to check
this process of purification Satan, out of the Hyle and the
imprisoned particles of light, of which he still had possession,
made Adam and Eve after his own image and that of the first man,
and incited them to fleshly lusts and carnal intercourse, so
that the light of their soul became dim and weak, and more and
more the body became its gloomy prison. His demons, moreover,
were continually busying themselves in fastening the chains of
darkness more tightly about their descendants by means of the
false religions of Judaism and paganism. Therefore at last the
_Jesus impatibilis_, clothed with the appearance of a body,
descended from the sun to the earth, to instruct men about their
souls and the means and end of their redemption. The sufferings
and death inflicted upon him by the Prince of Darkness were only
in appearance. The death of the cross and the resurrection were
only sensible representations of the overthrow and final victory
of the _Jesus patibilis_. As in the macrocosm of the earthly
world there is set forth the emancipation of this suffering
Christ from the bonds of hylic matter, so also in the microcosm
represented in each individual man, we have the dominion of the
spirit over the flesh, the redemption of the soul of light from
the prison of the body, and its return to the realm of light,
conceived of as the end and aim of all endeavour. The method
for attaining this consists in the greatest possible abstinence
from all connection and intercourse with the world of sense; the
_Signaculum oris_ in particular demands absolute abstinence from
all animal food and restriction in the use even of vegetable food,
for in the slaughtering of the animal all elements of light are
with the life withdrawn from its flesh, and only hylic elements
remain, whereas in vegetable fare the substances of light there
present contribute to the strengthening of the light in the man’s
own soul. Wine and all intoxicating drinks as “Satan’s gall”
are strictly forbidden, as well as animal food. The _Signaculum
manuum_ prohibits all injuring of animal or plant life, all
avoidable contact with or work upon matter, because the material
is thereby strengthened. The _Signaculum sinus_ forbids all
sensual pleasure and carnal intercourse. The souls of those men
who have perfectly satisfied the threefold injunction, return at
death immediately into the blessed home of light. Those who only
partially observe them must, by transmigration of the soul into
other bodies, of animals, plants or men, in proportion to the
degree of purification attained unto, that is, by metempsychosis,
have the purifying process carried to perfection. But all who
have not entered upon the way of sanctification, are finally
delivered over unreservedly to Satan and hell. The Apostles
greatly misunderstood and falsified this doctrine of Christ;
but in the person of Manes the promised Paraclete appeared, who
taught it again in its original purity. For the most part Manes
accepted the Pauline epistles in which the doctrines of the
groaning creation and the opposition of flesh and spirit must
have been peculiarly acceptable to him; all the more decidedly
did he reject the Acts of the Apostles, and vigorously did
he oppose the account which it gave of the outpouring of the
Holy Spirit as in conflict with his doctrine of the Paraclete.
According to the Fihrist, Manes distinguished from the _Jesus
impatibilis_ who as true redeemer descended to earth in the
appearance of a body, the historical Jesus as prophet of the
Devil, and the false Messiah who for the punishment of his
wickedness suffered actual death on the cross instead of the
true Jesus. The Old Testament he wholly rejected. The god of the
Jews was with him the Prince of Darkness; the prophets with Moses
at their head were the messengers of the Devil. As his own true
precursors--the precursors of the Paraclete--he named Adam, Seth,
Noah, Abraham, Buddha, and Zoroaster.
§ 29.3. =Constitution, Worship, and Missionarizing.=--Manes was
still regarded after his death as the invisibly present head
(_Princeps_) of the church. At the head of the hierarchical order
as his visible representative stood an Imam or Pope, who resided
at Babylon. The first of these, appointed by Manes himself before
his death, was named Sis or Sisinius. The Manichæan ministry
was distributed under him into twelve _Magistri_ and seventy-two
_Bishops_, with presbyters and deacons in numbers as required.
The congregations consisted of Catechumens (_Auditores_) and
Elect (_Electi_, _Perfecti_). The latter were strictly bound
to observe the threefold _Signaculum_. The _Auditores_ brought
them the food necessary for the support of their life and out
of the abundance of their holiness they procured pardon to
these imperfect ones for their unavoidable violation of mineral
and vegetable life in making this provision. The _Auditores_
were also allowed to marry and even to eat animal food; but
by voluntary renunciation of this permission they could secure
entrance into the ranks of the _Electi_. The worship of the
Manichæans was simple, but orderly. They addressed their prayers
to the sun and moon. The Sunday was hallowed by absolute fasting,
and the day of common worship was dedicated to the honour of
the spirit of the sun; but on Monday the _Electi_ by themselves
celebrated a secret service. At their annual chief festival,
that of the Pulpit (βῆμα), on the day of their founder’s death,
they threw themselves down upon the ground in oriental fashion
before a beautifully adorned chair of state, the symbol of their
departed master. The five steps leading up to it represented
the five hierarchical decrees of the _Electi_, _Diaconi_,
_Presbyteri_, _Episcopi_ and _Magistri_. Baptism and the Lord’s
Supper, the former with oil, the latter with bread without wine,
belonged to the secret worship of the Perfect. Oil and bread were
regarded as the most luminous bearers of the universal soul in
the vegetable world.--Notwithstanding the violent persecution
which after the execution of Manes was raised against the
adherents of his doctrine throughout the whole Persian empire,
their number increased rapidly in all quarters, especially in
the East, but also in the West, in Syria, Palestine, Egypt, etc.
Proconsular Africa became the centre of its Western propaganda;
and thence it spread into Italy and Spain. In A.D. 290 Diocletian
issued an edict by which the Proconsul of Africa was required to
burn the leaders of this sect, doubly dangerous as springing from
the hostile Persian empire, along with their books, to execute
with the sword its persistent adherents, or send them to work in
the quarries, and confiscate their goods.--Continuation at § 54, 1.
III. THE DOCTRINAL DEVELOPMENT AND APOLOGETICAL
ACTIVITY OF THE CHURCH.[52]
§ 30. THE THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE OF THE POST-APOSTOLIC
AGE, A.D. 70-170.[53]
The literary remains of the so-called Apostolic Fathers constitute the
first fruits of Patristic-Christian literature. These are in respect of
number and scope insignificant, and, inasmuch as they had their origin,
from the special individual circumstances of their writers, they were
composed for the most part in the form of epistles. The old traditional
view that the authors of these treatises had enjoyed the immediate
fellowship and instruction of the Apostles is at once too narrow
and too wide. Among these writings must be included first of all the
recently discovered “Teaching of the Twelve Apostles.” About A.D. 130,
when Christianity was making its way among the ranks of the cultured,
Christian writers began to feel themselves called upon to engage with
paganism in a literary warfare defensive and offensive, in order to
repel the charges and calumnies raised against their religion and to
demonstrate its inner worth in opposition to the moral and religious
degradation of heathenism. These writings had a more theological and
scientific character than those of the Apostolic Fathers, which had more
of a practical and hortatory tendency. The works of these Apologists
still extant afford interesting and significant glimpses of the life,
doctrine, and thinking of the Christians of that age, which but for
these writings would have been almost unknown.
§ 30.1. =The Beginnings of Patristic Literature.=--According to
the established rule of the church we have to distinguish between
New Testament and Patristic literature in this way: to the former
belongs those writings to which, as composed by Apostles or at
least under Apostolic authority, the ancient church assigned
an objectively fundamental and regulative significance for
further ecclesiastical development; while in the latter we have
represented the subjective conception and estimation which the
Church Fathers made of the Christian message of salvation and
the structure they reared upon this foundation. The so-called
Apostolic Fathers may be regarded as occupying a position
midway between the two and forming a transition from the one
to the other, or as themselves constituting the first fruits
of Patristic literature. Indeed as regards the New Testament
writings themselves the ancient church was long uncertain and
undecided as to the selection of them from the multitude of
contemporary writings;[54] and Eusebius still designated several
of the books that were subsequently definitely recognised
ἀντιλεγόμενα; while modern criticism has not only repeated such
doubts as to the genuineness of these writings but has extended
these doubts to other books of the New Testament. But even this
criticism cannot deny the historical significance assigned above
to those New Testament books contested by it, even though it may
feel obliged to reject the account of them given by the ancient
church, and to assign their composition to the Post-Apostolic
Age.--When we turn to the so-called Apostolic Fathers, on closer
examination the usual designation as well as the customary
enumeration of seven names as belonging to the group will be
found too narrow because excluding the New Testament writings
composed by disciples of the Apostles, and too wide because
including names which have no claim to be regarded as disciples
or contemporaries of the Apostles, and embracing writings of
which the authenticity is in some cases clearly disproved, in
other cases doubtful or at least only problematical. We come upon
firm ground when we proceed to deal with the Apologists of the
age of Hadrian. It was not, however, till the period of the Old
Catholic Church, about A.D. 170, that the literary compositions
of the Christians became broadened, deepened and universalized
by a fuller appropriation and appreciation of the elements
of Græco-Latin culture, so as to form an all-sided universal
Christian literature representative of Christianity as a universal
religion.
§ 30.2. =The Theology of the Post-Apostolic Age.=--By far the
greater number of the ecclesiastical writers of this period
belong to the Gentile Christian party. Hence we might suppose
that it would reflect the Pauline type of doctrine, if not in its
full depth and completeness, yet at least in its more significant
and characteristic features. This expectation, however, is not
altogether realised. Among the Church Fathers of this age we
rather find an unconscious deterioration of the original doctrine
of Paul revealing itself as a smoothing down and belittling or
as an ignoring of the genuine Paulinism, which, therefore, as
the result of the struggle against the Gnostic tendency, only in
part overcome, was for the first time fully recognised and proved
finally victorious in the Reformation of the 16th century. On the
one hand, we see that these writers, if they do not completely
ignore the position and task assigned to Israel as the chosen
people of God, minimise their importance and often fail to
appreciate the pædagogical significance of the Mosaic law
(Gal. iii. 24), so that its ceremonial parts are referred to
misunderstanding, want of sense, and folly, or are attributed
even to demoniacal suggestion. But on the other hand, even
the gospel itself is regarded again as a new and higher law,
purified from that ceremonial taint, and hence the task of the
ante-mundane Son of God, begotten for the purpose of creating the
world, but now also manifest in the flesh, from whose influence
upon Old Testament prophets as well as upon the sages of paganism
all revelations of pre-Christian Judaism as well as all σπέρματα
of true knowledge in paganism have sprung, is pre-eminently
conceived of as that of a divine teacher and lawgiver. In this
way there was impressed upon the Old Catholic Church as it
grew up out of Pauline Gentile Christianity a legalistic moral
tendency that was quite foreign to the original Paulinism, and
the righteousness of faith taught by the Apostle when represented
as obedience to the “new law” passed over again unobserved into a
righteousness of works. Redemption and reconciliation are indeed
still always admitted to be conditioned by the death of Christ
and their appropriation to be by the faith of the individual;
but this faith is at bottom nothing more than the conviction
of the divinity of the person and doctrine of the new lawgiver
evidencing itself in repentance and rendering of practical
obedience, and in confident expectation of the second coming
of Christ, and in a sure confidence of a share in the life
everlasting.--The introduction of this legalistic tendency into
the Gentile Christian Church was not occasioned by the influence
of Jewish Christian legalism, nor can it be explained as
the result of a compromise effected between Jewish Christian
Petrinism and Gentile Christian Paulinism, which were supposed
by Baur, Schwegler, etc., to have been, during the Apostolic
Age, irreconcilably hostile to one another. This has been already
proved by Ritschl, who charges its intrusion rather upon the
inability of Gentile Christianity fully to understand the Old
Testament bases of the Pauline doctrine. By means of a careful
analysis of the undisputed writings of Justin Martyr and
by a comparison of these with the writings of the Apostolic
Fathers, Engelhardt has proved that anything extra-, un-, or
anti-Pauline in the Christianity of these Fathers has not so much
an Ebionitic-Jewish Christian, but rather a pagan-philosophic,
source. He shows that the prevalent religio-moral mode of thought
of the cultured paganism of that age reappears in that form
of Christianity not only as an inability to reach a profound
understanding of the Old Testament, but also just as much
as a minimising and depreciating, or disdaining of so many
characteristic features of the Pauline doctrinal resting on Old
Testament foundations.
§ 30.3. =The so-called Apostolic Fathers.=[55]--
a. =Clement of Rome= was one of the first Roman bishops,
probably the third (§ 16, 1). The opinion that he is to
be identified with the Clement named in Phil. iv. 3 is
absolutely unsupported. The sameness of age and residence
in some small measure favours the identifying him with
Tit. Flav. Clemens [Clement], the consul, and cousin of the
Emperor, who on account of his Christianity (?) was executed
in A.D. 95 (§ 22, 1). Besides a multitude of other writings
which subsequently assumed his well-known name (§ 28, 3;
43, 4), there are ascribed to him two so-called Epistles
to the Corinthians, of which however, the second certainly
is not his. The First Epistle which in the ancient church
was considered worthy to be used in public worship, was
afterwards lost, but fragments of it were recovered in
A.D. 1628 in the so-called _Codex Alexandrinus_ (§ 152, 2),
together with a portion of the so-called “Second Epistle.”
Recently however both writings were found in a complete
form by Bryennius, Metropolitan of Serrä in Macedonia, in
a Jerusalem Codex of A.D. 1056 discovered at Constantinople
and published by him.[56] In the following year a Codex
of the Syrian New Testament at Cambridge was more closely
examined,[57] and in it there was found a complete Syriac
translation of both writings inserted between the Catholic
and the Pauline Epistles, while in _Codex Alexandrinus_ they
are placed after the Apocalypse. =The “First” Epistle=, the
date of which is generally given as A.D. 93-95, does not
give the author’s name, but is assigned to Clement of Rome
by Dionysius of Corinth in A.D. 170, as quoted in Eusebius,
and by Irenæus, Clement of Alexandria, and Origen, and
described as written from Rome in name of the church of that
place to the church of Corinth, counselling peace and unity.
In the passage c. 58-63, formerly wanting but now restored,
the exhortation passes into a long prayer with intercessions
for those in authority and for the church according to what
was perhaps already the customary form of public prayer in
Rome. Both churches, those of Rome and Corinth, are admitted
without dispute to have been Gentile Christian churches,
which had accepted the Pauline type of doctrine, without
however fully fathoming or understanding it. But Peter also
occupies a position of equal honour alongside of Paul, and
nowhere does any trace appear of a consciousness of any
opposition between the two apostles. The divine sonship
of the Redeemer and His consequent universal sovereignty
are the basis of the Christian confession, but no sort
of developed doctrine of the divinity of Christ is here
found, and even His pre-existence is affirmed only as the
presupposition of the view that He was already operative in
the prophets by His spirit. The Old Testament, allegorically
and typically interpreted, is therefore the source and
proof of Christian doctrine. Of a particular election of
Israel the author knows nothing. Christians as such, whether
descended from Gentiles or from Jews, are the chosen people
of God; Abraham by reason of his faith is their father; and
it is only by faith in the Almighty God that men of all ages
have been justified before God.--In the so-called =Second
“Epistle”= the completed form of the second half proves
what the less complete form rendered probable, that it is
no Epistle but a sermon, and indeed the oldest specimen of
a sermon, that we here possess. The author, who delivered it
somewhere about A.D. 144-150, wrote it out first for his own
use, and then for the church. As it has in its theological
views many points of contact with the _Shepherd of Hermas_
(§ 30, 4), Harnack thinks it probable that a younger
Clement of Rome mentioned by Hermas may be the author;
while Hilgenfeld is inclined to regard it as a youthful
work of Clement of Alexandria (§ 31, 4). It contains a
forcible exhortation to thorough repentance and conversion
in accordance with the command of Christ, with a reference
to the judgment and the future glory. This shows in a
remarkable way what rapid progress had been made from the
religio-moral mode of thought of cultured paganism toward
moralizing legalism, and the smoothing down of Christianity
thereby introduced into the Gentile-Christian Catholic
Church, during the half century between the composition of
the Epistle of Clement and this Clementine discourse. For in
the latter already the gospel is represented as a new law, a
higher divine doctrine of virtue and reward, in which alms,
fasts, and prayer appear as specially meritorious works. The
righteousness that avails with God is still indeed derived
from faith, but this faith is reduced to a belief in the
future recompense of eternal life. Christ as Son of God is
conceived of by the author as a pneumatical heavenly being,
created before the world, who, sent by God into the world
for man’s redemption, took upon Him human σάρξ. But besides
Him, he also knows a second pneumatical hypostasis created
before the world, “before sun and moon,” the ἐκκλησία ζῶσα,
which, as the heavenly body of Christ, is at the same time
the presupposition for the making of the world restored by
His work of salvation. For the creation of this divine pair
of æons, that is, of Christ as the ἄνθρωπος ἐπουράνιος and
of the church as His heavenly σύζυγος, the author refers
to the account of the creation in Gen. i. 27. Of passages
quoted as sayings of Christ several are not to be found in
our Gospels.
§ 30.4.
b. The Epistle known by the name of Paul’s travelling companion
=Barnabas= (Acts iv. 36) was first recovered in the 17th
century. The first 4½ chapters were added from an old Latin
translation, till in the 19th century the _Codex Sinaiticus_
of the New Testament, and recently also the Jerusalem
Codex of Bryennius above referred to, supplied the complete
Greek text.[58] The date of the epistle has been variously
assigned to the age of Domitian, to that of Nerva, to that
of Hadrian; and is placed by Harnack between A.D. 96 and
A.D. 125. Its extravagant allegorical interpretation of
the Old Testament betrays its Alexandrian origin, and in
Gentile-Christian depreciation of the ceremonial law of the
Old Testament it goes so far as to attribute the conception
and actual composition of its books to diabolical inspiration.
It admits indeed a covenant engagement between God and
Israel, but maintains that this was immediately terminated
by Moses’ breaking of the tables of the law. All things
considered the composition of this Epistle by Barnabas is
scarcely conceivable. This was acknowledged by Eusebius
who counted it among the νόθοι, and by Jerome, who placed
it among the Apocrypha. For the rest, however, its type
of doctrine is in essential agreement with that of Paul,
though it fails to penetrate the depths of apostolic
truth. It is at least decidedly free from any taint of
that legalistic-moral conception of Christianity which is
so strongly masked in the discourse of Clement. The divine
sonship, pre-existence, and world-creating activity of Christ
is expressly acknowledged and taught, though there is yet no
reference to the doctrine of the Logos.
c. The prophetical writing known to us as =Pastor Hermæ
[Hermas]=,[59] which was first erroneously attributed by
Origen to Hermas the scholar of Paul at Rome (Rom. xvi. 14),
was so highly esteemed in the ancient church that it was
used in public like the canonical books of the New Testament.
Irenæus quotes it as holy scripture; Clement and Origen
regarded it as inspired, and the African church of the 3rd
century included it in the New Testament canon. On the other
hand, the Muratorian canon (§ 36, 8) had already ranked it
among the Apocrypha that might be used in private but not in
public worship. The book owes its title to the circumstance
that in it an angel appears in the form of a shepherd
instructing Hermas. It contains four visions, in which the
church, which πάντων πρώτη ἐκτίσθη, appears to the author
as an old woman giving instruction (πρεσβυτέρα); it contains
also twelve _Mandata_ of the angel, and finally, ten
_Similitudines_ or parables. The Gentile-Christian origin of
the author is shown by the position which he assigns to the
church as coeval with the creation of the world and as at
first embracing all mankind. The sending of the Son of God
into the world has for its end not the founding but only the
renewing and perfecting of the church, and the twelve tribes
to which the Apostles were to preach the gospel are “the
twelve peoples who dwell on the whole earth” (comp. Deut.
xxxii. 8). In all the three parts the book takes the form of
a continuous earnest call to repentance in view of the early
coming again of Christ, dominated throughout by that same
legalistic conception of the Gospel that we meet with in the
discourse of Clement. Indeed this is more fully carried
out, for it teaches that the true penitent is able not
only to live a perfectly righteous life, but also in good
works, such as fasts, alms, etc., to do more than fulfil the
commands of God, and in this way to win for himself a higher
measure of the divine favour and eternal blessedness. In
Hermas we find no trace of any application of the doctrine
of the Logos to the person of Christ, and the ideas of the
Son of God and the Holy Spirit are confused with one another.
The Son of God as the Holy Spirit is προγενέστερος πάσης
τῆς κτίσεως; at His suggestion and by His means God created
the world; through Him He bears, sustains, and upholds it;
and by Him He redeems it by means of His incarnation, for
the Son of God as the Holy Spirit descends upon the man
Jesus in His baptism. From its prophetical utterances,
its eager expectation of the early return of the Lord,
and its promises of a new outpouring of the Spirit for the
quickening of the church already become too worldly, the
book may be characterized as a precursor of the Montanist
movement (§ 40), although on questions of practical morality,
such as second marriages, martyrdom, fasting, etc., it
exhibits a milder tendency than that of Montanistic rigorism,
and in reference to penitential discipline (§ 39, 2), while
acknowledging the inadmissibility of absolution for a mortal
sin committed after baptism, it nevertheless, owing to
the nearness of the second coming, allows to be proclaimed
by the angel a repeated, though only short, space for
repentance. The date of the composition of this book is
still matter of controversy. Since Hermas is commanded in
the second vision to send a copy of his book to “Clement” in
order to secure its further circulation, most of the earlier
scholars, and among the moderns specially Zahn, identifying
this Clement with the celebrated Roman Presbyter-Bishop
of that name, fix its date at somewhere about A.D. 100.
Recently, however, Harnack, v. Gebhardt, and others have
rightly assigned much greater importance to the testimony
of the Muratorian canon, according to which it was written
somewhere between A.D. 130-160, “_nuperrime temporibus
nostris in urbe Roma_,” by Hermas, the brother of the Roman
bishop Pius (A.D. 139-154).
§ 30.5.
d. =Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch=, is said to have been a
pupil of the Apostle John, though no evidence of this can
be produced from the Epistles ascribed to him. The _Acta
martyrii sancti Ignatii_, extant in five parts, are purely
legendary and full of contradictory statements. According
to a later document, that of the Byzantine chronographer
Joh. Malalas, at the time of the Parthian war during the
visit of Trajan to Antioch in A.D. 115, soon after an
earthquake had been experienced there, he was torn asunder
by lions in the circus as a despiser of the gods. According
to the martyrologies he was transported to Rome and suffered
this fate there, as usually supposed in A.D. 115, in the
opinion of Wieseler and others in A.D. 107 (Lightfoot says
between A.D. 100-118), according to Harnack soon after
A.D. 130.[60] The epistles to various churches and one
to Polycarp ascribed to him have come down to us in three
recensions differing from one another in extent, number and
character. There is a shorter Greek recension containing
seven, a larger Greek form, with expansions introduced for a
purpose, containing thirteen epistles, twelve by and one to
Ignatius, and the shortest of all in a Syriac translation
containing three epistles, those to the Romans, to the
Ephesians, and to Polycarp.[61] According to the first-named
recension, Ignatius is represented as writing all his
epistles during his martyr journey to Rome, but no reference
to this is made in the Syrian recension. Vigorous polemic
against Judaistic and Docetic heresy, undaunted confession
of the divinity of Christ, and unwearied exhortation to
recognise the bishop as the representative of Christ,
while the presbyters are described as the successors of the
Apostles, distinguish these epistles from all other writings
of this age, especially in the two Greek recensions, and
have led many critics to question their genuineness. Bunsen,
Lipsius, Ritschl, etc., regarded the Syrian recension, in
which the hierarchical tendency was more in the background,
as the original and authentic form. Uhlhorn, Düsterdieck,
Zahn, Funk, Lightfoot, Harnack, etc., prefer the shorter
Greek recension, and view the Syrian form as abbreviated
perhaps for liturgical purposes, Baur, Hilgenfeld, Volkmar,
etc., deny the genuineness of all three. But even on this
assumption, in determining the date of the composition of
the two shorter recensions, to whichever of them we may
ascribe priority and originality, we cannot on internal
grounds put them later than the middle of the second century,
whereas the larger Greek recension paraphrased and expanded
into thirteen epistles belongs certainly to a much later
date (§ 43, 4).[62]
§ 30.6.
e. =Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna=, had also been according to
Irenæus ordained to this office by the Apostle John. He
died at the stake under Marcus Aurelius (Antoninus Pius?)
in A.D. 166 (or A.D. 155) at an extreme old age (§ 22, 3).
We possess an epistle of his to the Philippians of
practical contents important on account of its New Testament
quotations. Its genuineness, however, has been contested
by modern criticism. It stands and falls with the seven
Ignatian epistles, as it occupies common ground with them.
We have a legendary biography of Polycarp by Pionius dating
from the 4th century, which is reproduced in Lightfoot’s
work.
f. =Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis= in Galatia, was also,
according to Irenæus, a pupil of the Apostle John. This
statement, however, in the opinion of Eusebius and many
moderns, rests upon a confusion between the Apostle and
another John, whom Papias himself distinguishes by the title
πρεσβύτερος (§ 16, 2). He is said to have suffered death
as a martyr under Marcus Aurelius, about A.D. 163. With
great diligence he collected mediately and immediately
from the mouths of the πρεσβύτεροι, that is, from such as
had intercourse with the Apostles, or had been, like the
above-mentioned John the Presbyter, μαθηταὶ τοῦ κυρίου, oral
traditions about the discourses of the Lord, and set down
the results of his inquiries in a writing entitled Λογίων
κυριακῶν ἐξήγησις. A passage quoted by Eusebius in his
_Ch. Hist._, iii. 29, from the preface of this treatise has
given rise to a lively controversy as to whether Papias was a
pupil of the Apostle John and was acquainted with the fourth
Gospel. Another fragment on the history of the origin of
the Gospels of Matthew and Mark has occasioned a dispute
as to whether only these two Gospels were known to him.
Finally, there is preserved in Irenæus a passage giving a
reputed saying of Christ regarding the fantastically rich
fruitfulness of the earth during the thousand years’ reign
(§ 33, 9). He so revels in fantastic and sensuous chiliastic
dreams that Eusebius, who had previously spoken of him as
a learned and well-read man, is driven to pass upon him the
harsh judgment: σφόδρα γάρ τοι σμικρὸς ὢν τὸν νοῦν.[63]
g. Finally, we must here include an epistle to a certain
=Diognetus= by an unknown writer, who has described himself
as μαθητὴς τῶν ἀποστόλων. Justin Martyr, among whose
writings this epistle got inserted, cannot possibly have
been the author, as both his style and his point of view
are different. The epistle controverts in a spirited manner
the objections of Diognetus to Christianity, views the
pagan deities not, like the other Church Fathers, as demons,
but as unsubstantial phantoms, explains the Old Testament
institutions as human, and so in part foolish enactments,
and maintains keenly and determinedly the opinion that
God for the first time revealed Himself to man in Christ.
He thus, as Dräseke thinks, to some extent favours the
Marcionite view of the Old Testament, so that he regards
it as not improbable that our epistle was composed by a
disciple of Marcion, one perhaps like Apelles, who in the
course of the later development of the school had rejected
many of his master’s crudities (§ 27, 12). He addresses
his discourse to Diognetus, the stoical philosopher who
boasts of Marcus Aurelius as his master. On the other hand,
Overbeck assigns its composition to the Post-Constantine
Age, and the French scholar Doulcet, setting it down to the
age of Hadrian, thinks he has discovered the author to be
the Athenian philosopher Aristides. This idea has been more
fully carried out by Kihn, who endeavours to make out not
only the identity of the author, but that of him to whom the
epistle is addressed: Κράτιστε Διόγνητε, “Almighty son of
Zeus,” that is, Hadrian.
§ 30.7. =The Didache or Teaching of the Twelve Apostles.=--The
celebrated little treatise bearing the title Διδαχὴ κυρίου διὰ
τῶν δώδεκα ἀποστόλων τοῖς ἔθνεσιν was discovered by Bryennius
(then metropolitan of Serrä, now of Nicomedia) in the Jerusalem
Codex, to which we also owe the perfect text of the two so-called
Epistles of Clement, and it was edited by this scholar with
prolegomena and notes in Greek, at Constantinople in 1883. It at
once set in motion many learned pens in Germany, France, Holland,
England, and North America.--Eusebius, who first expressly names
it in his list of New Testament writings as τῶν ἀποστόλων αἱ
λεγόμεναι διδαχαί, which Rufinus renders by _Doctrina quæ dicitur
App._, places it in the closest connection with the Epistle of
Barnabas among the ἀντιλεγόμενα νόθα (§ 36, 8). Four years later
Athanasius ranks it as διδαχὴ καλουμένη τῶν ἀπ. along with the
Shepherd of Hermas, giving it the first place, as a New Testament
supplement corresponding to the Old Testament ἀναγινωσκόμενα
(§ 59, 1). Clement of Alexandria quoting a passage from it uses
the formula, ὑπὸ τῆς γραφῆς εἴρηται, and thus treats it as holy
scripture. In Origen again no sort of reference to it has as
yet been found. From the 39th Festival Epistle of Athanasius,
A.D. 367, which ranks it, as we have just seen, as a New Testament
supplement like the Old Testament Anaginoskomena, we know that
it like these were used at Alexandria παρὰ τῶν πατέρων in the
instruction of catechumens. In the East, according to Rufinus,
when enumerating in his _Expos. Symb. Ap._ the Athanasian
Anaginoskomena, we find alongside of Hermas, instead of
the Didache, the “Two Ways,” _Duæ viæ vel Judicium secundum
Petrum_. Jerome, too, in his _De vir. ill._, mentions among the
pseudo-Petrine writings a _Judicium Petri_. We have here no doubt
a Latin translation or recension of the first six chapters of
the Didache beginning with the words: Ὅδοι δύο εἰσι, these two
ways being the way of life and the way of death. The second title
instead of the twelve Apostles names their spokesman Peter as the
reputed author of the treatise. Soon after the time of Athanasius
our tract passed out of the view of the Church Fathers, but it
reappears in the Ecclesiastical Constitutions of the 4th century
(§ 43, 4, 5), of which it formed the root and stem. The Didache
itself, however, should not be ranked among the pseudepigraphs,
for it never claims to have been written by the twelve Apostles
or by their spokesman Peter.--Bryennius and others, from the
intentional prominence given to the twelve Apostles in the
title and from the legalistic moralizing spirit that pervades
the book, felt themselves justified in seeking its origin in
Jewish-Christian circles. But this moralizing character it shares
with the other Gentile-Christian writings of the Post-Apostolic
Age (§ 30, 2), and the restriction of the term “Apostles” by the
word “twelve” was occasioned by this, that the itinerant preachers
of the gospel of that time, who in the New Testament are called
Evangelists (§ 17, 5) were now called Apostles as continuators of
the Apostles’ missionary labours, and also the exclusion of the
Apostle Paul is to be explained by the consideration that the
book is founded upon the sayings of the Lord, the tradition
of which has come to us only through the twelve. It has been
rightly maintained on the other hand by Harnack, that the author
must rather have belonged to Gentile-Christian circles which
repudiated all communion with the Jews even in matters of mere
form; for in chap. viii. 1, 2, resting upon Matt. vi. 5, 16,
he forbids fasting with the hypocrites, “the Jews,” or perhaps
in the sense of Gal. ii. 13, the Jewish-Christians, on Monday
and Thursday, instead of Wednesday and Friday according to the
Christian custom (§ 37, 3), and using Jewish prayers instead
of the Lord’s Prayer. The address of the title: τοῖς ἔθνεσιν
is to be understood according to the analogy of Rom. xi. 13;
Gal. ii. 12-14; and Eph. iii. 1. The author wishes in as brief,
lucid, easily comprehended, and easily remembered form as
possible, to gather together for Christians converted from
heathenism the most important rules for their moral, religious
and congregational life in accordance with the precepts of
the Lord as communicated by the twelve Apostles, and in doing
so furnishes us with a valuable “commentary on the earliest
witnesses for the life, type of doctrine, interests and
ordinances of the Gentile-Christian churches in the pre-Catholic
age.” As to the date of its composition, its connection with
the Epistle of Barnabas and the Shepherd of Hermas indicates the
period within which it must fall, for the connection is so close
that it must have employed them or they must have employed it.
However, not only is the age of the Epistle of Barnabas, as well
as that of the Shepherd of Hermas, still undetermined, but it is
also disputed whether one or other of these two or the Didache
has priority and originality. On the other hand, the Didache
itself in almost all its data and presuppositions bears so
distinct an impress of an archaic character that one feels
obliged to assign its date as near the Apostolic Age as possible.
Harnack who feels compelled to ascribe priority not only to the
Pseudo-Barnabas, but also to the Shepherd of Hermas, fixes its
date between A.D. 140-165, after Hermas and before Marcion. On
the other hand, Zahn and Funk, Lechler, Taylor, etc., give the
Didache priority even over the Epistle of Barnabas. The place
as well as the time of the composition of this work is matter
of dispute. Those who maintain its Jewish-Christian origin think
of the southern lands to the east or west of the Jordan; others
think of Syria. On account of its connection with the Epistle
of Barnabas, and with reference to Clement and Athanasius (see
above), Harnack has decided for Egypt, and, on account of its
agreement with the Sahidic translation of the New Testament in
omitting the doxology from Matt. v. 13, he fixes more exactly upon
Upper Egypt. The objection that the designation of the grain of
which the bread for the Lord’s Supper is made in the eucharistic
prayer given in chap. ix. 4 as ἐπάνω τῶν ὀρέων, does not
correspond with that grown there, is sought to be set aside
with the scarcely satisfactory remark that “the origin of the
eucharistic prayer does not decide the origin of the whole
treatise.” That the book, however, does not bear in itself
any specifically Alexandrian impress, such as, _e.g._, is
undeniably met with in the Epistle of Barnabas, has been admitted
by Harnack.[64]
§ 30.8. =The Writings of the Earliest Christian Apologists=[65]
are lost. At the head of this band stood =Quadratus= of Athens,
who addressed a treatise in defence of the faith to Hadrian, in
which among other things he shows that he himself was acquainted
with some whom Jesus had cured or raised from the dead. No trace
of this work can be found after the 7th century. His contemporary,
=Aristides= the philosopher, in Athens after his conversion
addressed to the same emperor an Apology that has been praised by
Jerome. A fragment of an Armenian translation of this treatise,
which according to its superscription belongs to the 5th century,
was found in a codex of the 10th century by the Mechitarists at
S. Lazzaro, and was edited by them along with a Latin translation.
This fragment treats of the nature of God as the eternal creator
and ruler of all things, of the four classes of men,--barbarians
who are sprung from Belos, Chronos, etc., Greeks from Zeus,
Danaus, Hellenos, etc., Jews from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
and Christians from Christ,--and of Jesus Christ as the Son of
God born of a Jewish virgin, who sent His twelve Apostles into
all the world to teach the nations wisdom. This probably formed
the beginning of the Apology. The antique character of its point
of view and the complete absence of any reference to the Logos
doctrine or to any heretical teaching, lends great probability
to the authenticity of this fragment, although the designation
of the mother of Jesus as the “bearer of God” must be a
later interpolation (comp. § 52, 3). The genuineness of the
second piece, however, taken from another Armenian Codex,--an
anti-docetic homily, _De Latronis clamore et Crucifixi
responsione_ (Luke xxiii. 42), which from the words of Christ
and those crucified with Him proves His divinity--is both on
external and on internal grounds extremely doubtful. According
to the Armenian editor this Codex has the title: By the Athenian
philosopher Aristeas. This is explained as a corruption of the
name Aristides, but recently another Catholic scholar, Dr. Vetter,
on close examination found that the name was really that of
Aristides.--To a period not much later must be assigned the
apologetic dialogue between the Jewish Christian Jason and the
Alexandrian Jew Papiscus, in which the proof from prophecy was
specially emphasized, and the _in principio_ of Gen. i. 1 was
interpreted as meaning _in filio_. The pagan controversialist
Celsus is the first to mention this treatise. He considers it, on
account of its allegorical fancies, not so much fitted to cause
laughter as pity and contempt, and so regards it as unworthy of
any serious reply. Origen, too, esteemed it of little consequence.
Subsequently, however, in the 5th century, it obtained high
repute and was deemed worthy of a Latin translation by the
African bishop Celsus. The controversialist Celsus, and also
Origen, Jerome, and the Latin translator, do not name the writer.
His name is first given by Maximus Confessor as =Ariston of
Pella=. Harnack has rendered it extremely probable that in the
“_Altercatio Simonis Judæi et Theophili Christiani_” discovered
in the 18th century, reported on by Gennadius (§ 47, 16), and
ascribed by him to a certain Evagrius, we have a substantially
correct Latin reproduction of the old Greek dialogue, in which
everything that is told us about the earlier document is met
with, and which, though written in the 5th century, in its ways
of looking at things and its methods of proof moves within the
circle of the Apologists of the 2nd century. In it, just as in
those early treatises the method of proof is wholly in accordance
with the Old Testament; by it every answer of the Christian
to the Jew is supported; at last the Jew is converted and asks
for baptism, while he regards the Christians as _lator salutis_
and _ægrotorum bone medice_ with a play probably upon the word
Ἰάσων=ἰατρός and from this it is conceivable how Clement of
Alexandria supposed Luke, the physician, to be the author of
the treatise. Harnack’s conclusion is significant inasmuch as
it lends a new confirmation to the fact that the non-heretical
Jewish Christianity of the middle of the second century had
already completely adopted the dogmatic views of Gentile
Christianity. =Claudius Apollinaris=, bishop of Hierapolis,
and the rhetorician =Miltiades of Athens= addressed very famous
apologies to the emperor Marcus Aurelius. =Melito of Sardis= was
also a highly esteemed apologist, and a voluminous writer in many
other departments of theological literature.[66] The elaborate
introduction to the mystical interpretation of scripture by
investigating the mystical meaning of biblical names and words
published in Pitra’s “Spicileg. Solesm.” II. III., as “_Clavis
Melitonis_,” belongs to the later period of the middle ages.
Melito’s six books of Eclogues deal with the Old Testament as a
witness for Christ and Christianity, where he takes as his basis
not the LXX. but the Hebrew canon (§ 36, 1).[67]
§ 30.9. =Extant Writings of Apologists of the Post-Apostolic Age.=
a. The earliest and most celebrated of these is =Justin
Martyr=.[68] Born at Shechem (Flavia Neapolis) of Greek
parents, he was drawn to the Platonic doctrine of God and to
the Stoical theory of ethics, more than to any of the other
philosophical systems to which, as a pagan, he turned in
the search after truth. But full satisfaction he first found
in the prophets and apostles, to whom he was directed by an
unknown venerable old man, whom he once met by the sea-side.
He now in his thirtieth year cast off his philosopher’s
cloak and adopted Christianity, of which he became a
zealous defender, but thereby called down upon himself
the passionate hatred of the pagan sages. His bitterest
enemy was the Cynic Crescens in Rome, who after a public
disputation with him, did all he could to compass his
destruction. In A.D. 165, under Marcus Aurelius, Justin
was condemned at Rome to be scourged and beheaded.--His two
Apologies, addressed to Antoninus Pius and his son Marcus
Aurelius are certainly genuine. Of these, however, the
shorter one, the so-called second Apology is probably only
a sort of appendix to the first. His _Dialogus cum Tryphone
Judæo_ is probably a free rendering of a disputation which
actually occurred. Except a few fragments, his Σύνταγμα κατὰ
Μαρκίωνος have been lost. It is disputed whether that was an
integral part of the Σύνταγμα κατὰ πασῶν αἱρέσεων of which
he himself makes mention, or a later independent work. The
following are of more than doubtful authenticity: the Λόγος
παραινετικὸς πρὸς Ἕλληνας (_Cohortatio ad Græcos_), which
seeks to prove that not by the poets nor by the philosophers,
but only by Moses and the prophets can the true knowledge
of God be found, and that whatever truth is spoken by
the former, they had borrowed from the latter; also, the
shorter Λόγος πρὸς Ἕλληνας (_Oratio ad Græcos_), on the
irrationality and immorality of the pagan mythology; further,
the short treatise Περὶ μοναρχίας, which proves the vanity
of polytheism from the admissions of heathen poets and
philosophers; and a fragment Περὶ ἀναστάσεως.--Justin’s
theology is of the Gentile Christian type, quite free from
any Ebionitic taint, inclining rather to the speculation and
ethics of Greek philosophy and to an Alexandrian-Hellenistic
conception and exposition of scripture. To these sources
everything may be traced in which he unconsciously departs
from biblical Paulinism and Catholic orthodoxy. Then in
his idea of God and creation, he has not quite overcome the
partly pantheistic, partly dualistic, principles derived
from the Platonic philosophy. He shows traces of Alexandrian
influences in his conception of the person and work of
Christ, to whom he assigns merely the role of a divine
teacher, who has made known the true idea of God the Creator,
of righteousness, and of eternal life, and has won power by
death, resurrection and ascension, and will give evidence
of it by His coming again to reward the righteousness
of the saints with immortal blessedness. He was also led
into doctrinal aberrations in the anthropological domain,
because his idea of freedom and virtue borrowed from Greek
philosophy prevented him from fully grasping the Pauline
doctrine of sin. His theory of morals, with its legalistic
tendency and its righteousness of works, was grounded
not in Judaism but in Stoicism. His chiliasm, too, is not
Ebionitic but is immediately derived from scripture, and
has less significance for his speculation than the other
eschatological principles of Resurrection, Judgment, and
Recompence. His Christianity consists essentially of only
three elements: Worship of the true God, a virtuous life
according to the commandments of Christ, and belief in
rewards and punishments hereafter. Over against the pagan
philosophy it represents itself as the true philosophy,
and over against the Mosaic law as the new law freed from
the fetters of ceremonialism. Even in the natural man, in
consequence of the divine reason that is innate in him,
there dwells the power of living as a Christian: Abraham
and Elias, Socrates and Heraclitus, etc., have to such a
degree lived according to reason that they must be called
Christians. But even they possessed only σπέρματα Λόγου,
only a μέρος Λόγου; for the divine reason dwells in men
only as Λόγος σπερματικός; in Christ alone as the incarnate
Logos it dwells as ὁ πᾶς Λόγος or τὸ Λογικὸν τὸ ὅλον. He is
the only true Son of God, pre-mundane but not eternal, the
πρῶτον γέννημα τοῦ θεοῦ, or the πρωτότοκος τοῦ θεοῦ, by whom
God in the beginning created all things. The Father alone is
ὄντως θεός, and the Logos only a divine being of the second
rank, a ἕτερος θεὸς παρὰ τὸν ποιητὴν τῶν ὅλων, to whom,
however, as such, worship should be rendered. In Justin’s
theological speculation the Holy Spirit stands quite in
the background, though the baptismal and congregational
Trinitarian confession obliged him to assign to the Spirit
the rank of an independent divine being, whom the Logos had
used for the enlightening of His prophets. Justin too knows
nothing of a particular election of Israel as the people of
God; with him the Christians as such are the true Israel,
the people of God, the children of the faith of Abraham.
From the Old Testament he proves the divinity of the person
and doctrine of Christ, and from the Ἀπομνημονεύματα τῶν
ἀποστόλων (§ 36, 7) he derives his information about the
historical life, teaching, and works of Jesus. The Gospel
of John, although never mentioned, was not unknown to him,
but it appeared to him more as a doctrinal and hortatory
treatise than as a historical document, and undoubtedly
his Logos doctrine is connected with that of John. He shows
himself familiar with the Epistles of Paul, although he
never expressly quotes from them.
§ 30.10.
b. =Tatian=, a Greek born in Assyria (according to Zahn, a
Semite) while engaged as a rhetorician at Rome, was won to
Christianity by Justin Martyr, according to Harnack about
A.D. 150. As the fruit of youthful zeal, he published an
Apologetical Λόγος πρὸς Ἕλληνας, in which he treats the
Greek paganism and its culture with withering scorn for
even its noblest manifestations, and shared with his teacher
the hatred and persecution of the philosopher Crescens.
His later written Εὐαγγέλιον διὰ τεσσάρων (§ 36, 7) was a
Gospel harmony, in which the removal of all reference to
the descent of Jesus from the seed of David, according
to the flesh, objected to by Theodoret, was occasioned
perhaps more by antipathy to Ebionism than by any sympathy
with Gnosticism. Zahn affirms, while Harnack decidedly
denies, that this work was originally composed in Syriac. The
exclusive use by the Syrians of the Greek name _Diatessaron_
seems to afford a strong argument for a Greek original.
Its general agreement with the readings of the so-called
Itala (§ 36, 8) witnesses to the West as the place of its
composition. The introduction of a Syriac translation of it
into church use in the East is to be explained by a longer
residence of the author in his eastern home; and its neglect
on the part of many of the Greek and Latin Church Fathers,
and even their complete ignorance of it, may be accounted
for by the fact that, while in the far East it was
unsuspected, elsewhere it came to be branded as heretical
(§ 27, 10).[69]
c. =Athenagoras=, about whose life we have no authentic
information, in A.D. 177 addressed his Πρεσβεία
(_Intercessio_) περὶ Χριστιανῶν to Marcus Aurelius, in
which he clearly and convincingly disproves the hideous
calumnies of Atheism, Ædipodean atrocities, Thyestean feasts
(§ 22), and extols the excellence of Christianity in life and
doctrine. In the treatise Περὶ ἀναστάσεως νέκρων he proves,
from the general philosophical rather than distinctively
Christian standpoint, the necessity of resurrection from the
vocation of man in connection with the wisdom, omnipotence
and righteousness of God.
d. =Theophilus, Bishop of Antioch= († after A.D. 180), was
by birth a pagan. His writing Πρὸς Αὐτόλυκον περὶ τῆς τῶν
Χριστιανῶν πίστεως is one of the most excellent apologetical
treatises of this period. Autolycus was one of his heathen
acquaintances. His commentaries and controversial works have
been lost. Zahn, indeed, has sought to prove that an extant
Latin Commentary on selected passages from the four Gospels
in the allegorical style belonging to the first half of the
3rd century, and bearing the name of Theophilus of Antioch,
is a substantially faithful translation of the authentic
Greek original of A.D. 170. He has also called attention
to the great importance of this commentary, not only for
the oldest history of the Canon, Text and Exposition,
but also for that of the church life, the development of
doctrine and the ecclesiastical constitution, especially of
the monasticism already appearing in those early times. But
while Zahn reached those wonderful results from a conviction
that the verbal coincidences of the Latin Church Fathers of
the 3rd to the 5th centuries with the supposed Theophilus
commentary were examples of their borrowing from it, Harnack
has convincingly proved that this so-called commentary is
rather to be regarded as a compilation from these same Latin
Church Fathers made at the earliest during the second half
of the 5th century.
e. Finally, an otherwise unknown author =Hermias= wrote under
the title Διασυρμὸς τῶν ἔξω φιλοσόφων (_Irrisio gentilium
philos._) a short abusive treatise, in a witty but
superficial style, of which the fundamental principle is
to be found in 1 Cor. iii. 19.
§ 31. THE THEOLOGICAL LITERATURE OF THE OLD CATHOLIC AGE,
A.D. 170-323.
From about A.D. 170, during the Old Catholic Age, scientific theology
in conflict with Judaizing, paganizing and monarchianistic heretics
progressed in a more vigorous and comprehensive manner than in the
apologetical and polemical attempt at self-defence of Post-Apostolic
Times. Throughout this period, however, the zeal for apologetics
continued unabated, but also in other directions, especially in
the department of dogmatics, important contributions were made to
theological science. While these developments were in progress, there
arose within the Catholic church three different theological schools,
each with some special characteristic of its own, the Asiatic, the
Alexandrian, and the North African.
§ 31.1. =The Theological Schools and Tendencies.=--=The School
of Asia Minor= was the outcome of John’s ministry there, and
was distinguished by firm grasp of scripture, solid faith,
conciliatory treatment of those within and energetic polemic
against heretics. Its numerous teachers, highly esteemed in the
ancient church, are known to us only by name, and in many cases
even the name has perished. Only two of their disciples resident
in the West--Irenæus and Hippolytus--are more fully known. A
yet greater influence, more widely felt and more enduring, was
that of the =Alexandrian School=.[70] Most of its teachers were
distinguished by classical culture, a philosophical spirit,
daring speculativeness and creative power. Their special task
was the construction of a true ecclesiastical gnosis over against
the false heretical gnosis, and so the most celebrated teachers
of this school have not escaped the charge of unevangelical
speculative tendencies. The nursery of this theological tendency
was especially this Catechetical School of Alexandria which from
an institution for the training of educated Catechumens had grown
up into a theological seminary. =The North African School= by
its realism, a thoroughly practical tendency, formed the direct
antithesis of the idealism and speculative endeavours of the
Alexandrian. It repudiated classical science and philosophy
as fitted to lead into error, but laid special stress upon the
purity of Apostolic tradition, and insisted with all emphasis
upon holiness of life and strict asceticism.--Finally, our period
also embraces the first beginnings of the =Antiochean School=,
whose founders were the two presbyters Dorotheus and Lucian.
The latter especially gave to the school in its earlier days
the tendency to critical and grammatico-historical examination
of scripture. At =Edessa=, too, as early as the end of the 2nd
century, we find a Christian school existing.
1. CHURCH FATHERS WRITING IN GREEK.
§ 31.2. =Church Teachers of the Asiatic Type.=
a. =Irenæus=, a pupil of Polycarp, was a native of Asia Minor.
According to the _Vita Polycarpi_ of Pionius he lived in
Rome at the time of Polycarp’s death as a teacher, and it
is not improbable that he had gone there in company with
his master (§ 37, 2). Subsequently he settled in Gaul, and
held the office of presbyter at Lyons. During his absence at
Rome as the bearer of a tract by the imprisoned confessors
of Lyons on the Montanist controversy to the Roman bishop
Eleutherus, Pothinus, the aged bishop of Lyons, fell a
victim to the dreadful persecution of Marcus Aurelius which
raged in Gaul. Irenæus succeeded him as bishop in A.D. 178.
About the time and manner of his death nothing certain is
known. Jerome, indeed, once quite casually designates him
a martyr, but since none of the earlier Church Fathers, who
speak of him, know anything of this, it cannot be maintained
with any confidence. Gentleness and moderation, combined
with earnestness and decision, as well as the most lively
interest in the catholicity of the church and the purity of
its doctrine according to scripture and tradition, were the
qualities that make him the most important and trustworthy
witness to his own age, and led to his being recognised in
all times as one of the ablest and most influential teachers
of the church and a most successful opponent of heretical
Gnosticism. His chief work against the Gnostics: Ἔλεγχος καὶ
ἀνατροπὴ τῆς ψευδονύμου γνώσεως (_Adv. hæreses_) in 5 books,
is mainly an _ex professo_ directed against the Valentinians
and the schools of Ptolemy and Marcus There is appended to
it, beyond what had been proposed at the beginning, a short
discussion of the views of other Gnostics, the basis of
which may be found in an older treatise, perhaps in the
Syntagma of Justin. The last four books give the express
scripture proofs to sustain the general confutation, without
doing this, however, in a complete manner; at the same time
there is rapid movement amid many digressions and excursuses.
This work has come down to us in a complete form only
in an old translation literally rendered in barbarous
Latin, even to the reproduction of misunderstood words,
which was used as early as by Tertullian in his treatise
against the Valentinians. We are indebted to the writings
of the heresiologists Hippolytus and Epiphanius for the
preservation of many remarkable fragments of the original,
with or without the author’s name. Of his other writings
we have only a few faint reminiscences. Two epistles
addressed to the Roman presbyter Florinus combat the
Valentinian heresy to which Florinus was inclined. During the
controversy about Easter (§ 37, 2) he wrote several epistles
of a conciliatory character, especially one to Blastus in
Rome, an adherent of the Asiatic practice, and in the name
of the whole Gallic church, he addressed a letter to the
Roman bishop, Victor, and afterwards a second letter in his
own name.[71]
§ 31.3.
b. =Hippolytus=, a presbyter and afterwards schismatical bishop
at Rome, though scarcely to be designated of Asia Minor, but
rather a Lyonese, if not a Roman pupil of Irenæus, belonged
to the same theological school. He was celebrated for his
comprehensive learning and literary attainments, and yet
his career until quite recently was involved in the greatest
obscurity. Eusebius, who is the first to refer to him,
places him in the age of Alex. Severus (A.D. 222-235),
calls him a bishop, without, however, naming his supposed
oriental diocese, which even Jerome was unable to determine.
The Liberian list of Popes of A.D. 354, describes him
as _Yppolytus presbyter_ who was burnt in Sardinia about
A.D. 235 along with the Roman bishop, Pontianus (§ 41, 1).
In the fifth century, the Roman church gave him honour as a
martyr. The poet Prudentius († A.D. 413) who himself saw the
crypt in which his bones were laid and which in the book of
his martyrdom was pictorially represented, celebrated his
career in song. According to him Hippolytus was an adherent
of the Novatian schism (§ 41, 3), but returned to the
Catholic church and suffered martyrdom at Portus near Rome.
According to his own statement quoted by Photius he was
a hearer of the doctrinal discourses of Irenæus. A statue
representing him in a sitting posture which was exhumed at
Rome in A.D. 1551, has on the back of the seat a list of
his writings along with an Easter cycle of sixteen years
drawn up by him (§ 56, 3). Finally, there was found among
the works of Origen a treatise on the various philosophical
systems entitled _Philosophoumena_, which professes to be
the first book of a writing in ten books found in Greece in
A.D. 1842, Κατὰ πασῶν αἱρέσεων ἔλεγχος. Starting from the
position, and seeking to establish it, that the heretics
have got their doctrines not from holy scripture, but from
astrology, pagan mysteries and the Greek philosophers, this
treatise is generally of great importance not only for the
history of the heresies of the Gnostics and Monarchians,
but also for the history of philosophy. The English editor,
E. Miller (Oxon., 1851), attributed the authorship of the
whole to Origen, which, however, from the complete difference
of style, point of view and position was soon proved to be
untenable. Since the writer admits that he was himself the
author of a book Περὶ τῆς τοῦ πάντος οὐσίας, and Photius
ascribes a book with the same title to the Roman Caius
(§ 31, 7), Baur attributes to the latter the composition of
the Elenchus. Photius, however, founds his opinion simply
upon an apocryphal note on the margin of his copy of the
book. Incomparably more important are the evidences for
the Hippolytus authorship, which is now almost universally
admitted. The Elenchus is not, indeed, enumerated in
the list of works on the statue. The book Περὶ τῆς τοῦ
πάντος οὐσίας, however, appears there, and it contains
the statement that its author also wrote the Elenchus. The
author of the Elenchus also states that he had previously
written a similar work in a shorter form, and Photius
describes such a shorter writing of Hippolytus, dating
from the time of his intercourse with Irenæus, under the
title Σύνταγμα κατὰ πασῶν αἱρέσεων. Lipsius has made it
appear extremely probable that in the _Libellus adv. omnes
hæreticos_ appended to Tertullian’s _De præscriptione
hæreticorum_, and so usually styled a treatise of the
Pseudo-Tertullian, we have an abbreviated Latin reproduction
of that work; for this one as well as the other begins
with Dositheus and ends with Noëtus, and both deal with
thirty-two heresies. Epiphanius and Philastrius [Philaster]
have used it largely in their heresiological works. The
discussion in the Elenchus agrees therewith in many passages
but also in many is essentially different, which, however,
when we consider the much later date of the first named
treatise affords no convincing evidence against the theory
that both are by one author. The Elenchus thereby wins a
high importance as giving information about the condition of
the Roman church during the first decades of the 3rd century,
about the position of the author who describes himself in
his treatise as a pupil of Irenæus, about his own and his
opponents’ way of viewing things, and about his conflict
with them leading to schism, though all is told from
the standpoint of an interested party (§§ 33, 5; 41, 1).
A considerable fragment directed against the errors of
Noëtus (§ 33, 5) was perhaps originally a part of his
Syntagma,--though not perhaps of the anonymous, so-called
Little Labyrinth against the Artemonites (§ 33, 3) or
probably against the Monarchians generally, from which
Eusebius makes extensive quotations, especially about the
Theodotians. This work is ascribed by Photius to the Roman
Caius, but without doubt wrongly. Great probability has been
given to the recently advanced idea that this book too may
have been written by Hippolytus.[72]
§ 31.4. =The Alexandrian Church Teachers.=
a. The first of the teachers of the catechetical school at
Alexandria known by name was =Pantænus=, who had formerly
been a Stoic philosopher. About A.D. 190 he undertook
a missionary journey into Southern Arabia or India, and
died in A.D. 202 after a most successful and useful life.
Jerome says of him: _Hujus multi quidem in s. Scri. exstant
Commentarii, sed Magis viva voce ecclesiis profuit_. Of his
writings none are preserved.
b. =Titus Flavius Clemens [Clement]= was the pupil of Pantænus
and his successor at the catechetical school in Alexandria.
On his travels undertaken in the search for knowledge he
came to Alexandria as a learned pagan philosopher, where
probably Pantænus gained an influence over him and was
the means of his conversion. During the persecution under
Septimius Severus in A.D. 202 he sought in flight to escape
the rage of the heathens, in accordance with Matt. x. 23.
But he continued unweariedly by writing and discourse
to promote the interests of the church till his death in
A.D. 220. The most important and most comprehensive of his
writings is the work in three parts of which the first part
entitled Λόγος προτρεπτικὸς πρὸς Ἕλληνας (_Cohortatio ad
Græcos_) with great expenditure of learning seeks to prepare
the minds of the heathen for Christianity by proving the
vanity of heathenism; the second part, Ὁ παιδαγωγός in
three books, with a _Hymnus in Salvatorem_ attached, gives
an introduction to the Christian life; and the third part,
Στρωματείς (_Stromata_), that is, patchwork, so-called from
the aphoristic style and the variety of its contents, in
eight books, setting forth the deep things of Christian
gnosis, but in the form rather of a collection of materials
than a carefully elaborated treatise. The little tractate
Τίς ὁ σωζόμενος πλούσιος (_Quis dives salvetur_) shows how
even wealth may be made contributory to salvation. Among
his lost treatises the most important was the Ὑποτυπώσεις
in eight books, an expository review of the contents of holy
scripture.[73]
§ 31.5.
c. Great as was the reputation of Clement, he was far
outstripped by his pupil and successor =Origen=,
acknowledged by pagan and Christian contemporaries to be
a miracle of scholarship. On account of his indomitable
diligence, he was named Ἀδαμάντιος. Celebrated as a
philosopher, philologist, critic, exegete, dogmatist,
apologist, polemist, etc., posterity has with equal right
honoured him as the actual founder of an ecclesiastical and
scientific theology, and reproached him as the originator
of many heretical opinions (§§ 51; 52, 6). He was born of
Christian parents at Alexandria about A.D. 185, was educated
under his father Leonidas, Pantænus and Clement, while still
a boy encouraged his father when he suffered as a martyr
under Septimius Severus in A.D. 202, became the support
of his helpless mother and his six orphaned sisters, and
was called in A.D. 203 by bishop Demetrius to be teacher
of the catechetical school. In order to qualify himself
for the duties of his new calling, he engaged eagerly in
the study of philosophy under the Neo-Platonist Ammonius
Saccas. His mode of life was extremely simple and from
his youth he was a strict ascetic. In his eager striving
after Christian perfection he had himself emasculated,
from a misunderstanding of Matt. xix. 12, but afterwards
he admitted that that was a wrong step. His fame advanced
from day to day. About A.D. 211 he visited Rome. Accepting
an honourable invitation in A.D. 215 he wrought for a long
time as a missionary in Arabia, he was then appointed by the
celebrated Julia Mammæa (§ 22, 4) to Antioch in A.D. 218;
and in A.D. 230 undertook in the interest of the church
a journey to Greece through Palestine, where the bishops
of Cæsarea and Jerusalem admitted him to the rank of a
presbyter. His own bishop, Demetrius, jealous of the daily
increasing fame of Origen and feeling that his episcopal
rights had been infringed upon, recalled him, and had him
at two Alexandrian Synods, in A.D. 231 and 232, arraigned
and excommunicated for heresy, self-mutilation and contempt
of the ecclesiastical laws of his office. Origen now
went to Cæsarea, and there, honoured and protected by the
Emperor, Philip the Arabian, opened a theological school.
His literary activity here reached its climax. But under
Decius he was cast into prison at Tyre, in A.D. 254,
and died in consequence of terrible tortures which he
endured heroically.--Of his numerous writings[74] only a
comparatively small number, but those of great value, are
preserved; some in the original, others only in a Latin
translation.
1. To the department of =Biblical Criticism= belongs the
fruit of twenty-seven years’ labour, the so-called
Hexapla, that is, a placing side by side the Hebrew text
of the O.T. (first in Hebr. and then in the Gr. letters)
and the existing Greek translations of the LXX., Aquila,
Symmachus and Theodotion; by the addition in some
books of other anonymous translations, it came to be
an Octopla or Enneapla. By critical marks on the margin
all variations were carefully indicated. The enormous
bulk of fifty volumes hindered its circulation by means
of transcripts; but the original lay in the library
at Cæsarea open to the inspection of all, until lost,
probably in the sack of the city by the Arabians in
A.D. 653.[75]
2. His =Exegetical works= consist of Σημειώσεις or
short scholia on separate difficult passages, Τόμοι
or complete commentaries on whole books of the bible,
and Ὁμιλίαι or practical expository lectures. Origen,
after the example of the Rabbinists and Hellenists,
gave a decided preference to the allegorical method
of interpretation. In every scripture passage he
distinguished a threefold sense, as σῶμα, ψυχή, πνεῦμα,
first a literal, and then a twofold higher sense, the
tropical or moral, and the pneumatical or mystical.
He was not just a despiser of the literal sense, but
the unfolding of the mystical sense seemed to him
of infinitely greater importance. All history in the
bible is a picture of things in the higher world. Most
incidents occurred as they are told; but some, the
literal conception of which would be unworthy or
irrational, are merely typical, without any outward
historical reality. The Old Testament language is
typical in a twofold sense: for the New Testament
history and for the heavenly realities. The New
Testament language is typical only of the latter.
He regarded the whole bible as inspired, with the
exception of the books added by the LXX., but the New
Testament in a higher degree than the Old. But even the
New Testament had defects which will only be overcome
by the revelation of eternity.
3. To the department of =Dogmatics= belongs his four books
Περὶ ἀρχῶν (_De Principiis_), which have come down to
us in a Latin translation of Rufinus with arbitrary
interpolations. His Στρωματεῖς in ten books which
sought to harmonize the Christian doctrine with Greek
philosophy is lost, and also his numerous writings
against the heretics. His comprehensive apologetical
work in eight books, _Contra Celsum_ (§ 23, 3), has
come down to us complete.[76] Gregory of Nazianzus
[Nazianzen] and Basil the Great made a book entirely
from his writings under the title Φιλοκαλία, which
contains many passages from lost treatises, and a
valuable original fragment from his Περὶ ἀρχῶν. His
principal doctrinal characteristics are the following:
There is a twofold revelation, the primitive revelation
in conscience to which the heathen owe their σπέρματα
ἀληθείας, and the historical revelation in holy
scripture; there are three degrees of religious
knowledge, that of the ψιλὴ πίστις, an unreasoned
acceptance of the truth, wrought by God immediately in
the heart of men, that of γνῶσις or ἐπιστήμη to which
the reasoning mind of man can reach by the speculative
development of scripture revelation in his life, and
finally, that of σοφία or θεωρία, the vision of God,
the full enjoyment of which is attained unto only
hereafter. For his doctrine of the Trinity, see § 33, 6.
His cosmological, angelological and anthropological
views represent a mixture of Platonic, Gnostic
and spiritualistic ideas, and run out into various
heterodoxies; thus, he believes in timeless or eternal
creation, an ante-temporal fall of human souls,
their imprisonment in earthly bodies, he denies the
resurrection of the body, he believed in the animation
and the need and capacity of redemption of the stars
and star-spirits, in the restoration of all spirits to
their original, ante-temporal blessedness and holiness,
ἀποκατάστασις τῶν πάντων.
4. Of his =Ascetical Works=, the treatise Περὶ εὐχῆς with
an admirable exposition of the Lord’s prayer, and a
Λόγος προτρεπικὸς εἰς μαρτύριον have been preserved.
Of his numerous epistles, the _Epistola ad Julium
Africanum_ defends against his correspondent the
genuineness of the history of Susannah.
§ 31.6.
d. Among the successors of Origen in the school of Alexandria
the most celebrated, from about A.D. 232, was =Dionysius
Alexandrinus= [of Alexandria]. He was raised to the rank
of bishop in A.D. 247, and died in A.D. 265. In speculative
power he was inferior to his teacher Origen. His special
gift was that of κυβέρνησις. He was honoured by his own
contemporaries with the title of The Great. During the
Decian persecution he manifested wisdom and good sense
as well as courage and steadfastness. The ecclesiastical
conflicts of his age afforded abundant opportunities for
testing his noble and gentle character, as well as his
faithful attachment to the church and zeal for the purity of
its doctrine, and on all hands his self-denying amiability
wrought in the interests of peace. Of his much-praised
writings, exegetical, ascetical, polemical (Περὶ ἐπαγγελιῶν
§ 33, 9), apologetical (Περὶ φύσεως against the Atomism
of Democritus and Epicurus), and dogmatical (§ 33, 7),
only fragments are preserved, mostly from his Epistles
in quotations by Eusebius. We have, however, one short
tract complete addressed to Novatian at Rome (§ 31, 12),
containing an earnest entreaty that he should abandon his
schismatic rigorism.
e. =Gregory Thaumaturgus= was one of Origen’s pupils at Cæsarea.
Origen was the means of converting the truth-seeking heathen
youth to Christianity, and Gregory clung to his teacher with
the warmest affection. He subsequently became bishop of his
native city of Neo-Cæsarea, and was able on his death-bed
in A.D. 270 to comfort himself with the reflection that he
left to his successor no more unbelievers in the city than
his predecessor had left him of believers (their number was
seventeen). He was called the second Moses and the power of
working miracles was ascribed to him. We have from his pen
a panegyric on Origen, an Epistle on Church Discipline, a
Μετάφρασις εἰς Ἐκκλησιάστην, a Confession of Faith important
for the history of the Ante-Nicene period (§ 50, 1): Ἔκθεσις
πίστεως. Two other tracts in a Syrian translation are
ascribed to him: To Philagrius on Consubstantiality, and
To Theopompus on the Passibility of God. Dräseke, however,
identifies the first-named with Oratio 45 of Gregory
Nazianzus [Nazianzen] and assigns to him the authorship.[77]
f. The learned presbyter =Pamphilus= of Cæsarea, the friend
of Eusebius (§ 47, 2) and founder of a theological seminary
and the celebrated library of Cæsarea, who died as a martyr
under Maximinus, belongs to this group. His Old Testament
Commentaries have been lost. In prison he finished his work
in five books which he undertook jointly with Eusebius, the
Apology for Origen, to which Eusebius independently added a
sixth book. Only the first book is preserved in Rufinus’
Latin translation.
§ 31.7. =Greek-speaking Church Teachers in other Quarters.=
a. =Hegesippus= wrote his five books Ὑπομνήματα, about A.D. 180,
during the age of the Roman bishop Eleutherus. From his
knowledge of the Hebrew language, literature and traditions
Eusebius concludes that he was a Jew by birth. He himself
says distinctly that in A.D. 155 during the time of bishop
Anicetus he was staying in Rome, and that on his way thither
he visited Corinth. The opinion formerly current that
his Hypomnemata consisted of a collection of historical
traditions from the time of the Apostles down to the age of
the writer, and so might be called a sort of Church History,
arose from the historical character of the contents of eight
quotations made from this treatise by Eusebius in his own
Church History. It is, however, not borne out by the fact
that what Hegesippus tells in his detailed narrative of the
end of James the Just (§ 16, 3) occurs, not in the first
or second but in the fifth and last book of his treatise.
Moreover, among writers against the heretics or Gnostics,
Eusebius enumerates in the first place one Hegesippus,
having it would seem his Hypomnemata in view. From this
circumstance, in conjunction with everything else quoted
from and told about him by Eusebius, we may with great
probability conclude that the purpose of his writing was
to confute the heresies of his age. In doing so he traces
them partly to Gentile sources, but partly and mainly to
pre-Christian Jewish heresies, seven of which are enumerated.
He treats in the first three books of the so-called Gnostics
and their relations to heathenism and false Judaism. Then in
the fourth book he discusses the heretical Apocrypha and, as
contrasted with them, the orthodox ecclesiastical writings,
mentioning among them expressly the Epistle of Clemens
[Clement] Romanus [of Rome] to the Corinthians. Finally,
in the fifth book, he proves from the Apostolic succession
of the leaders of the church, the unity and truth of
ecclesiastically transmitted doctrine. The historical value
of his writing, owing to the confusion and want of critical
power shown in the instances referred to, cannot be placed
very high. The school of Baur, more particularly Schwegler
(see § 20), attached greater importance to him as a supposed
representative of the anti-Pauline Judaism of his time.
The value of his testimony in this direction, however, is
reduced by his acknowledgment of the Epistle of Clement that
accords so high a place to the Apostle Paul. His relations
to Rome and Corinth, with his judgment on the general unity
of faith in the church of his age, prove that he would be by
no means disposed to repudiate the Apostle Paul in favour of
any Ebionitic tendency.
b. =Caius of Rome=, a contemporary of bishop Zephyrinus
about A.D. 210, was one of the most conspicuous opponents
of Montanism. Eusebius who characterizes him as ἀνὴρ
ἐκκλησιαστικός and λογιώτατος, quotes four times from
his now lost controversial tract in dialogue form against
Proclus the Roman Montanist leader.
§ 31.8.
c. =Sextus Julius Africanus=, according to Suidas a native of
Libya, took part, as he says himself in his Κεστοῖς, in the
campaign of Septimius Severus against Osrhoëne in A.D. 195,
became intimate with the Christian king Maanu VIII. of
Edessa, whom in his Chronographies he calls ἱερὸς ἀνὴρ,
and was often companion in hunting to his son and successor
Maanu IX. About A.D. 220 we find him, according to Eusebius
and others, in Rome at the head of an embassy from Nicopolis
or Emmaus in Palestine petitioning for the restoration of
that city. In consequence of Origen addressing him about
A.D. 227 as ἀγαπητὸς ἀδελφός it has been rashly concluded
that he was then a presbyter or at least of clerical rank.
The five books, Χρονογραφίαι, were his first and most
important work. This work which was known partly in the
original, partly in the citations from it in the Eusebian
Chronicle (§ 47, 2), together with its Latin continuation
by Jerome proved a main source of information in general
history during the Byzantine period and the Latin Middle
Age. Beginning with the creation of the world and fixing
the whole course of the world’s development at 6,000 years,
he set the middle point of this period to the age of Peleg
(Gen. x. 25), and in accordance with the chronology of the
LXX. and reckoning by Olympiads, proceeded to synchronize
biblical and profane history. He assigned the birth of
Christ to the middle of the sixth of the thousand year
periods, at the close of which he probably expected the
beginning of the millennium. From the fragments preserved
by later Byzantine chroniclers, Gelzer has attempted to
reproduce as far as possible the original work, carefully
indicating its sources and authorities. Of the other works
of Africanus we have in a complete form only an Epistle
to Origen, “a real gem of brilliant criticism spiced with
a gentle touch of fine irony” (Gelzer), which combats the
authenticity and credibility of the Pseudo-Daniel’s history
of Susannah. We have also a fragment quoted in Eusebius
from an Epistle to a certain Aristides, which attempts
a reconciliation of the genealogies in Matt. and Luke by
distinguishing παῖδες νόμῳ and παῖδες φύσει with reference
to Deut. xxv. 5. According to Eusebius “the chronologist
Julius Africanus,” according to Suidas “Origen’s friend
Africanus with the prænomen Sextus,” is also the author of
the so called Κεστοί (_embroidery_), a great comprehensive
work of which only fragments have been preserved, in which
all manner of wonderful things from the life of nature and
men, about agriculture, cattle breeding, warfare, etc.,
were recorded, so that it had the secondary title Παράδοξα.
The excessive details of pagan superstition here reported,
much of which, such as that relating to the secret worship
of Venus, was distinctly immoral, and its dependence on
the secret writings of the Egyptians seem now as hard to
reconcile with the standpoint of a believing Christian, as
with the sharpness of intellect shown in his criticism of
the letter of Susannah. It has therefore been assumed that
alongside of the Christian chronologist Julius Africanus
there was a pagan Julius Africanus who wrote the Κεστοί,--or,
seeing the identity of the two is strongly evidenced both
on internal and external grounds, the composition of the
Κεστοί is assigned to a period when the author was still a
heathen. The facts, however, that the Chronicles close with
A.D. 221 and that the Κεστοί is dedicated to Alex. Severus
(A.D. 222-235), seem to guarantee the earlier composition
of the Chronicles. The author of the Κεστοί, too, by his
quotation of Ps. xxxiv. 9 with the formula θεία ῥήματα,
shows himself a Christian, and on the other hand, the author
of the Chronicles says that at great cost he had made himself
acquainted in Egypt with a celebrated secret book.
§ 31.9.
d. =Methodius= bishop of Olympus in Lycia, subsequently at
Tyre, a man highly esteemed in his day, died as a martyr
in A.D. 311. He was a decided opponent of the spiritualism
prevailing in the school of Origen. His Συμπόσιον τῶν δέκα
παρθένων is a dialogue between several virgins regarding
the excellence of virginity written in eloquent and glowing
language (transl. in Ante-Nicene Lib., Edin., 1870). Of his
other works only outlines and fragments are preserved by
Epiphanius and Photius. To these belong Περὶ αὐτεξουσίου καὶ
ποθὲν κακά, a polemic against the Platonic-Gnostic doctrine
of the eternity of matter as the ultimate ground and cause
of sin, which are to be sought rather in the misuse of
human freedom; the dialogues Περὶ ἀναστάσεως and Περὶ τῶν
γεννητῶν, the former of which combats Origen’s doctrine of
the resurrection, and the latter his doctrine of creation.
His controversial treatise against Porphyry (§ 23, 3) has
been completely lost.
e. The martyr =Lucian of Samosata=, born and brought up in
Edessa, was presbyter of Antioch and co-founder of the
theological school there that became so famous (§ 47, 1),
where he, deposed by a Syrian Synod of A.D. 269, and
persecuted by the Emperor Aurelian in A.D. 272, as supporter
of bishop Paul of Samosata (§ 33, 8), maintained his
position under the three following bishops (till A.D. 303)
apart from the official church, and died a painful martyr’s
death under the Emperor Maximinus in A.D. 312. That
secession, however, was occasioned less perhaps through
doctrinal and ecclesiastical, than through national and
political, anti-Roman and Syrian sympathies with his
heretical countrymen of Samosata. For though in the Arian
controversy (§ 50, 1) Lucian undoubtedly appears as the
father of that Trinitarian-Christological view first
recognised and combated as heretical in his pupil Arius in
A.D. 318, this was certainly essentially different from the
doctrine of the Samosatian. About Lucian’s literary activity
only the scantiest information has come down to us. His most
famous work was his critical revision of the Text of the Old
and New Testaments, which according to Jerome was officially
sanctioned in the dioceses of the Patriarchs of Antioch
and Constantinople, and thus probably lies at the basis of
Theodoret’s and Chrysostom’s exegetical writings. Rufinus’
Latin translation of Eusebius’ Church History gives an
extract from the “Apologetical Discourse” in which he seems
to have openly confessed and vindicated his Christian faith
before his heathen judge.
2. CHURCH FATHERS WRITING IN LATIN.
§ 31.10. =The Church Teachers of North Africa.=--=Quintus
Septimius Florens Tertullianus [Tertullian]= was the son of a
heathen centurion of Carthage, distinguished as an advocate and
rhetorician, converted somewhat late in life, about A.D. 190,
and, after a long residence in Rome, made presbyter at Carthage
in A.D. 220. He was of a fiery and energetic character, in his
writings as well as in his life pre-eminently a man of force,
with burning enthusiasm for the truth of the gospel, unsparingly
rigorous toward himself and others. His “Punic style” is terse,
pictorial and rhetorical, his thoughts are original, brilliant
and profound, his eloquence transporting, his dialectic clear
and convincing, his polemic crushing, enlivened with sharp wit
and biting sarcasm. He shows himself the thoroughly accomplished
jurist in his use of legal terminology and also in the acuteness
of his deductions and demonstrations. Fanatically opposed to
heathen philosophy, though himself trained in the knowledge of it,
a zealous opponent of Gnosticism, in favour of strict asceticism
and hostile to every form of worldliness, he finally attached
himself, about A.D. 220, to the party of the Montanists (§ 40, 3).
Here he found the form of religion in which his whole manner of
thought and feeling, the energy of his will, the warmth of his
emotions, his strong and forceful imagination, his inclination to
rigorous asceticism, his love of bald realism, could be developed
in all power and fulness, without let or hindrance. If amid
all his enthusiasm for Montanism he kept clear of many of its
absurdities, he had for this to thank his own strong common sense,
and also, much as he affected to despise it, his early scientific
training. He at first wrote his compositions in Greek, but
afterwards exclusively in Latin, into which he also translated
the most important of his earlier writings. He is perhaps not
the first who treated of the Christian truth in this language
(§ 31, 12a), but he has been rightly recognised as the actual
creator of ecclesiastical Latin. His writings may be divided into
three groups.
a. =Apologetical and Controversial Treatises against Jews and
Pagans=, which belong to his pre-Montanist period. The most
important and instructive of these is the _Apologeticus adv.
Gentes_, addressed to the Roman governor. A reproduction of
this work intended for the general public, less learned, but
more vigorous, scathing and uncompromising, is the treatise
in two books entitled _Ad Nationes_. In the work _Ad
Scapulam_, who as Proconsul of Africa under Septimius
Severus had persecuted the Christians with unsparing cruelty,
he calls him to account for this with all earnestness and
plainness of speech. In the book, _De testimonio animæ_
he carries out more fully the thought already expressed in
the _Apologeticus c. 17_ of the _Anima humana naturaliter
christiana_, and proves in an ingenious manner that
Christianity alone meets the religious needs of humanity.
The book _Adv. Judæos_ had its origin ostensibly in a public
disputation with the Jews, in which the interruptions of his
audience interferes with the flow of his discourse.
b. =Controversial Treatises against the Heretics.= In the tract
_De præscriptione hæreticorum_ he proves that the Catholic
church, because in prescriptive possession of the field
since the time of the Apostles, is entitled on the legal
ground of _præscriptio_ to be relieved of the task of
advancing proof of her claims, while the heretics on the
other hand are bound to establish their pretensions. A
heresiological appendix to this book has been erroneously
attributed to Tertullian (see § 31, 3). He combats the
Gnostics in the writings: _De baptismo_ (against the Gnostic
rejection of water baptism); _Adv. Hermogenem_; _Adv.
Valentinianos_; _De anima_ (an Anti-Gnostic treatise,
which maintains the creatureliness, yea, the materiality of
the soul, traces its origin to sexual intercourse, and its
mortality to Adam’s sin); _De carne Christi_ (Anti-Docetic):
_De resurrectione carnis Scorpiace_ (an antidote to the
scorpion-poison of the Gnostic heresy); finally, the five
books, _Adv. Marcionem_. The book _Adv. Praxeam_ is directed
against the Patripassians (§ 33, 4). In this work his
realism reaches its climax at c. 7 in the statement: “_Quis
enim negabit, Deum corpus esse, etsi Deus spiritus est?
Spiritus enim corpus sui generis in sua effigie_,”--where,
however, he is careful to state that with him _corpus_ and
_substantia_ are identical ideas, so that he can also say in
c. 10 _de carne Christi_: “_Omne quod est, corpus est sui
generis. Nihil est incorporate nisi quod non est._”
c. =Practical and Ascetical Treatises.= His pre-Montanist
writings are characterized by moderation as compared with
the fanatical rigorism and scornful bitterness against the
Psychical, _i.e._ the Catholics, displayed in those of the
Montanist period. To the former class belong: _De oratione_
(exposition of the Lord’s Prayer); _De baptismo_ (necessity
of water baptism, disapproval of infant baptism); _De
pœnitentia_; _De idolatria_; _Ad Martyres_; _De spectaculis_;
_De cultu feminarum_ (against feminine love of dress); _De
patientia_; _Ad uxorem_ (a sort of testament for his wife,
with the exhortation after his death not to marry again,
but at least in no case to marry an unbeliever). To the
Montanist period belong: _De virginibus velandis_; _De
corona militis_ (defending a Christian soldier who suffered
imprisonment for refusing to wear the soldier’s crown);
_De fuga in persecutione_ (which with fanatical decision
is declared to be a renunciation of Christianity); _De
exhortatione castitatis_ and _De monogamia_ (both against
second marriages which are treated as fornication and
adultery); _De pudicitia_ (recalling his milder opinion
given in his earlier treatise _De pœnitentia_, that
every mortal sin is left to the judgment of God, with the
possibility of reconciliation); _De jejuniis adv. Psychicos_
(vindication of the fasting discipline of the Montanists,
§ 40, 4); _De pallio_ (an essay full of wit and humour
in answer to the taunts of his fellow-citizens about his
throwing off the toga and donning the philosopher’s mantle,
_i.e._ the Pallium, which even the Ascetics might wear).[78]
§ 31.11. =Thascius Cæcilius Cyprianus= [Cyprian], descended from
a celebrated pagan family in Carthage, was at first a teacher
of rhetoric, then, after his conversion in A.D. 245, a presbyter
and from A.D. 248 bishop in his native city. During the Decian
persecution the hatred of the heathen mob expressed itself in
the cry _Cyprianum ad leonem_; but he withdrew himself for a
time in flight into the desert in A.D. 250, from whence he guided
the affairs of the church by his Epistles, and returned in the
following year when respite had been given. The disturbances that
had meanwhile arisen afforded him abundant opportunity for the
exercise of that wisdom and gentleness which characterized him,
and the earnestness, energy and moderation of his nature, as well
as his Christian tact and prudence all stood him in good stead in
dealing, on the one hand, with the fallen who sought restoration,
and on the other, the rigorous schismatics who opposed them
(§ 41, 2). When persecution again broke out under Valerian in
A.D. 257 he was banished to the desert Curubis, and when he
returned to his oppressed people in A.D. 258, he was beheaded.
His epoch-making significance lies not so much in his theological
productions as in his energetic and successful struggle for the
unity of the church as represented by the monarchical position
of the episcopate, and in his making salvation absolutely
dependent upon submission to episcopal authority, as well
as in the powerful impetus given by him to the tendency to
view ecclesiastical piety as an _opus operatum_ (§ 39). As a
theologian and writer he mainly attaches himself to the giant
Tertullian, whose thoughts he reproduces in his works, with
the excision, however, of their Montanist extravagances. Jerome
relates that no day passed in which he did not call to his
amanuensis: _Da magistrum_! In originality, profundity, force
and fulness of thought, as well as in speculative and dialectic
gifts, he stands indeed far below Tertullian, but in lucidity and
easy flow of language and pleasant exposition he far surpasses
him. His eighty-one Epistles are of supreme importance for the
Ch. Hist. of his times, and next to them in value is the treatise
“De unitate ecclesiæ” (§ 34, 7). His _Liber ad Donatum s. de
gratia Dei_, the first writing produced after his conversion,
contains treatises on the leadings of God’s grace and the
blessedness of the Christian life as contrasted with the
blackness of the life of the pagan world. The Apologetical
writings _De idolorum vanitate_ and _Testimonia adv. Judæos_,
II. iii., have no claims to independence and originality. This
applies also more or less to his ascetical tracts: _De habitu
virginum_, _De mortalitate_, _De exhortatione martyrii_,
_De lapsis_, _De oratione dominica_, _De bono patientiæ_,
_De zelo et livore_, etc. His work _De opere et eleemosynis_
specially contributed to the spread of the doctrine of the merit
of works.[79]
§ 31.12. =Various Ecclesiastical Writers using the Latin Tongue.=
a. The Roman attorney =Minucius Felix=, probably of Cirta in
Africa, wrote under the title of _Octavius_ a brilliant
Apology, expressed in a fine Latin diction, in the form of a
conversation between his two friends the Christian Octavius
and the heathen Cæcilius, which resulted in the conversion
of the latter. It is matter of dispute whether it was
composed before or after Tertullian’s Apologeticus, and
to which of the two the origin of thoughts and expressions
common to both is to be assigned. Recently Ebert has
maintained the opinion that Minucius is the older, and
this view has obtained many adherents; whereas the contrary
theory of Schultze has reached its climax in assigning the
composition of the _Octavius_ to A.D. 300-303, so that he is
obliged to ascribe the Octavius as well as the Apologeticus
to a compiler of the fourth or fifth century, plagiarizing
from Cyprian’s treatise _De idolorum vanitate_!
b. =Commodianus= [Commodus], born at Gaza, was won to
Christianity by reading holy scripture, and wrote about
A.D. 250 his _Instructiones adv. Gentium Deos_, consisting
of eighty acrostic poems in rhyming hexameters and scarcely
intelligible, barbarous Latin. His _Carmen apologeticum adv.
Jud. et Gent._ was first published in 1852.
c. The writings of his contemporary the schismatical =Novatian=
of Rome (§ 41, 3) show him to have been a man of no ordinary
dogmatical and exegetical ability. His _Liber de Trinitate
s. de Regula fidei_ is directed in a subordinationist
sense against the Monarchians (§ 33). The _Epistola de
cibis Judaici_ repudiates any obligation on the part of
Christians to observe the Old Testament laws about food;
and the _Epistola Cleri Romani_ advocates milder measures
in the penitential discipline.
d. =Arnobius= was born at Sicca in Africa, where he was engaged
as a teacher of eloquence about A.D. 300. For a long time he
was hostilely inclined toward Christianity, but underwent a
change of mind by means of a vision in a dream. The bishop
distrusted him and had misgivings about admitting him
to baptism, but he convinced him of the honesty of his
intentions by composing the seven books of _Disputationes
adv. Gentes_. This treatise betrays everywhere defective
understanding of the Christian truth; but he is more
successful in combating the old religion than in defending
the new.
e. The bishop =Victorinus of Pettau= (Petavium in Styria), who
died a martyr during the Diocletian persecution in A.D. 303,
wrote commentaries on the Old and New Testament books that
are no longer extant. Only a fragment _De fabrica mundi_ on
Gen. i. and Scholia on the Apocalypse have been preserved.
f. =Lucius Cœlius Firmianus Lactantius= († about A.D. 330),
probably of Italian descent, but a pupil of Arnobius
in Africa, was appointed by Diocletian teacher of Latin
eloquence at Nicomedia. At that place about A.D. 301 he
was converted to Christianity and resigned his office
on the outbreak of the persecution. Constantine the Great
subsequently committed to him the education of his son
Crispus, who, at his father’s command, was executed in
A.D. 326. From his writings he seems to have been amiable
and unassuming, a man of wide reading, liberal culture
and a warm heart. The purity of his Latin style and the
eloquence of his composition, in which he excels all the
Church Fathers, has won for him the honourable name of the
Christian Cicero. We often miss in his writings grip, depth
and acuteness of thinking; especially in their theological
sections we meet with many imperfections and mistakes.
He was not only carried away by a fanatical chiliasm,
but adopted also many opinions of a Manichæan sort. The
_Institutiones divinæ_ in seven bks., a complete exposition
and defence of the Christian faith, is his principal work.
The _Epitome div. inst._ is an abstract of the larger works
prepared by himself with the addition of many new thoughts.
His book _De mortibus persecutorum_ (Engl. trans. by
Dr. Burnett, “Relation of the Death of the Primitive
Persecutors.” Amsterdam, 1687), contains a rhetorically
coloured description of the earlier persecutions as well
as of those witnessed by himself during his residence in
Nicomedia. It is of great importance for the history of the
period but must be carefully sifted owing to its strongly
partisan character. Not only the joy of the martyrs but
also the proof of a divine Nemesis in the lives of the
persecutors are regarded as demonstrating the truth of
Christianity. The tract _De ira Dei_ seeks to prove the
failure of Greek philosophy to combine the ideas of justice
and goodness in its conception of God. The book _De opificio
Dei_ proves from the wonderful structure of the human body
the wisdom of divine providence. Jerome praises him as a
poet; but of the poems ascribed to him only one on the bird
phœnix, which, as it rises into life out of its own ashes
is regarded as a symbol of immortality and the resurrection,
can lay any claim to authenticity.
§ 32. THE APOCRYPHAL AND PSEUDEPIGRAPHICAL LITERATURE.[80]
The practice, so widely spread in pre-Christian times among pagans
and Jews, of publishing treatises as original and primitive divine
revelations which had no claim to such a title found favour among
Christians of the first centuries, and was continued far down into the
Greek and Latin Middle Ages. The majority of the apocryphal or anonymous
and pseudepigraphic writings were issued in support of heresies Ebionite
or Gnostic. Many, however, were free from heretical taint and were
simply undertaken for the purpose of glorifying Christianity by what
was then regarded as a harmless _pia fraus_ through a _vaticinia post
eventum_, or of filling up blanks in the early history with myths and
fables already existing or else devised for the occasion. They took the
subjects of their romances partly from the field of the Old Testament,
and partly from the field of the New Testament in the form of Gospels,
Acts, Apostolic Epistles and Apocalypses. A number of them are
professedly drawn from the prophecies of old heathen seers. Of greater
importance, especially for the history of the constitution, worship and
discipline of the church are the Eccles. Constitutions put forth under
the names of Apostles. Numerous apocryphal Acts of Martyrs are for the
most part utterly useless as historical sources.
§ 32.1. =Professedly Old Heathen Prophecies.=--Of these the
=Sibylline Writings= occupy the most conspicuous place. The
Græco-Roman legend of the Sibyls, σιοῦ βούλη (Æol. for θεοῦ
βούλη), _i.e._ prophetesses of pagan antiquity, was wrought up
at a very early period in the interests of Judaism and afterwards
of Christianity, especially of Ebionite heresy. The extant
collection of such oracles in fourteen books were compiled in the
5th or 6th century. It contains in Greek verses prophecies partly
purely Jewish, partly Jewish wrought up by a Christian hand,
partly originally Christian, about the history of the world, the
life and sufferings of Christ, the persecutions of His disciples
and the stages in the final development of His kingdom. The
Christian participation in the composition of the Sibylline
oracles began in the first century, soon after the irruption of
Vesuvius in A.D. 79, and continued down to the 5th century. The
Apologists, especially Lactantius, made such abundant use of
these prophecies that the heathens nicknamed them Sibyllists.--Of
the prophecies about the coming of Christ ascribed to an ancient
Persian seer, =Hystaspes=, none have been preserved.
§ 32.2. =Old Testament Pseudepigraphs.=[81]--These are mostly of
=Jewish Origin=, of which, however, many were held by the early
Christians in high esteem.
a. To this class belongs pre-eminently the =Book of Enoch=,
written originally in Hebrew in the last century before
Christ, quoted in the Epistle of Jude, and recovered only in
an Ethiopic translation in A.D. 1821. In its present form in
which a great number of older writings about Enoch and Noah
have been wrought up, the book embraces accounts of the fall
of a certain part of the angels (Gen. vi. 1-4; Jude 6; and
2 Pet. ii. 4), also statements of the holy angels about the
mysteries of heaven and hell, the earth and paradise, about
the coming of the Messiah, etc.
b. The =Assumptio Mosis= (ἀνάληψις), from which, according to
Origen, the reference to the dispute between Michael and
Satan about the body of Moses in the Epistle of Jude is
taken, was discovered by the librarian Ceriani at Milan.
He found the first part of this book in an old Latin
translation and published it in A.D. 1860. In the exercise
of his official gift Moses prophesies to Joshua about the
future fortunes of his nation down to the appearing of the
Messiah. The second part, which is wanting, dealt with the
translation of Moses. The exact date of its composition is
not determined, but it may be perhaps assigned to the first
Christian century.
c. The so-called =Fourth Book of Ezra= is first referred to by
Clement of Alexandria. It is an Apocalypse after the manner
of the Book of Daniel. It was probably written originally in
Greek but we possess only translations: a Latin one and four
oriental ones--Ethiopic, Arabic, Syriac and Armenian. From
these oriental translations the blanks in the Latin version
have been supplied, and its later Christian interpolations
have been detected. The angel Uriel in seven visions makes
known to the weeping Ezra the signs of the approaching
destruction of Jerusalem, the decay of the Roman empire,
the founding of the Messianic kingdom, etc. The fifth vision
of the eagle with twelve wings and three heads seems to fix
the date of its composition to the time of Domitian.
d. In the year 1843 the missionary Krapff sent to Tübingen
the title of an Ethiopic Codex, in which Ewald recognised
the writing referred to frequently by the Church Fathers as
the =Book of Jubilees= (Ἰωβελαῖα) or the =Little Genesis=
(Λεπτογένεσις). This book, written probably about A.D. 50
or 60, is a complete summary of the Jewish legendary matter
about the early biblical history from the creation down to
the entrance into Canaan, divided into fifty jubilee periods.
The name _Little Genesis_ was given it, notwithstanding
its large dimensions, as indicating a Genesis of the second
rank.[82]
§ 32.3. The following Pseudepigraphs are of =Christian Origin=.
a. The short romantic =History of Assenath=, daughter of
Potiphar and wife of Joseph (Gen. xli. 45). Its main point
is the conversion of Assenath by an angel.
b. =The Testaments of the XII. Patriarchs=, after the style of
Gen. xlix., written in Greek in the 2nd cent., and quoted
by Origen. As in the chapter of Gen. referred to parting
counsels are put in the mouth of Jacob, they are here
ascribed to his twelve sons. These discourses embrace
prophecies of the coming of Christ and His atoning
sufferings and death, statements about baptism and the
Lord’s supper, about the great Apostle of the Gentiles,
the rejection of the O.T. covenant people and the election
of the Gentiles, the destruction of Jerusalem and the
final completion of the kingdom of God. The book is thus a
cleverly compiled and comprehensive handbook of Christian
faith, life and hope.
c. Of the =Ascensio Isaiæ= (Ἀναβατικόν) and the =Visio Isaiæ=
(Ὅρασις) traces are to be found as early as in Justin
Martyr and Tertullian. The Greek original is lost. Dillmann
published an old Ethiopic version (Lps., 1877), and Gieseler
an old Lat. text (Gött., 1832). Its Cabbalistic colouring
commended it to the Gnostics. In its first part, borrowed
from an old Jewish document, it tells about the martyrdom of
Isaiah who was sawn asunder by King Manasseh; in its second
part, entitled _Visio Isaiæ_ it is told how the prophet in
an ecstasy was led by an angel through the seven heavens and
had revealed to him the secrets of the divine counsels
regarding the incarnation of Christ.
d. A collection in Syriac belonging perhaps to the 5th or 6th
century in which other legends about early ages are kept
together, is called =Spelunca thesaurorum=. We are here
told about the sepulchre of the patriarch Lamech and the
treasures preserved there from which the wise men obtained
the gifts which they presented to the infant Saviour. The
Ethiopic _Vita Adami_ is an expansion of the book just
referred to. This book is manifestly a legendary account of
the changes wrought upon all relations of life in our first
parents by means of the fall (hence the title: “Conflict
of Adam and Eve”), and Golgotha is named as Adam’s burying
place. A second and shorter part treats of the Sethite
patriarchs down to Noah. The still shorter third part
relates the post-diluvian history down to the time of
Christ.[83]
§ 32.4. =New Testament Apocrypha and Pseudepigraphs.=--The
Gnostics especially produced these in great abundance. Epiphanius
speaks of them as numbering thousands. But the Catholics, too,
were unable to resist the temptation to build up the truth by
these doubtful means.
I. =Apocryphal Gospels.=
1. =Complete Gospels= existed in considerable numbers,
_i.e._ embracing the period of Christ’s earthly
labours, more or less corrupted in the interests of
Gnostic or Ebionitic heresy, or independently composed
Gospels; but only of a few of these do we possess any
knowledge.[84] The most important of these are the
following: _The Gosp. of the Egyptians_, esteemed by
the Encratites, according to Origen one of the writings
referred to in Luke i. 1; also _the Gosp. of the XII.
Apostles_, generally called by the Fathers Εὐαγγ. καθ’
Ἑβραίους originally written in Aramaic; and finally,
_the Gosp. of Marcion_ (§ 27, 11). The most important
of these is the Gospel of the Hebrews, on account of
its relation to our canonical Gospel of Matthew, which
is generally supposed to have been written originally
in Aramaic.[85] Jerome who translated the Hebrew Gospel
says of it: _Vocatur a plerisque Matthæi authenticum_;
but this is not his own opinion, nor was it that of
Origen and Eusebius. The extant fragments show many
divergences as well as many similarities, partly in
the form of apocryphal amplifications, partly of changes
made for dogmatic reasons.
2. Gospels dealing with particular Periods--referring to
the days preceding the birth of Jesus and the period of
the infancy or to the closing days of His life, where
the heretical elements are wanting or are subordinated
to the general interests of Christianity. Of these
there was a large number and much of their legendary or
fabulous material, especially about the family history
of the mother of Jesus (§ 57, 2), has passed over into
the tradition of the Catholic Church. Among them may be
mentioned;
a. _The Protevangel. Jacobi minoris_, perhaps the
oldest, certainly the most esteemed and most widely
spread, written in Greek, beginning with the story
of Mary’s birth and reaching down to the death of
the children of Bethlehem;
b. The _Ev. Pseudo Matthæi_, similar in its contents,
but continued down to the period of Jesus’ youth,
and now existing only in a Lat. translation;
c. The _Ev. de nativitate Mariæ_, only in Lat.,
containing the history of Mary down to the birth of
Jesus;
d. The _Hist. Josephi fabri lignarii_ down to his death,
dating probably from the 4th cent., only now in an
Arabic version;
e. The _Ev. Infantiæ Salvatoris_, only in Arabic, a
compilation with no particular dogmatic tendency;
f. Also the so-called _Ascension of Mary_ (§ 57, 2)
soon became the subject of apocryphal treatment,
for which John was claimed as the authority (John
xix. 26), and is preserved in several Greek, Syriac,
Arabic and Latin manuscripts;
g. The _Ev. Nicodemi_ (John xix. 39) in Greek and Lat.
contains two Jewish writings of the 2nd century.
The first part consists of the _Gesta_ or _Acta
Pilati_. There can be no doubt of its identity with
the _Acta Pilati_ quoted by Justin, Tert., Euseb.,
Epiph. It contains the stories of the canonical
Gospels variously amplified and an account of
the judicial proceedings evidently intended to
demonstrate Jesus’ innocence of the charges brought
against Him by His enemies. The second part,
bearing the title _Descensus Christi ad inferos_,
is of much later origin, telling of the descent
of Christ into Hades along with two of the saints
who rose with him (Matt. xxvii. 52), Leucius and
Carinus, sons of Simeon (Luke ii. 25).[86]
§ 32.5.
II. The numerous =Apocryphal Histories and Legends of the
Apostles= were partly of heretical, and partly of Catholic,
origin. While the former have in view the establishing of
their heretical doctrines and peculiar forms of worship,
constitution and life by representing them as Apostolic
institutions, the latter arose mostly out of a local
patriotic intention to secure to particular churches the
glory of being founded by an Apostle. Those inspired by
Gnostic influences far exceed in importance and number
not only the Ebionitic but also the genuinely Catholic.
The Manichæans especially produced many and succeeded in
circulating them widely. The more their historico-romantic
contents pandered to the taste of that age for fantastic
tales of miracles and visions the surer were they to find
access among Catholic circles.--A collection of such
histories under the title of Περίοδοι τῶν ἀποστόλων was
received as canonical by Gnostics and Manichæans, and even
by many of the Church Fathers. Augustine first named as
its supposed author one Leucius. We find this name some
decades later in Epiphanius as that of a pupil of John and
opponent of the Ebionite Christology, and also in Pacianus
of Barcelona as that of one falsely claimed as an authority
by the Montanists. According to Photius this collection
embraced the Acts of Peter, John, Andrew, Thomas and Paul,
and the author’s full name was Leucius Carinus, who also
appears in the second part of the _Acta Pilati_, but in
quite other circumstances and surroundings. That all the
five books were composed by one author is not probable;
perhaps originally only the Acts of John bore the name of
Leucius, which was subsequently transferred to the whole.
Zahn’s view, on the other hand, is, that the Περίοδοι τῶν
ἀποστόλων, especially the _Acts of John_, was written under
the falsely assumed name of John’s pupil Leucius, about
A.D. 130, at a time when the Gnostics had not yet been
separated from the Church as a heretical sect, was even at
a later period accepted as genuine by the Catholic church
teachers notwithstanding the objectionable character of much
of its contents, its modal docetic Christology and encratite
Ethics with contempt of marriage, rejection of animal food
and the use of wine and the demand of voluntary poverty, and
held in high esteem as a source of the second rank for the
Apostolic history. Lipsius considers that it was composed in
the interests of the vulgar Gnosticism (§ 27) in the second
half of the 2nd, or first half of the 3rd cent., and proves
that from Eusebius down to Photius, who brands it as πασῆς
αἱρέσεως πηγὴν καὶ μητέρα, the Catholic church teachers
without exception speak of it as heretical and godless,
and that the frequent patristic references to the _Historiæ
ecclesiasticiæ_ do not apply to it but to Catholic
modifications of it, which were regarded as the genuine
and generally credible original writing of Leucius which
were wickedly falsified by the Manichæans.--Catholic
modifications of particular Gnostic Περίοδοι, as well as
independent Catholic writings of this sort in Greek are
still preserved in MS. in great numbers and have for the
most part been printed. The _Hist. certaminis apostolici_ in
ten books, which the supposed pupil of the Apostles Abdias,
first bishop of Babylon, wrote in Hebrew, was translated by
his pupil Eutropius into Greek and by Julius Africanus into
Latin.[87]--They are all useless for determining the history
of the Apostolic Age, although abundantly so used in the
Catholic church tradition. For the history of doctrines and
sects, the history of the canon, worship, ecclesiastical
customs and modes of thought during the 2nd-4th cents., they
are of the utmost importance.
§ 32.6.
From the many apocryphal monographs still preserved on the
life, works and martyrdom of the biblical Apostles and their
coadjutors, in addition to the Pseudo-Clementines already
discussed in § 28, 3, the following are the most important.
a. The Greek =Acta Petri et Pauli=. These describe the
journeys of Paul to Rome, the disputation of the
two Apostles at Rome with Simon Magus, and the Roman
martyrdom of both, and constitute the source of the
traditions regarding Peter and Paul which are at the
present day regarded in the Roman Catholic Church as
historical. These Acts, however, as Lipsius has shown,
are not an original work, but date from about A.D. 160,
and consist of a Catholic reproduction of Ebionite
or Anti-Pauline, _Acts of Peter_, with additions from
Gentile-Christian traditions of Paul. The _Acts of Peter_
take up the story where the Pseudo-Clementines end, as
may be seen even from their Catholic reproduction, for
they make Simon Magus, followed everywhere and overcome
by the Apostle Peter, at last seek refuge in Rome,
where, again unmasked by Peter, he met a miserable end
(§ 25, 2). As the Κηρύγματα Πέτρου which formed the
basis of the Pseudo-Clementine writings combats the
specifically Pauline doctrines as derived from Simon
Magus (§ 28, 4), so the Acts of Peter identify him
even personally with Paul, for they maliciously and
spitefully assign well-known facts from the Apostle’s
life to Simon Magus, which are _bona fide_ in the
Catholic reproduction assumed to be genuine works
of Simon.--The Gnostic _Acts of Peter_ and _Acts
of Paul_ had wrought up the current Ebionite and
Catholic traditions about the doings and martyr deaths
of the two Apostles with fanciful adornments and
embellishments after the style and in the interests of
Gnosticism. A considerable fragment of these, purified
indeed by Catholic hands, is preserved to us in
the _Passio Petri et Pauli_, to which is attached
the name of Linus, the pretended successor of
Peter. The fortunes of the two Apostles are related
quite independently of one another: Paul makes his
appearance at Rome only after the death of Peter. Of the
_non-heretical Acts of Paul_ which according to Eusebius
were in earlier times received in many churches as holy
scripture (§ 36, 8), no trace has as yet been discovered.
b. Among the Greek =Acts of John=, the remnants of the
Leucian Περίοδοι Ἰωάννου preserved in their original
form deserve to be first mentioned. According to
Zahn, they are one of the earliest witnesses for
the genuineness of the Gospel of John, and give the
deathblow to the theory that with and after the Apostle
John, there was in Ephesus another John the Presbyter
distinct from him (§ 16, 2). Lipsius, on the other
hand, places their composition in the second half of
the 2nd cent., and deprives them of that significance
for the life of the Apostle, but admits their great value
for a knowledge of doctrines, principles and forms of
worship of the vulgar Gnosticism then widely spread. The
Πράξεις Ἰωάννου, greatly esteemed in the Greek church,
and often translated into other languages, written
in the 5th cent. by a Catholic hand and ascribed to
Prochoros [Prochorus] the deacon of Jerusalem (Acts
vi. 5), is a poetic romance with numerous raisings from
the dead, exorcisms, etc., almost wholly the creation
of the writer’s own imagination, without a trace of any
encratite tendency like the Leucian Περίοδοι and without
any particular doctrinal significance.
c. To the same age and the same Gnostic party as the Leucian
Acts of John, belong the =Acts of Andrew= preserved
in many fragments and circulated in various Catholic
reproductions. Of these latter the most esteemed were
the _Acts of Andrew and Matthew_ in the city of the
cannibals.
d. The Catholic reproductions in Greek and Syriac that
have come down to us of the Leucian =Acts of Thomas= are
of special value because of the many Gnostic elements
which, particularly in the Greek, have been allowed to
remain unchanged in the very imperfectly purified text.
The scene of the Apostle’s activity is said to be India.
The central point in his preaching to sinners is the
doctrine that only by complete abstinence from marriage
and concubinage can we become at last the partner of
the heavenly bridegroom (§ 27, 4). A highly poetical
hymn on the marriage of Sophia (Achamoth) is left
in the Greek text unaltered, while the Syriac text
puts the church in place of Sophia. Then we have two
poetical consecration prayers for baptism and the
eucharist, in which the Syriac substituted Christ
for Achamoth. But besides, even in the Syriac text,
a grandly swelling hymn, which is wanting in the Greek
text, romances about the fortunes of the soul, which,
sent from heaven to earth to fetch a pearl watched by
the serpent forgets its heavenly origin and calling,
and only remembers this after repeated reminders from
heaven, etc. Gutschmied has shown it to be probable
that the history groundwork of the Acts of Thomas is
borrowed from older Buddhist legends (§ 68, 6).
e. =The Acta Pauli et Thecla=, according to Tertullian and
Jerome, were composed by a presbyter of Asia Minor who,
carried away by the mania for literary forging, excused
himself by saying that he had written _Pauli amore_,
but was for this nevertheless deprived of his office.
According to these Acts Thecla, the betrothed bride
of a young man of importance at Iconium, was won to
Christianity by a sermon of Paul on continence as a
condition of a future glorious resurrection, forsook
her bridegroom, devoted herself to perpetual virginity,
and attached herself forthwith to the Apostle whose
bodily presence is described as contemptible,--little,
bald-headed, large nose, and bandy legs,--but lighted
up with heavenly grace. Led twice to martyrdom she was
saved by miraculous divine interposition, first from
the flames of the pile, then, after having baptized
herself in the name of Christ by plunging into a pit
full of water, from the rage of devouring animals;
whereupon Paul, recognising that sort of baptism in an
emergency as valid, sent her forth with the commission:
Go hence and teach the word of God! After converting
and instructing many, she died in peace in Seleucia.
Although Jerome treats our book as apocryphal, the
legends of Thecla as given in it were regarded in the
West as genuine, and St. Thecla was honoured throughout
the whole of the Latin middle ages next to the mother
of Jesus as the most perfect pattern of virginity.
In the Greek church where we meet with the name first
in the Symposium of Methodius, the book remained
unsuspected and its heroine, as ἡ ἀπόστολος and ἡ
πρωτομάρτυς, was honoured still more enthusiastically
than in the West.
f. The Syriac =Doctrina Addæi Apost.= was according to
its own statement deposited in the library of Edessa,
but allusions to later persons and circumstances show
that it could not have been written before A.D. 280
(according to Zahn about A.D. 270-290; acc. to Lipsius
not before A.D. 360). It assigns the founding of the
church of Edessa, which is proved to have been not
earlier than A.D. 170, according to local tradition
to the Apostle Addai [Addæi] (in Euseb. and elsewhere,
Thaddeus: comp. Matt. x. 3; Mark iii. 18), whom it
represents as one of the seventy disciples and as
having been sent by Thomas to Abgar Uchomo in accordance
with Christ’s promise (§ 13, 2).[88]
§ 32.7.
III. =Apostolic Epistles.= The apocryphal _Epistle of Paul to
the Laodiceans_ (Col. iv. 16), and that to the _Corinthians_
suggested by the statement in 1 Cor. v. 9, are spiritless
compilations from the canonical Epistles. From the
_Correspondence of Paul with Seneca_, quotations are made by
Jerome and Augustine. It embraces fourteen short epistles.
The idea of friendly relations between these two men
suggested by Acts xviii. 12, Gallio being Seneca’s brother,
forms the motive for the fiction.
IV. =The apocryphal Apocalypses= that have been preserved are of
little value. An _Apocalypsis Petri_ was known to Clement of
Alexandria. The _Apoc. Pauli_ is based on 2 Cor. xii. 2.
V. =Apostolical Constitutions=, comp. § 43, 4, 5.[89]
§ 32.8. =The Acts of the Martyrs.=--Of the numerous professedly
contemporary accounts of celebrated martyrs of the 2nd and 3rd
cents., those adopted by Eusebius in his Church History may be
accepted as genuine; especially the _Epistle of the Church of
Smyrna to the Church at Philomelium_ about the persecution which
it suffered (§ 22, 3); also the _Report of the Church at Lyons
and Vienne_ to the Christians in Asia and Phrygia about the
persecution under Marcus Aurelius in A.D. 177 (§ 22, 3); and an
_Epistle of Dionysius Bishop of Alexandria_ to Fabian of Antioch
about the Alexandrian martyrs and confessors during the Decian
persecution. The Acts of the Martyrs of Scillita are also genuine
(§ 22, 3); so too the Montanistic History of the sufferings of
Perpetua, Felicitas, and their companions (§§ 22, 4; 40, 3); as
well as the _Acta s. Cypriani_. The main part of the _Martyrdom
of Justin Martyr_ by Simeon Metaphr. (§ 68, 4) belongs
probably to the 2nd cent. The _Martyrdom of Ignatius_ (§ 30, 5)
professedly by his companions in his last journey to Rome, and
the _Martyrdom of Sympherosa_ in the Tiber, who was put to death
with her seven sons under Hadrian, as well as all other Acts of
the Martyrs professedly belonging to the first four centuries,
are of more than doubtful authenticity.
§ 33. THE DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES OF THE
OLD CATHOLIC AGE.[90]
The development of the system of Christian doctrine must become a
necessity when Christianity meeting with pagan culture in the form of
science is called upon to defend her claim to be the universal religion.
In the first three centuries, however, there was as yet no official
construction and establishment of ecclesiastical doctrine. There
must first be a certain measure of free subjective development and
wrestling with antagonistic views. A universally acknowledged organ is
wanting, such as that subsequently found in the Œcumenical Councils.
The persecutions allowed no time and peace for this; and the church had
enough to do in maintaining what is specifically Christian in opposition
to the intrusion of such anti-Christian, Jewish and Pagan elements
as sought to gain a footing in Ebionism and Gnosticism. On the other
hand, friction and controversy within the church had already begun
as a preparation for the construction of the ecclesiastical system of
doctrine. The _Trinitarian_ controversy was by far the most important,
while the _Chiliastic_ discussions were of significance for Eschatology.
§ 33.1. =The Trinitarian Questions.=--The discussion was mainly
about the relation of the divine μοναρχία (the unity of God) to
the οἰκονομία (the Trinitarian being and movement of God). Then
the relation of the Son or Logos to the Father came decidedly
to the front. From the time when the more exact determination of
this relationship came to be discussed, toward the end of the 2nd
cent., the most eminent teachers of the Catholic church maintained
stoutly the personal independence of the Logos--=Hypostasianism=.
But the necessity for keeping this view in harmony with the
monotheistic doctrine of Christianity led to many errors and
vacillations. Adopting Philo’s distinction of λόγος ἐνδιάθετος
and λόγος προφορικός (§ 10, 1), they for the most part regarded
the hypostasizing as conditioned first by the creating of the
world and as coming forth not as a necessary and eternal element
in the very life of God but as a free and temporal act of the
divine will. The proper essence of the Godhead was identified
rather with the Father, and all attributes of the Godhead were
ascribed to the Son not in a wholly equal measure as to the
Father, for the word of Christ: “the Father is greater than I”
(John xiv. 28), was applied even to the pre-existent state of
Christ. Still greater was the uncertainty regarding the Holy
Spirit. The idea of His personality and independence was far less
securely established; He was much more decidedly subordinated,
and the functions of inspiration and sanctification proper to
Him were ascribed to Christ, or He was simply identified with
the Son of God. The result, however, of such _subordinationist
hypostasianism_ was that, on the one hand, many church teachers
laid undue stress on the fundamental anti-pagan doctrine of the
unity of God, just as on the other hand, many had indulged in
exaggerated statements about the divinity of Christ. It seemed
therefore desirable to set aside altogether the question of the
personal distinction of the Son and Spirit from the Father. This
happened either in the way clearly favoured by the Ebionites who
regarded Christ as a mere man, who, like the prophets, though
in a much higher measure, had been endued with divine wisdom and
power (_dynamic_ =Monarchianism=), or in a way more accordant
with the Christian mode of thought, admitting that the fulness
of the Godhead dwelt in Christ, and either identifying the
Logos with the Father (_Patripassianism_), or seeing in Him
only a mode of the activity of the Father (_modal Monarchianism_).
Monarchianism in all these forms was pronounced heretical by all
the most illustrious fathers of the 3rd cent., and hypostasianism
was declared orthodox. But even under hypostasianism an
element of error crept in at a later period in the form of
subordinationism, and modal Monarchianism approached nearer
to the church doctrine by adopting the doctrine of sameness
of essence (ὁμοουσία) in Son and Father. The orthodox combination
of the two opposites was reached in the 3rd cent, in _homoousian
hypostasianism_, but only in the 4th cent. attained universal
acceptance (§ 50).
§ 33.2. =The Alogians.=--Soon after A.D. 170 in Asia Minor we
meet with the Alogians as the first decided opponents from within
the church of Logos doctrine laid down in the Gospel by John
and the writings of the Apologists. They started in diametrical
opposition to the chiliasm of the Montanists and their claims
to prophetic gifts, and were thus led not only to repudiate the
Apocalypse but also the Gospel of John; the former on account of
its chiliast-prophetic contents which embraced so much that was
unintelligible, yea absurd and untrue; the latter, first of all
on account of the use the Montanists made of its doctrine of the
Paraclete in support of their prophetic claims (§ 40, 1), but
also on account of its seeming contradictions of and departures
from the narratives of the Synoptists, and finally, on account
of its Logos doctrine in which the immediate transition from the
incarnation of the Logos to the active life of Christ probably
seemed to them too closely resembling docetic Gnosticism. They
therefore attributed to the Gnosticizing Judaist, Cerinthus, the
authorship both of the Fourth Gospel and of the Apocalypse. Of
their own Christological theories we have no exact information.
Irenæus and Hippolytus deal mildly with them and recognise
them as members of the Catholic church. It is Epiphanius who
first gives them the equivocal designation of Alogians (which
may either be “deniers of the Logos” or “the irrational”),
denouncing them as heretical rejecters of the Logos doctrine
and the Logos-Gospel. This is the first instance which we have of
historical criticism being exercised in the Church with reference
to the biblical books.
§ 33.3. =The Theodotians and Artemonites.=--Epiphanius describes
the sect of the Theodotians at Rome as an ἀπόσπασμα τῆς ἀλόγου
αἱρέσεως. The main source of information about them is the Little
Labyrinth (§ 31, 3), and next to it Hippolytus in his Syntagma,
quoted by the Pseudo-Tertullian and Epiphanius, and in his
Elenchus. The founder of this sect, =Theodotus= ὁ σκυτεύς, _the
Tanner_, a man well trained in Greek culture, came A.D. 190 to
Byzantium where, during the persecution, he denied Christ, and
on this account changed his residence to Rome and devoted himself
here to the spread of his dynamic Monarchianism. He maintained
ψιλὸν ἄνθρωπον εἶναι τὸν Χριστόν,--_Spiritu quidem sancto
natum ex virgine, sed hominem nudum nulla alia præ cæteris nisi
sola justitæ auctoritate_. He sought to justify his views by
a one-sided interpretation of scripture passages referring to
the human nature of Christ.[91] But since he acknowledged the
supernatural birth of Christ as well as the genuineness of the
Gospel of John, and in other respects agreed with his opponents,
he could still represent himself as standing on the basis of
the Old Catholic _Regula fidei_ (§ 35, 2). Nevertheless the
Roman bishop Victor (A.D. 189-199) excommunicated him and his
followers. The most distinguished among his disciples was a
_second_ =Theodotus= ὁ τραπεζίτης, the _Money-changer_. By an
exegesis of Heb. v. 6, 10; vi. 20; vii. 3, 17, he sought to prove
that Melchisedec was δύναμις τίς μεγίστη and more glorious than
Christ; the former was the original type, the latter only the
copy; the former was intercessor before God for the angels,
the latter only for men; the origin of the former is secret,
because truly heavenly, that of Christ open, because born of
Mary. The later heresiologists therefore designate his followers
Melchisedecians. Laying hold upon the theory φύσει τὸν υἱὸν τοῦ
θεοῦ ἐν ἰδέᾳ ἀνθρώπου τότε τῷ Ἀβραὰμ πεφηνέναι which, according
to Epiphanius, was held even by Catholics, and also, like the
Shepherd of Hermas, identifying the Son of God with the Holy
Spirit that descended in baptism on the man Jesus, Theodotus
seems from those two points of view to have proceeded to
teach, that the historical Christ, because operated upon only
dynamically by the Holy Spirit or the Son of God, was inferior to
the purely heavenly Melchisedec who was himself the very eternal
Son of God. The reproaches directed against the Theodotians by
their opponents were mainly these: that instead of the usual
allegorical exegesis they used only a literal and grammatical,
that they practised an arbitrary system of Textual criticism, and
that instead of holding to the philosophy of the divine Plato,
they took their wisdom from the empiricists (Aristotle, Euclid,
Galen, etc.), and sought by such objectionable means to support
their heretical views. We have thus probably to see in them a
group of Roman theologians, who, towards the close of the 2nd
cent. and the beginning of the 3rd cent. maintained exegetical
and critical principles essentially the same as those which the
Antiochean school with greater clearness and definiteness set
forth toward the end of the 3rd cent. (§§ 31, 1; 47, 1). The
attempt, however, which they made to found an independent sect
in Rome about A.D. 210 was an utter failure. According to the
report of the Little Labyrinth, they succeeded in getting for
their bishop a weak-minded confessor called Natalius. Haunted
by visions of judgment and beaten sore one night by good angels
till in a miserable plight, he hasted on the following morning
to cast himself at the feet of bishop Zephyrinus (A.D. 199-217),
successor of Victor, and showing his stripes he begged for
mercy and restoration.--The last of the representatives of the
Theodotians in Rome, and that too under this same Zephyrinus, was
a certain =Artemon= or Artemas. He and his followers maintained
that their own doctrine (which cannot be very exactly determined
but was also of the dynamic order) had been recognised in Rome
as orthodox from the time of the Apostles down to that of bishop
Victor, and was first condemned by his successor Zephyrinus. This
assertion cannot be said to be altogether without foundation in
view, on the one hand, of the agreement above referred to between
Theodotus the younger and the Roman Hermas, and on the other hand,
of the fact that the Roman bishops Zephyrinus and Callistus had
passed over to Noëtian _Modalism_. Artemon must have lived at
least until A.D. 260, when Paul of Samosata (§ 33, 8), who also
maintained fellowship with the excommunicated Artemonites in
Rome, conducted a correspondence with him.
§ 33.4. =Praxeas and Tertullian.=--Patripassianism, which
represented the Father Himself as becoming man and suffering in
Christ, may be characterized as the precursor and first crude
form of Modalism. It also had its origin during the 2nd cent.,
in that same intellectually active church of Asia Minor, and
from thence the movement spread to Rome, where after a long and
bitter struggle it secured a footing in the 3rd cent.--=Praxeas=,
a confessor of Asia Minor and opponent of Montanism, was its first
representative at Rome, where unopposed he expounded his views
about A.D. 190. As he supported the Roman bishop Victor in his
condemnation of Montanism (§ 40, 2), so he seems to have won
the bishop’s approval for his Christological theory.[92] Perhaps
also the excommunication which was at this time uttered against
the dynamic Monarchian, Theodotus the Elder, was the result of
the bishop’s change of views. From Rome Praxeas betook himself,
mainly in the interest of his Anti-Montanist crusade, to Carthage,
and there also won adherents to his Christology. Meanwhile,
however, Tertullian returned to Carthage, and as a convert
to Montanism, hurled against Praxeas and his followers a
controversial treatise, in which he laid bare with acute
dialectic the weaknesses and inconsistencies, as well as the
dangerous consequences of their theory. Just like the Alogians,
Praxeas and his adherents refused to admit the doctrine of the
Logos into their Christology, and feared that it in connection
with the doctrine of the hypostasis would give an advantage to
Gnosticism. In the interests of monotheism, as well as of the
worship of Christ, they maintained the perfect identity of Father
and Son. God became the Son by the assumption of the flesh;
under the concept of the Father therefore falls the divinity,
the spirit; under that of the Son, the humanity, the flesh of
the Redeemer.--=Tertullian= himself in his Hypostasianism had not
wholly got beyond the idea of subordinationism, but he made an
important advance in this direction by assuming three stages in
the hypostasizing of the Son (_Filiatio_). The first stage is
the eternal immanent state of being of the Son in the Father; the
second is the forthcoming of the Son alongside of the Father for
the purpose of creating the world; and the third is the going
forth of the Son into the world by means of the incarnation.
§ 33.5. =The Noëtians and Hippolytus.=--The Patripassian
standpoint was maintained also by =Noëtus= of Smyrna, who summed
up his Christological views in the sentence: the Son of God is
His own, and not another’s Son. One of his pupils, _Epigonus_,
in the time of bishop Zephyrinus brought this doctrine to Rome,
where a Noëtian sect was formed with Cleomenes at its head.
Sabellius too, who in A.D. 215 came to Rome from Ptolemais in
Egypt, attached himself to it, but afterwards constructed an
independent system of doctrine in the form of a more speculative
Modalism. The most vigorous opponent of the Noëtians was the
celebrated presbyter =Hippolytus= (§ 31, 3). He strongly insisted
upon the hypostasis of the Son and of the Spirit, and claimed
for them divine worship. But inasmuch as he maintained in all
its strictness the unity of God, he too was unable to avoid
subordinating the Son under the Father. The Son, he taught, owed
His hypostasizing to the will of the Father; the Father commands
and the Son obeys; the perfect Logos was the Son from eternity,
but οὐ λόγος ὡς φωνὴ, ἀλλ’ ἐνδιάθετος τοῦ πάντος λογισμός,
therefore in a hypostasis, which He became only at the creation
of the world, so that He became perfect Son first in the
incarnation. Bishop Zephyrinus, on the other hand, was not
inclined to bear hard upon the Noëtians, but sought in the
interests of peace some meeting-point for the two parties. The
conflagration fairly broke out under his successor, Callistus
(A.D. 217-222; comp. § 41, 1). Believing that truth and error
were to be found on both sides he defined his own position thus:
God is a spirit without parts, filling all things, giving life
to all, who as such is called Logos, and only in respect of name
is distinguished as Father and Son. The Pneuma become incarnate
in the Virgin is personally and essentially identical with the
Father. That which has thereby become manifest, the man Jesus,
is the Son. It therefore cannot be said that the Father as such
has suffered, but rather that the Father has suffered in and
with the Son. Decidedly Monarchian as this formula of compromise
undoubtedly is, it seems to have afforded the bridge upon which
the official Roman theology crossed over to the homoousian
Hypostasianism which forty years later won the day (§ 33, 7).
Among the opposing parties it found no acceptance. Hippolytus
denounced the bishop as a Noëtian, while the Noëtians nicknamed
him a Dytheist. The result was that the two party leaders,
Sabellius and Hippolytus, were excommunicated. The latter formed
the company of his adherents in Rome into a schismatic sect.
§ 33.6. =Beryllus and Origen.=--=Beryllus of Bostra=[93] in
Arabia also belonged to the Patripassians; but he marks the
transition to a nobler Modalism, for though he refuses to the
deity of Christ the ἰδία θεότης, he designates it πατρικὴ θεότης,
and sees in it a new form of the manifestation (πρόσωπον) of
God. In regard to him an Arabian Synod was held in A.D. 244,
to which =Origen= was invited. Convinced by him of his error,
Beryll [Beryllus] retracted.--All previous representatives of
the hypostasis of the Logos had understood his hypostatizing
as happening in time for the purpose of the creation and the
incarnation. =Origen= removed this restriction when he enunciated
the proposition: The Son is from eternity begotten of the Father
and so from eternity an hypostasis. The generation of the Son
took not place simply as the condition of creation, but as of
itself necessary, for where there is light there must be the
shedding forth of rays. But because the life of God is bound
to no time, the objectivizing of His life in the Son must also
lie outside of all time. It is not therefore an act of God
accomplished once and for ever, but an eternally continued
exercise of living power (ἀεὶ γεννᾲ τὸν υἱόν). Origen did not
indeed get beyond subordinationism, but he restricted it within
the narrowest possible limits. He condemns the expression that
the Son is ἐκ τῆς οὐσίας τοῦ πατρός, but only in opposition
to the Gnostic theories of emanation. He maintained a ἑτερότης
τῆς οὐσίας, but only in opposition to the ὁμοούσιος in the
Patripassian sense. He teaches a generation of the Son ἐκ τοῦ
θελήματος θεοῦ, but only because he sees in Him the objectified
divine will. He calls Him a κτίσμα, but only in so far as He is
θεοποιούμενος, not αὐτόθεος, though indeed the Son is αὐτοσοφία,
αὐτοαλήθεια, δεύτερος θεός. Thus what he teaches is not a
subordination of essence or nature, but only of existence or
origin.
§ 33.7. =Sabellius and Dionysius of Alex. and Dionysius of
Rome.=--We have already seen that =Sabellius= had founded in
Rome a speculative Manichæan system, which found much favour
among the bishops of his native region. His assigning an essential
and necessary place in his system to the Holy Spirit indicates
an important advance. God is a unity (μονάς) admitting of no
distinctions, resting in Himself as θεὸς σιωπών coming forth
out of Himself (for the purpose of creation) as θεὸς λαλῶν. In
the course of the world’s development the Monas for the sake of
redemption assumes necessarily three different forms of being
(ὀνόματα πρόσωπα), each of which embraces in it the complete
fulness of the Monas. They are not ὑποστάσεις, but πρόσωπα, masks,
we might say roles, which the God who manifests Himself in the
world assumes in succession. After the _prosopon_ of the Father
accomplished its work in the giving of the law, it fell back into
its original condition; advancing again through the incarnation
as Son, it returns by the ascension into the absolute being of
the Monas; it reveals itself finally as the Holy Spirit to return
again, after securing the perfect sanctification of the church,
into the Monas that knows no distinctions, there to abide through
all eternity. This process is characterized by Sabellius as
an expansion (ἔκτασις) and contraction (συστολή). By way of
illustration he uses the figure of the sun ὄντος μὲν ἐν μίᾳ
ὑποστάσει, τρεῖς δὲ ἔχοντος τὰς ἐνεργείας, namely τὸ τῆς
περιφερείας σχῆμα, τὸ φωτιστικὸν καὶ τὸ θάλπον.--At a Synod of
Alexandria in A.D. 261 =Dionysius the Great= (§ 31, 6) entered
the lists against the Sabellianism of the Egyptian bishops, and
with well-intentioned zeal employed subordinationist expressions
in a highly offensive way (ξένον κατ’ οὐσίαν αὐτὸν εἶναι τοῦ
Πατρὸς ὥσπερ ἐστὶν ὁ γεωργὸς πρὸς τὴν ἄμπελον καὶ ὁ ναυπηγὸς πρὸς
τὸ σκάφος,--ὡς ποίημα ὢν οὐκ ἦν πρὶν γέννηται). When bishop
=Dionysius of Rome= (A.D. 259-268) was informed of these
proceedings he condemned his Alexandrian colleague’s modes of
expression at a Synod at Rome in A.D. 262, and issued a tract
(Ἀνατροπή), in which against Sabellius he affirmed hypostasianism
and against the Alexandrians, notwithstanding the suspicion of
Manichæanism that hung about it, the doctrine of the ὁμοουσία
and the eternal generation of the Son. With a beautiful modesty
Dionysius of Alexandria retracted his unhappily chosen phrases
and declared himself in thorough agreement with the Roman
exposition of doctrine.
§ 33.8. =Paul of Samosata.=--In Rome and throughout the West
general dynamical Monarchianism expired with Artemon and his
party. In the East, however, it was revived by Paul of Samosata,
in A.D. 260 bishop of the Græco-Syrian capital Antioch, which,
however, was then under the rule of Queen Zenobia of Palmyra.
Attaching himself to the other dynamists, especially the
Theodotians and Artemonites, he went in many respects beyond them.
Maintaining as they did the unipersonality of God (ἓν πρόσωπον),
he yet admitted a distinction of Father, Son (λόγος) and Spirit
(σοφία) the two last, however, being essentially identical
attributes of the first, and also the distinction of the
λόγος προφορικός from the λόγος ἐνδιάθετος, the one being the
ἐπιστήμη ἀνυπόστατος operative in the prophets, the other the
ἐπ. ἀνυπ. latent in God. Further, while placing like the dynamists
the personality of Christ in His humanity and acknowledging
His supernatural birth from the Holy Spirit by the Virgin, he
conceived of Him, like the modern Socinians, as working the
way upward, ἐκ προκοπῆς τεθεοποιῆσθαι, _i.e._ by reason of His
unique excellence to divine rank and the obtaining of the divine
name.--Between A.D. 264-269 the Syrian bishops held three large
Synods in regard to him at Antioch, to which also many other
famous bishops of the East were invited. The first two were
without result, for he knew how to conceal the heterodox character
of his views. It was only at the third that the presbyter Malchion,
a practised dialectician and formerly a rhetorician, succeeded
in unmasking him at a public disputation. The Synod now declared
him excommunicated and deprived him of his office, and also
transmitted to all the catholic churches, first of all to Rome
and Alexandria, the records of the disputation together with
a complete report in which he was described as a proud, vain,
pompous, covetous and even immoral man (§ 39, 3). Nevertheless
by the favour of the Queen he kept possession of his bishopric,
and holding a high office at the court he exercised not only
spiritual functions but also great civil authority. But when
Zenobia was overcome by Aurelian in A.D. 272, the rest of the
bishops accused him before the pagan emperor, who decided that
the ecclesiastical buildings should be made over to that one
of the contending bishops whom the Christian bishops of Rome
and Italy should recognise. In these conflicts undoubtedly a
national and political antagonism lay behind the dogmatic and
ecclesiastical dispute (§ 31, 9 e).--At the Synod of A.D. 269
the expression ὁμοούσιος, which since it had been first used by
Sabellius was always regarded with suspicion in church circles,
was dragged into the debate and expressly condemned; and so it is
doubtful whether Paul himself had employed it, or whether, on the
contrary, he wished to charge his opponents with heresy as being
wont to use this term.
§ 33.9. =Chiliasm= or the doctrine of an earthly reign of the
Messiah in the last times full of splendour and glory for His
people arose out of the literal and realistic conception of the
Messianic prophecies of the Old Testament. The adoption of the
period of a thousand years for its duration rested on the idea
that as the world had been created in six days, so, according
to Ps. xc. 4 and 2 Pet. iii. 8, its history would be completed
in six thousand years. Under the oppression of the Roman rule
this notion came to be regarded as a fundamental doctrine of
Jewish faith and hope (Matt. xx. 21; Acts i. 6). The Apocalypse
of St. John was chiefly influential in elaborating the Christian
chiliastic theory. In chap. xx. under the guise of vision the
doctrine is set forth that after the finally victorious conflict
of the present age there will be a first and partial resurrection,
the risen saints shall reign with Christ a thousand years, and
then after another revolt of Satan that is soon suppressed the
present age will be closed in the second universal resurrection,
the judgment of the world and the creation of new heavens and a
new earth. What fantastic notions of the glory of the thousand
years’ reign might be developed from such passages, is seen in
the traditional saying of the Lord given by Papias (_Iren._,
v. 33) about the wonderful fruitfulness of the earth during the
millennium: one vine-stock will bear 10,000 stems (palmites),
each stem will have 10,000 branches (bracchia), each branch
10,000 twigs (flagella), each twig 10,000 clusters (botrus), each
cluster 10,000 grapes, and every grape will yield 25 measures
of wine; “_et quum eorum apprehenderit aliquis Sanctorum,
alius clamabit: Botrus ego melior sum, me sume, per me Dominum
benedic_!” After the time of Papias Chiliasm became the favourite
doctrine of the Christians who under the severe pressure of
pagan persecution longed for the early return of the Lord. The
Apologists of the 2nd century do indeed pass it over in silence,
but only perhaps because it seemed to them impolitic to give
it a marked prominence in works directly addressed to the pagan
rulers; at least Justin Martyr does not scruple in the _Dialog.
c. Tryph._ addressed to another class of readers to characterize
it as a genuinely orthodox doctrine. Asia Minor was the chief
seat of these views, where, as we have seen (§ 40), Montanism
also in its most fanatical and exaggerated form was elevated
into a fundamental article of the Christian faith. Irenæus
enthusiastically adopted chiliastic views and gave a full though
fairly moderate exposition of them in his great work against the
Gnostics (v. 24-36). Tertullian also championed these notions,
at the same time rejecting many outgrowths of a grossly carnal
nature (_Adv. Marc._, iii. 24, and in a work no longer extant,
_De spe fidelium_). The most vigorous opposition is shown to
Chiliasm by the Alogians, Praxeas the Patripassian and Caius
of Rome, who were also the determined opponents of Montanism.
The last named indeed went so far in his controversial writing
against Proclus the Montanist, as to ascribe the authorship of
the Johannine Apocalypse to the heretic Cerinthus (§ 27, 1).
The Alexandrian spiritualists too, especially Origen (_De Prin._,
ii. 11), were decided opponents of every form of Chiliasm and
explained away the Scripture passages on which it was built by
means of allegorical interpretation. Nevertheless even in Egypt
it had numerous adherents. At their head about the middle of
the 3rd cent. stood the learned bishop Nepos of Arsinoe, whose
Ἔλεγχος τῶν ἀλληγοριστῶν directed against the Alexandrians is no
longer extant. After his death his party under the leadership of
the presbyter Coracion separated from the church of Alexandria,
the bishop Dionysius the Great going down himself expressly
to Arsinoe in order to heal the breach. In a conference of the
leaders of the parties continued for three days he secured the
sincere respect of the dissentients by his counsels, and even
Coracion was induced to make a formal recantation. Dionysius
then wrote for the confirmation of the converts his book: Περὶ
ἐπαγγελιῶν. But not long after, opposition to the spiritualism of
the school of Origen made Methodius, the bishop of Olympus, play
the part of a new herald of Chiliasm, and in the West, Commodian,
Victor of Poitiers, and especially Lactantius, became its zealous
advocates in a particularly materialistic form. Its day, however,
was already past. What tended most to work its complete overthrow
was the course of events under Constantine. Amid the rejoicings
of the national church as a present reality, interest in the
expectation of a future thousand years’ reign was lost. Among
post-Constantine church teachers only Apollinaris the Younger
favoured Chiliasm (§ 47, 5). Jerome indeed, in deference to the
cloud of witnesses from the ancient church, does not venture to
pronounce it heretical, but treats it with scornful ridicule;
and Augustine (_De civ. Dei_), though at an earlier period not
unfavourable to it, sets it aside by showing that the scriptural
representations of the thousand years’ reign are to be understood
as referring to the church obtaining dominion through the
overthrow of the pagan Roman empire, the thousand years being a
period of indefinite duration, and the first resurrection being
interpreted of the reception of saints and martyrs into heaven
as sharers in the glory of Christ.--See Candlish, “The Kingdom of
God.” Edin., 1884. Especially pp. 409-415, “Augustine on the City
of God.”
IV. CONSTITUTION, WORSHIP, LIFE AND DISCIPLINE.[94]
§ 34. THE INNER ORGANIZATION OF THE CHURCH.[95]
From the beginning of the 2nd cent. the episcopal constitution
was gradually built up, and the superiority of one bishop over the
whole body of the other presbyters (§ 17, 6) won by degrees universal
acceptance. The hierarchical tendency inherent in it gained fresh
impetus from two causes: (1) from the gradual disappearance of the
charismatic endowments which had been continued from the Apostolic
Age far down into post-Apostolic times, and the disposition of
ecclesiastical leaders more and more to monopolise the function
of teaching; and (2) from the reassertion of the idea of a special
priesthood as a divine institution and the adoption of Old Testament
conceptions of church officers. The antithesis of _Ordo_ or κλῆρος
(sc. τοῦ θεοῦ) and _Plebs_ or λαός (λαϊκοί) when once expression had
been given to it, tended to become even more marked and exclusive. In
consequence of the successful extension of the churches the functions,
rights and duties of the existing spiritual offices came to be more
precisely determined and for the discharge of lower ecclesiastical
service new offices were created. Thus arose the partition of the
clergy into _Ordines majores_ and _Ordines minores_. As it was in the
provincial capital that common councils were held, which were convened,
at first in consequence of the requirements of the hour, afterwards as
regular institutions (Provincial Synods), the bishop of the particular
capital assumed the president’s chair. Among the metropolitans
pre-eminence was claimed by churches founded by Apostles (_sedes
apostolicæ_), especially those of Rome, Antioch, Jerusalem, Alexandria,
Ephesus and Corinth. To the idea of the =unity and catholicity of
the church=, which was maintained and set forth with ever increasing
decision, was added the idea of the Apostle Peter being the single
individual representative of the church. This latter notion was founded
on the misunderstood word of the Lord, Matt. xvi. 18, 19. Rome, as the
capital of the world, where Peter and Paul suffered death as martyrs
(§ 16, 1), arrogated to itself the name of _Chair_ (Cathedra) _of Peter_
and transferred the idea of the individual representation of the church
to its bishops as the supposed successors of Peter.
§ 34.1. =The Continuation of Charismatic Endowments into
Post-Apostolic Times= has, by means of the Apostolic Didache
recently rendered accessible to us (§ 30, 7), not only received
new confirmation, but their place in the church and their relation
to it has been put in a far clearer light. In essential agreement
with 1 Cor. xii. 28, and Eph. iv. 11 (§ 17, 5), it presents to
us the three offices of Apostle, Prophet and Teacher. The Pastors
and Teachers of the Epistle to the Ephesians, as well as of
the passage from Corinthians, are grouped together in one; and
the Evangelists, that is, helpers of the Apostles, appear now
after the decease of the original Apostles, as their successors
and heirs of their missionary calling under the same title of
Apostles. Hermas indeed speaks only of Apostles and Teachers;
but he himself appears as a Prophet and so witnesses to the
continuance of that office. The place and task of the three
offices are still the same as described in § 17, 5 from Eph.
iv. 11, 12 and ii. 20. These three were not chosen like the
bishops and deacons by the congregations, but appointment and
qualifications for office were dependent on a divine call,
somewhat like that of Acts xiii. 2-4, or on a charism that had
evidently and admittedly been bestowed on them. They are further
not permanent officials in particular congregations but travel
about in the exercise of their teaching function from church to
church. Prophets and Teachers, however, but not Apostles, might
settle down permanently in a particular church.--In reference
exclusively to the =Apostles= the Didache teaches as follows:
In the case of their visiting an already constituted church
they should stay there at furthest only two days and should
accept provision only for one day’s journey but upon no account
any money (Matt. x. 9, 10). Eusebius too, in his Ch. Hist.,
iii. 37, tells that after the death of the twelve the gospel was
successfully spread abroad in all lands by means of itinerating
Apostolic men, whom he designates, however, by the old name of
evangelists, and praises them for having according to the command
of the Lord (Matt. x. and Luke x.) parted their possessions among
the poor, and having adhered strictly to the rule of everywhere
laying only the foundations of the faith and leaving the further
care of what they had planted to the settled pastors.--The
Didache assigns the second place to the =Prophets=: they too,
inasmuch as like the Apostles they are itinerants, are without
a fixed residence; but they are distinguished from the latter by
having their teaching functions directed not to the founding of
a church but only to its edification, and in this respect they
are related to the Teachers. Their distinguishing characteristic,
however, is the possession of the charism of prophesying in the
wider sense, whereas the Teachers’ charism consisted in the λόγος
σοφίας and the λόγος γνώσεως (§ 17, 1). When they enter into a
church as ἐν πνεύματι λαλοῦντες, that church may not, according
to the Didache, in direct opposition to 1 Thess. v. 21; 1 Cor.
xii. 10; xiv. 29; 1 John iv. 1, exercise the right of trying
their doctrine, for that would be to commit the sin against the
Holy Ghost who speaks through them, but the church may inquire
of their life, and thus distinguish true prophets from the
false. If they wish to settle down in a particular church, that
church should make provision for their adequate maintenance by
surrendering to them, after the pattern of the Mosaic law, all
firstlings of cattle, and first fruits of grain and oil and wine,
and also the first portion of their other possessions, “for they
are your high priests.” This phrase means either, that for them
they are with their prophetic gift what the high priests of the
old covenant with their Urim and Thummim were to ancient Israel,
or, as Harnack understands it on the basis of chap. x. 7: τοῖς
προφήταις ἐπιτρέπετε εὐχαριστεῖν ὅσα θέλουσιν, while ordinary
ministers had to confine themselves to the usual formularies,
that they were pre-eminently entrusted with the administration of
the Lord’s Supper which was the crowning part of the worship. If,
however, there were no Prophets present, these first fruits were
to be distributed among the poor.--The rank also of =Teachers=
(διδάσκαλοι, Doctores) is still essentially the same as described
in § 17, 5. As their constant association with the Apostles
and Prophets would lead us to expect, they also were properly
itinerant teachers, who like the Prophets had to minister to
the establishment of existing churches in the Christian life,
in faith and in hope. But when they settled down in a particular
church, whether in consequence of that church’s special needs, or
with its approval in accordance with their own wish, that church
had to provide for their maintenance according to the principle
that the labourer is worthy of his reward. The author of the
Didache, as appears from the whole tenor of his book, was himself
such a teacher. Hermas, who at the same time makes no mention of
the Prophets, speaks only twice and that quite incidentally of
the Teachers, without indicating particularly their duties and
privileges.--The continuance of those three extraordinary offices
down to the end of the 2nd cent. was of the utmost importance.
The numerous churches scattered throughout all lands had not
as yet a firmly established New Testament Canon nor any one
general symbol in the form of a confession of faith, and so
were without any outward bond of union: but these Teachers, by
means of their itinerant mode of life and their authoritative
position, which was for the first time clearly demonstrated by
Harnack, contributed powerfully to the development of the idea
of ecclesiastical unity. According to Harnack, the composition
of the so-called Catholic Epistles and similar early Christian
literature is to be assigned to them, and in this way he would
account for the Apostolic features which are discoverable
in these writings. He would not, however, attribute to them
the fiction of claiming for their works an Apostolic origin,
but supposes that the subsequently added superscriptions
and the author’s name in the address rest upon an erroneous
tradition.--The gradual disappearance of charismatic offices was
mainly the result of the endeavour, that became more and more
marked during the 2nd cent., after the adoption of current social
usages and institutions, which necessarily led to a repression
of the enthusiastic spirit out of which those offices had sprung
and which could scarcely reconcile itself with what seemed
to it worldly compromises and concessions. The fanatical and
eccentric pretension to prophetic gifts in Montanism, with its
uncompromising rigour (§ 40) and its withdrawal from church
fellowship, gave to these charismatic offices their deadly blow.
A further cause of their gradual decay may certainly be found in
their relation to the growing episcopal hierarchy. At the time of
the Didache, which knows nothing of a subordination of presbyters
under the bishop (indeed like Phil. i. 1, it makes no mention
of presbyters), this relation was one of thoroughly harmonious
co-ordination and co-operation. In the 13th chap. the exhortation
is given to choose only faithful and approved men as bishops
and deacons, “for they too discharge for you τὴν λειτουργίαν τῶν
προφητῶν καὶ διδασκάλων and so they represent along with those
the τετιμημένοι among you.” The service of prophets, according
to the Didache, was pre-eminently that of the ἀρχιερεῖς and so
there was entrusted to them the consecration of the elements
in the Lord’s Supper. This service the bishops and deacons
discharged, inasmuch as, in addition to their own special duties
as presidents of the congregation charged with its administration
and discipline, they were required in the absence of prophets
to conduct the worship. Then also they had to officiate as
Teachers (1 Tim. v. 17) when occasion required and the necessary
qualifications were possessed. But this peaceful co-operating
of the two orders undoubtedly soon and often gave place to
unseemly rivalry, and the hierarchical spirit obtruding itself
in the _Protepiscopate_ (§ 17, 6), which first of all reduced
its colleagues from their original equality to a position of
subordination soon asserted itself over against the extraordinary
offices which had held a place co-ordinate with and in the
department of doctrine and worship even more authoritative and
important than that of the bishops themselves. They were only too
readily successful in having their usurpation of their offices
recognised as bearing the authority of a divine appointment.
These soon completed the theory of the hierarchical and
monarchical rank of the clergy and the absurd pretension to
having obtained from God the absolute fulness of His Spirit and
absolute sovereign power.
§ 34.2. =The Development of the Episcopal Hierarchy= was the
result of an evolution which in existing circumstances was not
only natural but almost necessary. In the deliberations and
consultations of the college of presbyters constituting the
ecclesiastical court, just as in every other such assembly, it
must have been the invariable custom to confer upon one of their
number, generally the eldest, or at least the one among them most
highly esteemed, the presidency, committing to him the duty of
the orderly conduct of the debates, as well as the formulating,
publishing and enforcing of their decrees. This president must
soon have won the pre-eminent authority of a _primus inter pares_,
and have come to be regarded as an ἐπίσκοπος of higher rank.
From such a primacy to supremacy, and from that to a monarchical
position, the progress was natural and easy. In proportion as the
official authority, the ἐπισκοπή, concentrated itself more and
more in the president, the official title, ἐπίσκοπος, at first by
way of eminence, then absolutely, was appropriated to him. This
would be all the more easily effected since, owing to the twofold
function of the office (§ 17, 5, 6), he who presided in the
administrative council still bore the title of πρεσβύτερος. It
was not accomplished, however, without a long continued struggle
on the part of the presbyters who were relegated to a subordinate
rank, which occasioned keen party contentions and divisions
lasting down even into the 3rd century (§ 41). But the need of
the churches to have in each one man to direct and control was
mightier than this opposition. That need was most keenly felt
when the church was threatened with division and dissolution
by the spread of heretical and separatist tendencies. The need
of a single president in the local churches was specially felt
in times of violent persecution, and still more just after the
persecution had ceased when multitudes who had fallen away during
the days of trial sought to be again restored to the membership
of the church (§ 39, 2), in order to secure the reorganization
of the institution which, by violence from without and weakness
within, had been so sorely rent. Both in the Old and in the New
Testament there seemed ground for regarding the order of things
that had grown up in the course of time as _jure divino_ and
as existing from the beginning. After the idea of a distinct
sacerdotal class had again found favour, the distribution of
the clergy in the Old Testament into High priest, priests and
Levites was supposed to afford an exact analogy to that of
the episcopate, presbyterate and diaconate. To effect this the
charismatic offices of teaching had to be ignored and their
divinely ordained functions had to be set aside. It was even
supposed that the relative ranks in the offices of the Christian
church must be determined by the corresponding orders in the Old
Testament. Then in the gospels, it seemed as if the relations of
Christ to His disciples corresponded to that of the bishop to the
presbyters; and from the Acts of the Apostles the preponderating
authority of James at the head of the Jerusalem presbytery or
eldership (§ 17, 2) might be used as a witness for the supremacy
of the bishop. The oldest and most important contender for the
monarchical rank of the bishop is the author of the _Ignatian
Epistles_ (§ 30, 5). In every bishop he sees the representative
of Christ, and in the college of presbyters the representatives
of the Apostles. In the _Clementines_ too the bishop appears
as ἐπὶ τῆς Χριστοῦ καθέδρας καθεσθείς. This view also finds
expression in the _Apostolic Constitutions_ (2, 26), and even in
the writings of _Dionysius the Areopagite_ (§ 47, 11). Another
theory, according to which the bishops are successors of the
Apostles and as such heirs of the absolute dominion conferred in
Matt. xiv. 18, 19 upon Peter and through him on all the Apostles,
sprang up in the West and gained currency by means of Cyprian’s
eloquent enunciation of it (§ 34, 7).
§ 34.3. =The Regular Ecclesiastical Offices of the Old Catholic
Age.= The =Ordines Majores= embraced the Bishops, Presbyters
and Deacons. Upon the =Bishop=, elected by the people and the
clergy in common, there devolved in his monarchical position the
supreme conduct of all the affairs of the church. The exclusively
episcopal privileges were these: the ordination of presbyters
and deacons, the absolving of the penitent, according to strict
rule also the consecration of the eucharistic elements, in later
times also the right of speaking at Synods, and in the West also
the confirmation of the baptised. In large cities where a single
church was no longer sufficient daughter churches were instituted.
Country churches founded outside of the cities were supplied
with presbyters and deacons from the city. If they increased
in importance, they chose for themselves their own bishop, who
remained, however, as Χωρεπίσκοπος dependent upon the city bishop.
Thus distinctly official episcopal dioceses came to be formed.
And just as the city bishops had a pre-eminence over the country
bishops, so also the bishops of the chief cities of provinces
soon came as metropolitans to have a pre-eminence over those
of other cities. To them was granted the right of calling and
presiding at the Synods, and of appointing and ordaining the
bishops of their province. The name Metropolitan, however, was
first used in the Acts of the Council of Nicæa in A.D. 325.--The
=Presbyters= were now only the advisers and assistants of the
bishop, whose counsel and help he accepted just in such ways and
at such times as seemed to him good. They were employed in the
directing of the affairs of the church, in the administration of
the sacrament, in preaching and in pastoral work, but only at the
bidding or with the express permission of the bishop. During the
following period for the first time, when demands had multiplied,
and the episcopal authority was no longer in need of being
jealously guarded, were their functions enlarged to embrace
an independent pastoral care, preaching and dispensation of the
sacraments for which they were personally responsible.--In regard
to official position the =Deacons= had a career just the converse
of this; for their importance increased just as the range
of their official functions was enlarged. Seeing that in the
earliest times they had occupied a position subordinate to the
presbyter-bishops, they could not be regarded in this way as
their rivals; and the development of the proto-presbyterate into
a monarchical episcopate was too evidently in their own interests
to awaken any opposition on their part. They therefore stood in a
far closer relation to the bishops than did the presbyters. They
were his confidants, his companions in travel, often also his
deputies and representatives at the Synods. To them he committed
the distribution of the church’s alms, for which their original
charge of the poor qualified them. To these duties were added
also many of the parts of divine service; they baptised under the
commission of the bishop, obtained and prepared the sacramental
elements, handed round the cup, at the close of the service
carried to the sick and imprisoned the body and blood of the Lord,
intimated the beginning and the close of the various parts of
divine service, recited the public prayers, read the gospels, and
kept order during worship. Often, too, they preached the sermon.
In consequence of the preponderating position given to the Old
Testament idea of the priesthood the bishop was compared to the
high priest, the presbyters to the priests, and the deacons to
the Levites, and so too did they already assume the name, from
which the German word “Priester,” English “Priest,” French
“Prêtre,” Italian “Prête,” is derived.
Among the =Ordines Minores= the oldest was the office of =Reader=,
Ἀναγνώστης. In the time of Cyprian this place was heartily
accorded to the Confessors. In later times it was usual to begin
the clerical career with service in the readership. The duties
of this office were the public reading of the longer scripture
portions and the custody of the sacred books. Somewhat later than
the readership the office of the =Subdiaconi=, ὑποδιάκονοι was
instituted. They were assistants to the Deacons, and as such
took first rank among the _Ordines Minores_, and of these were
alone regarded as worthy of ordination. Toward the end of the 3rd
century the office of the =Cantores=, ψαλταί, was instituted for
the conducting of the public service of praise. The =Acolytes=,
who are met with in Rome first about the middle of the 3rd
century, were those who accompanied the bishop as his servants.
The =Exorcists= discharged the spiritual function of dealing with
those possessed of evil spirits, ἐνεργούμενοι, δαιμονιζόμενοι,
over whom they had to repeat the public prayers and the formula
of exorcism. As there was also an exorcism associated with
baptism, the official functions of the exorcists extended to
the catechumens. The =Ostiarii= or =Janitores=, θυρωροί, πυλωροί,
occupied the lowest position.--In the larger churches for the
instruction of the catechumens there were special =Catechists=
appointed, _Doctores audientium_, and where the need was
felt, especially in the churches of North Africa speaking
the Punic tongue, there were also =Interpreters= whose duty
it was to translate and interpret the scripture lessons. To
the =Deaconesses=, for the most part widows or virgins, was
committed the care of the poor and sick, the counselling of
inexperienced women and maidens, the general oversight of
the female catechumens. They had no clerical character.--The
=Ordination= of the clergy was performed by the laying on
of hands. Those were disqualified who had just recently been
baptised or had received baptism only during severe illness
(_Neophyti_, _Clinici_), also all who had been excommunicated
and those who had mutilated themselves.--Continuation, § 45, 3.
§ 34.4. =Clergy and Laity.=--The idea that a priestly mediation
between sinful men and a gracious deity was necessary had been so
deeply implanted in the religious consciousness of pre-Christian
antiquity, pagan as well as Jewish, that a form of public worship
without a priesthood seemed almost as inconceivable as a religion
without a god. And even though the inspired writings of the New
Testament decidedly and expressly taught that the pre-Christian
or Old Testament institution of a special human priesthood
had been abolished and merged in the one eternal mediation
of the exalted Son of God and Son of man, and that there was
now a universal spiritual priesthood of all Christians with
the right and privilege of drawing near even to the heavenly
throne of grace (Heb. iv. 16; 1 Pet. ii. 5, 9; Rev. i. 6), yet,
in consequence of the idea of the permanence of Old Testament
institutions which prevailed, even in the Post-Apostolic Age,
the sacerdotal theory came more and more into favour. This
relapse to the Old Testament standpoint was moreover rendered
almost inevitable by the contemporary metamorphosis of the
ecclesiastical office which existed as the necessary basis of
human organisation (§ 17, 4) into a hierarchical organisation
resting upon an assumed divine institution. For clericalism,
with its claims to be the sole divinely authorised channel for
the communication of God’s grace, was the correlate and the
indispensable support of hierarchism, with its exclusive claims
to legislative, judicial, disciplinary and administrative
precedence in the affairs of the church. The reaction which
Montanism (§ 40) initiated in the interests of the Christian
people against the hierarchical and clerical tendencies spreading
throughout the church, was without result owing to its extreme
extravagance. Tertullian emphasised indeed very strongly the
Apostolic idea of the universal priesthood of all Christians, but
in Cyprian this is allowed to fall quite behind the priesthood
of the clergy and ultimately came to be quite forgotten.--The Old
Catholic Age, however, shows many reminiscences of the original
relation of the congregation to the ecclesiastical officers,
or as it would now be called, of the laity to the clergy. That
the official teaching of religion and preaching in the public
assemblies of the church, although as a rule undertaken by the
_Ordines majores_, might even then in special circumstances and
with due authorisation be discharged by laymen, was shown by
the Catechetical institution at Alexandria and by the case
of Origen who when only a Catechist often preached in the
church. The Apostolic Constitutions, too, 8, 31, supported the
view that laymen, if only they were skilful in the word and of
irreproachable lives, should preach by a reference to the promise:
“They shall be all taught of God.” The repeated expressions of
disapproval of the administration of the eucharist by laymen
in the Ignatian Epistles presupposes the frequent occurrence
of the practice; Tertullian would allow it in case of necessity,
for “_Ubi tres, ecclesia est, licet laici_.” Likewise in
reference to the administration of baptism he teaches that under
ordinary circumstances _propter ecclesiæ honorem_ it should be
administered only by the bishop and the clergy appointed by him
to the work, _alioquin_ (_e.g._ in times of persecution) _etiam
laicis jus est_. This, too, is the decision of the Council
of Elvira in A.D. 306. The report which Cyprian gives of his
procedure in regard to the vast number of the _Lapsi_ of his time
(§ 39, 2; 41, 2) affords evidence that at least in extraordinary
and specially difficult cases of discipline the whole church was
consulted. The people’s right to take part in the choice of their
minister had not yet been questioned, and their assistance at
least in the Synods was never refused.
§ 34.5. =The Synods.=--The Council of Apostles at Jerusalem
(Acts xv.) furnished an example of Synodal deliberation and
issuing of decrees. But even in the pagan world such institutions
had existed. The old religio-political confederacies in Greece
and Asia Minor had indeed since the time of the Roman conquest
lost their political significance; but their long accustomed
assemblies (κοιναὶ σύνοδοι, _Concilia_) continued to meet in
the capitals of the provinces under the presidency of the Roman
governor. The fact that the same nomenclature was adopted seems
to show that they were not without formal influence on the
origin of the institution of the church synod. The first occasion
for such meetings was given by the Montanist movements in Asia
Minor (§ 40, 1); and soon thereafter by the controversies about
the observance of Easter (§ 37, 2). In the beginning of the 3rd
century the Provincial Synods had already assumed the position
of fixed and regularly recurring institutions. In the time of
Cyprian, the presbyters and deacons took an active part in the
Synods alongside of the bishops, and the people generally were
not prevented from attending. No decision could be arrived at
without the knowledge and the acquiescence of the members of the
church. From the time of the Nicene Council, in A.D. 325, the
bishops alone had a vote and the presence of the laity was more
and more restricted. The decrees of Synods were communicated
to distant churches by means of Synodal rescripts, and even
in the 3rd century the claim was made in these, in accordance
with Acts xv., to the immediate enlightenment of the Holy
Spirit.--Continuation, § 43, 2.
§ 34.6. =Personal and Epistolary Intercourse.=--From the very
earliest times the Christian churches of all lands maintained
a regular communication with one another through messengers
or itinerating brethren. The _Teaching of the XII. Apostles_
furnishes the earliest account of this: Any one who comes from
another place in the name of the Lord shall be received as a
brother; one who is on his journey, however, shall not accept the
hospitality of the church for more than two, or at furthest than
three days; but if he chooses to remain in the place, he must
engage in work for his own support, in which matter the church
will help him; if he will not so conduct himself he is to be sent
back as a χριστέμπορος, who has been seeking to make profit out
of his profession of Christ. The Didache knows nothing as yet of
the letters of authentication among the earlier messengers of the
church which soon became necessary and customary. As a guarantee
against the abuse of this custom such συστατικαὶ ἐπιστολαί (2 Cor.
iii. 1) had come into use even in Tertullian’s time, who speaks
of a _Contesseratio hospitalitatis_, in such a form that they
were understood only by the initiated as recognisable tokens of
genuineness, and were hence called _Litteræ formatæ_, or γράμματα
τετυπωμένα. The same care was also taken in respect of important
epistolary communications from one church to another or to other
churches. Among these were included, _e.g._ the Synodal rescripts,
the so-called γράμματα ἐνθρονιστικά by which the newly-chosen
bishops intimated their entrance upon office to the other bishops
of their district, the _Epistolæ festales_ (paschales) regarding
the celebration of a festival, especially the Easter festival
(§ 56, 3), communications about important church occurrences,
especially about martyrdoms (§ 32, 8), etc. According to Optatus
of Mileve (§ 63, 1): “_Totus orbis_” could boast of “_comnmercio
formatarum in una communionis societate concordat_.”
§ 34.7. =The Unity and Catholicity of the Church.=--The fact
that Christianity was destined to be a religion for the world,
which should embrace all peoples and tongues, and should permeate
them all with one spirit and unite them under one heavenly
head, rested upon the presupposition that the church was one and
universal or catholic. The inward unity of the spirit demanded
also a corresponding unity in manifestation. It is specially
evident from the _Teaching of the XII. Apostles_ that the
consciousness of the unity of the church had deeply rooted itself
even in the Post-Apostolic Age (§ 20, 1). “The points which
according to it prove the unity of Christendom are the following:
firstly, the _disciplina_ in accordance with the ethical
requirements of the Lord, secondly, baptism in the name of the
Father, Son and Holy Spirit, thirdly, the order of fasting and
prayer, especially the regular use of the Lord’s Prayer, and
fourthly and lastly, the eucharist, _i.e._ the sacred meal in
partaking of which the church gives thanks to God, the creator of
all things, for the revelation imparted to it through Jesus, for
faith and knowledge and immortality, and implores the fulfilment
of its hope, the overthrow of this world, the coming again of
Christ, and reception into the kingdom of God. He who has this
doctrine and acts in accordance with it is a ‘Christian,’ belongs
to ‘the saints,’ is a ‘brother,’ and ought to be received even
as the Lord” (Harnack). The struggle against the Gnostics had
the effect of transforming this primitive Christian idea of
unity into a consciousness of the necessity of adopting a common
doctrinal formula, which again this controversy rendered much
more definite and precise, to which a concise popular expression
was given in one common _Regula fidei_ (§ 35, 2), and by
means of which the specific idea of catholicity was developed
(§ 20, 2).--The misleading and dangerous thing about this
construction and consolidation of one great Catholic church was
that every deviation from external forms in the constitution and
worship as well as erroneous doctrine, immorality and apostasy,
was regarded as a departing from the one Catholic church, the
body of Christ, and consequently, since not only the body was
put upon the same level with the head, but even the garment of
the body was identified with the body itself, as a separating
from the communion of Christ, involving the loss of salvation
and eternal blessedness. This notion received a powerful
impulse during the 2nd century when the unity of the church
was threatened by heresies, sects and divisions. It reached
its consummation and won the _Magna Charta_ of its perfect
enunciation in Cyprian’s book _De Unitate Ecclesiæ_. In
the monarchical rank of the bishop of each church, as the
representative of Christ, over the college of presbyters, as
representatives of the Apostles, Ignatius of Antioch sees the
guarantee of the church’s unity. According to Cyprian, this unity
has its expression in the Apostolate; in the Episcopate it has
its support. The promise of Christ, Matt. xvi. 18, is given to
Peter, not as the head but as the single representative of the
Apostles (John xx. 21). The Apostolic office, with the promise
attached to it, passed from the Apostles by means of ordination
to the bishops. These, through their monarchical rank, represent
continuously for the several churches (_Ecclesia est in episcopo_),
and through their combined action, for the whole of Christendom,
the unity of the church; _Episcopatus unus est, cujus a singulus
in solidum, pars tenetur_. All the bishops, just as all the
Apostles, have perfect parity with one another; _pares consortio,
jure et honore_. Each of them is a successor of Peter and heir
of the promise given first to Peter but for all.--He who cuts
himself off from the bishops, cuts himself off from the church.
_Habere non potest Deum patrem, qui ecclesiam non habet matrem....
Extra ecclesiam nulla spes salutis._ Alongside of the Apostolic
writings, the tradition which prevailed among the Apostolic
churches (_Sedes apostolicæ_) was regarded as a standard of
catholicity in constitution, worship and doctrine; indeed, it
must even have ranked above the Apostolic writings themselves
in settling the question of the New Testament Canon (§ 36, 8),
until these had secured general circulation and acceptance.
§ 34.8. =The Roman Primacy.=--The claims of the Roman bishopric
to the primacy over the whole church, which reached its fuller
development in the 4th and 5th centuries (§ 46, 7), were founded
originally and chiefly on the assertion that the promise of
Matt. xvi. 18, 19, was given only and exclusively to the Apostle
Peter as the Primate of the Apostles and the head of the church.
This assumption overlooked the fact that in Matt. xviii. 18 and
John xx. 21 ff., this promise was given with reference to all
the Apostles. These claims were further supposed to be supported
by the words addressed to Peter, “strengthen thy brethren”
(Luke xxii. 31), which seemed to accord to Peter a primacy
over his fellow Apostles; and also by the interpretation given
of John xxi. 15 ff., where “lambs” were understood of laymen
and “sheep” of the Apostles. It was likewise assumed that
the bishop of Rome was the successor of Peter, and so the
legitimate and only heir of all his prerogatives. The fable of
the Roman bishopric of Peter (§ 16, 1) was at an early period
unhesitatingly adopted, all the more because no one expected the
results which in later times were deduced from a quite different
understanding of Matt. xvi. 18. During this whole period such
consequences were never dreamt of either by a Roman bishop or by
anybody else. Only this was readily admitted at least by the West
that Rome was the foremost of all the Apostolic churches, that
there the Apostolic tradition had been preserved in its purest
form, and that, therefore, its bishops should have a particularly
influential voice in all questions that were to be judged of
by the whole episcopate, and the Roman bishops were previously
content with taking advantage of this concession in the largest
measure possible.[96]
§ 35. THE ADMINISTRATION OF BAPTISM.[97]
As an indispensable means to participation in salvation and as
a condition of reception into the communion of the church, baptism
was practised from the earliest times. Infant baptism, though not
universally adopted, was yet in theory almost universally admitted to
be proper. Tertullian alone is found opposing it. All adults who desired
baptism had, as Catechumens, to pass through a course of training under
a Christian teacher. Many, however, voluntarily and purposely postponed
their baptism, frequently even to a deathbed, in order that all the
sins of their lives might be certainly removed by baptismal grace. After
a full course of instruction had been passed through, the Catechumens
prepared themselves for baptism by prayer and fasting, and before the
administration of the sacred ordinance they were required to renounce
the devil and all his works (_Abrenuntiare diabolo et pompæ et angelis
ejus_) and to recite a confession of their faith. The controversy as to
whether baptism administered by heretics should be regarded as valid was
conducted with great bitterness during the 3rd century.
§ 35.1. =The Preparation for Receiving Baptism.=--After a
complete exposition of the evangelical moral code in chap. 1-6,
the _Teaching of the XII. Apostles_ proceeds thus: Ταῦτα πάντα
προειπόντες βαπτίσατε εἰς τὸ ὄνομα, etc. At this time, therefore,
besides the necessarily presupposed acquaintance with the chief
points in the gospel history, the initiation into the moral
doctrine of the gospel of the person receiving baptism was
regarded as most essential in the baptismal instruction. In this
passage there is no mention of a doctrinal course of teaching
based upon a symbol. But what here is still wanting is given in
a summary way in chaps. 7 ff. in the instructions about baptism
and the Lord’s supper attached to the baptismal formula and the
eucharistic prayers. This therefore was reserved for that worship
from which the candidates for baptism and the newly baptized had
to gather their faith and hope as to the future completion of the
kingdom of God. First the struggle against Gnosticism obliged the
church to put more to the front the doctrines of faith which were
thereby more fully developed, and to concern itself with these
questions even in the instruction of the Catechumens. The custom,
which the Didache and Justin Martyr show to have been prevalent
in post-Apostolic times, of the baptiser together with others
voluntarily offering themselves taking part with the candidate
for baptism in completing the preparation for the holy ordinance
by observing a two days’ fast, seems soon, so far as the baptiser
and the others were concerned, to have fallen into desuetude,
and is never again mentioned.--Since the development of the
Old Catholic church the preparation of candidates for baptism
has been divided into two portions of very unequal duration,
namely, that of instruction, for which on an average a period
of two years was required, and that of immediate preparation by
prayer and fasting after the instructions had been completed.
During the former period the aspirants were called κατηχοῦμενοι,
_Catechumeni_; during the latter, φωτιζόμενοι, _Competentes_.
As to their participation in the public divine service, the
Catechumens were first of all as ἀκροώμενοι admitted only to the
hearing of the sermon, and had thus no essential privileges over
the unbelievers. They first came into closer connection with
the church only when it was permitted them to take part in
the devotional exercises, yet only in those portions which had
reference to themselves, kneeling as γονυκλίνοντες, while also
the congregation prayed kneeling. Only in cases of dangerous
illness could baptism be given before the Catechumen had
completed his full course (_Baptismus Clinicorum_). The Council
of Neo-Cæsarea soon after A.D. 314 ordained that a Catechumen
who as a γονυκλίνων had been guilty of an open sin, should be
put back to the first stage of the Catechumenate, namely, to that
of the ἀκροᾶσθαι, and if he then again sinned he should be cast
off altogether; and the Œcumenical Council of Nicæa in A.D. 325
demanded that offending (παραπέσοντες) Catechumens should remain
ἀκροώμενοι for three years and only then should be allowed to
take part in the devotional service of the church.[98]
§ 35.2. =The Baptismal Formula.=--In close connection with the
words of institution of baptism (Matt. xxviii. 19) and hence in
a trinitarian framework, an outline of the doctrine common to all
the churches, introduced first of all as a confession of faith
professed by candidates for baptism, obtained currency at a very
early date. Only a few unimportant modifications were afterwards
made upon it, and amid all the varieties of provincial and local
conditions, the formula remained essentially the same. Hence it
could always be properly characterized with Irenæus as ἀκλινής,
and with Tertullian as _immobilis et irreformabilis_. As a token
of membership in the Catholic church it is called the Baptismal
Formula or =Symbolum=. After the introduction of the _Disciplina
arcani_ (§ 36, 4) it was included in that, and hence was kept
secret from heathens and even from catechumens, and first
communicated to the _competentes_. As the “unalterable and
inflexible” test and standard of the faith and doctrine, as
well as an intellectual bond of union between churches scattered
over all the earth, it was called =Regula fidei= and Κανὼν τῆς
ἀληθείας. That we never find it quoted in the Old Catholic Age,
is to be explained from its inclusion in the _disciplina arcani_
and by this also, that the ancient church in common with Jeremiah
(xxxi. 33), laid great stress upon its being engraven not with
pen and ink on paper, but with the pen of the Holy Spirit on the
hearts of believers. Instead then of literal quotation we find
among the fathers of the Old Catholic Age (Irenæus, Tertullian,
Origen, Novatian, etc.) only paraphrastic and explanatory
references to it which, seeing that no sort of official sanction
was accorded them in the church, are erroneously spoken of
as _Regulæ fidei_. These paraphrases, however, are valuable
as affording information about the creed of the early church,
because what is found the same in them all must be regarded as an
integral part of the original document. In harmony with this is
the testimony of Rufinus, about A.D. 390, who in his _Expositio
Symb. apost._ produces three different recensions, namely, the
Roman, the Aquileian and the Oriental. The oldest and simplest
was that used in Rome, traces of which may be found as early
as the middle of the 2nd century. In the time of Rufinus there
was a tradition that this Roman creed had been composed by the
XII. Apostles in Jerusalem at the time of their scattering, as
a universal rule of faith, and had been brought to Rome by Peter.
It is not quite the same as that known among us as the =Apostles’
Creed=. It wants the phrases “Creator of heaven and earth,”
“suffered, dead, descended into hell,” “catholic, communion of
saints, eternal life.” The creed of Aquileia adopted the clause
“_Descendit ad infera_,” and intensified the clause _Carnis
resurrectio_ by the addition of “_hujus_” and the phrase _Deus
pater omnipotens_ by the addition of the anti-Patripassian
predicate (§ 33, 4) _invisibilis et impassibilis_.
§ 35.3. =The Administration of Baptism.=--According to the
showing of the _Teaching of the XII. Apostles_ baptism was
ordinarily administered by a thrice-repeated immersion in flowing
water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
If there be no flowing water at hand, any other kind, even warm
water, may be used, and in case of necessity sprinkling may be
substituted for the thrice-repeated immersion. At a later time
sprinkling was limited to the baptism of the sick, _Baptismus
clinicorum_. We hear nothing of a consecration of the water to
its holy use, nor is there any mention of the renunciation and
exorcism which became customary first in the 3rd century through
the use of a form of adjuration previously employed only in cases
of possession. Upon immersion followed an anointing, χρίσμα
(still unknown to the Didache), as a symbol of consecration to a
spiritual priesthood (1 Pet. ii. 9), and then, in accordance with
Acts viii. 16 f., the laying on of hands as the vehicle for the
communication of the Holy Spirit. Soon the immersion came to be
regarded as the negative part of the ordinance, the putting away
of sin, and the anointing with the laying on of hands as the
positive part, the communication of the Spirit. In the Eastern
church presbyters and deacons were permitted to dispense baptism
including also the anointing. Both, therefore, continued there
unseparated. In the West, however, the bishops claimed the laying
on of hands as their exclusive right, referring in support of
their claim to Acts viii. Where then the bishop did not himself
dispense the baptism, the laying on of hands as well as the
chrismatic anointing was given separately and in addition by him
as =Confirmation=, _Confirmatio_, _Consignatio_, which separation,
even when the baptism was administered by a bishop, soon became
the usual and legal practice. Nevertheless even in the Roman
church there was at the baptism an anointing with oil which had
canonical sanction and was designated _chrism_, without prejudice
to confirmation as an independent act at a later time. The usual
seasons for administering baptism were Easter, especially the
Sabbath of Passion week, baptism into the death of Christ,
Rom. vi. 3, and Pentecost, and in the East also the Epiphany.
The place for the administration of baptism was regarded as
immaterial. With infant baptism was introduced the custom of
having sponsors, ἀνάδοχοι, _sponsores_, who as sureties repeated
the confession of faith in the name of the unconscious infant
receiving the baptism.--Continuation, § 58, 1.
§ 35.4. =The Doctrine of Baptism.=--The Epistle of Barnabas says:
Ἀναβαίνομεν καρποφοροῦντες ἐν τῇ καρδίᾳ. Hermas says: _Ascendunt
vitæ assignati_. With Justin the water of baptism is a ὕδωρ τῆς
ζωῆς, ἐξ οὗ ἀναγεννήθημεν, According to Irenæus it effects a
ἕνωσις πρὸς ἀφθαρσίαν. Tertullian says: _Supervenit spiritus de
cœlis,--caro spiritualiter mundatur_. Cyprian speaks of an _unda
genitalis_, of a _nativitas secunda in novum hominem_. Firmilian
says: _Nativitas, quæ est in baptismo, filios Dei generat_.
Origen calls baptism χαρισμάτων θείων ἀρχὴν καὶ πηγήν.--Of the
bloody baptism of martyrdom Tertullian exclaims: _Lavacrum non
acceptum repræsentat et perditum reddit_. Hermes and Clement of
Alexandria maintain that there will be in Hades a preaching and
a baptism for the sake of pious Gentiles and Jews.
§ 35.5. =The Controversy about Heretics’ Baptism.=--The church of
Asia Minor and Africa denied the validity of baptism administered
by heretics; but the Roman church received heretics returning to
the fold of the Catholic church, if only they had been baptized
in the name of Christ or of the Holy Trinity, without a second
baptism, simply laying on the hands as in the case of penitents.
Stephen of Rome would tolerate no other than the Roman custom and
hastened to break off church fellowship with those of Asia Minor
(A.D. 253). Cyprian of Carthage whose ideal of the unity of that
church in which alone salvation was to be obtained seemed to be
overthrown by the Roman practice, and Firmilian of Cæsarea in
Cappadocia, were the most vigorous supporters of the view
condemned by Rome. Three Carthaginian Synods, the last and most
important in A.D. 256, decided unequivocally in their favour.
Dionysius of Alexandria sought to effect a reconciliation by
writing a tenderly affectionate address to Stephen. To this end
even more effectively wrought the Valerian persecution, which
soon afterwards broke out, during which Stephen himself suffered
martyrdom (A.D. 257). Thus the controversy reached no conclusion.
The Roman practice, however, continued to receive more and more
acceptance, and was confirmed by the first Œcumenical Council at
Nicæa in A.D. 325, with the exclusion only of the Samosatians (§
33, 8); likewise also at the Council at Constantinople in A.D.
381, with the exclusion of the Montanists (§ 40, 1), the
Eunomians (§ 50, 3) and the Sabellians (§ 33, 7). These
exceptions, therefore, referred mostly to the Unitarian heretics,
the Montanists being excluded on account of their doctrine of the
Paraclete. Augustine’s successful polemic against the Donatists
(§ 63, 1), in his treatise in seven books _De baptismo_ first
overcame all objections hitherto waged against the validity of
baptism administered by heretics derived from the objectivity of
the sacrament, and henceforth all that was required was that it
should be given in the name of the three-one God.
§ 36. PUBLIC WORSHIP AND ITS VARIOUS PARTS.[99]
There was a tendency from the 2nd century onwards more and more to
dissolve the connection of the Lord’s Supper with the evening _Agape_
(§ 17, 7). Trajan’s strict prohibition of secret societies, _hetæræ_
(§ 22, 2) seems to have given the first occasion for the separation
of these two and for the temporary suppression of the love-feasts.
The Lord’s Supper was now observed during the Sunday forenoon service
and the mode of its observance is described even by Justin Martyr. In
consideration of the requirements of the Catechumens the service was
divided into two parts, a _homiletical_ and a _sacramental_, and from
the latter all unbaptized persons, as well as all under discipline
and those possessed of evil spirits, were excluded. Each part of the
service was regularly closed by a concluding benediction, and in the
West bore the designations respectively of _Missa catechumenorum_
and _Missa fidelium_, while in the East they were distinguished as
λειτουργία τῶν κατηχουμένων and λειτουργία τῶν πιστῶν. In connection
with this there grew up a notion that the sacramental action had
a mysterious character, _Disciplina arcani_. Owing to the original
connection of the Supper with the Agape it became customary to
provide the elements used in the ordinance from the voluntary gifts
brought by the members of the church, which were called _Oblationes_,
προσφοραί,--a designation which helped to associate the idea of
sacrifice with the observance of the Lord’s Supper.
§ 36.1. =The Agape.=--That in consequence of the imperial
edict against secret societies, at least in Asia Minor, the
much suspected and greatly maligned love-feasts (§ 22) were
temporarily abandoned, appears from the report of Pliny to
the Emperor, according to which the Christians of whom he made
inquiries assured him that they had given up the _mos coeundi
ad capiendum cibum promiscuum_. But in Africa they were still
in use or had been revived in the time of Tertullian, who in his
_Apology_ makes mention very approvingly of them, although at
a later period, after he had joined the Montanists, he lashes
them in his book _De Jejuniis_ with the most stinging sarcasm.
Clement of Alexandria too is aware of flagrant abuses committed
in connection with those feasts. They continued longest to be
observed in connection with the services in commemoration of
the dead and on the festivals of martyrs. The Council of Laodicæa,
about the middle of the 4th century, forbade the holding of these
in the churches and the Second Trullan Council in A.D. 692 renewed
this prohibition. After this we find no further mention of them.
§ 36.2. =The Missa Catechumenorum.=--The reading of scripture
(ἀνάγνωσις, _Lectio_,--comp. § 36, 7) formed the chief exercise
during this part of the service. There was unrestricted liberty
as to the choice of the portions to be read. It was the duty of
the Readers, Ἀναγνώσται, to perform this part of the worship,
but frequently Evangelists on the invitation of the Deacons
would read, and the whole congregation showed their reverence
by standing up. At the close of the reading an expository and
practical address (ὁμιλία, λόγος, _Sermo_, _Tractatus_) was given
by the bishop or in his absence by a presbyter or deacon, or even
by a Catechist, as in the case of Origen, and soon, especially in
the Greek church, this assumed the form of an artistic, rhetorical
discourse. The reading and exposition of God’s word were followed
by the prayers, to which the people gave responses. These were
uttered partly by the bishop, partly by the deacons, and were
extemporary utterances of the heart, though very soon they
assumed a stereotyped form. The congregation responded to each
short sentence of the prayer with Κύριε ἐλέησον. In the fully
developed order of public worship of the 3rd century the prayers
were arranged to correspond to the different parts of the service,
for Catechumens, energumens (possessed), and penitents. After
all these came the common prayer of the church for all sorts of
callings, conditions, and needs in the life of the brethren.
§ 36.3. =The _Missa Fidelium_.=--The centre of this part of the
service was the celebration of the Lord’s Supper. In the time of
Justin Martyr the liturgy connected therewith was very simple. The
brotherly kiss followed the common prayer, then the sacramental
elements were brought in to the ministrant who consecrated
them by the prayer of praise and thanksgiving (εὐχαριστία). The
people answered Amen, and thereupon the consecrated elements
were distributed to all those present. From that prayer the whole
ordinance received the name εὐχαριστία, because its consecrating
influence made common bread into the bread of the Supper. Much
more elaborate is the liturgy in the 8th Book of the _Apostolic
Constitutions_ (§ 43, 4), which may be regarded as a fair sample
of the worship of the church toward the end of the 3rd century.
At the close of the sermon during the prayers connected with
that part of the service began the withdrawal successively of
the Catechumens, the energumens and the penitents. Then the _Missa
fidelium_ was commenced with the common intercessory prayer of
the church. After various collects and responses there followed
the brotherly kiss, exhortation against participation in unworthy
pleasures, preparation of the sacramental elements, the sign of
the cross, the consecration prayer, the words of institution, the
elevation of the consecrated elements, all accompanied by suitable
prayers, hymns, doxologies and responses. The bishop or presbyter
distributed the bread with the words, Σῶμα Χριστοῦ; the deacon
passed round the cup with the words, Αἷμα Χριστοῦ, ποτήριον ζωῆς.
Finally the congregation kneeling received the blessing of the
bishop, and the deacon dismissed them with the words, Ἀπολύεσθε
ἐν εἰρήνῃ.--The bread was that commonly used, _i.e._, leavened
bread (κοινὸς ἄρτος); the wine also was, according to the custom
of time, mixed with water (κρᾶμα), in which Cyprian already
fancied a symbol of the union of Christ and the church. In the
African and Eastern churches, founding on John vi. 53, children,
of course, those who had already been baptised, were allowed to
partake of the communion. At the close of the service the deacons
carried the consecrated sacramental elements to the sick and
imprisoned. In many places a portion of the consecrated bread
was taken home, that the family might use it at morning prayer
for the consecration of the new day. No formal act of confession
preceded the communion. The need of such an act in consequence
of the existing disciplinary and liturgical ordinance had not yet
made itself felt.
§ 36.4. =The Disciplina Arcani.=--The notion that the
sacramental part of the divine service, including in this
the prayers and hymns connected therewith, the Lord’s prayer,
administration of baptism and the baptismal formula, as well as
the anointing and the consecration of the priest, was a _mystery_
(μυστικὴ λατρεία, τελετή) which was to be kept secret from all
unbaptised persons (ἀμύητοι) and only to be practised in presence
of the baptised (συμμύσται), is quite unknown to Justin Martyr
and also to Irenæus. Justin accordingly describes in his Apology,
expressly intended for the heathen, in full detail and without
hesitation, all the parts of the eucharistic service. It was in
Tertullian’s time that this notion originated, and it had its
roots in the catechumenate and the consequent partition of the
service into two parts, from the second of which the unbaptised
were excluded. The official Roman Catholic theology, on the other
hand, regards the _disciplina arcani_ as an institution existing
from the times of the Apostles, and from it accounts for the want
of patristic support to certain specifically Roman Catholic dogmas
and forms of worship, in order that they may, in spite of the
want of such support, maintain that these had a place in primitive
Christianity.
§ 36.5. =The Doctrine of the Lord’s Supper.=--Though the idea
was not sharply and clearly defined, there was yet a widespread
and profound conviction that the Lord’s Supper was a supremely
holy mystery, spiritual food indispensable to eternal life,
that the body and blood of the Lord entered into some mystical
connection with the bread and wine, and placed the believing
partaker of them in true and essential fellowship with Christ.
It was in consequence of the adoption of such modes of expression
that the pagan calumnies about _Thyestian feasts_ (§ 22) first
gained currency. Ignatius calls the Lord’s Supper a φάρμακον
ἀθανασίας, the cup a ποτήριον εἰς ἕνωσιν τοῦ αἵματος Χριστοῦ,
and professes εὐχαριστίαν σάρκα εἶναι τοῦ σωτῆρος. Justin Martyr
says: σάρκα καὶ αἷμα ἐδιδάχθημεν εἶναι. According to Irenæus,
it is not _communis panis, sed eucharistia ex duabus rebus
constans, terrena et cœlesti_, and our bodies by means of its
use become _jam non corruptibilia, spem resurrectionis habentia_.
Tertullian and Cyprian, too, stoutly maintain this doctrine, but
incline sometimes to a more symbolical interpretation of it. The
spiritualistic Alexandrians, Clement and Origen, consider that
the feeding of the soul with the divine word is the purpose of
the Lord’s Supper.[100]--Continuation § 58, 2.
§ 36.6. =The Sacrificial Theory.=--When once the sacerdotal
theory had gained the ascendancy (§ 34, 4) the correlated notion
of a sacrifice could not much longer be kept in the background.
And it was just in the celebration of the Lord’s Supper that the
most specious grounds for such a theory were to be found. First
of all the prayer, which formed so important a part of this
celebration that the whole service came to be called from it the
Eucharist, might be regarded as a spiritual sacrifice. Then again
the gifts brought by the congregation for the dispensation of the
sacrament were called προσφοραί, _Oblationes_, names which were
already in familiar use in connection with sacrificial worship.
And just as the congregation offered their contributions to the
Supper, so also the priests offered them anew in the sacramental
action, and also to this priestly act was given the name
προσφέρειν, ἀναφέρειν. Then again, not only the prayer but the
Supper itself was designated a θυσία, _Sacrificium_, though at
first indeed in a non-literal, figurative sense.--Continuation
§ 58, 3.
§ 36.7. =The Use of Scripture.=--In consequence of their
possessing but few portions of Scripture, the references of the
Apostolic Fathers to the New Testament books must necessarily be
only occasional. The synoptic gospels are most frequently quoted,
though these are referred to only as a whole under the name τὸ
εὐαγγέλιον. In Justin Martyr the references become more frequent,
yet even here there are no express citation of passages; only
once, in the Dialogue, is the Revelation of John named. He
mentions as his special source for the life and works of Jesus
the Ἀπομνημονεύματα τῶν ἀποστόλων. What he borrows from this
source is for the most part to be found in our Synoptic Gospels;
but we have not in this sufficient ground for identifying the one
with the other. On the contrary, we find that the citations of our
Lord’s words do not correspond to the text of our gospels, but are
sometimes rather in verbal agreement with the Apocryphal writings,
and still further, that he adopts Apocryphal accounts of the life
of Jesus, _e.g._, the birth of Christ in a cave, the coming of
the Magi from Arabia, the legend that Jesus as a carpenter made
ploughs and yokes, etc., borrowing them from the Ἀπομνημονεύματα
τῶν ἀποστόλων. If one further considers Justin’s account of the
Sunday service as consisting of the reading of the Ἀπομνημονεύματα
or the writings of the Prophets, and thereafter closed by the
expository and hortatory address of the president (προεστώς), he
will be led to the conclusion that his “Apostolic Memoirs” must
have been a Gospel Harmony for church use, probably on the basis
of Matthew’s Gospel drawn from our Synoptic Gospels, with the
addition of some apocryphal and traditional elements. The author
of the Didache too does not construct his “commands of the Lord
communicated by the Apostles” directly from our Synoptic Gospels,
but from a εὐαγγέλιον τοῦ κυρίου which presented a text of
Matthew enriched by additions from Luke. The Diatessaron of
Tatian (§ 30, 10) shows that soon after this the gospel of John,
which was not regarded by Justin or the author of the Didache
as a source for the evangelical history, although there are not
wanting in both manifold references to it, came to be regarded
as a work to be read in combination with these. It was only after
a New Testament Canon had been in the Old Catholic Age gradually
established, and from the vast multitude of books on gospel
history, which even Luke had found existing (i. 1) and which
had been multiplied to an almost incalculable extent both in the
interests of heresy and of church doctrine, our four gospels were
universally recognised as alone affording authentic information
of the life and doctrines of the Lord, that the eclectic gospels
hitherto in use had more and more withdrawn from them the favour
of the church. =Tatian’s Diatessaron= maintained its place longest
in the Syrian Church. Theodoret, † A.D. 457, testifies that in his
diocese he had found and caused to be put away about two hundred
copies. Aphraates (about A.D. 340, § 47, 13) still used it as the
text of his homilies. At the time of publication of the _Doctrina
Addæi_ (§ 32, 6) it was still used in the church of Edessa, and
Ephraim Syrus in A.D. 360 refers to a commentary in the form of
scholia on it in an Armenian translation, in which the passages
commented on are literally reproduced, Theodoret’s charge against
it of cutting out passages referring to the descent of Christ
after the flesh from David, especially the genealogies of Matthew
and Luke, is confirmed by these portions thus preserved. Otherwise
however, it is free from heretical alterations, though not wholly
without apocryphal additions. All the four gospels are in brief
summary so skilfully wrought into one another that no joining
is ever visible. What cannot be incorporated is simply left out,
and the whole historical and doctrinal material is distributed
over the one working year of the synoptists.
§ 36.8. =Formation of a New Testament Canon.=--The oldest
collection of a New Testament Canon known to us was made by the
Gnostic _Marcion_ (§ 27, 11) about A.D. 150. Some twenty years
later in the so-called _Muratorian Canon_, a fragment found by
Muratori in the 18th century with a catalogue in corrupt Latin
justifying the reception of the New Testament writings received
in the Roman church. For later times the chief witnesses are
Irenæus, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria, Origen and Eusebius.
The Muratorian Canon and Eusebius are witnesses for the fact that
in the 2nd century, besides the Gospels, the Apostolic Epistles
and the Revelation of John, other so-called Apostolic Epistles
were read at worship in the churches, for instance, the _1st
Ep. of Clement of Rome_, _the Ep. of Barnabas_, _the Shepherd
of Hermas_, in some churches also the apocryphal _Apocalypse
of Peter_ and _Acts of Paul_, in Corinth, an Ep. of the Roman
bishop Soter (A.D. 166-174) to that church, and also _Acts of the
Martyrs_. Montanist as well as Gnostic excesses gave occasion for
the definite fixing of the New Testament Canon by the Catholic
church (§ 40). Since the time of Irenæus, the four Gospels, the
Acts, the 13 Epp. of Paul, the Ep. to the Hebrews (which some
in the West did not regard as Pauline), 1st Peter, and 1st John,
along with the Revelation of John, were universally acknowledged.
Eusebius therefore calls these ὁμολογούμενα. There was still some
uncertainty as to the Ep. of James, 2nd Peter, 2nd and 3rd John
and Jude (ἀντιλεγόμενα). The antilegomena of a second class,
which have no claim to canonicity, although in earlier times they
were much used in churches just like the canonical scriptures,
were called by him νόθα, viz. the Acts of Paul, the Shepherd of
Hermas, the Apocalypse of Peter, the Ep. of Barnabas, and the
Didache. He would also very willingly have included among these
the Revelation of John (§ 33, 9), although he acknowledged
that elsewhere that is included in the Homologoumena.--=The Old
Testament Canon= was naturally regarded as already completed. But
since the Old Testament had come to the Greek and Latin Church
Teachers in the expanded form of the LXX., they had unhesitatingly
assumed that its added books were quite as sacred and as fully
inspired as those of the Hebrew Canon. Melito of Sardis, however,
about A.D. 170, found it desirable to make a journey of research
through Palestine in order to determine the limits of the Jewish
Canon, and then to draw up a list of the Holy Scriptures of the
Old Testament essentially corresponding therewith. Origen too
informs us that the Jews, according to the number of letters in
their alphabet acknowledged only 22 books, which, however, does
not lead him to condemn this reception of the additional books of
the church. From the end of the 2nd century, the Western church
had =Latin Translations= of the biblical books, the origin of
which is to be sought in North Africa, where in consequence
of prevailing ignorance of the Greek language the need of
such translations was most deeply felt. Even so early as the
beginning of the 5th century we find Jerome († 420) complaining
of _varietas_ and _vitiositas_ of the _Codices latini_, and
declaring: _Tot sunt exemplaria_ (=forms of the text) _paene
quot codices_. Augustine[101] gives preference to the _Itala_
over all others. The name =Itala= is now loosely given to all
fragments of Latin translations previous to that of Jerome.--The
Syriac translation, =the Peshito=, plain or simple (so-called
because it exactly and without paraphrasing renders the words
of the Hebrew and Greek originals) belongs to the 3rd century,
although first expressly referred to by Ephraim. In it 2 Peter,
2 and 3 John and Jude are not found.
§ 36.9. =The Doctrine of Inspiration.=--In earlier times it
was usual, after the example of Philo, to regard the prophetic
inspiration of the sacred writers as purely passive, as ἔκστασις.
Athenagoras compares the soul of the prophet while prophesying
to a flute; Justin Martyr in his _Cohort. ad Græc._ to a lyre,
struck by the Holy Spirit as the _plectrum_, etc. The Montanist
prophets first brought this theory into disrepute. The Apologist
Miltiades of Asia Minor was the first Church Teacher who
vindicated over against the Montanists the proposition: προφήτην
μὴ δεῖν ἐν ἐκστάσει λαλεῖν. The Alexandrians who even admitted
an operation of the Holy Spirit upon the nobler intellects of
paganism, greatly modified the previously accepted doctrine
of inspiration. Origen, for example, teaches a gradual rising
or falling in the measure of inspiration even in the bible,
and determines this according to the more or less prominence
secured by the human individuality of the writers of scripture.
§ 36.10. =Hymnology.=--The _Carmen Christo quasi Deo dicere
secum invicem_ in the report of Pliny (§ 22, 2), may be classed
with the antiphonal responsive hymns of the church. Tertullian
bears witness to a rich use of song in family as well as
congregational worship. So too does Origen. In the composition
of church hymns the heretics seem for a long while to have kept
abreast of the Catholics (Bardesanes and Harmonius, § 27, 5),
but the latter were thereby stirred up to greater exertions.
The Martyr Athenogenes and the Egyptian bishop Nepos are named
as authors of church hymns. We have still a hymn εἰς Σωτῆρα by
Clement of Alexandria. Socrates ascribes to Ignatius, bishop
of Antioch, the introduction of the alternate-song (between
different congregational choirs). More credible is Theodoret’s
statement that the Antiochean monks Flavian and Diodorus had
imported it, about A.D. 260, from the National Syrian into the
Greek-Syrian church.--Continuation § 59, 4, 5.
§ 37. FEASTS AND FESTIVAL SEASONS.[102]
Sunday as a day of joy was distinguished by standing at prayer,
instead of kneeling as at other times, and also by the prohibition
of fasting. Of the other days of the week, Wednesday, the day on
which the Jewish Council decided to put Jesus to death and Judas had
betrayed him, and Friday, as the day of his death, were consecrated
to the memory of Christ’s suffering; hence the _Feria quarta et sexta_
were celebrated as watch days, _dies stationum_, after the symbolism
of the _Militia christiana_ (Eph. vi. 10-17), by public meetings
of the congregation. As days of the Passion, penitence and fasting
they formed a striking contrast to the Sunday. The chief days of the
Christian festival calendar, which afterwards found richer and more
complete expression in the cycle of the Christian year, were thus
at first associated with the weekly cycle. A long continued and wide
spread controversy as to the proper time for celebrating Easter arose
during the 2nd century.
§ 37.1. =The Festivals of the Christian Year.=--The thought
of Christ’s suffering and death was so powerful and engrossing
that even in the weekly cycle one day had not been sufficient.
Still less could one festal day in the yearly cycle satisfy
the hearts of believers. Hence a long preparation for the
festival was arranged, which was finally fixed at forty days,
and was designated the season _Quadragesima_ (τεσσαρακοστή). Its
conclusion and acme was the so-called Great Week, beginning with
the Sunday of the entrance into Jerusalem, culminating in the day
of the crucifixion, Good Friday, and closing with the day of rest
in the tomb. This Great Week or Passion Week was regarded as the
antitype of the Old Testament Passover feast. The Old Catholic
church did not, however, transfer this name to the festival
of the resurrection (§ 56, 4). The day of the resurrection
was rather regarded as the beginning of a new festival cycle
consecrated to the glorification of the redeemer, viz. the season
of _Quinquagesima_ (πεντηκοστή), concluding with the festival
of the outpouring of the Holy Spirit on the anniversary of the
founding of the Christian church, which has now come to be known
_par excellence_ as _Pentecost_. The fifty intervening days were
simply days of joy. There was daily communion, no fasting, only
standing and not kneeling at prayer. The fortieth day, the day
of the _Ascension_, had a special pre-eminence as a day of festal
celebrations. The festival of Epiphany on 6th January originated
in the East to celebrate the baptism of Christ in Jordan, as the
manifestation of his Messianic rank. As yet there is nowhere any
trace of the Christmas festival.--Continuation, § 56.
§ 37.2. =The Paschal Controversies.=--During the 2nd century,
there were three different practices prevalent in regard to the
observance of the Paschal festival. The Ebionite Jewish Christians
(§ 28, 1) held the Paschal feast on the 14th Nisan according to
the strict literal interpretation of the Old Testament precepts,
maintaining also that Christ, who according to the synoptists
died on the 15th, observed the Passover with his disciples on
the 14th. Then again the church of Asia Minor followed another
practice which was traced back to the Apostle John. Those of Asia
Minor attached themselves indeed in respect of date to the Jewish
festival, but gave it a Christian meaning. They let the passover
alone, and pronounced the memorial of Christ’s death to be the
principal thing in the festival. According to their view, based
upon the fourth Gospel, Christ died upon the 14th Nisan, so that
He had not during the last year of His life observed a regular
Passover. On the 14th Nisan, therefore, they celebrated their
Paschal festival, ending their fast at the moment of Christ’s
death, three o’clock in the afternoon, and then, instead of the
Jewish Passover, having an Agape with the Lord’s Supper. Those who
adopted either of those two forms were at a later period called
_Quartodecimans_ or _Tessareskaidekatites_. Different from both
of these was a third practice followed in all the West, as also
in Egypt, Palestine, Pontus and Greece, which detached itself
still further from the Jewish Passover. This Western usage
disregarded the day of the month in order to secure the observance
of the great resurrection festival on the first day of the week.
The πάσχα σταυρώσιμον, then, if the 14th did not happen to be a
Friday, was always celebrated on the first Friday after the 14th,
and the Easter festival with the observance of the Lord’s Supper
on the immediately following Sunday. The Westerns regarded the
day of Christ’s death as properly a day of mourning, and only
at the end of the pre-Easter fast on the day of the Resurrection
introduced the celebration of the Agape and the Lord’s Supper.
These divergent practices first awakened attention on the
appearing of Polycarp, bishop of Smyrna at Rome in A.D. 155.
The Roman bishop Anicetus referred to the tradition of the Roman
Church; Polycarp laid stress upon the fact that he himself had
celebrated the Paschal festival after the manner followed in
Asia Minor along with the Apostle John. No common agreement was
reached at this time; but, in token of their undisturbed church
fellowship, Anicetus allowed Polycarp to dispense the communion
in his church. Some fifteen years later a party, not distinctly
particularised, obtained at Laodicea in Phrygia sanction for
the Ebionite practice with strict observance of the time of
the Passover, and awakened thereby a lively controversy in the
church of Asia Minor, in which opposite sides were taken by the
Apologists, Apollinaris and Melito (§ 30, 7). The dispute assumed
more serious dimensions about A.D. 196 through the passionate
proceedings of the Roman bishop Victor. Roused probably by the
agitation of a Quartodeciman named Blastus then in Rome, he urged
upon the most distinguished bishops of the East and West the
need of holding a Synod to secure the unequivocal vindication
of the Roman practice. On this account many Synods were held,
which almost invariably gave a favourable verdict. Only those
of Asia Minor with Polycrates, bishop of Ephesus at their head,
entered a vigorous protest against the pretensions of Rome, and
notwithstanding all the Roman threatenings determined to stand
by their own well established custom. Victor now went the length
of breaking off church fellowship with them, but this extreme
procedure met with little favour. Even Irenæus expressed himself
to the Gallican bishops as opposed to it.--Continuation § 56, 3.
§ 37.3. =The Ecclesiastical Institution of Fasting.=--The
Didache gives evidence that even at so early a date, the regular
fasts were religiously observed on the _Dies stationum_ by
expressly forbidding fasting “with hypocrites” (Jews and Jewish
Christians, Luke xviii. 12) on Monday and Thursday, instead of
the Christian practice of so observing Wednesday and Friday. The
usual fast continued as a rule only till three o’clock in the
afternoon (Semijejunia, Acts x. 9, 30; iii. 1). In Passion week
the Saturday night, which, at other times, just like the Sunday,
was excluded from the fasting period, as part of the day during
which Christ lay buried, was included in the forty-hours’ fast,
representing the period during which Christ lay in the grave.
This was afterwards gradually lengthened out into the forty-days’
fast of Lent (Exod. xxxiv. 28; 1 Kings xix. 8; Matt. iv. 2), in
which, however, the _jejunium_ proper was limited to the _Dies
Stationum_, and for the rest of the days only the ξηροφαγίαι,
first forbidden by the Montanists (§ 40, 4), _i.e._ all fattening
foods, such as flesh, eggs, butter, cheese, milk, etc., were
abstained from.--On fasting preparatory to baptism, see § 35, 1.
The Didache, c. i. 3, adds to the gospel injunction that we should
pray for our persecutors (Matt. v. 44) the further counsel that
we should fast for them. The meaning of the writer seems to be
that we should strengthen our prayers for persecutors by fasting.
Hermas, on the other hand, recommends fasting in order that we may
thereby spare something for the poor; and Origen says that he read
_in quodam libello_ as _ab apostolis dictum: Beatus est, qui etiam
jejunat pro eo ut alat pauperem_.
§ 38. THE CHURCH BUILDINGS AND THE CATACOMBS.
The earliest certain traces of special buildings for divine worship
which had been held previously in private houses of Christians are met
with in Tertullian about the end of the 2nd century. In Diocletian’s
time Nicomedia became a royal residence and hard by the emperor’s
palace a beautiful church proudly reared its head (§ 22, 6), and even
in the beginning of the 3rd century Rome had forty churches. We know
little about the form and arrangement of these churches. Tertullian
and Cyprian speak of an altar or table for the preparation of the
Lord’s supper and a desk for the reading, and in the _Apostolic
Constitutions_ it is required that the building should be oblong in
shape. The wide-spread tradition that in times of sore persecution
the worshippers betook themselves to the Catacombs is evidently
inconsistent with the limited space which these afforded. On the
other hand, the painter whose works, by a decree of a Spanish Council
in A.D. 306, were banished from the churches, found here a suitable
place for the practice of sacred art.
§ 38.1. =The Catacombs.=--The Christian burying places were
generally called κοιμητήρια, _Dormitoria_. They were laid out
sometimes in the open fields (_Areæ_), sometimes, where the
district was suitable for that, hewn out in the rock (κρύπται,
crypts). This latter term was, by the middle of the 4th century,
quite interchangeable with the name _Catacumbæ_, (κατὰ κύμβας=in
the caves). The custom of laying the dead in natural or rock-hewn
caves was familiar to pagan antiquity, especially in the East.
But the recesses used for this purpose were only private or family
vaults. Their growth into catacombs or subterranean necropolises
for larger companies bound together by their one religion without
distinctions of rank (Gal. iii. 28), first arose on Christian
soil from a consciousness that their fellowship transcended death
and the grave. For the accomplishment of this difficult and costly
undertaking, Christian burial societies were formed after the
pattern of similar institutions of paganism (§ 17, 3). Specially
numerous and extensive necropolises have been found laid out in
the immediate neighbourhood of Rome. But also in Malta, in Naples,
Syracuse, Palermo, and other cities, this mode of sepulchre
found favour. The Roman catacombs, of which in the hilly district
round about the eternal city fifty-eight have been counted in
fourteen different highways, are almost all laid out in the white
porous tufa stone which is there so abundant, and useful neither
for building nor for mortar. It is thus apparent that these are
neither wrought-out quarries nor gravel pits (_Arenariæ_), but
were set in order from the first as cemeteries. A few _Arenariæ_
may indeed have been used as catacombs, but then the sides with
the burial niches consist of regularly built walls. The Roman
Catacombs in the tufa stone form labyrinthine, twisting, steep
galleries only 3 or 4 feet broad, with rectangular corners caused
by countless intersections. Their perpendicular sides varied
greatly in height and in them the burial niches, _Loculi_, were
hewn out one above the other, and on the reception of the body
were built up or hermetically sealed with a stone slab bearing
an inscription and a Christian symbol. The wealthy laid their
dead in costly marble sarcophagi or stone coffins ornamented with
bas-reliefs. The walls too and the low-arched roofs were adorned
with symbols and pictures of scripture scenes. From the principal
passages many side paths branched off to so-called burial
chambers, _Cubicula_, which were furnished with shafts opening
up to the surface and affording air and light, _Luminaria_. In
many of these chambers, sometimes even in the passages, instead
of simple _Loculi_ we meet with the so-called _Arcosolium_ as the
more usual form; one or more coffin-shaped grooves hewn out in the
rocky wall are covered with an altar-shaped marble plate, and over
this plate, _Mensa_, is a semicircular niche hewn out spreading
over it in its whole extent. These chambers are often held
in reverence as “catacomb churches,” but they are so small in
size that they could only accommodate a very limited number,
such as might gather perhaps at the commemoration of a martyr or
the members of a single family. And even where two or three such
chambers adjoin one another, connected together by doors and
having a common lighting shaft, accommodating at furthest about
twenty people, they could not be regarded as meeting-places for
public congregations properly so called.--Where the deposit of
tufa stone was sufficiently large, there were several stories
(_Piani_), as many as four or five connected by stairs, laid
out one above the other in galleries and chambers. According to
_de Rossi’s_[103] moderate calculation there have been opened
altogether up to this time so many passages in the catacombs
that if they were put in a line they would form a street of
120 geographical miles. Their oldest inscriptions or epitaphs date
from the first years of the second century. After the destruction
of Rome by the hordes of Alaric in A.D. 410, the custom of burying
in them almost entirely ceased. Thereafter they were used only
as places of pilgrimage and spots where martyr’s relics were
worshipped. From this time the most of the so-called _Graffiti_,
_i.e._ scribblings of visitors on the walls, consisting of pious
wishes and prayers, had their origin. The marauding expedition of
the Longobard Aistulf into Roman territory in A.D. 756, in which
even the catacombs were stripped of their treasures, led Pope
Paul I. to transfer the relics of all notable martyrs to their
Roman churches and cloisters. Then pilgrimages to the catacombs
ceased, their entrances got blocked up, and the few which in later
times were still accessible, were only sought out by a few novelty
hunting strangers. Thus the whole affair was nigh forgotten until
in A.D. 1578 a new and lively interest was awakened by the chance
opening up again of one of those closed passages. Ant. Bosio from
A.D. 1593 till his death in A.D. 1629, often at the risk of his
life, devoted all his time and energies to their exploration. But
great as his discoveries were, they have been completely outdone
by the researches of the Roman nobleman, Giov. Battista de Rossi,
who, working unweariedly at his task since A.D. 1849 till the
present time, is recognised as the great master of the subject,
although even his investigations are often too much dominated
by Roman Catholic prejudices and by undue regard for traditional
views.[104]
§ 38.2. =The Antiquities of the Catacombs.=--The custom widely
spread in ancient times and originating in piety or superstition
of placing in the tombs the utensils that had been used by
the deceased during life was continued, as the contents of
many burial niches show among the early Christians. Children’s
toys were placed beside them in the grave, and the clothes,
jewels, ornaments, amulets, etc., of grown up people. Quite a
special interest attaches to the so-called Blood Vases, _Phiolæ
rubricatæ_, which have been found in or near many of these niches,
_i.e._ crystal, rarely earthenware, vessels with Christian symbols
figured on a red ground. The _Congregation of rites and relics_
in A.D. 1668, asserted that they were blood-vessels, in which the
blood of the martyrs had been preserved and stood alongside of
their bones; and the existence of such jars, as well as every
pictorial representation of the palm branch (Rev. vii. 9),
was supposed to afford an indubitable proof that the niches
in question contained the bones of martyrs. But the Reformed
theologian Basnage shows that this assumption is quite untenable,
and he has explained the red ground from the dregs of the red
sacramental wine which may have been placed in the burial niches
as a protection against demoniacal intrusion. Even many good
Roman Catholic archæologists, Mabillon, Papebroch, Tillemont,
Muratori, etc., contest or express doubts as to the decree of the
_Congregation_. At the instigation probably of the Belgian Jesuit
Vict. de Buck, Pius IX. in A.D. 1863 confirmed and renewed the
old decree, and among others, Xav. Kraus has appeared as its
defender. But a great multitude of unquestionable facts contradict
the official decree of the church; _e.g._ the total absence
of any support to this view in tradition, the silence of such
inscriptions as relate to the martyrs, above all the immense
number of these jars, their being found frequently alongside the
bones of children of seven years old, the remarkable frequency
of them in the times of Constantine and his successors which were
free from persecution, the absence of the red dregs in many jars,
etc. Since dregs of wine, owing to their having the vegetable
property of combinableness could scarcely be discernible down
to the present day, it has recently been suggested that the red
colour may have been produced by a mineral-chemical process as
oxide of iron.
§ 38.3. =Pictorial Art and the Catacombs.=--Many of the earliest
Christians may have inherited a certain dislike of the pictorial
arts from Judaism, and may have been confirmed therein by their
abhorrence of the frivolous and godless abuse of art in heathenism.
But this aversion which in a Tertullian grew from a Montanistic
rigorism into a fanatical hatred of art, is never met with as a
constituent characteristic of Christianity. Much rather the great
abundance of paintings on the walls of the Roman and Neapolitan
catacombs, of which many, and these not the meanest, belong
to the 2nd century, some indeed perhaps to the last decades of
the 1st century, serves to show how general and lively was the
artistic sense among the earliest Christians at least in the
larger and wealthier communities. Yet from its circumstances the
Christian church in its appreciation of art was almost necessarily
limited on two sides; for, on the one hand, no paintings were
tolerated in the churches, and on the other hand, even in private
houses and catacombs they were restricted almost exclusively to
symbolico-allegorical or typical representations. The 36th Canon
of the Council of Elvira in A.D. 306 is a witness for the first
statement when it says: _Placuit picturas in ecclesia non esse
debere, ne quod colitur et adoratur in parietibus depingatur_.
The plain words of the Canon forbid any other interpretation
than this: From the churches, as places where public worship is
regularly held, all pictorial representations must be banished,
in order to make certain that in and under them there might not
creep in those images, forbidden in the decalogue, of Him who
is the object of worship and adoration. The Council thus assumed
practically the same standpoint as the Reformed church in the
16th century did in opposition to the practice of the Roman
Catholic and Lutheran churches. It cannot, however, be maintained
that the Canon of this rigorous Council (§ 45, 2) found general
acceptance and enforcement outside of Spain--Proof of the
second limitation is as convincingly afforded by what we find
in the catacombs. On the positive side, it has its roots in the
fondness which prevailed during these times for the mystical and
allegorical interpretation of scripture; and on the negative side,
in the endeavour, partly in respect for the prohibition of images
contained in the decalogue, partly, and perhaps mainly, in the
interests of the so-called _Disciplina arcani_, fostered under
pressure of persecution, to represent everything that pertained
to the mysteries of the Christian faith as a matter which only
Christians have a right fully to understand. From the prominence
given to the point last referred to it may be explained how
amid the revolution that took place under Constantine the age of
Symbolism and Allegory in the history of Christian art also passed
away, and henceforth painters applied themselves pre-eminently to
realistic historical representations.
§ 38.4. The pictorial and artistic representations of
the pre-Constantine age may be divided into the six following
groups:--
a. =Significant Symbols.=--To these belong especially _the
cross_,[105] though, for fear of the reproaches of Jews
and heathens (§ 23, 2), not yet in its own proper form but
only in a form that indicated what was meant, namely in
the form of the Greek Τ, very frequently in later times in
the monogram of the name of Christ, _i.e._ in a variously
constructed combination of its first two letters Χ and Ρ,
while the Χ, as _crux dissimulatæ_, has very often on
either side the letters α and ω.
b. =Allegorical Figures.=--In the 4th century a particularly
favourite figure was that of the _Fish_, the name of
which, ἰχθύς, formed a highly significant monogrammatic
representation of the sentence, Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς Θεοῦ Υἱὸς
Σωτήρ, and which pointed strikingly to the new birth from
the water of baptism. Then there is the _lamb_ or _sheep_,
as symbol of the soul, which still in this life seeks
after spiritual pastures; and the _dove_ as symbol of
the pious believing soul passing into eternal rest, often
with an _olive branch_ in its mouth (Gen. viii. 11), as
symbol of the eternal peace won. Also we have the _hart_
(Ps. xlii. 1), the _eagle_ (Ps. ciii. 5), the _chicken_,
symbol of Christian growth, the _peacock_, symbol of
the resurrection on account of the annual renewal of its
beautiful plumage, the _dolphin_, symbol of hastiness
or eagerness in the appropriation of salvation, _the
horse_, symbol of the race unto the goal of eternal life,
_the hare_, as symbol of the Christian working out his
salvation with fear and trembling, _the ship_, with
reference to Noah’s ark as a figure of the church, _the
anchor_ (Heb. vi. 19), _the lyre_ (Eph. v. 19), _the palm
branch_ (Rev. vii. 9), _the garland_ (or crown of life,
Rev. ii. 9), _the lily_ (Matt. vi. 28), _the balances_,
symbol of divine righteousness, _fishes and bread_,
symbol of spiritual nourishment with reference to Christ’s
miracle of feeding in the wilderness, etc.
c. =Parabolic Figures.=--These are illustrations borrowed from
the parables of the Gospels. To these belong conspicuously
the figure of the _Good Shepherd_, who bears on His
shoulder the lost sheep that He had found (Luke xv. 5),
the _Vine Stock_ (John xv.), the _Sower_ (Matt. xiii. 3),
the _Marriage Feast_ (Matt. xxii.), the _Ten Virgins_
(Matt. xxv.), etc.
d. =Historical Pictures of O. T. Types.=--Among these we
have Adam and Eve, the Rivers of Paradise (as types of
the four evangelists), Abel and Cain, Noah in the Ark, the
Sacrifice of Isaac, Scenes from Joseph’s History, Moses at
the Burning Bush, the Passage of the Red Sea, the Falling
of the Manna, the Water out of the Rock, History of Job,
Samson with the Gates of Gaza (the gates of Hell), David’s
Victory over Goliath, Elijah’s Ascension, Scenes from the
History of Jonah and Tobit, Daniel in the Lion’s Den, the
Three Children in the Fiery Furnace, etc. Also typical
material from heathen mythology had a place assigned them,
such as the legends of Hercules, Theseus, and especially
of Orpheus who by his music bewitched the raging elements
and tamed the wild beasts, descended into the lower world
and met his death through the infuriated women of his own
race.
e. =Figures from the Gospel History.=--These, _e.g._ the
Visit of the Wise Men from the East, and the Resurrection
of Lazarus, are throughout this period still exceedingly
rare. We do not find a single representation of the
Passion of our Lord, nor any of the sufferings of Christian
martyrs. Pictorial representations of the person of Christ,
as a beardless youth with a friendly mild expression,
are met with in the catacombs from the first half of the
2nd century, but without any claim to supply the likeness
of a portrait, such as might be claimed for the figures of
Christ in the temple of the Carpocratians (§ 27, 8) and in
the Lararium of the Emperor Alexander Severus (§ 22, 4).
Clement of Alexandria and Tertullian, in accordance with
the literal interpretation of Isa. liii. 2, 3, thought
that Christ had an unattractive face; the post-Constantine
fathers, on the contrary, resting upon Ps. xlv. 3 and
John i. 14, thought of Him as beautiful and gracious.
f. =Liturgical Figures.=--These were connected only with the
ordinances of baptism and the Lord’s Supper.
§ 39. LIFE, MANNERS, AND DISCIPLINE.[106]
When the chaff had been so relentlessly severed from the wheat
by the persecutions of that age, a moral earnestness and a power of
denying the world and self must have been developed, sustained by
the divine power of the gospel and furthered by a strict and rigorous
application of church discipline to the Christian life, such as the
world had never seen before. What most excited and deserved wonder
in the sphere of heathendom, hitherto accustomed only to the reign
of selfishness, was the brotherly love of the Christians, their
systematic care of the poor and sick, the widespread hospitality,
the sanctity of marriage, the delight in martyrdom, etc. Marriages
with Jews, heathens and heretics were disapproved, frequently even the
celebration of a second marriage after the death of the first wife was
disallowed. Public amusements, dances, and theatres were avoided by
Christians as _Pompa diaboli_. They thought of the Christian life,
in accordance with Eph. vi. 10 ff., as _Militia Christi_. But even
in the Post-Apostolic Age we come upon indications of a tendency to
turn from the evangelical spirituality, freedom and simplicity of the
Apostolic Age toward a pseudo-catholic externalism and legalism in the
fundamental views taken of ethical problems, and at the same time and
in the same way in the departments of the church constitution (§ 34),
worship (§ 36) and exposition of doctrine (§ 30, 2). The teachers of
the church do still indeed maintain the necessity of a disposition
corresponding to the outward works, but by an over-estimation of
these they already prepare the way for the doctrine of merit and the
_opus operatum_, _i.e._ the meritoriousness of works in themselves.
Even the _Epistle of Barnabas_ and the _Didache_ reckon almsgiving
as an atonement for sins. Still more conspicuously is this tendency
exhibited by _Cyprian_ (_De Opere et eleemosynis_) and even in
the _Shepherd of Hermas_ (§ 30, 4) we find the beginnings of the
later distinction, based upon 1 Cor. vii. 25, 26; Matt. xxv. 21, and
Luke xviii. 10, between the divine commands, _Mandata_ or _Præcepta_,
which are binding upon all Christians, and the evangelical counsels,
_Consilia evangelica_, the non-performance of which is no sin, but the
doing of which secures a claim to merit and more full divine approval.
Among the Alexandrian theologians, too, under the influence of the
Greek philosophy a very similar idea was developed in the distinction
between higher and lower morality, after the former of which the
Christian sage (ὁ γνωστικός) is required to shine, while the ordinary
Christian may rest satisfied with the latter. On such a basis a
special order of Ascetics very early made its appearance in the
churches. Those who went the length of renouncing the world and
going out into the wilderness were called Anchorets. This order
first assumed considerable dimensions in the 4th century (§ 44).
§ 39.1. =Christian Morals and Manners.=--The Christian spirit
pervaded the domestic and civil life and here formed for itself
a code of Christian morals. It expressed itself in the family
devotions and family communions (§ 36, 3), in putting the sign
of the cross upon all callings in life, in the Christian symbols
(§ 38, 3) with which dwellings, garments, walls, lamps, cups,
glasses, rings, etc. were adorned. As to private worship the
Didache requires without fixing the hours that the head of the
household shall have prayers three times a day (Dan. vi. 30),
meaning probably, as with Origen, morning, noon, and night.
Tertullian specifies the 3rd, 6th, and 9th hours as the hours
of prayer, and distinctly demands a separate morning and evening
prayer.--The concluding of marriage according to the then existing
Roman law had to be formally carried through by the expressed
agreement of the parties in the presence of witnesses, and this
on the part of the church was regarded as valid. The Christian
custom required that there should be a previous making of it
known, _Professio_, to the bishop, and a subsequent going to the
church of the newly married pair in order that, amid the church’s
intercessions and the priestly benediction, a religious sanction
might be given to their marriage covenant, by the oblation
and common participation of the Lord’s Supper at the close of
the public services. Tertullian’s Montanistic rigorism shows
itself in regarding marriages where these are omitted, _occultæ
conjunctiones_, as no better than _mœchia_ and _fornicatio_. The
crowning of the two betrothed ones and the veiling of the bride
were still disallowed as heathenish practices; but the use of the
wedding ring was sanctioned at an early date and had a Christian
significance attached to it. The burning of dead bodies prevalent
among the heathens reminded them of hell fire; the Christians
therefore preferred the Jewish custom of burial and referred in
support to 1 Cor. xv. 36. The day of the deaths of their deceased
members were celebrated in the Christian families by prayer and
oblations in testimony of their fellowship remaining unbroken by
death and the grave.--Continuation § 61, 2, 3.
§ 39.2. =The Penitential Discipline.=--According to the
Apostolic ordinance (§ 17, 8) notorious sinners were excluded
from the fellowship of the church, _Excommunicatio_, and only
after prolonged trial of their penitence, _Exomologesis_,
were they received back again, _Reconciliatio_. In the time
of Cyprian, about A.D. 250, there was already a well defined
order of procedure in this matter of restoring the lapsed which
continued in force until the 5th century. Penance, _Pœnitentia_,
must extend through four stages, each of which according to
circumstances might require one or more years. During the first
stage, the πρόσκλαυσις, _Fletio_, the penitents, standing at
the church doors in mourning dress, made supplication to the
clergy and the congregation for restoration; in the second,
the ἀκρόασις, _Auditio_, they were admitted again to the reading
of the scriptures and the sermon, but still kept in a separate
place; in the third, ὑπόπτωσις, _Substratio_, they were allowed
to kneel at prayer; and finally, in the fourth, σύστασις,
_Consistentia_, they took part again in the whole of the public
services, with the exception of the communion which they were
only allowed to look at standing. Then they received Absolution
and Reconciliation (=_pacem dare_) in presence of the assembled
and acquiescing congregation by the imposition of the hands
of the bishop and the whole of the clergy, together with
the brotherly kiss and the partaking of the communion. This
procedure was directed against open and demonstrable sins
of a serious nature against the two tables of the decalogue,
against so called _deadly sins_, _Peccata_ or _crimina mortalia_,
1 John v. 16. Excommunication was called forth, on the one
side, against idolatry, blasphemy, apostasy from the faith and
abjuration thereof; on the other, against murder, adultery and
fornication, theft and lying, perfidy and false swearing. Whether
reconciliation was permissible in the case of any mortal sin at
all, and if so, what particular sins might thus be treated, were
questions upon which teachers of the church were much divided
during the 3rd century. But only the Montanists and Novatians
(§§ 40, 41) denied the permissibility utterly and that in
opposition to the prevailing practice of the church, which
refused reconciliation absolutely only in cases of idolatry
and murder, and sometimes also in the case of adultery.
Even Cyprian at first held firmly by the principle that all
mortal sins committed “against God” must be wholly excluded
from the range of penitential discipline, but amid the horrors
of the Decian persecution, which left behind it whole crowds
of fallen ones, _Lapsi_ (§ 22, 5), he was induced by the
passionate entreaties of the church to make the concession that
reconciliation should be granted to the _Libellatici_ after a
full penitential course, but to the _Sacrificati_ only when in
danger of death. All the teachers of the church, however, agree
in holding that it can be granted only once in this life, and
those who again fall away are cut off absolutely. But excessive
strictness in the treatment of the penitents called forth the
contrary extreme of undue laxity (§ 41, 2). The _Confessors_
frequently used their right of demanding the restoration of the
fallen by means of letters of recommendation, _Libelli pacis_,
to such an extent as to seriously interfere with a wholesome
discipline.[107]--Continuation § 61, 1.
§ 39.3. =Asceticism.=--The Ascetism (_Continentia_, ἐγκρατεία)
of heathenism and Judaism, of Pythagoreanism and Essenism,
resting on dualistic and pseudo-spiritualistic views, is
confronted in Christianity with the proposition: Πάντα ὑμῶν
ἐστιν (1 Cor. iii. 21; vi. 12). Christianity, however, also
recognised the ethical value and relative wholesomeness of a
moderate asceticism in proportion to individual temperament,
needs and circumstances (Matt. ix. 12; 1 Cor. vii. 5-7), without
demanding it or regarding it as something meritorious. This
evangelical moderation we also find still in the 2nd century,
_e.g._ in Ignatius. But very soon a gradual exaggeration becomes
apparent and an ever-advancing over estimation of asceticism as a
higher degree of morality with claims to be considered peculiarly
meritorious. The negative requirements of asceticism are directed
first of all to frequent and rigid fasts and to celibacy or
abstinence from marital intercourse; its positive requirements,
to the exercise of the spiritual life in prayer and meditation.
The most of the =Ascetics=, too, in accordance with Luke xviii. 24,
voluntarily divested themselves of their possessions. The number
of them, men and women, increased, and even in the first half
of the 2nd century, they formed a distinct order in the church,
though they were not yet bound to observe this mode of life by any
irrevocable vows. The idea that the clergy were in a special sense
called to an ascetic life resulted in their being designated the
κλῆρος Θεοῦ. Owing to the interpretation given to 1 Tim. iii. 2,
second marriages were in the 2nd century prohibited among the
clergy, and in the 3rd century it was regarded as improper for
them after ordination to continue marital intercourse. But it was
first at the Council of Elvira, in A.D. 306, that this opinion was
elevated into a law, though it could not even then be rigorously
enforced (§ 45, 2).--The immoral practice of ascetics or clerics
having with them virgins devoted to God’s service as _Sorores_,
ἀδελφαί on the ground of 1 Cor. ix. 5, with whom they were united
in spiritual love, in order to show their superiority to the
temptations of the flesh, seems to have been introduced as early
as the 2nd century. In the middle of the 3rd century it was
already widespread. Cyprian repeatedly inveighs against it.
We learn from him that the so-called _Sorores_ slept with the
Ascetics in one bed and surrendered themselves to the tenderest
caresses. For proof of the purity of their relations they referred
to the examinations of midwives. Among bishops, Paul of Samosata
in Antioch (§ 33, 8) seems to have been the first who favoured
this evil custom by his own example. The popular wit of the
Antiochenes [Antiocheans] invented for the more than doubtful
relationship the name of the γυναίκες συνεισάκτοι, _Subintroductæ_,
_Agapetæ_, _Extreneæ_. Bishops and Councils sent forth strict
decrees against the practice.--The most remarkable among the
celebrated ascetics of the age was =Hieracas=, who lived at
Leontopolis in Egypt toward the end of the 3rd and beginning of
the 4th century and died there when ninety years old. A pupil
of Origen, he was distinguished for great learning, favoured
the allegorical interpretation of Scripture, a spiritualistic
dogmatics and strict asceticism. Besides this he was a physician,
astronomer and writer of hymns, could repeat by heart almost all
the Old and New Testaments, wrote commentaries in Greek and Coptic,
and gathered round him a numerous society of men and women, who
accepted his ascetical principles and heterodox views. Founding
upon Matt. xix. 12; 1 Cor. vii. and Heb. xii. 14, he maintained
that celibacy was the only perfectly sure way to blessedness
and commended this doctrine as the essential advance from the
Old Testament to the New Testament morality. He even denied
salvation to Christian children dying in infancy because they had
not yet fought against sensuality, referring to 2 Tim. ii. 5. Of
a sensible paradise he would hear nothing, and just as little of
a bodily resurrection; for the one he interprets allegorically
and the other spiritually. Epiphanius, to whom we owe any precise
information that we have about him, is the first to assign him
and his followers a place in the list of heretics.
§ 39.4. =Paul of Thebes.=--The withdrawal of particular
ascetics from ascetical motives into the wilderness, which was
a favourite craze for a while, may have been suggested by Old
and New Testament examples, _e.g._ 1 Kings xvii. 3; xix. 4;
Luke i. 80; iv. 1; but it was more frequently the result of sore
persecution. Of a regular professional institution of anchorets
with life-long vows there does not yet appear any authentic trace.
According to Jerome’s _Vita Pauli monachi_ a certain =Paul of
Thebes= in Egypt, about A.D. 250, during the Decian persecution,
betook himself, when sixteen years old, to the wilderness, and
there forgotten by all the world but daily fed by a raven with
half a loaf (1 Kings xvii. 4), he lived for ninety-seven years
in a cave in a rock, until St. Anthony (§ 44, 1), directed
to him by divine revelation and led to him first by a centaur,
half man, half horse, then by a fawn, and finally by a she-wolf,
came upon him happily just when the raven had brought him as
it never did before a whole loaf. He was just in time to be
an eye-witness, not indeed of his death, but rather of his
subsequent ascension into heaven, accompanied by angels, prophets
and apostles, and to arrange for the burial of his mortal remains,
for the reception of which two lions, uttering heart-breaking
groans, dug a grave with their claws. These lions after earnestly
seeking and obtaining a blessing from St. Anthony, returned back
to their lair.--Contemporaries of the author, as indeed he himself
tells, declared that the whole story was a tissue of lies. Church
history, however, until quite recently, has invariably maintained
that there must have been some historical foundation, though it
might be very slight, for such a superstructure. But seeing that
no single writer before Jerome seems to know even the name of Paul
of Thebes and also that the _Vita Antonii_ ascribed to Athanasius
knows nothing at all of such a wonderful expedition of the saint,
Weingarten (§ 44) has denied that there ever existed such a man
as this Paul, and has pronounced the story of Jerome to be a
monkish Robinson Crusoe, such as the popular taste then favoured,
which the author put forth as true history _ad majorem monachatus
gloriam_. We may simply apply to this book itself what Jerome
at a later period confessed about his epistles of that same
date _ad Heliodorum:--sed in illo opere pio ætate tunc lusimus
et celentibus adhuc Rhetorum studiis atque doctrinis quædam
scholastico flore depinximus_.
§ 39.5. =Beginning of Veneration of Martyrs.=--In very early
times a martyr death was prized as a sin-atoning _Lavacrum
sanguinis_, which might even abundantly compensate for the want
of water baptism. The day of the martyr’s death which was
regarded as the day of his birth into a higher life, γενέθλια,
_Natalitia martyrum_, was celebrated at his grave by prayers,
oblations and administration of the Lord’s Supper as a testimony
to the continuance of that fellowship with them in the Lord that
had been begun here below. Their bones were therefore gathered
with the greatest care and solemnly buried; so _e.g._ Polycarp’s
bones at Smyrna (§ 22, 2), as τιμιώτερα λίθων πολυτελῶν καὶ
δωκιμώτερα ὑπὲρ χρυσίον, so that at the spot where they were
laid the brethren might be able to celebrate his γενέθλιον ἐν
ἀγαλλιάσει καὶ χαρᾷ, εἴς τε τῶν προηθληκότων μνήμην καὶ τῶν
μελλόντων τε καὶ ἑτοιμασίαν. Of miracles wrought by means of
the relics, however, we as yet find no mention. The _Graffiti_
on the walls of the catacombs seem to represent the beginning
of the invocation of martyrs. In these the pious visitors seek
for themselves and those belonging to them an interest in the
martyr’s intercessions. Some of those scribblings may belong
to the end of our period; at least the expression “_Otia petite
pro_,” etc. in one of them seem to point to a time when they
were still undergoing persecution. The greatest reverence, too,
was shown to the _Confessors_ all through their lives, and great
influence was assigned them in regard to all church affairs,
_e.g._ in the election of bishops, the restoration of the fallen,
etc.--Continuation, § 57.
§ 39.6. =Superstition.=--Just as in later times every great
Christian missionary enterprise has seen religious ideas
transferred from the old heathenism into the young Christianity,
and, consciously or unconsciously, secretly or openly, acquiesced
in or contended against, securing for themselves a footing, so
also the Church of the first centuries did not succeed in keeping
itself free from such intrusions. A superstition forcing its
entrance in this way can either be taken over _nude crude_ in its
genuinely pagan form and, in spite of its palpable inconsistency
with the Christian faith, may nevertheless assert itself side
by side with it, or it may divest itself of that old pagan form,
and so unobserved and uncontested gain an entrance with its not
altogether extinguished heathenish spirit into new Christian
views and institutions and thus all the more dangerously make its
way among them. It is especially the magico-theurgical element
present in all heathen religions, which even at this early period
stole into the Christian life and the services of the church
and especially into the sacraments and things pertaining thereto
(§ 58), while it assumed new forms in the veneration of martyrs
and the worship of relics. One can scarcely indeed accept as a
convincing proof of this the statement of the Emperor Hadrian
in his correspondence regarding the religious condition of
Alexandria as given by the historian Vopiscus: _Illic qui
Serāpem colunt Christiani sunt, et devoti sunt Serapi qui se
Christi episcopos dicunt; nemo illic archisynagogus Judæorum,
nemo Samarites, nemo Christianorum presbyter non mathematicus,
non haruspex, non aliptes_. This statement bears on its face
too evidently the character of superficial observation, of vague
hearsay and confused massing together of sundry reports. What
he says of the worship of Serapis, may have had some support
from the conduct of many Christians in the ascetic order, the
designating of their presbyters _aliptæ_ may have been suggested
by the chrism in baptism and the anointing at the consecration
of the clergy, perhaps also in the anointing of the sick
(Matt. vi. 13; Jas. v. 14); so too the characterizing of them
as _mathematici_ may have arisen from their determining the date
of Easter by means of astronomical observations (§ 37, 2; 56, 3),
though it could not be specially wonderful if there actually
were Christian scholars among the Alexandrian clergy skilled
in astronomy, notwithstanding the frequent alliance of this
science with astrology. But much more significant is the gross
superstition which in many ways shows itself in so highly
cultured a Christian as Julius Africanus in his _Cestæ_ (§ 31, 8).
In criticising it, however, we should bear in mind that this book
was written in the age of Alexander Severus, in which, on the one
hand, a wonderful mixture of religion and theurgical superstition
had a wonderful fascination for men, while on the Christian side
the whirlwind of persecution had not for a long time blown its
purifying breeze. The catacombs, too, afford some evidences of a
mode of respect for the departed that was borrowed from heathen
practices, but these on the whole are wonderfully free from
traces of superstition.
§ 40. THE MONTANIST REFORMATION.[108]
Earnest and strict as the moral, religious and ascetical requirements
of the church of the 2nd and 3rd centuries generally were in regard
to the life and morals of its members, and rigidly as these principles
were carried out in its penitential discipline, there yet appeared
even at this early date, in consequence of various instances of the
relaxation of such strictness, certain eager spirits who clamoured
for a restoration or even an intensification of the earlier rules of
discipline. Such a movement secured for itself a footing about the
middle of the 2nd century in Montanism, a growth of Phrygian soil, which
without traversing in any way the doctrine of the church, undertook
a thorough reformation of the ecclesiastical constitution on the
practical side. Montanism, in opposition to the eclecticism of heretical
Gnosticism, showed the attitude of Christianity to heathenism to be
exclusive; against the spiritualizing and allegorizing tendencies of the
church Gnosticism it opposed the realism and literalism of the doctrines
and facts of the scripture revelation; against what seemed the excessive
secularization of the church it presented a model of church discipline
such as the nearness of the Lord’s coming demanded; against hierarchical
tendencies that were always being more and more emphasized it maintained
the rights of the laity and the membership of the church; while in order
to secure the establishment of all these reforms it proclaimed that a
prophetically inspired spiritual church had succeeded to Apostolic
Christianity.
§ 40.1. =Montanism in Asia Minor.=--According to Epiphanius as
early as A.D. 156, according to Eusebius in A.D. 172, according
to Jerome in A.D. 171, a certain Montanus appeared as a prophet
and church reformer at Pepuza in Phrygia. He was formerly a
heathen priest and was only shortly before known as a Christian.
He had visions, preached while unconscious in ecstasy of the
immediate coming again of Christ (_Parousia_), fulminated against
the advancing secularisation of the church, and, as the supposed
organ of the _Paraclete_ promised by Christ (John xiv. 16)
presented in their most vigorous form the church’s demands in
respect of morals and discipline. A couple of excited women
_Prisca_ and _Maximilla_ were affected by the same extravagant
spirit by which he was animated, fell into a somnambulistic
condition and prophesied as he had done. On the death of
Maximilla about A.D. 180, Montanus and Prisca having died
before this, the supposed prophetic gift among them seems to
have been quenched. At least an anonymous writer quoted in
Eusebius (according to Jerome it was Rhodon, § 27, 12), in
his controversial treatise published thirteen years afterwards,
states that the voices of the prophets were then silent. So
indeed she herself had declared: Μεθ’ ἐμὲ προφῆτης οὐκέτι ἔσται,
ἀλλὰ συντέλεια. The Montanist prophecies occasioned a mighty
commotion in the whole church of Asia Minor. Many earnest
Christians threw themselves eagerly into the movement. Even
among the bishops they found here and there favour or else mild
criticism, while others combated them passionately, some going
so far as to regard the prophesying women as possessed ones and
calling exorcism to their aid. By the end of the year 170 several
synods, the first synods regularly convened, had been held
against them, the final result of which was their exclusion from
the catholic church. Montanus now organized his followers into an
independent community. After his death, his most zealous follower,
Alcibiades, undertook its direction. It was also not without
literary defenders. Themison, Alcibiades’ successor, issued “in
imitation of the Apostle” (John?) a Καθολικὴ ἐπιστολή, and the
utterances of the prophets were collected and circulated as
holy scripture. On the other hand during this same year 170 they
were attacked by the eminent apologists Claudius Apollinaris
and Miltiades (§ 36, 9) probably also by Melito. Their radical
opponents were the so-called _Alogi_ (§ 33, 2). Among their later
antagonists, who assumed more and more a passionately embittered
tone, the most important according to Eusebius were one
Apollinaris, whom Tertullian combats in the VII. Bk. of his
work, _De ecstasi_, and Serapion. At a Synod at Iconium about
the middle of the 3rd century at which also Firmilian of Cæsarea
(§ 35, 5) was present and voted, the baptism of the Montanists,
although their trinitarian orthodoxy could not be questioned,
was pronounced to be like heretical baptism null, because
administered _extra ecclesiam_, and a second baptism declared
necessary on admission to the Catholic church. And although at the
Council of Nicæa in A.D. 325 and of Constantinople in A.D. 381,
the validity of heretics’ baptism was admitted if given orderly
in the name of the Holy Trinity, the baptism of the Montanists was
excluded because it was thought that the Paraclete of Montanism
could not be recognised as the Holy Spirit of the church.--Already
in the time of Constantine the Great the Montanists were spreading
out from Phrygia over all the neighbouring provinces, and were
called from the place where they originated Κατάφρυγες and
Pepuziani. The Emperor now forbade them holding any public
assemblies for worship and ordered that all places for public
service should be taken from them and given over to the Catholic
church. Far stricter laws than even these were enforced against
them by later emperors down to the 5th century, _e.g._ prohibition
of all Montanist writings, deprivation of almost all civil rights,
banishment of their clergy to the mines, etc. Thus they could only
prolong a miserable existence in secret, and by the beginning of
the sixth century every trace of them had disappeared.
§ 40.2. =Montanism at Rome.=--The movement called forth by
Montanism in the East spread by and by also into the West. When
the first news reached Gaul of the synodal proceedings in Asia
Minor that had rent the church, the Confessors imprisoned at
Lyons and Vienne during the persecution of Marcus Aurelius, of
whom more than one belonged to a colony that had emigrated from
Phrygia to Gaul, were displeased, and, along with their report
of the persecution they had endured (§ 32, 8), addressed a letter
to those of Asia Minor, not given by Eusebius, but reckoned pious
and orthodox, exhorting to peace and the preservation of unity.
At the same time (A.D. 177) they sent the Presbyter Irenæus to
Rome in order to win from Bishop Eleutherus (A.D. 174-189), who
was opposed to Montanism, a mild and pacific sentence. Owing,
however, to the arrival of Praxeas, a Confessor of Asia Minor and
a bitter opponent of Montanism, a formal condemnation was at last
obtained (§ 33, 4). Tertullian relates that the Roman bishop, at
the instigation of Praxeas, revoked the letters of peace which
had been already prepared in opposition to his predecessors.
It is matter of controversy whether by this unnamed bishop
Eleutherus is meant, who then was first inclined to a peaceable
decision by Irenæus and thereafter by the picture of Montanist
extravagances given by Praxeas was led again to form another
opinion; or that it was, what seems from the chronological
references most probable, his successor Victor (A.D. 189-199), in
which case Eleutherus is represented as having hardened himself
against Montanism in spite of the entreaties of Irenæus, while
Victor was the first who for a season had been brought to think
otherwise.--Yet even after their condemnation a small body of
Montanists continued to exist in Rome, whose mouthpiece during
the time of bishop Zephyrinus (A.D. 199-217) was Proclus, whom
the Roman Caius (§ 31, 7) opposed by word and writing.
§ 40.3. =Montanism in Proconsular Africa.=--When and how
Montanism gained a footing in North Africa is unknown, but
very probably it spread thither from Rome. The movement issuing
therefrom first attracted attention when Tertullian, about
A.D. 201 or 202, returned from Rome to Carthage, and with the
whole energy of his character decided in its favour, and devoted
his rich intellectual gifts to its advocacy. That the Montanist
party in Africa at that time still continued in connection with
the Catholic church is witnessed to by the Acts of the Martyrs
Perpetua and Felicitas (§ 32, 8), composed some time after this,
which bear upon them almost all the characteristic marks of
Montanism, while a vision communicated there shows that division
was already threatened. The bishop and clergy together with the
majority of the membership were decided opponents of the new
ecstatic-visionary prophecy already under ecclesiastical ban in
Asia Minor. They had not yet, however, come to an open breach
with it, which was probably brought about in A.D. 206 when quiet
had been again restored after the cessation of the persecution
begun about A.D. 202 by Septimius Severus. Tertullian had stood
at the head of the sundered party as leader of their sectarian
services, and defended their prophesyings and rigorism in
numerous apologetico-polemical writings with excessive bitterness
and passion, applying them with consistent stringency to all the
relations of life, especially on the ethical side. From the high
esteem in which, notwithstanding his Montanist eccentricities,
Tertullian’s writings continued to be held in Africa, _e.g._
by Cyprian (§ 31, 11), and generally throughout the West, the
tendency defended by him was not regarded in the church there as
in the East as thoroughly heretical, but only as a separatistic
overstraining of views allowed by the church. This mild estimate
could all the easier win favour, since to all appearance the
extravagant visionary prophesying, which caused most offence, had
been in these parts very soon extinguished.--Augustine reports
that a small body of “Tertullianists” continued in Carthage
down to his time († 430), and had by him been induced to return
to the Catholic church; and besides this, he also tells us
that Tertullian had subsequently separated himself from the
“Cataphrygians,” _i.e._ from the communion of the Montanists of
Asia Minor, whose excesses were only then perhaps made known to
him.
§ 40.4. =The Fundamental Principle of Montanism.=--Montanism
arose out of a theory of a divinely educative revelation
proceeding by advancing stages, not finding its conclusion in
Christ and the Apostles, but in the age of the Paraclete which
began with Montanus and in him reached its highest development.
The times of the law and the prophets in the Old Covenant is
the childhood of the kingdom of God; in the gospel it appears in
its youth; and by the Montanist shedding forth of the Spirit it
reaches the maturity of manhood. Its absolute perfection will be
attained in the millennium introduced by the approaching Parousia
and the descent of the heavenly Jerusalem at Pepuza (Rev. xx. 21).
The Montanist prophecy did not enrich or expand but only
maintained and established against the heretics, the system of
Christian doctrine already exclusively revealed in the times of
Christ. Montanism regarded as its special task a reformation of
Christian life and Church discipline highly necessary in view of
the approaching Parousia. The defects that had been borne with
during the earlier stages of revelation were to be repaired or
removed by the _Mandata_ of the Paraclete. The following are some
of the chief of these prescriptions: Second marriage is adultery;
Fasting must be practised with greater strictness; On _dies
stationum_ (§ 37, 3) nothing should be eaten until evening, and
twice a year for a whole week only water and bread (ξηροφαγίαι);
The excommunicated must remain their whole lifetime in _status
pœnitentiæ_; Martyrdom should be courted, to withdraw in any way
from persecution is apostasy and denial of the faith; Virgins
should take part in the worship of God only when veiled; Women
generally must put away all finery and ornaments; secular science
and art, all worldly enjoyments, even those that seem innocent,
are only snares of the devil, etc. An anti-hierarchical tendency
early showed itself in Montanism from the circumstance that
it arrogated to itself a new and high authority to which
the hierarchical organs of the church refused to submit
themselves. Yet even Montanism, after repudiating it, for its
own self-preservation was obliged to give itself an official
congregational organization, which, according to Jerome, had
as its head a patriarch resident at Pepuza, and, according to
Epiphanius, founding on Gal. iii. 28, gave even women admission
into ecclesiastical offices. Its worship was distinguished
only by the space given to the prophesyings of its prophets and
prophetesses. Epiphanius notes this as a special characteristic
of the sect, that often in their assemblies seven white-robed
virgins with torches made their appearance prophesying; evidently,
as the number seven itself shows, as representatives of the seven
spirits of God (Rev. iv. 5, etc.), and not of the ten virgins
who wait for the coming of the Lord. According to Philaster they
allowed even unbaptized persons to attend all their services and
were in the habit of baptizing even the dead, as is elsewhere
told also of certain Gnostic sects. Epiphanius too speaks of a
Montanist party which celebrated the Lord’s Supper with bread and
cheese, _Artotyrites_, according to Augustine, because the first
men had presented offerings of the fruits of the earth and sheep.
§ 40.5. =The Attitude of Montanism toward the Church.=--The
derivation of Montanism from Ebionism, contended for by Schwegler,
has nothing in its favour and much against it. To disprove this
notion it is enough to refer to the Montanist fundamental idea
of a higher stage of revelation above Moses and the prophets as
well as above the Messiah and His Apostles. Neither can we agree
with Neander in regarding the peculiar character of the Phrygian
people, as exhibited in their extravagant and fanatical worship
of Cybele, as affording a starting point for the Montanist
movement, but at most as a predisposition which rendered the
inhabitants of this province peculiarly susceptible in presence
of such a movement. The origin of Montanism is rather to be
sought purely among the specifically Catholic conditions and
conflicts within the church of Asia which at that time was
pre-eminently gifted and active. In regard to dogma Montanism
occupied precisely the same ground as the Catholic church;
even upon the trinitarian controversies of the age it took up
no sectarian position but went with the stream of the general
development. Not on the dogmatical but purely on the practical
side, namely, on that of the Christian life and ecclesiastical
constitution, discipline and morals, lay the problems which by
the action of the Montanists were brought into conflict. But
even upon this side Montanism, with all its eccentricities, did
not assume the attitude of an isolated separatistic sect, but
rather as a quickening and intensifying of views and principles
which from of old had obtained the recognition and sanction of
the church,--views which on the wider spread of Christianity
had already begun to be in every respect toned down or even
obliterated, and just in this way called forth that reaction of
enthusiasm which we meet with in Montanism. From the Apostles’
time the expectation of the early return of the Lord had stood
in the foreground of Christian faith, hope and yearning, and
this expectation continued still to be heartily entertained.
Nevertheless the fulfilment had now been so long delayed that men
were beginning to put this coming into an indefinitely distant
future (2 Pet. iii. 4). Hence it happened that even the leaders
of the church, in building up its hierarchical constitution and
adjusting it to the social circumstances and conditions of life
by which they were surrounded, made their arrangements more and
more deliberately in view of a longer continuance of the present
state of things, and thus the primitive Christian hope of an
early Parousia, though not expressly denied, seemed practically
to have been set aside. Hence the Montanist revivalists
proclaimed this hope as most certain, giving a guarantee for it
by means of a new divine revelation. Similarly too the moral,
ascetic and disciplinary rigorism of the Montanist prophecy is
to be estimated as a vigorous reaction against the mild practice
prevailing in the church with its tendency to make concessions
to human weakness, in favour of the strict exercise of church
discipline in view of the nearness of the Parousia. Montanism
could also justify the reappearance of prophetic gifts among
its founders by referring to the historical tradition which from
the Apostolic Age (Acts xi. 27 f.; xxi. 9) presented to view a
series of famous prophets and prophetesses, endowed with ecstatic
visionary powers. The exclusion of Montanism from the Catholic
Church could not, therefore, have been occasioned either by its
proclaiming an early Parousia or by its rigorism, or finally,
even by its prophetic claims, but purely by its doctrine of the
Paraclete. Under the pretence of instituting a new and higher
stage of revelation, it had really undertaken to correct the
moral and religious doctrines of Christ and the Apostles as
defective and incomplete, and had thereby proved itself to the
representatives of the church to be undoubtedly a pseudo-prophecy.
The spiritual pride with which the Montanists proclaimed
themselves to be the privileged people of the Holy Spirit,
Πνευματικοὶ, _Spirituales_ and characterized the Catholics as,
on the contrary, Ψυχικοὶ, _Carnales_, as also the assumption
that chose their own obscure Pepuza for the site of the heavenly
Jerusalem, and the manifold extravagances committed by their
prophets and prophetesses in their ecstatic trances, must
have greatly tended to create an aversion to every form of
spiritualistic manifestation. The origin of Montanism, the
contesting of it and its final expulsion, constitute indeed a
highly significant crisis in the historical development of the
church, conditioned not so much by a separatistic sectarian
tendency, but rather by the struggle of two tendencies existing
within the church, in which the tendency represented by Montanism
and honestly endeavouring the salvation of the church, went
under, while that which was victorious would have put an end
to all enthusiasm. The expulsion of Montanism from the church
contributed greatly to freeing the church from the reproach
so often advanced against it of being a narrow sect, made its
consenting to the terms, demands and conditions of everyday
life in the world easier, gave a freer course and more powerful
impulse to its development in constitution and worship dependent
upon these, as well as in the further building up of its
practical and scientific endeavours, and generally advanced
greatly its expansion and transformation from a sectarian close
association into a universal church opening itself up more and
more to embrace all the interests of the culture of the age;--a
transformation which indeed in many respects involved a
secularizing of the church and imparted to its spiritual
functions too much of an official and superficial character.
§ 41. SCHISMATIC DIVISIONS IN THE CHURCH.
Even after the ecclesiastical sentence had gone forth against
Montanism, the rigoristic penitential discipline in a form more or less
severe still found its representatives within the Catholic church. As
compared with the advocates of a milder procedure these were indeed
generally in the minority, but this made them all the more zealously
contend for their opinions and endeavour to secure for them universal
recognition. Out of the contentions occasioned thereby, augmented by
the rivalry of presbyter and episcopus, or episcopus and metropolitan,
several ecclesiastical divisions originated which, in spite of the
pressing need of the time for ecclesiastical unity, were long continued
by ambitious churchmen in order to serve their own selfish ends.
§ 41.1. =The Schism of Hippolytus at Rome about A.D. 220.=--On
what seems to have been the oldest attempt to form a sect at Rome
over a purely doctrinal question, namely that of the Theodotians,
about A.D. 210, see § 33, 3.--Much more serious was the schism of
Hippolytus, which broke out ten years later. In A.D. 217, after
an eventful and adventurous life, a freedman Callistus was raised
to the bishopric of Rome, but not without strong opposition on
the part of the rigorists, at whose head stood the celebrated
presbyter Hippolytus. They charged the bishop with scoffing at
all Christian earnestness, conniving at the loosening of all
church discipline toward the fallen and sinners of all kinds, and
denounced him especially as a supporter of the Noetian [Noëtian]
heresy (§ 33, 5). They took great offence also at his previous
life which his opponent Hippolytus (_Elench._, ix. 11 ff.) thus
describes: When the slave of a Christian member of the imperial
household, Callistus with the help of his lord established
a bank; he failed, took to flight, was brought back, sprang into
the sea, was taken out again and sent to the treadmill. At the
intercession of Christian friends he was set free, but failing to
satisfy his urgent creditors, he despairingly sought a martyr’s
death, for this end wantonly disturbed the Jewish worship, and
was on that account scourged and banished to the Sardinian mines.
At the request of bishop Victor the imperial concubine Marcia
(§ 22, 3) obtained the freedom of the exiled Christian confessors
among whom Callistus, although his name had been intentionally
omitted from the list presented by Victor, was included. After
Victor’s death he wormed himself into the favour of his weak
successor Zephyrinus, who placed him at the head of his clergy,
in consequence of which he was able by intrigues and craft
to secure for himself the succession to the bishopric.--An
opportunity of reconciliation was first given, it would seem,
under Pontianus, the second successor of Callistus, by banishing
the two rival chiefs to Sardinia. Both parties then united in
making a unanimous choice in A.D. 235.[109]
§ 41.2. =The Schism of Felicissimus at Carthage in
A.D. 250.=--Several presbyters in Carthage were dissatisfied with
the choice of Cyprian as bishop in A.D. 248 and sought to assert
their independence. At their head stood Novatus. Taking the
law into their own hands they chose Felicissimus, the next
head of the party, as a deacon. When Cyprian during the Decian
persecution withdrew for a time from Carthage, they charged him
with dereliction of duty and faint-heartedness. Cyprian, however,
soon returned, A.D. 251, and now they used his strictness toward
the _Lapsi_ as a means of creating a feeling against him. He
expressed himself very decidedly as to the recklessness with
which many confessors gave without examination _Libelli pacis_
to the fallen, and called upon these to commit their case to a
Synod that should be convened after the persecution. A church
visitation completed the schism; the discontented presbyters
without more ado received all the fallen and, notwithstanding
that Cyprian himself on the return of persecution introduced
a milder practice, they severed themselves from him under an
opposition bishop Fortunatus. Only by the unwearied exercise of
wisdom and firmness did Cyprian succeed in putting down the
schism.[110]
§ 41.3. =The Schism of the Presbyter Novatian at Rome in
A.D. 251.=--In this case the rigorist and presbyterial interests
coincide. After the martyrdom of bishop Fabian under Decian in
A.D. 250, the Roman bishopric remained vacant for more than a
year. His successor Cornelius (A.D. 251-253) was an advocate
of the milder practice. At the head of his rigorist opponents
stood his unsuccessful rival, Novatian, a learned but ambitious
presbyter (§ 31, 12). Meanwhile Novatus, excommunicated by Cyprian
at Carthage, had also made his way to Rome. Notwithstanding his
having previously maintained contrary principles in the matter
of church discipline, he attached himself to the party of the
purists and urged them into schism. They now chose Novatian as
bishop. Both parties sought to obtain the recognition of the most
celebrated churches. In doing so Cornelius described his opponent
in the most violent and bitter manner as a mere intriguer,
against whose reception into the number of presbyters as one
who had received clinical baptism (§ 35, 3) and especially
as an energoumenon under the care of the exorcists, he had
already protested; further as having extorted a sham episcopal
consecration from three simple Italian bishops, after he had
attached them to himself by pretending to be a peacemaker, then
locking them up and making them drunk, etc. Cyprian, as well as
Dionysius of Alexandria, expressed himself against Novatian, and
attacked the principles of his party, namely, that the church has
no right to give assurance of forgiveness to the fallen or such
as have broken their baptismal vows by grievous sin (although
the possibility of finding forgiveness through the mercy of
God was indeed admitted), and that the church as a communion of
thoroughly pure members should never endure any impure ones in
its bosom, nor receive back any excommunicated ones, even after
a full ecclesiastical course of penitence. The Novatianists had
therefore called themselves the Καθαροί. The moral earnestness of
their fundamental principles secured for them even from bishops
of contrary views an indulgent verdict, and Novatianist churches
sprang up over almost all the Roman empire. The Œcumenical
Council at Nicæa in A.D. 325 maintained an attitude toward them
upon the whole friendly, and in the Arian controversy (§ 50) they
stood faithfully side by side with their ecclesiastical opponents
in the defence of Nicene orthodoxy, and with them suffered
persecution from the Arians. Later on, however, the Catholic
church without more ado treated them as heretics. Theodosius
the Great sympathizing with them because of such unfair treatment,
took them under his protection; but Honorius soon again withdrew
these privileges from them. Remnants of the party continued
nevertheless to exist down to the 6th century.[111]
§ 41.4. =The Schism of Meletius in Egypt in A.D. 306.=--Meletius,
bishop of Lycopolis in the Thebaid, a representative of the
rigorist party, during the Diocletian persecution claimed to
confer ordinations and otherwise infringed upon the metropolitan
rights of Peter, bishop of Alexandria, a supporter of the
milder practice who for the time being lived in retirement. All
warnings and admonitions were in vain. An Egyptian Synod under
the presidency of Peter issued a decree of excommunication and
deposition against him. Then arose the schism, A.D. 306, which
won the whole of Egypt. The General Synod at Nicæa in A.D. 325
confirmed the Alexandrian bishop in his rights of supremacy
(§ 46, 3) and offered to all the Meletian bishops an amnesty
and confirmation in the succession on the death of the catholic
anti-bishop of their respective dioceses. Many availed themselves
of this concession, but others persisted in their schismatical
course and finally attached themselves to the Arian party
(§ 50, 2).
SECOND SECTION.
The History of the Græco-Roman Church from
the 4th-7th centuries.
A.D. 323-692.
I. CHURCH AND STATE.
§ 42. THE OVERTHROW OF PAGANISM IN THE ROMAN EMPIRE.[112]
After the overthrow of Licinius (§ 22, 7) Constantine identified
himself unreservedly with Christianity, but accepted baptism only
shortly before his death in A.D. 337. He was tolerant toward paganism,
though encouraging its abandonment in all possible ways. His sons,
however, began to put it down by violence. Julian’s short reign was
a historical anomaly which only proved that paganism did not die a
violent death, but rather gradually succumbed to a _Marasmus senilis_.
Succeeding emperors reverted to the policy of persecution and
extermination.--Neoplatonism, notwithstanding the patronage of
Julian and the brilliant reputation of its leading representatives,
could not reach the goal arrived at, but from the ethereal heights of
philosophical speculation sank ever further and further into the misty
region of fantastic superstition (§ 24, 2). The attempts at regeneration
made by the _Hypsistarians_, _Euphemites_, _Cœlicolæ_, in which paganism
strove after a revival by means of a barren Jewish monotheism or an
effete Sabaism, proved miserable failures. The literary conflict between
Christianity and paganism had almost completely altered its tone.
§ 42.1. =The Romish Legend of the Baptism of Constantine.=--That
Constantine the Great only accepted baptism shortly before his
death in Nicomedia, from Eusebius, bishop of that place, and a
well-known leader of the Arian party (§ 50, 1, 2), is put beyond
question by the evidence of his contemporary Eusebius of Cæsarea
in his _Vita Const._, of Ambrose, of Jerome in his Chronicle,
etc. About the end of the 5th century, however, a tradition,
connecting itself with the fact that a Roman baptistery bore
the name of Constantine, gained currency in Rome, to the effect
that Constantine had been baptised at this baptistery more than
twenty years before his death by Pope Sylvester (A.D. 314-335).
According to this purely fabulous legend Constantine, who
had up to that time been a bitter enemy and persecutor of the
Christians, became affected with leprosy, for the cure of which
he was recommended to bathe in a tub filled with the blood
of an innocent child. Moved by the tears of the mother the
emperor rejected this means of cure, and under the direction of
a heavenly vision applied to the Pope, who by Christian baptism
delivered him from his malady, whereupon all the members of the
Roman senate still heathens, and all the people were straightway
converted to Christ, etc. This legend is told in the so-called
_Decretum Gelasii_ (§ 47, 22), but is first vindicated as
historically true in the _Liber pontificalis_ (§ 90, 6), and
next in A.D. 729, in Bede’s Chronicle (§ 90, 2). In the notorious
_Donatio Constantini_ (§ 87, 4) it is unhesitatingly accepted.
Since then, at first with some exceptions but soon without
exceptions, all chroniclers of the Middle Ages and likewise since
the 9th century the _Scriptores hist. Byzant._, have adopted
it. And although in the 15th century Æneas Sylvius and Nicolaus
[Nicolas] of Cusa admitted that the legend was without foundation,
yet in the 16th century in Baronius and Bellarmine, and in
the 17th in Schelstraate, it found earnest defenders. The
learned French Benedictines of the 17th century were the first
to render it utterly incredible even in the Roman Catholic
church.[113]
§ 42.2. =Constantine the Great and his Sons.=--Constantine’s
profession of Christianity was not wholly the result of political
craft, though his use of the name _Pontifex Maximus_ and in
this capacity the continued exercise of certain pagan practices,
gave some colour to such an opinion. Outbursts of passion,
impulsiveness exhibited in deeds of violence and cruelty, as in
the order for the execution of his eldest son Crispus in A.D. 326
and his second wife Fausta, are met with even in his later years.
Soon after receiving baptism he died without having ever attended
a complete divine service. His toleration of paganism must be
regarded purely as a piece of statecraft. He only prohibited
impure rites and assigned to the Christians but a few of the
temples that had actually been in use. Aversion to the paganism
still prevalent among the principal families in Rome may partly
have led him to transfer his residence to Byzantium, since called
Constantinople, in A.D. 330. His three sons divided the Empire
among them. Constantius (A.D. 337-361) retained the East, and
became, after the death of Constantine II. in A.D. 340 and of
Constans in A.D. 350, sole ruler. All the three sought to put
down paganism by force. Constantius closed the heathen temples
and forbade all sacrifices on pain of death. Multitudes of
heathens went over to Christianity, few probably from conviction.
Among the nobler pagans there was thus awakened a strong
aversion to Christianity. Patriotism and manly spirit came to
be identified with the maintenance of the old religion.[114]
§ 42.3. =Julian the Apostate (A.D. 361-363).=--The sons of
Constantine the Great began their reign in A.D. 337 with the
murder of their male relatives. The brothers Julian and Gallus,
nephews of Constantine, alone were spared; but in A.D. 345 they
were banished to a Cappadocian castle where Julian officiated for
a while as reader in the village church. Having at last obtained
leave to study in Nicomedia, then in Ephesus, and finally in
Athens, the chief representatives of paganism fostered in him the
conviction that he was specially raised up by the gods to restore
again the old religion of his fathers. As early as A.D. 351
in Nicomedia he formally though still secretly returned to
paganism, and at Athens in A.D. 355 he took part in the Eleusinian
mysteries. Soon thereafter Constantius, harassed by foreign wars,
assigned to him the command of the army against the Germans. By
affability, personal courage and high military talent, he soon
won to himself the enthusiastic attachment of the soldiers.
Constantius thought to weaken the evident power of his cousin
which seemed to threaten his authority, by recalling the best
of the legions, but the legions refused obedience and proclaimed
Julian emperor. Then the emperor refused to ratify the election
and treated Julian himself as a rebel. The latter advanced at
the head of his army by forced marches upon the capital, but
ere he reached the city, he received the tidings of the opposing
emperor’s death. Acknowledged now as emperor throughout the
whole empire without any opposition, Julian proceeded with zeal,
enthusiasm and vigour to accomplish his long-cherished wish, the
restoring of the glory of the old national religion. He used no
violent measures for the subversion and overthrow of Christianity,
nor did he punish Christian obstinacy with death, except where it
seemed to him the maintenance of his supremacy required it. But
he demanded that temples which had been converted into churches
should be restored to the heathen worship, those destroyed should
be restored at the cost of the church exchequer and the money for
the state that had been applied to ecclesiastical purposes had to
be repaid. He scornfully referred the clergy thus robbed of their
revenues to the blessedness of evangelical poverty. He also
fomented as much as possible dissension in the church, favoured
all sectaries and heretics, excluded Christians from all the
higher, and afterwards from all the lower, civil and military
offices, and loaded them on every occasion with reproach and
shame, and by these means he actually induced many to apostatise.
In order to discredit Christ’s prophecy in Matt. xxiv. 2, he
resolved on the restoration of the Jewish temple at Jerusalem,
but after having been begun it was destroyed by an earthquake. He
excluded all Christian teachers from the public schools, and also
forbade them in their own schools from explaining the classical
writers who were objected to and contested by them only as
godless; so that Christian boys and youths could obtain a higher
classical education only in the pagan schools. By petty artifices
he endeavoured to get Christian soldiers to take part, if
only even seemingly, in the heathen sacrifices. Indeed at a
later period in Antioch he was not ashamed to stoop to the mean
artifice of Galerian (§ 22, 6) of sprinkling with sacrificial
water the necessaries of life exposed in the public market, etc.
On the other hand, he strove in every way to elevate and ennoble
paganism. From Christianity he borrowed Benevolent Institutions,
Church Discipline, Preaching, Public Service of Song, etc.; he
gave many distinctions to the heathen priesthood, but required
of them a strict discipline. He himself sacrificed and preached
as _Pontifex Maximus_, and led a strictly ascetic, almost a
cynically simple life. The ineffectiveness of his attempts and
the daring, often even contemptuous, resistance of many Christian
zealots embittered him more and more, so that there was now
danger of bloody persecution when, after a reign of twenty
months, he was killed from a javelin blow in a battle against the
Persians in A.D. 363. Shortly before in answer to the scornful
question of a heathen, “What is your Carpenter’s Son doing now?”
it had been answered, “He is making a coffin for your emperor.”
At a later period the story became current that Julian himself,
when he received the deadly stroke, exclaimed, _Tandem vicisti
Galilæe_! His military talents and military virtues had shed a
glory around the throne of the Cæsars such as it had not known
since the days of Marcus Aurelius, and yet his whole life’s
struggle was and remained utterly fruitless and vain.[115]
§ 42.4. =The Later Emperors.=--After Julian’s death, Jovian,
and then on his death in A.D. 364, Valentinian I. († 375),
were chosen emperors by the army. The latter resigned to his
brother Valens the empire of the East (A.D. 364-378). His son and
successor Gratian (A.D. 375-383) at the wish of the army adopted
his eldest half-brother of four years old, Valentinian II., as
colleague in the empire of the West, and upon the death of Valens
resigned the government of the West to the Spaniard Theodosius I.,
or the Great (A.D. 379-395), who, after the assassination of
Valentinian II. in A.D. 392, became sole ruler. After his death
his sons again divided the empire among them: Honorius († 423)
took the West, Arcadius († 408) the East, and now the partitioned
empire continued in this condition until the incursions of the
barbarians had broken up the whole West Roman division (A.D. 476).
Belisarius and Narses, the victorious generals of Justinian I.,
were the first to succeed, between A.D. 533-553, in conquering
again North Africa and all Italy along with its islands. But in
Italy the Byzantine empire from A.D. 569 was reduced in size from
time to time by the Longobards, and in Africa from A.D. 665 by
the Saracens, while even earlier, about A.D. 633, the Saracens
had secured to themselves Syria, Palestine, and Egypt.--Julian’s
immediate successors tolerated paganism for a time. It was,
however, a very temporary respite. No sooner had =Theodosius I.=
quieted in some measure political disorders, than he proceeded
in A.D. 382 to accomplish the utter overthrow of paganism.
The populace and the monks combined in destroying the temples.
The rhetorician Libanius († 395) then addressed his celebrated
discourse Περὶ τῶν ἱερῶν to the emperor; but the remaining
temples were closed and the people were prohibited from visiting
them. In Alexandria, under the powerful bishop Theophilus, there
were bloody conflicts, in consequence of which the Christians
destroyed the beautiful Serapeion in A.D. 391. In vain did
the pagans look for the falling down of the heavens and the
destruction of the earth; even the Nile would not once by causing
blight and barrenness take vengeance on the impious. In the West,
=Gratian= was the first of the emperors who declined the rank of
_pontifex maximus_; he also deprived the heathen priests of their
privileges, removed the foundations of the temple of Fiscus,
and commanded that the altar of Victory should be taken away
from the hall of the Senate in Rome. In vain did Symmachus,
_præfectus urbi_, entreat for its restoration, if not “_numinis_”
yet “_nominis causa_.” =Valentinian II.=, urged on by Ambrose,
sent back four times unheard the deputation that came about this
matter. So soon as =Theodosius I.= became sole ruler the edicts
were made more severe. On his entrance into Rome in A.D. 394 he
addressed to the Roman Senate a severe lecture and called them
to repentance. His sons, Honorius in the West and Arcadius in the
East, followed the example of their father. Under the successor
of the latter, =Theodosius II.= (A.D. 408-450), monks with
imperial authority for the suppression of heathenism traversed
the provinces, and in A.D. 448, in common with =Valentinian III.=
(A.D. 425-455), the western emperor, he issued an edict
which strictly enjoined the burning of all pagan polemical
writings against Christianity, especially those of Porphyry “the
crack-brained,” wherever they might be found. This period is
also marked by deeds of bloody violence. The most horrible of
these was the murder of the noble pagan philosopher Hypatia,
the learned daughter of Theon the mathematician, at Alexandria
in A.D. 415. Officially paganism may be regarded as no longer
existent. Branded long even before this as the religion of the
peasants (such is the derivation of the word paganism), it was
now almost wholly confined to remote rural districts. Its latest
and solitary stronghold was the University of Athens raised to
the summit of its fame under Proclus (§ 24, 2). =Justinian I.=
(A.D. 527-565) decreed the suppression of this school in
A.D. 529. Its teachers fled into Persia, and there laid the
first foundations of the later literary period of Islam under the
ruling family of the Abassidæ at Bagdad (§ 65, 2). This was the
death hour of heathenism in the Roman empire. The Mainottæ in the
mountains of the Peloponnesus still maintained their political
independence and the heathen religion of their fathers down
to the 9th century. In the Italian islands, too, of Sardinia,
Corsica, and Sicily, there were still many heathens even in the
time of Gregory the Great († 604).[116]
§ 42.5. =Heathen Polemics and Apologetics.=--=Julian’s=
controversial treatise Κατὰ Γαλιλαίων λόγοι, in 3 bks. according
to Cyril, in 7 bks. according to Jerome, is known only from the
reply of Cyril of Alexandria (§ 47, 6) which follows it section
by section, the rest of the answers to it having been entirely
lost. Of Cyril’s book only the first ten λόγοι have come down to
us in a complete state, and from these we are able almost wholly
to restore the first book of Julian’s treatise. Only fragments
of the second decade of Cyril’s work are extant, and not even
so much of the third, so that of Julian’s third book we may be
said to know nothing.[117] Julian represented Christianity as a
deteriorated Judaism, but Christolatry and the worship of martyrs
as later falsifications of the doctrine of Christ.--The later
advocates of heathenism, Libanius and Symmachus, were content
with claiming toleration and religious freedom. But when from
the 5th century, under the influence of the barbarians, signs of
the speedy overthrow of the Roman empire multiplied, the heathen
polemics assumed a bolder attitude, declaring that this was
the punishment of heaven for the contempt of the old national
religion, under which the empire had flourished. Such is the
standpoint especially of the historians Eunapius and Zosimus. But
history itself refuted them more successfully than the Christian
apologists; for even these barbarous peoples passed over in
due course to Christianity, and vied with the Roman emperors in
their endeavours to extirpate heathenism. In the 5th century,
the celebrated Neo-Platonist Proclus wrote “eighteen arguments
(ἐπιχειρήματα) against the Christians” in vindication of the
Platonic doctrine of the eternity of the world and in refutation
of the Christian doctrine of creation. The Christian grammarian
John Philoponus (§ 47, 11) answered them in an exhaustive and
elaborate treatise, which again was replied to by the philosopher
=Simplicius=, one of the best teachers in the pagan University
of Athens.--The dialogue =Philopatris=, “the Patriot,” included
among the works of Lucian of Samosata, but certainly not composed
by him, is a feeble imitation of the famous scoffer, in which the
writer declares that he can no longer fitly swear at the Olympic
gods with their many unsavoury loves and objectionable doings,
and with a satirical reference to Acts xvii. 23 recommends
for this purpose “the unknown God at Athens,” whom he further
scurrilously characterizes as ὑψιμέδων θεὸς, υἵος πατρὸς, πνεῦμα
ἐκ πατρὸς ἐκπορευόμενον ἓν ἐκ τριῶν καὶ ἐξ ἑνὸς τρία (§ 50, 1, 7).
Finally he tells of some closely shaven men (§ 45, 1) who were
treated as liars, because, having in consequence of a ten days’
fast and singing had a vision foreboding ill to their fatherland,
their prophecy was utterly discredited by the arrival of an
account of the emperor’s successes in the war against the
Persians. The impudence with which the orthodox Christianity
and the Nicene orthodox formula are sneered at, as well as the
allusions to the spread of monasticism and a victorious war
against the Persians, fix the date of the dialogue in the reign
of Julian, or rather, since the writer would scarcely have had
Julian’s approval in his scoffing at the gods of Olympus, in
the time of the Arian Valens (§ 50, 4). But since the overthrow
of Egypt and Crete is spoken of in this treatise, Niebuhr has
put its date down to the time of the Emperor Nicephoras Phocas
(A.D. 963-969), understanding by Persians the Saracens and by
Scythians the Bulgarians.
§ 42.6. The religion of the =Hypsistarians= in Cappadocia was,
according to Gregory Nazianzen, whose father had belonged to the
sect, a blending of Greek paganism with bald Jewish monotheism,
together with the oriental worship of fire and the heavenly
bodies, with express opposition to the Christian doctrine
of the trinity. Of a similar nature were the vagaries of the
=Euphemites=, “Praise singers,” in Asia, who were also called
_Messalians_, “Petitioners,” or _Euchites_, and in Africa bore
the name of =Cœlicolæ=.
§ 43. THE CHRISTIAN EMPIRE AND THE ECCLESIASTICAL LAW.
As in earlier times the supreme direction of all religious matters
belonged to the Roman Emperor as Pontifex Maximus, so now that
Christianity had become the state religion he claimed for himself
the same position in relation to the church. Even Constantine the
Great regarded himself as ἐπίσκοπος τῶν ἔξω τῆς ἐκκλησίας, and all his
successors exercised the _Jus circa sacra_ as their unquestioned right.
Only the Donatists (§ 63, 1) denied to the state all and any right
over the church. There was no clear consciousness of the limits of this
jurisdiction, but this at least in theory was firmly maintained, that
in all ecclesiastical matters, in worship, discipline and doctrine, the
emperors were not of themselves entitled to issue conclusive decisions.
For this purpose they called Œcumenical Synods, the decrees of which
had legal validity throughout the empire when ratified by the emperor.
But the more the Byzantine empire degenerated and became a centre of
intrigues, the more hurtful did contact with the court become, and
more than once the most glaring heresy for a time prevailed by means
of personal passion, unworthy tricks and open violence, until at last
orthodoxy again secured the ascendency.--From the ordinances issued by
the recognised ecclesiastical and civil authorities upon ecclesiastical
rights, duties and conditions, as well as from the pseudo-epigraphic
apostolic writings already being secretly introduced in this department,
there sprang up during this period a rich and varied literature on canon
law.
§ 43.1. The =Jus circa sacra= gave to the =Emperors= the right of
legally determining all the relations between church and state,
but assigned to them also the duty of caring for the preservation
or restoration of peace and of unity in the church, guarding
orthodoxy with a strong arm, looking after the interests of
the church and the clergy, and maintaining the authority of
ecclesiastical law. Even Constantine the Great excluded all
heretics from the privileges which he accorded to the church,
and regarded it as a duty forcibly to prevent their spread.
The destruction or closing of their churches, prohibition of
public meetings, banishment of their leaders, afterwards seizure
of their possessions, were the punishments which the state
invariably used for their destruction. The first death sentence
on a heretic was issued and executed so early as A.D. 385 by
the usurper Maximus (§ 54, 2), but this example was not imitated
during this period. Constans II. in A.D. 654 gave the first
example of scourging to the effusion of blood and barbarous
mutilation upon a persistent opponent of his union system of
doctrine (§ 52, 8). The fathers of the 4th century were decidedly
opposed to all compulsion in matters of faith (comp. however
§ 63, 1). The right of determining by imperial edict what was
to be believed and taught in the empire was first asserted by
the usurper Basilicus in A.D. 476 (§ 52, 5). The later emperors
followed this example; most decidedly Justinian I. (§ 52, 6)
and the court theologians justified such assumptions from
the emperor’s sacerdotal rank, which was the antitype of that
of Melchizedec [Melchisedec]. The emperor exercised a direct
influence upon the choice of bishops especially in the capital
cities; at a later period the emperor quite arbitrarily appointed
these and set them aside. The church’s power to afford protection
secured for it generally a multitude of outward privileges and
advantages. The state undertook the support of the church partly
by rich gifts and endowments from state funds, partly by the
making over of temples and their revenues to the church, and
Constantine conferred upon the church the right of receiving
bequests of all kinds. The churches and their officers were
expressly exempted from all public burdens. The distinct
judicial authority of the bishops recognised of old was
formally legitimized by Constantine under the name of _Audentia
episcopalis_. The clergy themselves were exempted from the
jurisdiction of civil tribunals and were made subject to an
ecclesiastical court. The right of asylum was taken from the
heathen temples and conferred upon the Christian churches. With
this was connected also the right of episcopal intercession or
of interference with regard to decisions already come to by the
civil courts which were thus in some measure subject to clerical
control.
§ 43.2. =The Institution of Œcumenical Synods.=--The σύνοδοι
οἰκουμενικαί, _Concilia universalia s. generalia_, owe their
origin to Constantine the Great (§ 50, 1). The calling of
councils was an unquestioned right of the crown. A prelate
chosen by the emperor or the council presided; the presence
of the imperial commissioner, who opened the Synod by reading
the imperial edict, was a guarantee for the preservation of
the rights of the state. The treasury bore the expense of
board and travelling. The decisions generally were called ὅροι,
_Definitiones_; if they were resolutions regarding matters of
faith, δόγματα; if in the form of a confession, σύμβολα; if they
bore upon the constitution, worship and discipline, κανόνες. On
doctrinal questions there had to be unanimity; on constitutional
questions a majority sufficed. Only the bishops had the right
of voting, but they allowed themselves to be influenced by the
views of the subordinate clergy. As a sort of substitute for
the œcumenical councils which could not be suddenly or easily
convened we have the σύνοδοι ἐνδημοῦσα at Constantinople, which
were composed of all the bishops who might at the time be present
in the district. At Alexandria, too, these _endemic_ Synods
were held. The _Provincial Synods_ were convened twice a year
under the presidency of the metropolitan; as courts of higher
instances we have the _Patriarchal_ or _Diocesan Synods_ (comp.
§ 46, 1).[118]
§ 43.3. =Canonical Ordinances.=--As canonical decrees
acknowledged throughout the whole of the Catholic national
church or at least throughout the more important ecclesiastical
districts the following may be named.
1. The Canons of the Œcumenical Councils.
2. The Decrees of several important Particular Synods.
3. The _Epistolæ canonicæ_ of distinguished bishops, especially
those of the _Sedes apostolicæ_, § 34, preeminently of Rome
and Alexandria, pertaining to questions which have had a
determining influence on church practice, which were at a
later time called at Rome _Epistt. decretales_.
4. The canonical laws of the emperors, νόμοι (Codex
Theodosianus in A.D. 440, Codex Justinianæus in A.D. 534,
Novellæ Justiniani).
The first systematically arranged collection of the Greek church
known to us was made by Johannes Scholasticus, then presbyter
at Antioch, afterwards Patriarch at Constantinople († 578). A
second collection, also ascribed to him, to which were added
the canonical νόμοι of Justinian, received the name of the
_Nomocanon_. In the West all earlier collections were put out
of sight by the _Codex canonum_ of the Roman abbot Dionysius the
Little (§ 47, 23), to which were also added the extant _Decretal
Epistles_ about A.D. 520.
§ 43.4. =Pseudepigraphic Church Ordinances.=--Even so early
as the 2nd and 3rd centuries there sprang up no inconsiderable
number of writings upon church law, with directions about ethical,
liturgical and constitutional matters for the instruction of the
church members as well as the clergy, the moral precepts of which
are of importance in church procedure as affording a standard
for discipline. The oldest probably of these has lately been
made again accessible to us in the Teaching of the XII. Apostles,
the Didache (§ 30, 7). It designates its contents, even where
these are taken not from the Old Testament or the “Gospel,” but
from the so-called church practice, as apostolic, with the honest
conviction that by means of oral apostolic tradition it may be
traced back to the immediate appointment of the Lord, without,
however, pseudepigraphically claiming to have been written by
the Apostles. Many treatises of the immediately following period,
no longer known to us or known only by fragments, occupied the
same standpoint. But even so early as the end of the 3rd century
pseudepigraphic apostolic fiction makes its appearance in
the so-called _Apostolic Didascalia_, and some sixty years
later, it reached its climax in the eight bks. of the so-called
=Constitutiones Apostolicæ=, Διαταγαὶ τῶν ἀπ. διὰ Κλήμεντος. The
first six bks. correspond to the previously named _Didascalia_
expanded and variously altered.[119] It assumes the form of a
prolix epistolary discourse of the Apostle, communicated through
Clement of Rome, about everything pertaining to the Christian
life, the Catholic system of doctrine, liturgical practice and
hierarchical constitution which may be necessary and useful for
the laity as well as the clergy to know, with the exclusion,
however, of everything which belonged to the department of what
was then regarded as the _Disciplina arcani_ (§ 36, 4). Of older
writings, so far as known, those principally used are the seven
Ignatian Epistles (§ 30, 5). It is post-Novatianist (§ 41, 3)
and belongs to a time pre-Constantine but free from persecution
(§ 22, 6), and may therefore be placed somewhere between A.D. 260
and A.D. 302. It was written probably in Syria.--While the first
six bks. of the Apostolic Constitutions may be compared to the
Syrian recension as a contemporary rendition of the Didascalia,
the =seventh book= from an examination of the Didache seems
a rendition of that little work, in which the assumption of
apostolic authorship is made, and from which everything offensive
to the forger and his age is cut out, the old text being
otherwise literally reproduced, while into it is cleverly
smuggled from his own resources whatever would contribute to
the support of his own peculiar views as well as the prevailing
practice of the church. The Eusebian symbol, which is given in
the 41st chap., is an anti-Nicene, anti-Marcellianist, Arianizing
formula, fixing the date of the forgery at the period of the
Arian controversy, somewhere between A.D. 340 and A.D. 350
(§ 50, 2).--The =eighth book= is in great part an unmistakeable
forgery compiled from older sources belonging to the 3rd century,
some of which are still to be found, and forms a handbook for
the discharge of clerical, especially episcopal, duties in
the conducting of worship and other clerical functions, _e.g._
ordination, baptism, etc., together with the relative liturgical
formularies, drawn up in a thoroughly legal-like style, in
which the Apostles one by one give their contribution with the
formula Διατάσσομαι. The composition is probably ante-Nicene,
but the date of its incorporation with the other seven books
is uncertain.--In most, though not in all, MSS. the =Canones
Apostolorum=, sometimes 50, sometimes 85, in number, are appended
to the eighth book as its last chapter. Their standpoint is that
common to the canons of the early councils from which they are
chiefly borrowed. In respect of contents they treat mainly of
the moral behaviour and official functions of the clergy. The
85th contains a Scripture canon of the Old and New Testaments,
including the two Epp. of the Roman Clement (§ 30, 3), as well
as the Apost. Constitutions, but omitting the Apocalypse of John
(comp. § 33, 9). The collection of the apostolic canon cannot
have been made before the beginning of the 5th century, and most
likely in Syria. Dionysius the Little admitted only the first 50
as _Canones qui dicuntur Apostolorum_, but Johannes Scholasticus
quite unhesitatingly ascribes all the 85 to Clement of Rome. The
Second Trullan Council in A.D. 692 (§ 63, 2) acknowledged the
genuineness of the 85, but rejected the Apostolic Constitutions
as a heretical forgery which had found no general acceptance in
the West.--While hitherto it has been surmised that the 7th bk.
of the Apost. Constit., as an independent and original work,
should be assigned to another and a much later author than the
first six bks., Harnack, founding upon his study of the Didache,
has come to a clear understanding of their mutual relations. He
shows that the original documents lying at the basis respectively
of the Didache and the Didascalia are fundamentally distinct in
respect of composition and character, but the two in the form in
which they lie before us in the Apost. Constit. are undoubtedly
the work of one and the same interpolator. We further obtain
the equally convincing and surprising result that the author of
this forgery is also identical with the author of the =thirteen
Pseudo-Ignatian Epistles= (§ 30, 5), and had in the one case and
in the other the same object in view. Finally, he characterizes
him as a Syrian cleric well versed in Scripture, especially
the Old Testament, but also a shrewd worldly politician,
opposed to all strict asceticism, who sought by his forgeries
to win apostolic sanction and justification not only for the
constitutional and liturgical institutions of the church, as well
as the milder practice of his age, but also for his own semi-Arian
doctrinal views.
§ 43.5. =The Apostolic Church Ordinances=[120] are, according
to Harnack’s careful analysis, a compilation executed in a most
scholarly fashion of extracts from four old writings: the Didache,
the Ep. of Barnabas, from which the moral precepts are taken,
a κατάστασις τοῦ κλήρου from the beginning of the 3rd century,
and a κατάστασις τῆς ἐκκλησίας from the end of the 2nd century,
with many clumsy alterations and excursuses after the style of
the church tradition of its own period, the beginning of the
4th century. Its introduction consists of a formula of greeting
modelled upon the Ep. of Barnabas from the twelve Apostles who
are designated by name. The list, which begins with the name of
John, wants one of the two Jameses and the late chosen Matthias,
and the number of twelve is made up by the addition of the name
of Nathanael and that of Cephas in addition to that of Peter.
Then the Apostles tell that Christ had commanded them to divide
among them by lot the Eparchies, Episcopates, Presbyterates,
Diaconates, etc., of all lands, and to send forth οἱ λόγοι into
the whole οἰκουμένη; then follow these λόγοι, first the moral
rules, then the constitutional enactments, both being divided
among the several Apostles (Ἰωάννης εἶπεν, Ματθαίος εἶπεν,
etc.). The compilation had its origin in Egypt, not, however,
at Alexandria, where Athanasius was still unacquainted with it,
or at least did not think it worthy of being mentioned among the
church manuals (§ 59, 1), while at a later period it was held in
the highest esteem by the Copts, Ethiopians, Arabians, etc., and
took the first rank among their books on ecclesiastical procedure.
II. MONASTICISM, CLERICALISM AND HIERARCHISM.
§ 44. MONASTICISM.[121]
Disgusted with worldly pursuits and following an impulse of the
oriental character in favour of the contemplative life, many ascetics
withdrew into deserts and solitudes, there as Anchorets (ἐρεμίται,
μοναχοί, μονάζοντες), amid prayer and labour, privation and self-denial,
wringing out of the wilderness their scanty support, they strove after
holiness of life which they thought they could reach only by forsaking
the accursed world. The place where this extravagant extreme of the
old ascetism arose was the Thebaid in Upper Egypt (§ 39, 3). The first,
and for a long time isolated, examples of such professional abandonment
of the world may be traced back to the 3rd century; but they had wider
spread first in the post-Constantine Age. The example of St. Anthony was
specially influential in leading a number of like-minded men to betake
themselves to isolated dwellings, λαῦραι, in his neighbourhood and to
place themselves under his spiritual direction. In this we have already
the transition from a solitary anchoret life to a communal cœnobite
life (κοινὸς βίος), and this reached maturity when Anthony’s disciple
Pachomius gathered the scattered residents in his district into one
common dwelling, _Claustrum_, _Cœnobium_, _Monasterium_, _Mandra_=fold,
and bound them under a common system of ascetic practice in prayer and
labour, especially basket making and carpet weaving. This arrangement,
without, however, any tendency to displace the anchoret life properly
so-called, won great favour, and this went on for some decades until
first of all in the East, then also in the West about A.D. 370, the land
was covered over with monasteries. The monastic life under its twofold
aspect was now esteemed as βὶος ἀγγελικός (Matt. xxii. 30), φιλοσοφία
ὑψηλή, _melior vita_. Yet even here corruption soon spread. Not merely
the feeling of spiritual need, but ambition, vanity, slothfulness
and especially the desire to avoid military service and villainage,
taxes and imposts, induced men to enter the monasteries. The Emperor
Valens therefore issued an order in A.D. 365 that such men should be
dragged out by force from their retreats. Spiritual vices too were not
wanting--extravagance and fanaticism, spiritual pride, etc. All the
more did the most distinguished bishops, _e.g._ Basil the Great, feel
it their duty to take the monasteries under their special supervision
and care. Under such direction, besides serving their own special
purpose, they became extremely important and beneficial as places of
refuge for the oppressed and persecuted, and as benevolent institutions
for the sick and the poor. Sometimes also by the introduction of
theological studies as seminaries to prepare candidates for the higher
ecclesiastical offices. Other prelates, however, preferred to use their
monks as a trusty horde for the accomplishment of their own ambitious
party ends. The monks were always reckoned among laymen, but were
distinguished from the _Seculares_ as _Religiosi_ or _Conversi_.
§ 44.1. =The Biography of St. Anthony.=--According to the _Vita
s. Antonii_ ascribed to Athanasius, Anthony was sprung from a
wealthy Coptic family of the country town of Coma in Upper Egypt,
and was born in A.D. 251. At the age of eighteen he lost his
parents, and, being powerfully affected by hearing the story of
the rich young ruler in the gospel read in church, he gave away
all his goods to the poor and withdrew into the desert (A.D. 285).
Amid terrible inward struggles, which took the form of daily
conflicts with demons, who sprang upon him from the sides of his
cave in the shape of all sort of beasts and strange creatures,
he spent a long time in a horrible tomb, then twenty years in the
crumbling ruins of a castle, and finally he chose as his constant
abode a barren mountain, afterwards called Anthony’s Mount,
where a well and some date palms afforded him the absolutely
indispensable support. His clothing, a sheep’s skin and a hairy
cloak, was on his body day and night, nor did he ever wash
himself. The fame of his holiness attracted a multitude of
like-minded ascetics who settled in his neighbourhood and
put themselves under his spiritual direction. But also men of
the world of all ranks made pilgrimages to him, seeking and
finding comfort. Even Constantine and his sons testified in
correspondence with him their veneration, and he answered “like
a Christian Diogenes to the Christian Alexander.” Pointing to
Christ as the only miracle worker, he healed by his prayers
bodily maladies and by his conversations afflictions of the soul.
Amid the distress of the persecution of Maximian in A.D. 311 he
went to Alexandria, but found not the martyrdom which he courted.
Again, in A.D. 351, during the bitter Arian controversy (§ 50),
he appeared suddenly in the great capital, this time gazed at
by Christians and pagans as a divine wonder, and converting
crowds of the heathen. In his last days he resigned the further
direction of the society of hermits gathered about him to his
disciple Pachomius, himself withdrawing along with two companions
into an unknown solitude, where he, bequeathing to the author his
sheepskin, died in A.D. 356, in his 105th year, after exacting a
promise that no one should know the place of his burial.--Until
the appearance of this book, which was very soon translated into
Latin by a certain Evagrius, no single writer, neither Lactantius,
nor Eusebius, nor even Athanasius in any of his other undoubtedly
genuine writings, mentions the name of this patriarchal monk
afterwards so highly esteemed, and all later writers draw only
from this one source. Weingarten has now not only proved that
this _Vita s. Ant._ is not a biography in the proper sense, but
a romance with a purpose which was intended “to represent the
ideal of a monkish life dovetailed into the ecclesiastical system
and raised notwithstanding all popular and vital elements into
a spiritual atmosphere,” but has also disproved the Athanasian
authorship of the book, without, however, seeking to deny the
historical existence of St. Anthony and his importance in the
establishment of monasticism, as this is already vouched for
by the fact that even in the 4th century in the days of Rufinus
pilgrimages were made to _Mons Antonii_.--The most important
witness for the Athanasian authorship is Gregory Nazianzen, who
begins his panegyric on Athanasius delivered in Constantinople
only a few years after that father’s death, which occurred in
A.D. 373, with the wish that he could describe brilliantly the
life of the highly revered man, as he himself had portrayed the
ideal of monasticism in the person of St. Anthony. But, on the
other hand, Jerome in his _Vita Pauli_ and Rufinus in his _Hist.
eremit._ seem not yet to have known the author of the book,
and the former, first in his _De scriptoribus ecclst._, written
twenty years later, knows that Athanasius was the author. Internal
reasons, too, seem with no small weight to tell against the
authenticity of the book, the biographical contents of which are
largely intermixed with fabulous and legendary elements.
§ 44.2. =The Origin of Christian Monasticism.=--From the fact
that not only Lactantius, but also Eusebius, whose history
reaches down to A.D. 324, have nothing to say of a monasticism
already developed or then first in process of development, it
may perhaps be concluded that although in a general way such
an institution was already in existence, it had not yet become
known beyond the bounds of the Thebaid where it originated.
But from the fact that Eusebius, who died in A.D. 340, in his
_Vita Constantini_ reaching down to A.D. 337, never makes any
mention of monasticism, we cannot with like probability infer
a continuance of such ignorance down to the above-mentioned
year, but must attribute it to the limited range of the book
in question. In his commentary on Ps. lxviii. 7 and lxxxiv. 4
he distinctly speaks of a Christian monasticism. The fugitive
Athanasius, too, so early as A.D. 356 betakes himself to the
monks of the Thebaid, and stays for a year with them (§ 50, 2, 4),
which presupposes a certain measure of organization and celebrity
on the part of the community of that region. In his _Hist.
Arianorum ad monachos_, written about A.D. 360, he declares that
already monasticism had spread through all the τόποι or districts
of Egypt. Of a monasticism outside of Egypt, however, even this
writing still knows nothing. We shall not, therefore, greatly
err if we assume that the latter years of Constantine’s reign
are to be taken as the period of the essential origin of Egyptian
monasticism; though from this it is not to be concluded that
the first isolated beginnings of it, which had not yet won
any special recognition, are not to be assigned to a very much
earlier period. Even the Old and New Testaments, in the persons
of Elijah, John the Baptist, and our Lord Himself, tell of
temporary withdrawals, from religious and ascetical motives, into
the wilderness. But even the life-long professional anchoretism
and cœnobitism had their precursors in the Indian _gymnosophists_,
in the East-Asiatic Buddhism and the Egyptian Serapis worship,
and to a certain extent also in the Essenism of Palestine
(§ 8, 4). From the place of its origin and the character of
its development, however, Christian monasticism can have been
influenced only by the Egyptian Serapis worship, and that in
a very general sort of way. That this actually was the case,
Weingarten especially has sought to prove from various analogies
based upon the learned researches of French Academicians.
§ 44.3. =Oriental Monasticism.=--For centuries Egypt continued
the central seat and training school of Christian monasticism
both for the East and for the West. The most celebrated of all
the Egyptian hermit colonies was that founded by Pachomius,
formerly perhaps a monk of Serapis, († 348), at Tabennæ, an
island of the Nile. To the mother monastery were soon attached
numerous daughter monasteries. Each of these institutions was
under the direction of a president called the abbot, _Abbas_,
_i.e._ “father,” or Archimandrite; while all of them together
were under the superior of the parent monastery. Similar unions
were established by Ammonius among the Nitrian mountains, and by
Macarius the Elder (§ 47, 7) in the Scetic desert. Hilarion, a
disciple of St. Anthony († 371), is celebrated by Jerome as the
founder of Palestinian monasticism. The _Vita Hilarionis_ of
the latter, richly adorned with records of adventurous travels
and wonderful events, most extravagant wonders and demoniacal
apparitions, like the life of Paul of Thebes (§ 39, 4), has
been recently shown to be a romance built upon certain genuine
reminiscences. Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen with
youthful enthusiasm sought to introduce monasticism into their
native Asia Minor, while Eustathius, Bishop of Sebaste († 380),
carried it still further east. But though among the Syrian
discourses of Aphraates (§ 47, 13) there is found one on
monasticism, which thus would seem to have been introduced into
Mesopotamia by A.D. 340, this is in contradiction to all other
witnesses and awakens a suspicion of the ungenuineness of the
discourse, which is further confirmed by its being wanting
in the Armenian translation, as well as in the enumeration
of Gennadius.--The zeal especially of Basil was successful in
ennobling monasticism and making it fruitful. The monastic rules
drawn up by him superseded all others in the East, and are to
this day alone recognised in the orthodox Greek Church. According
to these every monastery had one or more clerics for conducting
worship and administering the sacrament. Basil also advanced
the development and influence of monasticism by setting down
the monasteries in the neighbourhood of the cities. In the
5th century two of the noblest, most sensible and talented
representatives of ancient monasticism did much for its elevation
and ennobling; namely, Isidore, who died about A.D. 450,
abbot and priest of a cloister at Pelusium in Egypt, and his
contemporary Nilus, who lived among the monks of Sinai. The not
inconsiderable remnants of their numerous letters still extant
testify to their far-reaching influence, as well as to the noble
and liberal spirit which they manifested (§ 47, 6, 10).[122] A
peculiar kind of cœnobite life is found amongst the =Acoimetæ=,
for whom the Roman Studius founded about A.D. 46O the afterwards
very celebrated monastery _Studion_ at Constantinople, in which
as many as a thousand monks are said to have lived together
at one time. They took their name from the divine service
uninterruptedly continued in their cloister night and day. From
the 5th century the legislative Synods undertook the care of the
monasteries. The Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451 put them under
the jurisdiction of the bishop. Returning to the world was at
first freely permitted, but was always regarded as discreditable
and demanding submission to penance. From the 6th century,
however, monastic vows were regarded as of life-long obligation,
and therefore a regular canonical age was fixed and a long
novitiate prescribed as a time of testing and consideration.
About this time, too, besides the _propria professio_, the
_paterna devotio_ was also regarded as binding in accordance
with the example of 1 Sam. i. 11.
§ 44.4. =Western Monasticism.=--The West did not at first take
kindly to the monastic idea, and only the combined exhortations
of the most respected bishops and teachers of the Church, with
Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine at their head, secured for it
acceptance there. The idea that already the universally revered
Athanasius who from A.D. 341 resided a long time in Rome (§ 50, 2),
had brought hither the knowledge of Egyptian monasticism and
first awakened on behalf of it the sympathies of the Westerns,
is devoid of any sure foundation. Owing, however, to the free
intercourse which even on the side of the Church existed between
East and West, it is on the other hand scarcely conceivable that
the first knowledge of Eastern monasticism should have reached
Italy through Jerome on his return in A.D. 373 from his Eastern
travels. But it is certain that Jerome from that time most
zealously endeavoured to obtain recruits for it in the West,
applying himself specially to conspicuous pious ladies of Rome
and earning for this scant thanks from their families. The
people’s aversion, too, against monasticism was so great that
even in A.D. 384, when a young female ascetic called Blasilla,
the daughter of St. Paula, died in Rome as some supposed from
excessive fasting, an uproar was raised in which the indignant
populace, as Jerome himself relates, cried out, _Quousque genus
detestabile monachorum non urbe pellitur? Non lapidibus obruitur?
non præcipitatur in fluctus?_ But twenty years later Jerome could
say with exultation, _Crebra virginum monasteria, monachorum,
innumerabilis multitudo, ut ... quod prius ignominiæ fuerat,
esset postea gloriæ_. Popular opposition to the monks was longest
and most virulently shown in North Africa. Even so late as
about A.D. 450, Salvianus reports the expressions of such hate:
_Ridebant, ... maledicebant ... insectabantur ... detestabantur
... omnia in monacho pœne fecerunt quæ in Salvatorem nostrum
Judæorum impietas_, etc. Nevertheless monasticism continued
to spread and therewith also the institution grew in popular
esteem in the West. Martin of Tours (§ 47, 14) established it
in Northern Gaul in A.D. 370; and in Southern Gaul, Honoratus
[Honorius] about A.D. 400 founded the celebrated monastery of
Serinum, on the uninhabited island of Lerina, and John Cassianus
(§ 47, 21), the still more celebrated one at Massilia, now
Marseilles. The inroads of the invaders well nigh extinguished
Western monachism. It was Benedict of Nursia who first, in
A.D. 529, gave to it unity, order, and a settled constitution,
and made it for many centuries the pioneer of agricultural
improvement and literary culture throughout the Western empire
that had been hurled into confusion by the wars of the barbarians
(§ 85).
§ 44.5. =Institution of Nunneries.=--Virgins devoted to God, who
repudiated marriage, are spoken of as early as the 2nd century.
The limitations of their sex forbade them entering on the life
of anchorets, but all the more heartily did they adopt the idea
of the cloister life. St. Anthony himself is said to have laid
its first foundations when he was hastening away into solitude,
by establishing at Coma for the sake of his sister whom he
was leaving behind, an association of virgins consecrated unto
God. Pachomius founded the first female cloister with definite
rules, the superior of which was his own sister. From that time
there sprang up a host of women’s cœnobite unions. The lady
superior was called _Ammas_, “mother;” the members, μοναχαί,
_sanctimoniales_, _nonnæ_, which was a Coptic word meaning chaste.
The patroness of female monachism in the West was St. Paula
of Rome, who was the scholar and friend of Jerome. Accompanied
by her daughter Eustochium, she followed him to Palestine, and
founded three nunneries at Bethlehem.
§ 44.6. =Monastic Asceticism.=--Although the founders of the
Eastern monastic rules subjected themselves to the strictest
asceticism and performed them to a remarkable extent, especially
in fasting and enduring privations, yet the degree of asceticism
which they enjoined upon their monks in fasting, watching, prayer
and labour, was in general moderate and sensible. Valorous acts
of self mortification, so very congenial to the oriental spirit,
are thus met with in the proper monastic life seldomer than among
ascetics living after their own fancy in deserts and solitudes.
This accounts for the rare appearance of the =Stylites= or pillar
saints, by whom expression was given in an outward way to the
idea of elevation above the earthly and of struggle toward heaven.
The most celebrated of these was _Simeon Stylites_, who lived in
the neighbourhood of Antioch for thirty years on a pillar seventy
feet high, and preached repentance to the people who flocked to
him from every side. Thousands of Saracens who roamed through
those regions sought baptism, overcome, according to the legend,
by the power of his discourse. He died A.D. 459. After him the
most celebrated pillar saints were one _Daniel_ who died at
Constantinople in A.D. 489, and a younger _Simeon_ who died at
Antioch in A.D. 596.
§ 44.7. =Anti-Ecclesiastical and Heretical Monasticism.=--Even
after the regulating of monachism by Pachomius and Basil, there
were still isolated hermit societies which would be bound by no
rules. Such were the =Sarabaites= in Egypt and the =Remoboth=
in Syria. Crowds of monks, too, under no rule swarmed about,
called Βοσκοί, _Pabulatores_ or Grazers, because they supported
themselves only on herbs and roots. In Italy and Africa from
the 5th century we hear of so-called =Gyrovagi=, who under the
pretence of monachism led a useless vagabond life. Monasticism
assumed a decidedly heretical and schismatical character among
the Euchites and Eustathianists in the second half of the 4th
century. The =Euchites=, called also from their mystic dances
_Messalians or Chorentes_, not to be confounded with the pagan
Euchites (§ 42, 6), thought that they had reached the ideal of
perfection, and were therefore raised above observance of the law.
Under pretext of engaging in constant prayer and being favoured
with divine visions, they went about begging, because work was
not seemly for perfect saints. Every man they taught, by reason
of his descent from Adam, brings with him into the world an
evil demon who can be overcome only by prayer, and thus evil
can be torn out by the roots. Then man is in need neither of the
law, nor of holy scripture, nor of the sacraments, and may be
unconditionally left to himself, and may even do that which to
a legal man would be sinful. The mystic union of God and man they
represented by lascivious acts of sensual love. They understood
the gospel history only as an allegory and considered fire the
creative light of the universe. By craft and espionage Bishop
Flavian of Antioch, in A.D. 381, came to know their secret
principles and proceedings. But notwithstanding the persecution
now directed against them, they continued in existence till the
6th century. The =Eustathianists= took their name from Eustathius,
Bishop of Sebaste, the founder of monasticism in the eastern
provinces of the empire. Their fanatical contempt of marriage
went so far that they regarded fellowship with the married impure
and held divine service by themselves alone. They repudiated the
Church fasts and instead ordained fasts on Sundays and festival
days, and wholly abstained from eating flesh. The women dressed
in men’s clothes. From the rich they demanded the surrender of
all their goods. Servants forsook their masters, wives their
husbands, in order to attach themselves to the associations
of these saints. But the resolute interference of the Synod of
Gangra in Paphlagonia, between A.D. 360 and A.D. 370, checked
their further spread.--More closely related to the old ascetic
order than to the newly organized monasticism was a sect which,
according to Augustine, had gained special acceptance among the
country people round about Hippo. In accordance with the example
of Abel, who in the Old Testament history is without children,
its members, the so-called =Abelites=, indeed married, but
restrained themselves from marital intercourse, in order that
they might not by begetting children contribute to the spread of
original sin, and maintained their existence by the adoption of
strange children, one boy and one girl being received into each
family.
§ 45. THE CLERGY.
The distinction between clergy and laity was ever becoming more
and more clearly marked and in the higher church offices there grew
up a spiritual aristocracy alongside of the secular aristocracy. The
priesthood arrogated a position high above the laity just as the soul
is higher than the body. There was consequently such a thronging into
the clerical ranks that a restriction had to be put upon it by the
civil laws. The choice of the clergy was made by the bishops with the
formal consent of the members of the church. In the East the election
of bishops lay ordinarily with the episcopal board of the province
concerned though under the presidency of the metropolitan, whose duty
it was to ordain the individual so elected. The episcopal chair of the
imperial capital, however, was generally under the patronage of the
court. In the West on the other hand the old practice was continued,
according to which bishops, clergy and members of the church together
made the election. At Rome, however, the emperor maintained the right
of confirming the appointment of the new bishop. The exchange of one
bishopric for another was forbidden by the Nicene Council as spiritual
adultery (Eph. v. 33 ff.), but was nevertheless frequently practised.
The monarchical rank of the bishop among the clergy was undisputed. The
_Chorepiscopi_ (§ 34, 3) had their episcopal privileges and authority
always more and more restricted, were made subordinate to the city
bishops, and finally, about A.D. 360, were quite set aside. To the
Presbyters, on the other hand, in consequence of the success of the
anti-episcopal reaction, especially among the daughter and country
churches, complete independence was granted in regard to the ministry
of the word and dispensation of sacraments, with the exception of the
ordination of the clergy, and in the West also the confirmation of the
baptism, which the bishop alone was allowed to perform.
§ 45.1. =Training of the Clergy.=--The few theological seminaries
of Alexandria, Cæsarea, Antioch, Edessa and Nisibis could not
satisfy the need of clerical training, and even these for the
most part disappeared amid the political and ecclesiastical
upheavals of the 5th and 6th centuries. The West was entirely
without such institutions. So long as pagan schools of learning
flourished at Athens, Alexandria, Nicomedia, etc., many Christian
youths sought their scientific preparation for the service of
the church in them, and added to this on the Christian side by
asceticism and theological study among the anchorets or monks.
Others despised classical culture and were satisfied with what
the monasteries could give. Others again began their clerical
career even in boyhood as readers or episcopal secretaries,
and grew up under the oversight and direction of the bishop or
experienced clergymen. Augustine organized his clergy into a
monastic association, _Monasterium Clericorum_, and gave it the
character of a clerical seminary. This useful institution found
much favour and was introduced into Sicily and Sardinia by the
bishops driven out by the Vandals. The _Regula Augustini_, so
often referred to the Latin Middle Ages, is of later and
uncertain origin, but is based upon two discourses of Augustine,
“_De Moribus Clericorum_” and an Epistle to the Nuns at
Hippo.--The age of thirty was fixed upon as the canonical age
for entering the order of presbyter or priest; twenty-five for
that of deacon. Neophytes, those who had been baptized on a
sickbed (_Clinici_), penitents and energoumeni, _Bigenie_, the
mutilated, eunuchs, slaves, actors, comedians, dancers, soldiers,
etc., were excluded from the clerical office. The African church
even in the 4th century prescribed a strict examination of
candidates as to their attainments and orthodoxy. Justinian
at least insisted upon a guarantee of orthodoxy by means of
episcopal examination.--=Ordination=[123] made its appearance
as an appendage to the baptismal anointing as a sacramental
ordinance. The one was consecration to the priesthood in the
special sense: the other in the general sense; both bore a
_character indelibilis_. Their efficacy was generally regarded
as of a magical kind. The imparting of ordination was exclusively
an episcopal privilege; but presbyters could assist at the
consecration of those of their own order. The proposition:
_Ne quis vage ordinatur_, was of universal application; the
missionary office was the only exception. The anniversaries of
episcopal ordinations, _Natales episcoporum_, were frequently
observed as festivals. Legally no one could be ordained to a
higher ecclesiastical office, who had not passed through all the
lower offices from that of subdeacon. In earlier times ordination
consisted only in imposition of hands; but subsequently, after
the pattern of baptism there was added an anointing with _Chrism_,
_i.e._ oil with balsam. The Lord’s Supper was partaken of
before ordination, the candidate having previously observed a
fast.--From the 5th century it was made imperative that the party
ordained should adopt the =Tonsure=.[124] It had been introduced
first in connection with the penitents, then as a symbol of
humility it found favour among the monks, and from these it
passed over to the clergy. Originally the whole head was shaved
bare. At a later period the Greek tonsure, _Tonsura Pauli_, which
merely shaved the forehead, was distinguished from the Romish,
_Tonsura Petri_, which left a circle of hair round about the
crown of the head, as a memorial of Christ’s crown of thorns or
as the symbol of the royal priesthood, _Corona sacerdotalis_.
The shaving of the beard, as an effeminate foppish custom, seemed
to the ancient church to detract from the sternness and dignity
of the clerical rank. In all Eastern churches the full beard was
retained, and the wearing of it by-and-by made obligatory, as it
is to this day. In the West, however, perhaps to mark a contrast
to the bearded clergy of the Arian Germans, shaving became
general among the Catholic clergy, and by papal and synodal
ordinances became almost universally prevalent. The adoption
of the custom was also perhaps furthered by a desire to
give symbolic expression by the removal of the beard to the
renunciation of the claims of the male sex on the part of a
celibate clergy.--A solemn =Investiture= with the insignia of
office (§ 59, 7) was gradually introduced, and was that which
marked distinctions between the consecrations to the various
ranks of clerical offices.
§ 45.2. =The Injunction of Celibacy.=--In accordance with a hint
given by the Spanish Provincial Synod of Elvira in A.D. 306 in
its 32nd canon, the Œcumenical Council of Nicæa in A.D. 325 was
inclined to make the obligation of celibacy at least for the
_Ordines Majores_ a binding law over the whole church. But on the
other hand the Egyptian bishop Paphnutius, a confessor and from
his youth an ascetic, stoutly maintained that the fellowship of
married persons too is chastity. His powerful voice decided the
matter. The usual practice, however, was that bishops, presbyters
and deacons should not contract a second marriage (1 Tim. iii. 2),
after ordination should contract no marriage at all, and if
previously married, should continue to live with their wives
or not as they themselves should find most fit. The Easterns
maintained this free standpoint and at the Synod of Gangra in
A.D. 360 contended against the Eustathianists (§ 44, 7) for
the holiness of marriage and the legitimacy of married priests;
and in the 5th Apost. Canon there was an express injunction:
_Episcopus vel presbyter, vel diaconus uxorem suam non rejiciat
religionis prætexti; sin autem rejecerit segregetur, et si
perseveret deponatur_. Examples of married bishops are not
rare in the 4th and 5th centuries; _e.g._ the father of Gregory
Nazianzen, Gregory of Nyssa, Synesius of Ptolemais, etc.
Justinian I. forbade the election of a married man as bishop.
The second Trullan Council in A.D. 692 (§ 63, 2) confirmed this
decree, interdicted second marriages to all the clergy, but, with
an express protest against the unnatural hardness of the Roman
church, allowed to presbyters a single marriage with all its
privileges which, however, must have been entered upon before
consecration, and during the period of service at the altar all
marital intercourse had to be discontinued. In Rome, however, the
Spanish principles were strictly maintained. A decretal of the
Roman bishop, Siricius, in A.D. 385, with semi-Manichæan abuse
of marriage, insisted on the celibacy of all bishops, presbyters
and deacons, and Leo the Great included even subdeacons under
this obligation. All the more distinguished Latin church
teachers contended zealously for the universal application of
the injunction of clerical celibacy. Yet there were numerous
instances of the contravention of the order in Italy, in Gaul,
and in Spain itself, and conformity could not be secured even by
the most emphatic re-issue of the injunction by successive Synods.
In the British and Iro-Scottish church the right of the clergy
and even of bishops to marry was insisted upon (§ 77, 3).[125]
§ 45.3. =Later Ecclesiastical Offices.=--In addition to the
older church offices we now meet with attendants on the sick or
=Parabolani=, from παραβάλλεσθαι τὴν ζωήν, and grave-diggers,
κοπιαταί, _Fossarii_, whose number in the capital cities rose to
an almost incredible extent. They formed a bodyguard ever ready
to gratify episcopal love of pomp. Theodosius II. in A.D. 418
restricted the number of the Parabolani of Alexandria to six
hundred and the number of the Copiati of Constantinople to nine
hundred and fifty. For the administration of Church property
there were οἰκόνομοι; for the administration of the laws of the
church there were advocates, ἔνδικοι, σύνδικοι, _Defensores_; for
drawing up legal documents in regard to church affairs there were
_Notarii_, ταχύγραφοι, besides, Keepers of Archives, χαρτοφύλακες,
Librarians, _Thesaurarii_, σκευοφύλακες, etc. None of these as
such had clerical consecration. But also within the ranks of the
_Ordines Majores_ new offices sprang up. In the 4th century we
meet with an =Archdeacon= at the head of the deacons. He was the
right hand of the bishop, his representative and plenipotentiary
in the administration and government of the diocese, frequently
also his successor in office. The college of presbyters, too, had
as its head the =Arch-Presbyter= who represented and supported
the bishop in all acts of public worship. A city presbyter
was entrusted with the supervision of the country churches
as =Visitor=. The African _Seniores plebis_ were mere lay
elders without clerical ordination. The office of =Deaconess=
more or less lost its significance and gradually fell into
disuse.--Justinian I. restricted the number of ecclesiastical
officers in the four great churches of Constantinople to 525;
namely, in addition to the bishop, 60 presbyters, 100 deacons,
40 deaconesses, 90 subdeacons, 110 readers, 24 singers, and
100 doorkeepers.
§ 45.4. =Church Property.=--The possessions of the church
regularly increased by presents and bequests was regarded
down to the 5th century generally as the property of the poor,
_Patrimonium pauperum_, while the cost of maintaining public
worship and supplying the clergy with the means of livelihood
were defrayed by the voluntary contributions, _Oblationes_,
of the church members. But the growing demands of the clergy,
especially of the bishops, for an income corresponding to their
official rank and the increasing magnificence of the service, led,
first of all in Rome, to the apportioning of the whole sum into
four parts; for the bishops, for the subordinate clergy, for the
expenses of public worship (buildings, vestments, etc.), and for
the needs of the poor. With the introduction of the Old Testament
idea of priesthood the thought gradually gained ground that the
laity were under obligation, at first regarded simply as a moral
obligation, to surrender a tenth of all their possessions to the
church, and at a very early date this, in the form of freewill
offerings, was often realised. But the Council at Macon in
A.D. 585, demanded these tithes as a right of the church resting
on divine institution, without, however, being thereby able to
effect what first was secured by the Carolingian legislation
(§ 86, 1). The demand that all property which a cleric earned in
the service of the church, should revert to the church after his
death, was given effect to in a Council at Carthage in A.D. 397.
§ 46A. THE PATRIARCHAL CONSTITUTION AND THE PRIMACY.[126]
A hierarchical distinction of ranks among the bishops had already
made its appearance even in the previous period by the elevation of
the metropolitan see and the yet more marked precedency given to the
so-called _Sedes apostolicæ_ (§ 34). This tendency got powerful support
from the political divisions of the empire made by Constantine the
Great; for now the bishops of capital cities demanded an extension
of their spiritual superiority corresponding to that given in secular
authority to the imperial governors. The guarding of earlier privileges
along with respectful consideration of more recent claims prevented
the securing of a perfect correspondence between the political and
hierarchical distribution of ranks. The result of giving consideration
to both was the development of the Patriarchal Constitution, in which
the bishops of Rome, Alexandria, Antioch, Constantinople and Jerusalem
were recognised as heads of the church universal of equal rank with
jurisdiction over the patriarchates assigned them. The first place in
this clerical Pentarchy was claimed by the Roman see, which ever more
and more decidedly strove for the primacy of the whole church.
§ 46.1. =The Patriarchal Constitution.=--Constantine the Great
divided the whole empire into four prefectures which were
subdivided into dioceses, and these again into provinces. Many
bishops then of the capitals of these dioceses, especially in the
East, under the title of =Exarchs=, assumed a rank superior to
that of the metropolitans, just as these had before arrogated a
rank superior to that of provincial bishops. The first œcumenical
Council at Nicæa in A.D. 325 (§ 50, 1) affirmed on behalf of the
bishops of the three most prominent _Sedes apostolicæ_, =Rome=,
=Alexandria= and =Antioch=, that their supremacy had been already
established by old custom. The so-called second œcumenical
Council at Constantinople in A.D. 381 (§ 50, 4) exempted the
bishop of =Constantinople=, διὰ τὸ εἶναι αὐτὴν νέαν Ῥώμην (since
A.D. 330), from the jurisdiction of the metropolitan of Heraclea,
and gave him the first rank after the bishop of Rome. To these
distinguished prelates there was given the title of honour,
=Patriarch=, which formerly had been given to all bishops; but
the Roman bishops, declining to take common rank with the others,
refused the title, and assumed instead the exclusive use of the
title =Papa=, Πάπας, which had also been previously applied to
all of episcopal rank. The fourth œcumenical Council of Chalcedon
in A.D. 451, in the 28th canon, ranked the patriarch of the
Eastern capital along with the bishop of Rome, granted him
the right of hearing complaints against the metropolitans of
all dioceses that they might be decided at an _endemic_ Synod
(§ 43, 2), and as an equivalent to the vast dominions of
his Roman colleague, gave him as an endowment in addition to
his own patriarchal district, the three complete dioceses of
Thrace, Pontus and Asia. The Exarchs of Heraclea in Thrace, of
Neo-Cæsarea in Pontus, and of Ephesus in Asia, thus placed under
him, bearing the title of _Archbishops_, ἀρχιεπίσκοποι, formed
a hierarchical middle rank between him and the metropolitans of
these dioceses, without, however, any strict definition of their
status being given, so that their preferential rank remained
uncertain and gradually fell back again into that of ordinary
metropolitans. But even at Nicæa in A.D. 325 the bishopric of
=Jerusalem= had been declared worthy of very special honour,
without, however, its subordination under the Metropolitan of
Cæsarea being disputed. Founding on this, Juvenal of Jerusalem
in the 3rd œcumenical Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431 claimed
the rank and privileges of a patriarch, but on the motion of
Cyril of Alexandria was refused. He then applied to the Emperor
Theodosius II. who by an edict named him patriarch, and assigned
to him all Palestine and Arabia. Maximus, however, patriarch
of Antioch, who was thereby deprived of part of his diocese,
persisted in protesting until at Chalcedon in A.D. 451 at
least Phœnicia and Arabia were restored to him.--Within his own
official district each of these five prelates exercised supreme
spiritual authority, and at the head of his patriarchal Synod
decided all the affairs of the churches within the bounds. Still
many metropolitans, especially those of Salamis in Cyprus, of
Milan, Aquileia and Ravenna maintained a position, as Αὐτοκέφαλοι,
independent of any superiority of patriarchate or exarchate.
Alongside of the patriarchs in the East there were σύγκελλοι as
councillors and assistants, and at the imperial court they were
represented by permanent legates who were called _Apocrisiarians_.
From the 6th century the Popes of Rome began by sending them the
_pallium_ to confer confirmation of rank upon the newly-elected
metropolitans of the West, who were called in these parts
_Archiepiscopi_, Archbishops. The patriarchs meeting as a
court represented the unity of the church universal. Without
their consent no œcumenical Council could be held, nor could any
decision be binding on the whole church.--But first Jerusalem
in A.D. 637, then Antioch in A.D. 638, and next Alexandria in
A.D. 640, fell under the dominion of the Saracens.
§ 46.2. =The Rivalry between Rome and Byzantium.=--From the
time of the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451 the patriarch of
Constantinople continued to claim equality in rank and authority
with the bishop of Rome. But the principle upon which in either
case the claims to the primacy were based were already being
interpreted strongly in favour of Rome. In the East the spiritual
rank of the bishoprics was determined in accordance with the
political rank of the cities concerned. Constantinople was the
residence of the ruler of the οἰκουμένη, consequently its bishop
was œcumenical bishop. But in the eyes of the world Old Rome
still ranked higher than the New Rome. All the proud memories of
history clustered round the capital of the West. From Byzantium,
on the other hand, dated the visible decline, the threatened
overthrow of the empire. Moreover the West refused even to
admit the principle itself. Not the will of the emperor, not the
fortunes of the empire, ever becoming more and more deplorable,
should determine the spiritual rank of the bishops, but the
history of the church and the will of its Divine Founder and
Head. Measured by this standard the see of Constantinople stood
not only lower than those of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem,
but even below many other sees which though they scarcely had
metropolitan rank, could yet boast of apostolic origin. Then,
Rome unquestionably stood at the head of the church, for here
had lived, confessed and suffered the two chief apostles, here
too were their tombs and their bones; yea, still further, on the
Roman chair had Peter sat as its first bishop (§ 16, 1), whom the
Lord Himself had called to the primacy of the Apostles (§ 34, 8),
and the Roman bishops were his successors and heirs of his
privileges. The patriarch of Constantinople had nothing to
depend upon but his nearness to the court. He was backed up
and supported by the court, was only too often a tool in the
hands of political parties and a defender of heresies which
had the imperial favour. The case for the Roman bishop was
incomparably superior. His being a member of the West-Roman
empire, A.D. 395-476, with emperors for the most part weak and
oppressed on all sides by the convulsions caused by the invasions
of the barbarians, secured to him an incomparably greater
freedom and independence of action, which was little, if at
all, restricted by the Rugian and Ostrogoth invaders of Italy,
A D. 476-536. And even in A.D. 536, when the Byzantine empire
again obtained a footing in Italy, and held out with difficulty
against the onslaught of the Longobards from A.D. 569 to A.D. 752
within ever narrowing limits, the court could only seldom exercise
an influence upon his proceedings or punish him for his refusal
to yield by removal, imprisonment or exile. And while the East
was rent by a variety of ecclesiastical controversies, in which
sometimes the one, sometimes the other party prevailed, the
West under the direction of Rome almost constantly presented the
picture of undisturbed unity. The controversialists sought the
mediating judgment of Rome, the oppressed sought its intercession
and protection, and because the Roman bishops almost invariably
lent the weight of their intellectual and moral influence to the
cause of truth and right, the party in whose favour decision was
given, almost certainly at last prevailed. Thus Rome advanced
from day to day in the eyes of the Christian world, and soon
demanded as a constant right what personal confidence or pressure
of circumstances had won for it in particular cases. And in
the course of time Rome has never let a favourable opportunity
slip, never failed to hold what once was gained or even claimed
with any possibility of success. A strong feeling in favour of
strict hierarchical pretensions united all parties and found
its rallying point in the chair of St. Peter; even incapable and
characterless popes were upborne and carried through by means of
this idea. Thus Rome advanced with firm step and steady aim, and
in spite of all opposition and resistance continually approached
nearer and nearer to the end in view. The East could at last hold
on and save its ecclesiastical independence only by a complete
and incurable division (§ 67).
§ 46B. HISTORY OF THE ROMAN CHAIR AND ITS CLAIMS
TO THE PRIMACY.[127]
The history of the Roman bishopric during the first three centuries is
almost wholly enveloped in a cloud of legend which is only occasionally
broken by a gleam of historical light (see § 33, 3, 4, 5, 7; § 35, 5;
§ 37, 2; § 40, 2; § 41, 1, 3). Only after the martyr church became in
the 4th century the powerful state church does it really enter into
the field of regular and continuous history. And now also first begins
that striving after primacy, present from the earliest times among its
bishops and inherited from the political supremacy of “eternal Rome,”
to be prosecuted with success in political and ecclesiastical quarters.
Its history, for which biographies of the popes down to the end of the
9th century in the so-called _Liber pontificalis_ (§ 90, 6) are most
instructive sources, certainly always in need of critical sifting in
a high degree, permits therefore and demands for our purposes at this
point earnest and close consideration.
§ 46.3. =From Melchiades to Julius I., A.D. 310 to A.D. 352.=--At
the time when Constantine’s conversion so completely changed the
aspect of things =Melchiades= occupied the bishopric of Rome,
A.D. 310 to A.D. 314. Even in A.D. 313 Constantine conferred on
him as the chief bishop of the West the presidency of a clerical
commission for inquiry into the Donatist schism (§ 63, 1). Under
=Sylvester I.=, A.D. 314 to A.D. 335, the Arian controversy
broke out (§ 50), in which, however, he laid no claim to be
an authority on either side. That by his legates, Vitus and
Vincentius [Vincent], he presided at the first œcumenical
Synod at Nicæa in A.D. 325 is a purely Romish fabrication; no
contemporary and none of the older historians know anything of it.
On account of the rise in Egypt of the Meletian schism (§ 41, 4)
the 6th canon of the Council prescribes that the bishop of
Alexandria “in accordance with the old customs shall have
jurisdiction over Egypt, in Libya and in Pentapolis, since it
is also according to old custom for the bishop of Rome to have
such jurisdiction, as also the churches in Antioch and in the
other provinces.” The Council, therefore, as Rufinus also and
the oldest Latin collection of canons, the so-called _Prisca_,
understand this canon, maintains that the ecclesiastical
supremacy of the Roman chair extended not over all the West but
only over the ten _suburbicarian_ provinces belonging to the
diocese of Rome according to Constantine’s division, _i.e._ over
Middle and Southern Italy, with the islands of Sardinia, Corsica
and Sicily. The bishop of Rome, however, was and continued by
the wider development of the patriarchal constitution the sole
patriarch in all the West. What more natural than that he should
regard himself as the one patriarch _over_ all the West? But,
even as the only _sedes apostolica_ of the West, Rome had already
for a long time obtained a rank far beyond the limits of the
Nicene canon. In doubtful cases application was made from all
quarters of the West to Rome for instruction as to the genuine
apostolic tradition, and the epistolary replies to such questions
assumed even in the 4th century the tone of authoritative
statements of the truth, _epistolæ decretales_. But down to
A.D. 344 it was never attempted to claim the authority of Rome
over the East in giving validity to any matter. In this year,
however, the pressure of circumstances obliged the Council
of Sardica (§ 50, 2), after most of the Eastern bishops had
already withdrawn, to agree to hand over to the bishop of
Rome, =Julius I.=, A.D. 337-352, as a steadfast and consistent
confessor of the orthodox faith in this age of ecclesiastical
wavering, the right of receiving appeals from condemned bishops
throughout the empire, and if he found them well supported, of
appointing a new investigation by the bishops of the neighbouring
province. But this decree affected only the person of Julius and
was only the momentary makeshift of a hard-pressed minority. It
therefore attracted no attention and was soon forgotten,--only
Rome forgot it not.
§ 46.4. =From Liberius to Anastasius, A.D. 352 to
A.D. 402.=--Julius’ successor =Liberius=,[128] A.D. 352 to
A.D. 366, maintained with equal steadfastness as his predecessor
the confession of the orthodox Nicene faith, and was therefore
banished by the Emperor Constantius in A.D. 355, who appointed
as his successor the accommodating deacon Felix. But the members
of the church would have nothing to do with the contemptible
intruder, who moreover on the very day of the deportation of
Liberius had solemnly sworn with the whole clergy of Rome to
remain faithful to the exiled bishop. He succeeded indeed in
drawing over to himself a considerable number of the clergy. The
people, however, continued unfalteringly true to their banished
bishop, and even after he had in A.D. 358 by signing a heretical
creed (§ 50, 3) obtained permission to return, they received him
again with unfeigned joy. It was the emperor’s wish that Liberius
and Felix should jointly preside over the Roman church. But
Felix was driven away by the people and could not again secure
a footing among them. Liberius, who henceforth held his position
in Rome as a Nicæan, amnestied those of the clergy who had
fallen away. But the schism occasioned thereby in the church of
Rome broke out with great violence after his death. A rigorist
minority repudiated =Damasus I.=, A.D. 366 to A.D. 384, who had
been chosen as his successor by the majority, because he too at
an earlier date had belonged to the oath-breaking party of Felix.
This minority elected Ursinus as anti-bishop. Over this there
were contentions that led to bloodshed. The party of Damasus
attacked the church of Ursinus and one hundred and thirty-seven
corpses were carried out. Valentinian III. now exiled Ursinus,
and Gratian in A.D. 378 by an edict conferred upon Damasus the
right of giving decision without appeal as party and judge in
one person against all bishops and clergy involved in the schism.
In consequence of this victory of Damasus as partisan of Felix
there was now formed in Rome a tradition which has passed over
into the lists of the popes and the martyrologies, in which
Liberius figures as the adherent of a heretical emperor and a
bloody persecutor of the true Nicene faith and Felix II. as the
legitimate pope. He is also confounded with the martyr Felix who
suffered under Maximian and was celebrated in song by Paulinus
Nolanus, and is thus represented as a holy martyr.[129] To the
pontificate of =Siricius=, A.D. 384 to A.D. 398, the western
church is indebted for the oldest extant papal decretals dating
from A.D. 385 which contain a reply to various questions of
the Spanish bishop couched quite in the hierarchical form and
insisting in strong terms upon the binding obligation of clerical
celibacy. Subsequently the same pope, burdened with “the care of
all the churches,” feels himself obliged to issue an _encyclical_
to all the churches of the West, denouncing the frequent
neglect of existing ecclesiastical laws. In the Origenist
controversy between Jerome and Rufinus (§ 51, 2) he favoured
the latter;--whereas his successor, =Anastasius=, A.D. 398 to
A.D. 402, took the side of Jerome.
§ 46.5. =From Innocent I. to Zosimus, A.D. 402 to A.D. 418.=--In
consequence of the partition of the empire into an eastern and
a western division in A.D. 364 (comp. § 42, 4), the claims of
the Roman chair to ecclesiastical supremacy over the whole of the
West were not only confirmed but also very considerably extended.
For by this partition the western half of the empire included not
only those countries which had previously been reckoned western,
namely, Africa, Spain, Britain, Gaul and Italy, but also the
prefecture of Illyricum (Greece, Thessaly, Macedonia, Dalmatia,
Pannonia, Mœsia, Dacia) with its capital Thessalonica, and thus
events played into the hands of those who pressed the patriarchal
claims of Rome. Even when in A.D. 379 Eastern Illyria (Macedonia,
Mœsia and Dacia) was attached to the Eastern empire, the Roman
bishops continued still to regard it as belonging to their
patriarchal domain. These claims were advanced with special
emphasis and with corresponding success by =Innocent I.=,
A.D. 402 to A.D. 417. When in A.D. 402 he intimated to the
archbishop of Thessalonica his elevation to the chair, he at the
same time transferred to him as his representative the oversight
of all the Illyrian provinces, and to his successor, in A.D. 412,
he sent a formal document of installation as Roman vicar. Not
only did he apply to the Roman chair that canon of the Council
of Sardica which had referred only to the person of Julius, but
in a decretal to a Gallic bishop he extended also the clearly
circumscribed right of appeal on the part of condemned bishops
into an obligation to submit all “_causæ majores_” to the
decision of the apostolic see. From Africa a Carthaginian Synod
in A.D. 404 sent messengers to Rome in order to secure its
intercession with the emperor to put down the Donatists. From the
East Theophilus of Alexandria and Chrysostom of Constantinople
solicited the weighty influence of Rome in the Origenist
controversy (§ 51, 3); and Alexander of Antioch (§ 50, 8)
expresses the proud satisfaction he had, as only Western bishops
had done before, in asking the Roman bishop’s advice on various
constitutional and disciplinary matters. During the Pelagian
controversy (§ 53, 4) the Palestinian Synod at Diospolis in
A.D. 415 interceded with the Pope in favour of Pelagius accused of
heresy in Africa; on the other hand the African Synods of Mileve
and Carthage in A.D. 416 besieged him with the demand to give the
sanction of his authority to their condemnation of the heretic.
He took the side of the Anti-Pelagians, and Augustine could
shower upon the heretics the pregnant words: _Roma locuta ...
causa finita_.--The higher the authority of the Roman chair rose
under Innocent, all the more painful to Rome must the humiliation
have been, which his successor =Zosimus=, A.D. 417-418, called
down upon it, when he, in opposition to his predecessor, took
the part of Pelagius and his companion Cœlestius, and addressed
bitter reproaches to the Africans for their treatment of him, but
afterwards in consequence of their vigorous remonstrances and the
interference of the emperor Honorius was obliged to withdraw his
previous judgment and formally to condemn his quondam protegé.
And when a deposed presbyter of Africa, Apiarius, sought refuge
in Rome, the Council of Carthage in A.D. 418, in which Augustine
also took part, made this an excuse for forbidding under threat
of excommunication any appeal _ad transmarina judicia_. Zosimus
indeed appealed to the canon of the Sardican Synod, which he
quoted as Nicene; but the Africans, to whom that canon was quite
unknown, only said that on this matter they must make inquiries
among the Eastern churches.[130]
§ 46.6. =From Boniface I. to Sixtus III., A.D. 419 to
A.D. 440.=--After the death of Zosimus, 26th Dec., 418, a minority
of the clergy and the people, by the hasty election and ordination
of the deacon Eulalius, anticipated the action of the majority
who chose the presbyter Boniface. The recommendation of the city
prefect Symmachus secured for the former the recognition of the
Emperor Honorius; but the determined remonstrance of the majority
moved him to convene a Synod at Ravenna in A.D. 419 for a final
settlement of the dispute. When the bishops there assembled
could not agree, he called a new Synod to meet at Spoleto at the
approaching Easter festival, and ordered, so as to make an end
of disturbances and tumults in the city, that both rivals should
quit Rome until a decision had been reached. Eulalius, however,
did not regard the injunction but pushed his way by force of arms
into the city. The Emperor now banished him from Rome on pain of
death, and at Spoleto the bishops decided in consequence of the
moderation he had shown, to recognise =Boniface I.=, A.D. 419 to
A.D. 422, as bishop of Rome. His successor was =Cœlestine I.=,
A.D. 422 to A.D. 432. Apiarius, who meanwhile, because he
professed repentance and besought forgiveness, had been restored,
began anew to offend, was again deposed, and again obtained
protection and encouragement at Rome. But an African Synod at
Carthage energetically protested against Cœlestine’s interference,
charging him with having often referred to a Nicene canon
warranting the right of appeal to Rome which the most diligent
inquiries among the churches of Constantinople, Alexandria and
Antioch, had failed to discover. On the outbreak of the Nestorian
controversy (§ 52, 3) two opponents again sued for the favour
of the Roman league; first of all, Nestorius of Constantinople,
because he professed to have given particular information
about the Pelagian-minded bishops driven from Italy who sought
refuge in Constantinople (§ 53, 4) and had immediately made a
communication about the error of confounding the two natures of
Christ which had recently sprung up in the East. The brotherly
tone of this writing, free from any idea of subordination,
found no response at Rome. The letters of Cyril of Alexandria
proved more acceptable, filled as they were with cringing
flatteries of the Roman chair and venomous invectives against the
Constantinopolitan see and its occupier. Cœlestine unreservedly
took the side of Cyril, commanded Nestorius under threat of
deposition and excommunication within ten days to present to
a Roman Synod, A.D. 420, a written retractation, and remitted
to Cyril the carrying out of this judgment. To his legates at
the Council of Ephesus, A.D. 431, he gave the instructions:
_Auctoritatem sedis apostolicæ custodire debere mandamus.... Ad
disceptationem si fuerit ventum, vos de eorum sententiis judicare
debetis, non subire certamen._ The Council decided precisely
according to Cœlestine’s wish. The proud Alexandrian patriarch
had recognised Rome as the highest court of appeal; a Western
educated at Rome, named Maximian, thoroughly submissive to
Cœlestine, was, with the pope’s hearty approval, raised to the
patriarchal see of Constantinople as successor of the deposed
Nestorius; only John of Antioch opposed the decision. Cœlestine’s
successor =Sixtus III.=, A.D. 432 to A.D. 440, could already
boast in A.D. 433 that he had put himself superior to the decrees
of the Council, and in commemoration of the victory dedicated
a beautiful church newly built to the mother of God, now called
_S. Maria Maggiore_.[131]
§ 46.7. =From Leo the Great to Simplicius, A.D. 440 to
A.D. 483.=--=Leo I.=, A.D. 440 to A.D. 461 (comp. § 47, 22),
unquestionably up to that date the greatest of all the occupants
of the Roman chair, was also the most powerful, the worthiest and
most successful vindicator of its authority in the East as well
as in the West; indeed he may be regarded as properly the founder
of the Roman papacy as a universal episcopate with the full
sanction of the civil power. Even the Western Fathers of the 4th
and 5th centuries, such as Hilary, Ambrose, Jerome and Augustine,
as also Innocent I., had still interpreted the πέτρα of Matt.
xvi. 18 partly of the confession of Peter, partly of the Person
of Christ. First in the time of Cœlestine an attempt was made to
refer it to the person of Peter. The legates of Cœlestine at the
Council of Ephesus in A.D. 431 had said: ὅστις, ἕως τοῦ νῦν καὶ
ἀεὶ ἐν τοῖς αὐτοῦ διαδόχοις καὶ ζῇ καὶ δικάζει. Thus they claimed
universal primacy as of immediately Divine authority. Leo I.
adopted this view with all his soul. In the most determined
and persistent way he carried it out in the West; then next
in proconsular Africa which had so energetically protested in
the times of Innocent and Cœlestine against Romish pretensions.
When news came to him of various improprieties spreading there,
he sent a legate to investigate, and in consequence of his
report addressed severe censures which were submitted to without
opposition. The right of African clerics to appeal to Rome was
also henceforth unchallenged. In Gaul, however, Leo had still to
maintain a hard struggle with Hilary, archbishop of Arles, who,
arrogating to himself the right of a primacy of Gaul, had deposed
Celedonius, bishop of Besontio, _Besançon_. But Leo took up his
case and had him vindicated and restored by a Roman Synod. Hilary,
who came himself to Rome, defied the Pope, escaped threatened
imprisonment by secret flight, and was then deprived of his
metropolitan rights. At the same time, in A.D. 445, Leo obtained
from the young Emperor of the West, Valentinian III., a civil
enactment which made every sort of resistance to the divinely
established universal primacy of the Roman see an act of high
treason.--In the East, too, Leo gained a higher position than had
ever before been accorded to Rome on account of his moderation
in the Eutychian controversy (§ 52, 4). Once again was Rome
called in to mediate between the two conflicting parties. At the
Robber-Synod of Ephesus in A.D. 449, under the presidency of the
tyrannical Dioscurus of Alexandria, the legates of Leo were not,
indeed, allowed to speak. But at the next œcumenical Council at
Chalcedon in A.D. 451 his doctrine won a brilliant victory; even
here, however, much objection was raised to his hierarchical
pretensions. He demanded from the first the presidency for his
legates, which, however, was assigned not to them, but to the
imperial commissioners. The demand, too, for the expulsion of
Dioscurus from the Synod, because he dared _Synodum facere sine
auctoritate sedis apostolicæ, quod mumquam licuit, numquem factum
est_, did not, at first at least, receive the answer required.
When, notwithstanding the opposition of the legates the question
of the relative ranks of the patriarchs was dealt with, they
withdrew from the session and subsequently protested against the
28th canon agreed upon at that session with a reference to the
6th Nicene canon which in the Roman _translation_, _i.e._ forgery,
began with the words: _Ecclesia Romana semper habuit primatum_.
But the Council sent the Acts with a dutiful report to Rome for
confirmation, whereupon Leo strictly repudiated the 28th canon,
threatening the church of Constantinople with excommunication,
and so finally gained his point. The emperor annulled it in
A.D. 454, and Anatolius, patriarch of Constantinople, was obliged
to write a humble letter to Leo acquiescing in its erasure; but
this did not prevent his successor from always maintaining its
validity (§ 63, 2).--When the wild hordes of Attila, king of the
Huns, spread terror and consternation by their approach, Leo’s
priestly form appeared before him as a messenger of God, and
saved Rome and Italy from destruction. Less successful was his
priestly intercession with the Arian Vandal chief Genseric,
whose army in A.D. 455 plundered, burnt and murdered throughout
Rome for fourteen days; but all the more strikingly after his
withdrawal did the pope’s ability display itself in restoring
comfort and order amid scenes of unutterable destitution and
confusion.
§ 46.8. =From Felix III. to Boniface II., A.D. 483 to
A.D. 532.=--Under Leo’s second successor, the Rugian or Scyrrian
Odoacer put an end to the West-Roman empire in A.D. 476 (§ 76, 6).
As to the enactments of the Roman state, although himself an
Arian, after seventeen years of a wise rule he left untouched the
orthodox Roman church, and the Roman bishops could under him, as
under his successor, the Ostrogoth Theodoric, also an Arian, from
A.D. 493 to A.D. 526, more freely exercise their ecclesiastical
functions than under the previous government, all the more
as neither of these rulers resided in Rome but in Ravenna.
=Pope Felix III.=, A.D. 483 to A.D. 492, in opposition to the
Byzantine ecclesiastical policy, which by means of the imperial
authority had for quite a hundred years retarded the development
of the orthodox doctrine (§ 52, 5), began a schism lasting
for thirty-five years between East and West, from A.D. 484 to
A.D. 519, which no suspicion of disloyal combination with the
Western rulers can account for. On the appointment of Felix III.
Odoacer assumed the right of confirming all elections of Popes,
just as previously the West Roman emperors had claimed, and Rome
submitted without resistance. The Gothic kings, too, maintained
this right.--=Gelasius I.=, A.D. 492 to A.D. 496 (comp. § 47, 22),
ventured before the Emperor Anastasius I., in A.D. 493, to
indicate the relation of _Sacerdotium_ and _Imperium_ according
to the Roman conception, which already exhibits in its infant
stage of development the mediæval theory of the two swords
(§ 110, 1) and the favourite analogy of the sun and the moon
(§ 96, 9). His peaceable successor =Anastasius II.=, A.D. 496 to
A.D. 498, entered into negotiations for peace with the Byzantine
court; but a number of Roman fanatics wished on this account to
have him cast out of the communion of the church, and saw in his
early death a judgment of heaven upon his conduct. He has ever
since been regarded as a heretic, and as such even Dante consigns
him to a place in hell. After his death there was a disputed
election between =Symmachus=, A.D. 498 to A.D. 514, and Laurentius.
The schism soon degenerated into the wildest civil war, in which
blood was shed in the churches and in the streets. Theodoric
decided for Symmachus as the choice of the majority and the first
ordained, but his opponents then charged him before the king as
guilty of the gravest crimes. To investigate the charges brought
against the bishop the king now convened at Rome a Synod of all
the Italian bishops, _Synodus palmaris_ of A.D. 502, so called
from the porch of St. Peter’s Church adorned with palms, where it
first met. As Symmachus on his way to it was met by a wild mob of
his opponents and only narrowly escaped with his life, Theodoric
insisted no longer on a regular proof of the charges against
him. The bishops without any investigation freely proclaimed him
their pope, and the deacon Eunodius of Pavia, known also as a
hymn writer, commissioned by them to make an apology for their
procedure, laid down the proposition that the pope who himself is
judge over all, cannot be judged of any man. Bloody street fights
between the two parties, however, still continued by day and
night. Symmachus’ successor =Hormisdas=, A.D. 514 to A.D. 523,
had the satisfaction of seeing the Byzantine court, in order
to prepare the way for the winning back of Italy, seeking
for reconciliation with the Western church, and in A.D. 519
submitting to the humbling conditions of restoration to church
fellowship offered by the pope. A sharp edict of the West Roman
emperor Justin II. against the Arians of his empire caused
Theodoric to send an embassy in their favour to Constantinople,
at the head of which stood =John I.=, A.D. 523 to A.D. 526, with
a threat of reprisals. The pope, however, seems rather to have
utilized his journey for intrigues against the Italian government
of the Goths, for after his return Theodoric caused him to
be cast into prison, in which he died. He was succeeded by
=Felix IV.= A.D. 526 to A.D. 530, after whose death the election
was again disputed by two rivals. This schism, however, was only
of short duration, since Dioscurus, the choice of the majority,
died during the next month. His rival =Boniface II.=, A.D. 530
to A.D. 532, a Goth by birth and favoured by the Ostrogoth
government, applied himself with extreme severity to put down
the opposing party.
§ 46.9. =From John II. to Pelagius II., A.D. 532 to
A.D. 590.=--Meanwhile Justinian I. had been raised to the
Byzantine throne, and his long reign from A.D. 527 to A.D. 565,
was in many ways a momentous one for the fortunes of the Roman
bishopric. The reconquest of Italy, from A.D. 536 to A.D. 553, by
his generals Belisarius and Narses, and the subsequent founding
of the Exarchate at Ravenna in A.D. 567, at the head of which a
representative of the emperor, a so-called Roman patrician stood,
freed the pope indeed from the control of the Arian Ostrogoths
which since the restoration of ecclesiastical fellowship with the
East had become oppressive, but it brought them into a new and
much more serious dependence. For Justinian and his successors
demanded from the Roman bishops as well as from the patriarchs of
Constantinople unconditional obedience.--=Agapetus I.=, A.D. 535
to A.D. 536, sent as peacemaker by the Goths to Constantinople,
escaped the fate of John I. perhaps just because he suddenly died
there. Under his successor =Silverius=, A.D. 536 to A.D. 537,
Belisarius, in December, A.D. 536, made his entry into Rome,
and in the March following he deposed the pope and sentenced
him to banishment. This he did at the instigation of the Empress
Theodora whose machinations in favour of Monophysitism had been
already felt by Agapetus. Theodora had already designated the
wretched =Vigilius=, A.D. 537 to A.D. 555, as his successor. He
had purchased her favour by the promise of two hundred pounds
of gold and acquiescence in the condemnation of the so-called
_three chapters_ (§ 52, 6) so eagerly desired by her. Owing
to his cowardliness and want of character Africa, North Italy
and Illyria shook off their allegiance to the Roman see and
maintained their independence for more than half a century.
Terrified by this disaster he partly retracted his earlier
agreement with the empress, and Justinian sent him into exile.
He submitted unconditionally and was forgiven, but died before
reaching Rome. =Pelagius I.=, A.D. 555 to A.D. 560, also a
creature of Theodora, subscribed the agreement and so confirmed
the Western schism which Gregory the Great first succeeded in
overcoming.--The fantastic attempt of Justinian to raise his
obscure birthplace Tauresium, the modern Bulgarian Achrida, to
the rank of a metropolis as Justinianopolis or _Prima Justiniana_,
and its bishop to the rank of patriarch with Eastern Illyria as
his patriarchate, proved, notwithstanding the consent of Vigilius,
a still-born child.
§ 46.10. =From Gregory I. to Boniface V., A.D. 590 to
A.D. 625.=--After the papal chair had been held by three
insignificant popes in succession =Gregory the Great=, A.D. 590
to A.D. 604 (comp. § 47, 22), was raised to the Apostolic
see, the greatest, most capable, noblest, most pious and most
superstitious in the whole long series of popes. He took the
helm of the church at a time when Italy was reduced to the most
terrible destitution by the savage and ruthless devastations of
the Arian Longobards lasting over twenty years (§ 76, 8), and
neither the emperor nor his exarch at Ravenna had the means of
affording help. Gregory could not allow Italy and the church to
perish utterly under these desperate circumstances, and so was
compelled to assume the functions of civil authority. When the
Longobards in A.D. 593 oppressed Rome to the uttermost there
remained nothing for him but to purchase their withdrawal with
the treasures of the church, and the peace finally concluded
with them in A.D. 599 was his and not the exarch’s work. The
exceedingly rich possessions of lands and goods, the so-called
_Patrimonium Petri_, extending throughout all Italy and the
islands, brought him the authority of a powerful secular prince
far beyond the bounds of the Roman duchy, in comparison with
which the rank of the exarch himself was insignificant. The
Longobards too treated with him as an independent political power.
Gregory, therefore, may rightly be regarded as the first founder
of the temporal power of the Papacy on Italian soil. But all
this as we can easily understand provoked no small dislike of
the pope at Constantinople. The pope, on the other hand, was
angry with the Emperor Maurice because he gave no consideration
to his demand that the patriarch, Johannes Jejunator, should
be prohibited from assuming the title Ἐπίσκοπος οἰκουμενικός.
Gregory’s own position in regard to the primacy appears from
his Epistles. He writes to the bishop of Syracuse: _Si qua culpa
in episcopis invenitur, nescio, quis Sedi apostolicæ subjectus
non sit; cum vero culpa non existit, omnes secundum rationem
humilitatis æquales sunt_. And with this reservation it was
certainly meant when he, in a letter to the patriarch of
Alexandria, who had addressed him as “_Universalis Papa_,”
most distinctly refused this title and readily conceded to
the Alexandrian as well as to the Antiochean see, as of Petrine
origin (the Antiochean directly, § 16, 1; the Alexandrian
indirectly through Mark, § 16, 4), equal rank and dignity with
that of Rome; and when he denounced as an anti-Christ every
bishop who would raise himself above his fellow bishops. Thus
he compared Johannes Jejunator to Lucifer who wished to exalt
himself above all the angels. Gregory, on the other hand, in
proud humility styled himself, as all subsequent popes have done,
_Servus servorum Dei_. When he extolled the Frankish Jezebel
Brunhilda [Brunehilda] (§ 77, 7), who had besought him to send
her relics and at another time a pallium for a bishop, as an
exemplary pious Christian woman and a wise ruler, he may, owing
to the defective communication between Rome and Gaul, have had
no authentic information about her doings and disposition. The
memory of the otherwise noble-minded pope is more seriously
affected by his conduct in reference to the emperor Phocas,
A.D. 602 to A.D. 610, the murderer of the noble and just emperor
Maurice, whom he congratulates upon his elevation to the throne,
and makes all the angelic choirs of heaven and all tongues on
earth break forth in jubilees and hymns of thanksgiving; but even
here again, when he thus wrote, the news of his iniquities,--not
only the slaughter of the emperor, but also of his queen, his
five sons and three daughters, etc., by which this demon in
human form cut his way to the throne,--may not have been known to
him in their full extent.--Phocas, however, showed himself duly
thankful, for at the request of pope =Boniface III.=, A.D. 606
to A.D. 607, he refused to allow the patriarch of Constantinople
to assume the title of Universal bishop, while at the same time
he formally acknowledged the chair of Peter at Rome as _Caput
omnium ecclesiarum_. To the next pope =Boniface IV.=, A.D. 608 to
A.D. 615, he presented the beautiful Pantheon at Rome, which from
being a temple dedicated to Cybele, the mother of the gods, and
to all the gods, he turned into a church of the mother of God and
of all the martyrs.[132]
§ 46.11. =From Honorius I. to Gregory III., A.D. 625 to
A.D. 741.=--For almost fifty years, from A.D. 633 under
=Honorius I.=, A.D. 625 to A.D. 638, the third successor of
Boniface IV., the _Monothelite controversy_ (§ 52, 8) continued
its disastrous course. Honorius, a pious and peace-loving man,
had seen nothing objectionable in this attempt of the Emperor
Heraclius (A.D. 611 to A.D. 641) to win the numerous Monophysites
back to the unity of the church by the concession of _one_ will
in the two natures of Christ, and was prepared to co-operate in
the work. But the conviction grew more and more strong that the
doctrine proposed in the interests of peace was itself heretical.
All subsequent bishops of Rome therefore unanimously condemned as
an accursed heresy (§ 52, 9), what their predecessor Honorius had
agreed to and confessed. This explains how the exarch of Ravenna
delayed for more than a year the confirmation of the election
of the next pope, =Severinus=, A.D. 638 to A.D. 640, and granted
it only in A.D. 640 as amends for his wholesale plundering of
the treasury of the Roman church to supply his own financial
deficiencies. In the time of =Martin I.=, A.D. 649 to A.D. 653,
the Emperor Constans II., A.D. 642 to A.D. 668, sought to make
an end of the bitter controversy by the strict prohibition of any
statement as to one will or two wills. The determined pope had to
suffer for his opposition by severe imprisonment and still more
trying banishment, in which he suffered from hunger and other
miseries (A.D. 655). The new emperor Constantinus Pogonnatus,
A.D. 668 to A.D. 685, finally recognised the indispensable
necessity of securing reconciliation with the West. In A.D. 680,
he convened an œcumenical Council at Constantinople at which the
legates of the pope =Agatho=, A.D. 678 to A.D. 682, the fifth
successor of Martin I., once more prescribed to the Greeks what
should henceforth be regarded throughout the whole empire as
the orthodox faith. The Council sent its Acts to Rome with the
request that they might be confirmed, which Agatho’s successor,
=Leo II.=, A.D. 682 to A.D. 683, did, notwithstanding the
condemnation therein very pointedly expressed of the heretical
pope Honorius, which indeed he explicitly approved.--Once again
in A.D. 686, the Roman church was threatened with a schism by a
double election to the papal chair. This, however, was averted
by the opposing electors, lay and clerical, agreeing to set
aside both candidates and uniting together in the election of
the =Thracian Conon=, A.D. 686 to A.D. 687. Precisely the same
thing happened with a similar result on the death of Conon.
The new candidate whom both parties agreed upon this time was
=Sergius I.=, A.D. 687 to A.D. 701, but he was obliged to purchase
the exarch’s confirmation by a present of a hundred pounds of gold.
His rejection of the conclusions of the second Trullan Council
at Constantinople in A.D. 692 (§ 63, 2), which in various points
disregarded the pretensions of Rome, brought him into conflict
with the emperor Justinian II., A.D. 685 to A.D. 711. The result
of this contest was to show that the power and authority of the
pope in Italy were at this time greater than those of the emperor.
When the emperor sent a high official to Rome with the order
to bring the pope prisoner to Constantinople, almost the whole
population of the exarchate gathered out in the pope’s defence.
The Byzantine ambassador sought and obtained protection from the
pope, under whose bed he crept, and was then allowed to quit Rome
in safety, followed by the scorn and abuse of the people. Soon
thereafter, in A.D. 695, Justinian was overthrown, and with slit
ears and nose sent into exile. In A.D. 705, having been restored
by the Bulgarian king, he immediately took fearful revenge upon
the rebel inhabitants of Ravenna. Pope Constantine I., A.D. 708
to A.D. 715, intimidated by what he had seen, did not dare to
refuse the imperial mandate which summoned him to Byzantium
for the arrangement of ecclesiastical differences. With fear
and trembling he embarked. But he succeeded in coming to an
understanding with the emperor, who received and dismissed him
with every token of respect. Under his successor, =Gregory II.=,
A.D. 715 to A.D. 731, the Byzantine iconoclast controversy
(§ 66, 1) gave occasion to an almost complete rupture between
the papacy and the Byzantine empire; and under =Gregory III.=,
A.D. 731 to A.D. 741, the papacy definitely withdrew from the
Byzantine and put itself under the Frankish government. Down to
the latest age of the exarchate of Ravenna the confirmation of
papal elections by the emperor or his representative, the exarch,
was always maintained, and only after it had been given was
consecration allowed. This is proved both from the biographies
of the papal books and from the relative formulæ of petition in
the _Liber diurnus Rom. Pontificum_, a collection of formulæ for
the performance of the most important acts in the service of the
Romish Church made between A.D. 685 and A.D. 751. The election
itself was in the hands of the three orders of the city (_clerus_,
_exercitus_ and _populus_).--Continuation § 82.
III. THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND LITERATURE.
§ 47. THE THEOLOGICAL SCHOOLS AND THEIR MOST CELEBRATED
REPRESENTATIVES.
The Ancient Church reached its highest glory during the 4th and
5th centuries. The number of theological schools properly so-called
(§ 45, 1) was indeed small, and so the most celebrated theologians
were self-taught in theology. But all the greater must the intellectual
resources of this age have been and all the more powerful the general
striving after culture, when the outward means, helps and opportunities
for obtaining scientific training were so few. The middle of the 5th
century, marked by the Council of Chalcedon in A.D. 451, may be regarded
as the turning point where the greatest height in theological science
and in other ecclesiastical developments was reached, and from this
point we may date the beginnings of decline. After this the spirit
of independent research gradually disappeared from the Eastern as
well as from the Western Church. Political oppression, hierarchical
exclusiveness, narrowing monasticism and encroaching barbarism choked
all free scientific effort, and the industry of compilers took the place
of fresh youthful intellectual production. The authority of the older
church teachers stood so high and was regarded as binding in so eminent
a degree that at the Councils argument was carried on almost solely
by means of quotations from the writings of those fathers who had been
recognised as orthodox.
§ 47.1. =The Theological Schools and Tendencies:=
a. =In the 4th and 5th centuries.=--Since the time of the
two Dionysiuses (§ 33, 7) the Alexandrian theology had
been divided into two different directions which we may
distinguish as the old and the new Alexandrian. =The Old
Alexandrian School= held by the subordinationist view
of Origen and strove to keep open to scientific research
as wide a field as possible. Its representatives showed
deep reverence for Origen but avoided his more eccentric
speculations. Its latest offshoot was the _Semiarianism_
with which it came to an end in the middle of the 4th
century. This same free scientific tendency in theology
was yet more decidedly shown in =the Antiochean School=.
Although at first animated by the spirit which Origen had
introduced into theology, its further development was a
thoroughly independent one, departing from its original
in many particulars. To the allegorical method of
interpretation of the Origenist school it opposed
the natural grammatico-historical interpretation, to its
mystical speculation, clear positive thinking. Inquiry into
the simple literal sense of holy scripture and the founding
of a purely biblical theology were its tasks. Averse to all
mysteries, it strove after a positive, rational conception
of Christianity and after a construction of dogma by
means of clear logical thought. Hence its dogmatic aim was
pre-eminently the careful distinguishing of the divine and
human in Christ and in Christianity, forming a conception
of each by itself and securing especially in both due
recognition of the human. The theology of the national
=East-Syrian Church=, far more than that of the Antiochean
or Græco-Syrian, was essentially bound down by tradition.
It had its seminaries in the theological schools of Nisibis
and Edessa. The oriental spirit was here displayed in an
unrestricted manner; also a tendency to theosophy, mysticism
and asceticism, a special productiveness in developing forms
of worship and constitution, and withal doctrinal stability.
In their exegesis the members of this school co-operated
with the Antiocheans, though not so decidedly, in opposing
the arbitrary allegorizing of the Origenist school, but
their exegetical activity was not, as with the Antiocheans,
scientific and critical but rather practical and homiletical.
=The New Alexandrian School= was the prevailing one for the
4th century so far as Alexandrian culture was concerned.
Its older representatives, at least, continued devotedly
attached to Origen and favourable to the speculative
treatment of Christian doctrine introduced by him. But
they avoided his unscriptural extravagances and carried out
consistently the ecclesiastical elements of his doctrine. By
a firm acceptance of the doctrine of the eternal generation
of the Son they overcame the subordinationism of their
master, and in this broke away from the old Alexandrian
school and came into closer relations to the theology of the
Western church. To the Antiochean school, however, they were
directly opposed in respect of the delight they took in the
mysteries of Christianity, and their disinclination to allow
the reason to rule in theology. The union of the divine and
human in Christ and in Christianity seemed to them a sublime,
incomprehensible mystery, any attempt to resolve it being
regarded as alike useless and profane. But in this way
the human element became more and more lost to view and
became absorbed in the divine. They energetically affirmed
the inseparable union of the two, but thereby lost the
consciousness of their distinctness and fell into the
contrary error of Antiochean onesidedness. With Cyril of
Alexandria the New Alexandrian school properly began to
assume the form of a sect and to show symptoms of decay,
although he himself retained the reputation of an orthodox
teacher. =The Western Theology= of this period, as well as
its North-African precursor (§ 31, 10, 11), energetically
insisted upon the application of Christianity to the life,
the development of the doctrines affecting this matter
and the maintenance of the church system of doctrine as a
strong protection against all wilfulness in doctrine. In
it therefore the traditional theology finds its chief home.
Still the points of contact with the East were so many and
so vital that however much inclined to stability the West
might be, it could not altogether remain unmoved and without
enrichment from the theological movements of the age. Thus
we distinguish in the West four different but variously
inter-connected tendencies. First of all there is the
genuinely _Western_, which is separated on the one hand in
Tertullian and Cyprian, but on the other hand is variously
influenced by the talented teachers of the New Alexandrian
School, which continued to mould and dominate the cultured
theology of the West. Its chief representatives are
Hilary of Poitiers, Ambrose, and above all, Augustine,
who completely freed the Latin theology from its hitherto
prevailing dependence on the Greek, placing it now upon its
own feet. The representatives of this tendency were at first
in complete accord with the members of the New Alexandrian
school in their opposition to the semi-Arian Origenists
and the Nestorianizing Antiocheans, but then as that school
itself drifted into the position of a heretical sect, they
also decidedly contended for the other side of the truth
which the Antiochean school maintained. A second group of
Western theologians were inspired by the writings of Origen,
without, however, abandoning the characteristics of the
Western spirit. To this class belongs Jerome, who afterwards
repudiated his master and joined the previously named school,
and Rufinus. The third group of Pelagians represent the
practical but cool rationalistic tendency of the West. The
fourth is that of the semi-Pelagians who in the Western
theology intermingle synergistic elements of an Antiochean
complexion.
b. =Of the 6th and 7th Centuries.=--The brilliant period
of theological literature had now closed. There still
were scholars who wrought laboriously upon the original
contributions of the fathers, and reproduced the thoughts
of their predecessors in a new shape suited to the needs
of the time, but spirit and life, creative power and
original productivity had well nigh disappeared. After the
monophysite Johannes Philoponus of Alexandria had commented
on the works of Aristotle and applied their categories
to theology, the Platonic philosophy, hitherto on account
of its ideal contents the favourite of all philosophizing
church fathers, was more and more set aside by the
philosophy of the Stagirite so richly developed on the
formal side. The theology of the Greeks even at so early a
date assumed to some extent the character of Scholasticism.
Alongside of it, however, we have a theosophic mysticism
which reverting from the tendency that had lately come into
vogue to Neoplatonic ideas, drew its chief inspiration from
the Pseudo-Dionysian writings. In the West, in addition to
the general causes of decay, we have also the sufferings of
the times amid the tumult of the migration of the nations.
In Italy Boëthius and Cassiodorus won for themselves
imperishable renown as the fosterers of classical and
patristic studies in an age when these were in danger of
being utterly forgotten. The series of Latin church fathers
in the strict sense ends with Gregory the Great; that of
Greek church fathers with Johannes Damascenus.
1. THE MOST IMPORTANT TEACHERS OF THE EASTERN CHURCH.
§ 47.2. =The Most Celebrated Representative of the Old
Alexandrian School= is the father of Church History =Eusebius
Pamphili=, _i.e._, the friend of Pamphilus (§ 31, 6), bishop
of Cæsarea from A.D. 314 to A.D. 340. The favour of the emperor
Constantine laid the imperial archives open to him for his
historical studies. By his unwearied diligence as an investigator
and collector he far excels all the church teachers of his age
in comprehensive learning, to which we owe a great multitude of
precious extracts from long lost writings of pagan and Christian
antiquity. His style is jejune, dry and clumsy, sometimes
bombastic. His =Historical Writings= supported on all sides by
diligent research, want system and regularity, and suffer from
disproportionate treatment and distribution of the material. To
his Ἐκκλησιαστικὴ ἱστορία in 10 bks., reaching down to A.D. 324,
he adds a highly-coloured biography of Constantine in 4 bks.,
which is in some respects a continuation of his history; and
to it, again, he adds a fawning panegyric on the emperor.--At
a later date he wrote an account of the Martyrs of Palestine
during the Diocletian persecution which was afterwards added
as an appendix to the 8th bk. of the History. A collection of
old martyrologies, three bks. on the life of Pamphilus, and a
treatise on the origin, celebration and history of the Easter
festival, have all been lost. Of great value, especially for the
synchronizing of biblical and profane history, was his diligently
compiled Chronicle, Παντοδαπὴ ἱστορία, similar to that of Julius
Africanus (§ 31, 3), an abstract of universal history reaching
down to A.D. 352, to which chronological and synchronistic tables
were added as a second part. The Greek original has been lost,
but Jerome translated it into Latin, with arbitrary alterations,
and carried it down to A.D. 378.--The =Apologetical Writings=
take the second place in importance. Still extant are the two
closely-connected works: _Præparatio Evangelica_, Εὐαγγελικὴ
προπαρασκευή, in 15 bks., and the _Demonstratio Evangelica_,
Εὐαγγελικὴ ἀπόδειξις, in 8 out of an original of 20 bks. The
former proves the absurdity of heathenism; the latter, the truth
and excellence of Christianity. A condensed reproduction of
the contents and text of the Θεοφανεία in 5 bks. is found only
in a Syriac translation. The Ἐκλογαὶ προφητικαί in 4 bks., of
which only a portion is extant, expounds the Old Testament in an
allegorizing fashion for apologetic purposes; and the treatise
against Hierocles (§ 23, 3) contests his comparison of Christ
with Apollonius of Tyana. A treatise in 30 bks. against Porphyry,
and some other apologetical works are lost.--His =Dogmatic
Writings= are of far less value. These treatises--Κατὰ Μαρκέλλου,
in 2 bks., the one already named against Hierocles, and Περὶ τῆς
ἐκκλησιαστικῆς θεολογίας, also against Marcellus (§ 50, 2)--are
given as an Appendix in the editions of the _Demonstratio
Evangelica_. On his share in Pamphilus’ Apology for Origen, see
§ 31, 6; and on his Ep. to the Princess Constantia, see § 57, 4.
The weakness of his dogmatic productions was caused by his
vacillating and mediating position in the Arian controversy,
where he was the mouthpiece of the moderate semi-Arians
(§ 50, 1, 3), and this again was due to his want of speculative
capacity and dogmatic culture.--Of his =Exegetical Writings=
the Commentaries on Isaiah and the Psalms are the most complete,
but of the others we have only fragments. We have, however, his
Τοπικά in the Latin translation of Jerome: _De Situ et Nominibus
Locorum Hebraeorum_.[133]
§ 47.3. =Church Fathers of the New Alexandrian School.=
a. The most conspicuous figure in the church history of the
4th century is =Athanasius=, styled by an admiring posterity
_Pater orthodoxiæ_. He was indeed every inch of him a church
father, and the history of his life is the history of the
church of his times. His life was full of heroic conflict.
Unswervingly faithful, he was powerful and wise in building
up the church; great in defeat, great in victory. His was a
life in which insight, will and action, earnestness, force
and gentleness, science and faith, blended in most perfect
harmony. In A.D. 319 he was a deacon in Alexandria. His
bishop Alexander soon discovered the eminent gifts of the
young man and took him with him to the Council of Nicæa
in A.D. 325, where he began the battle of his life. Soon
thereafter, in A.D. 328, Alexander died and Athanasius
became his successor. He was bishop for forty-five years,
but was five times driven into exile. He spent about
twenty years in banishment, mostly in the West, and died
in A.D. 373. His writings are for the most part devoted
to controversy against the Arians (§ 50, 6); but he
also contested Apollinarianism (§ 52, 1), and vindicated
Christianity against the attacks of the heathens in the
pre-Arian treatise in two bks. _Contra Gentes_, Κατὰ Ἑλλήνων,
the first bk. of which argues against heathenism, while the
second expounds the necessity of the incarnation of God in
Christ. For a knowledge of his life and pastoral activity
the _Librî paschales_, Festal letters (§ 56, 3), are of
great value.[134] Of less importance are his exegetical,
allegorical writings on the Psalms. His dogmatic,
apologetical and polemical works are all characterized
by sharp dialectic and profound speculation, and afford
a great abundance of brilliant thoughts, skilful arguments
and discussions on fundamental points in a style as clear
as it is eloquent; but we often miss systematic arrangement
of the material, and they suffer from frequent repetition
of the same fundamental thoughts, defects which, from the
circumstances of their composition, amid the hot combats of
his much agitated life, may very easily be understood and
excused.[135]
§ 47.4. =(The Three Great Cappadocians.)=--
b. =Basil the Great=, bishop of his native city of Cæsarea
in Cappadocia, is in very deed a “kingly” figure in church
history. His mother Emmelia and his grandmother Macrina
early instilled pious feelings into his youthful breast.
Studying at Athens, a friendship founded on love to the
church and science soon sprang up between him and his
likeminded countryman Gregory Nazianzen, and somewhat
later his own brother Gregory of Nyssa became an equally
attached member of the fraternity. After he had visited
the most celebrated ascetics in Syria, Palestine and
Egypt, he continued long to live in solitude as an ascetic,
distributed his property among the poor, and became
presbyter in A.D. 364, bishop in A.D. 370. He died in
A.D. 379. The whole rich life of the man breathed of the
faith that overcometh the world, of self-denying love and
noble purpose. He gave the whole powers of his mind to
the holding together of the Catholic church in the East
during the violent persecution of the Arian Valens. The
most beautiful testimony to his noble character was the
magnificent Basil institute, a hospital in Cæsarea, to which
he, while himself living in the humblest manner, devoted
all his rich revenues. His writings, too, entitle Basil
to a place among the most distinguished church fathers.
They afford evidence of rich classical culture as well as of
profound knowledge of Scripture and of human nature, and are
vigorous in expression, beautiful and pictorial in style.
In exegesis he follows the allegorical method. Among his
dogmatic writings the following are the most important:
Ll. 5 _Adv. Eunomium_ (§ 50, 3) and _De Spiritu s. ad
Amphilochium_ against the Pneumatomachians (§ 50, 5). The
other writings bearing his name comprise 365 Epistles,
moral and ascetic tractates, Homilies on the Hexæmeron and
13 Psalms, and Discourses (among them, Πρὸς τοὺς νέους,
ὁπως ἂν ἐξ ἑλληνικῶν ὠφελοῖντο λόγων), a larger and a
short Monastic rule, and a Liturgy.[136]
c. =Gregory Nazianzen= was born in the Cappadocian village
Arianz. His father Gregory, in his earlier days a
Hypsistarian (§ 42, 6), but converted by his pious wife
Nonna, became bishop of Nazianzum [Nazianzen]. The son, after
completing his studies in Cæsarea, Alexandria and Athens,
spent some years with Basil in his cloister in Pontus, but,
when his father allowed himself to be prevailed upon to sign
an Arianizing confession, he hasted to Nazianzum [Nazianzen],
induced him to retract, and was there and then suddenly and
against his will ordained by him a presbyter in A.D. 361.
From that time, always vacillating between the desire for
a quiet contemplative ascetic life and the impulse toward
ecclesiastical official activity, easily attracted and
repelled, not without ambition, and so sometimes irritable
and out of humour, he led a very changeful life, which
prevented him succeeding in one definite calling. Basil
transferred to him the little bishopric of Sasima; but
Gregory fled thence into the wilderness to escape the
ill-feelings stirred up against him. He was also for a long
time assistant to his father in the bishopric of Nazianzum
[Nazianzen]. He withdrew, however, in A.D. 375, when the
congregation in spite of his refusal appointed him successor
to his father. Then the small, forsaken company of Nicene
believers in Constantinople called him to be their pastor.
He accepted the call in A.D. 379, and delivered here in a
private chapel, which he designated by the significant name
of Anastasia, his celebrated five discourses on the divinity
of the Logos, which won for him the honourable title of
ὁ θεόλογος. He was called thence by Theodosius the Great in
A.D. 380 to be patriarch of the capital, and had assigned
to him the presidency of the Synod of Constantinople in
A.D. 381. But the malice of his enemies forced him to resign.
He returned now to Nazianzum [Nazianzen], administered for
several years the bishopric there, and died in A.D. 390 in
rural retirement, without having fully realised the motto
of his life: Πράξις ἐπίβασις θεωρίας. His writings consist
of 45 Discourses, 242 Epistles, and several poems (§ 48, 5).
After the 5 λόγοι θεολογικοί and the Λόγος περὶ φυγῆς (a
justification of his flight from Nazianzum [Nazianzen] by
a representation of the eminence and responsibility of the
priesthood), the most celebrated are two philippics, Λόγοι
στηλιτευτικοί (στηλίτευσις=the mark branded on one at
the public pillory), _Invectivæ in Julianum Imperatorem_,
occasioned by Julian’s attempt to deprive the Christians
of the means of classical culture.[137]
d. =Gregory of Nyssa= was the younger brother of Basil. In
philosophical gifts and scientific culture he excelled his
two elder friends. His theological views too were rooted
more deeply than theirs in those of Origen. But in zeal
in controverting Arianism he was not a whit behind them,
and his reputation among contemporaries and posterity is
scarcely less than theirs. Basil ordained him bishop of
Nyssa in A.D. 371, and thus, not without resistance, took
him away from the office of a teacher of eloquence. The
Arians, however, drove him from his bishopric, to which he
was restored only after the death of the Emperor Valens.
He died in A.D. 394. He took his share in the theological
controversies of his times and wrote against Eunomius and
Apollinaris. His dogmatic treatises are full of profound
and brilliant thoughts, and especially the Λόγος κατηχητικὸς
ὁ μέγας, an instruction how to win over Jews and Gentiles
to the truth of Christianity; Περὶ ψυχῆς καὶ ἀναστάσεως,
conversations between him and his sister Macrina after the
death of their brother Basil, one of his most brilliant
works; Κατὰ εἱμαρμένης, against the fatalistic theory of
the world of paganism; Πρὸς Ἕλληνας ἐκ τῶν κοινῶν ἐννοίων,
for the establishment of the doctrine of the Trinity on
principles of reason. In his numerous exegetical writings
he follows the allegorical method in the brilliant style of
Origen. We also have from him some ascetical tracts, several
sermons and 26 Epistles.
§ 47.5.
e. =Apollinaris=, called the Younger, to distinguish him
from his father of the same name, was a contemporary of
Athanasius, and bishop of Laodicea. He died in A.D. 390.
A fine classical scholar and endowed with rich poetic gifts,
he distinguished himself as a defender of Christianity
against the attacks of the heathen philosopher Porphyry
(§ 23, 3) and also as a brilliant controversialist against
the Arians; but he too went astray when alongside of the
trinitarian question he introduced those Christological
speculations that are now known by his name (§ 52, 1).
That we have others of his writings besides the quotations
found in the treatises of his opponents, is owing to the
circumstance that several of them were put into circulation
by his adherents under good orthodox names in order to get
impressed upon the views developed therein the stamp of
orthodoxy. The chief of these is Ἡ κατὰ μέρος (_i.e._
developed bit by bit) πίστις, which has come down to us
under the name of Gregory Thaumaturgus (§ 31, 6). Theodoret
quotes passages from it and assigns them to Apollinaris,
and its contents too are in harmony with this view. So
too with the tract Περὶ τῆς σαρκώσεως τοῦ Θεοῦ Λόγου, _De
Incarnatione Verbi_, ascribed to Athanasius, which a scholar
of Apollinaris, named Polemon, with undoubted accuracy
ascribed to his teacher. That Cyril of Alexandria ascribes
this last-named tract to Athanasius may be taken as proof of
the readiness of the Monophysites and their precursor Cyril
to pass off the false as genuine (§ 52, 2). To Apollinaris
belong also an Epistle to Dionysius attributed to Julius,
bishop of Rome (§ 50, 2) and a tract, attributed to the
same, Περὶ τῆς ἐν Χριστῷ ἑνότητος τοῦ σώματος πρὸς τὴν
θεότητα, which were also assigned to Apollinaris by his own
scholars. Finally, the Pseudo-Justin Ἔκθεσις τῆς πίστεως
ἤτοι περὶ τριάδος seems to be a reproduction of a treatise
of Apollinaris’ Περὶ τριάδος, supposed to be lost, enlarged
with clumsy additions and palmed off in this form under the
venerated name of Justin Martyr.
f. =Didymus the Blind= lost his sight when four years of age,
but succeeded in making wonderful attainments in learning.
He was for fifty years Catechist in Alexandria, and as such
the last brilliant star in the catechetical school. He died
in A.D. 395. An enthusiastic admirer of Origen, he also
shared many of his eccentric views, _e.g._ Apocatastasis,
pre-existence of the soul, etc. But also in consequence of
the theological controversies of the times he gave to his
theology a decidedly ecclesiastical turn. His writings were
numerous; but only a few have been preserved. His book _De
Spiritu S._ is still extant in a Latin translation of Jerome;
his controversial tract against the Manichæans is known
only from fragments. His chief work _De S. Trinitate_, Περὶ
τριάδος, in 3 bks., in which he showed himself a vigorous
defender of the Nicene Creed, was brought to light in the
18th century. A commentary on the Περὶ ἀρχῶν of Origen
now lost, was condemned at the second Council of Nicæa in
A.D. 787.
§ 47.6.
g. =Macarius Magnes=, bishop of Magnesia in Asia Minor about
A.D. 403, under the title Μονογενὴς ἢ Ἀποκριτικός, etc.,
wrote an apology for Christianity in 5 bks., only recovered
in A.D. 1867, which takes the form of an account of a
disputation with a heathen philosopher. Doctrinally it has
a strong resemblance to the works of Gregory of Nyssa. The
material assigned to the opponent is probably taken from
the controversial tract of Porphyry (§ 23, 3).
h. =Cyril, Patriarch of Alexandria=, was the nephew, protegé
and, from A.D. 412, also the successor of Theophilus
(§ 51, 3). The zealous and violent temper of the uncle was
not without an injurious influence upon the character of the
nephew. At the _Synodus ad Quercum_ in A.D. 403, he voted
for the condemnation of Chrysostom, but subsequently, on
further consideration, he again of his own accord entered
upon the _diptyche_ (§ 59, 6) of the Alexandrian church
the name of the disgracefully persecuted man. In order to
revenge himself upon the Jews by whom in a popular tumult
Christian blood had been shed, he came down upon them at
the head of a mob, drove them out of the city and destroyed
their houses. He also bears no small share of the odium of
the horrible murder of the noble Hypatia (§ 42, 4). He shows
himself equally passionate and malevolent in the contest
with the Nestorians and the Antiocheans (§ 52, 3), and
to this controversy many of his treatises, as well as
87 epistles, are almost entirely devoted. The most important
of his writings is Πρὸς τὰ τοῦ ἐν ἀθέοις Ἰουλιανοῦ (§ 42, 5).
He systematically developed in almost scholastic fashion the
dogma of the Trinity in his _Thesaurus de S. Consubstantiali
Trinitate_; and in a briefer and more popular form, in two
short tracts. As a preacher he was held in so high esteem,
that, as Gennadius relates, Greek bishops learnt his homilies
by heart and gave them to their congregations instead of
compositions of their own. His 30 Λόγοι ἑορταστικοί, _Homiliæ
paschales_, delivered at the Easter festivals observed in
Alexandria (§ 56, 3), in unctuous language expatiate upon
the burning questions of the day, mostly polemical against
Jews, heathens, Arians and Nestorians. His commentaries
on the books of the Old and New Testaments illustrate the
extreme arbitrariness of the typical-allegorical method.[138]
The treatise Περὶ τῆς ἐν πνεύματι καὶ ἀληθείᾳ προσκυνήσεως
gives a typical exposition of the ceremonial law of Moses,
and his Γλαφυρά contain “ornate and elegant,” _i.e._
typical-allegorical, expositions of selected passages from
the Pentateuch.
i. =Isidore of Pelusium=, priest and abbot of a monastery
at Pelusium in Egypt, who died about A.D. 450, was one of
the noblest, most gifted and liberal representatives of
monasticism of his own and of all times. A warm supporter of
the new Alexandrian system of doctrine but also conciliatory
and moderate in his treatment of the persons of opponents,
while firm and decided in regard to the subject in debate,
he most urgently entreats Cyril to moderation. His writings
_Contra Gentiles_ and _Contra Fatum_ are lost; but his still
extant 2,012 Epistles in 5 bks. afford a striking evidence
of the richness of his intellect and of his culture, as
well as of the great esteem in which he was held and of
his far-reaching influence. His exegesis, too, which always
inclines to a simple literal sense, is of far greater
importance than that of the other Alexandrians.
§ 47.7. (=Mystics and Philosophers.=)
k. =Macarius the Great or the Elder=, monk and priest in
the Scetic desert, was exiled by the Arian Emperor Valens
on account of his zeal for Nicene orthodoxy. He died in
A.D. 391. From his writings, consisting of 50 Homilies, a
number of Apophthegms, some epistles and prayers, there is
breathed forth a deep warm mysticism with various approaches
to Augustine’s soteriological views, while other passages
seem to convey quite a Pelagian type of doctrine.
l. =Marcus Eremita=, a like-minded younger contemporary of
the preceding, lived about A.D. 400 as an inhabitant of
the Scetic desert. We possess of his writings only nine
tracts of an ascetic mystical kind, the second of which,
bearing the title Περὶ τῶν οἰομένων ἐξ ἔργων δικαιοῦσθαι,
has secured for them a place in the Roman Index with the
note “_Caute legenda_.” However even in his mysticism
contradictory views, Augustinian and Pelagian, in regard
to human freedom and divine grace, on predestination and
sanctification, etc., find a place alongside one another,
and have prominence given them according to the writer’s
humour and the requirement of his meditation or exhortation.
m. =Synesius of Cyrene=,[139] subsequently bishop of Ptolemais
in Egypt, was a disciple of the celebrated Hypatia (§ 42, 4)
and an enthusiastic admirer of Plato. He died about A.D. 420.
A happy husband and father, in comfortable circumstances
and devoted to the study of philosophy, he could not for a
long time be prevailed upon to accept a bishopric. He openly
confessed his Origenistic heterodoxy in reference to the
resurrection doctrine, the eternity of the world, as well
as the pre-existence of the soul. He also publicly declared
that as bishop he would continue the marriage relation with
his wife, and no one took offence thereat. In the episcopal
office he distinguished himself by noble zeal and courage
which knew no fear of man. His 10 Hymns contain echoes of
Valentinian views (§ 27, 4), and his philosophical tracts
are only to a small extent dominated by Christian ideas. His
155 Epistles are more valuable as illustrating on every hand
his noble character.
n. =Nemesius, Bishop of Emesa= in Phœnicia, lived in the
first half of the 5th century. He left behind a brilliant
treatise on religious philosophy, Περὶ φύσεως ἀνθρώπου. The
traditional doctrine of the Eastern church is unswervingly
set forth by him; still he too finds therein a place for
the eternity of the world, the pre-existence of the soul, a
migration of souls (excluding, however, the brute creation),
the unconditional freedom of the will, etc.
o. =Æneas of Gaza=, a disciple of the Neo-Platonist Hierocles
and a rhetorician in Alexandria, about A.D. 437 wrote a
dialogue directed against the Origenistic doctrines of the
eternity of the world and the pre-existence of the soul; as
also against the Neo-Platonic denial of the resurrection of
the body. It bore the title: Θεόφραστος.
§ 47.8. =The Antiocheans.=
a. =Eusebius of Emesa= was born at Edessa and studied in
Cæsarea and Antioch. A quiet, peaceful scholar, and one who
detested all theological wrangling, he declined the call to
the Alexandrian bishopric in place of the deposed Athanasius
in A.D. 341, but accepted the obscure bishopric of Emesa. He
was not, however, to be left here. When, on account of his
mathematical and astronomical attainments, the people there
suspected him of sorcery, he quitted Emesa and from that date
till his death in A.D. 360 taught in Antioch. Of his numerous
exegetical, dogmatical and polemical writings only a few
fragments are extant.
b. =Diodorus of Tarsus=, a scholar of the preceding, monk and
presbyter at Antioch, was afterwards bishop of Tarsus in
Cilicia, and died in A.D. 394. Only a few fragments of his
numerous writings survive. As an exegete he concerned himself
with the plain grammatico-historical sense and contested
the Alexandrian mode of interpretation in the treatise: Τίς
διαφορὰ θεωρίας καὶ ἀλληγορίας. By θεωρία he understands
insight into the relations transcending the bare literal
sense but yet essentially present in it as the ideal. By his
polemic against Apollinaris (§ 52, 1), he imprinted upon the
Antiochean school its specific dogmatic character (§ 52, 2),
in consequence of which he was at a later period regarded as
the original founder of the Nestorian party.
c. His scholar again was =John of Antioch=, whose proper name
afterwards almost disappeared before the honourable title of
=Chrysostom=. Educated by his early widowed mother Arethusa
with the greatest care, he attended the rhetoric school
of Libanius and started with great success as an advocate
in Antioch. But after receiving baptism he abandoned his
practice and became a monk. He was made deacon in A.D. 380
and presbyter in A.D. 386 in his native city. His brilliant
eloquence raised him at last in A.D. 398 to the patriarchal
chair at Constantinople (§ 51, 3). He died in exile in
A.D. 407. Next to Athanasius and the three Cappadocians
he is one of the most talented of the Eastern fathers, the
only one of the Antiochean school whose orthodoxy has never
been questioned. In his exegesis he follows the fundamental
principles of the Antiochean school. He wrote commentaries
on Isaiah (down to chap. viii. 10) and on Galatians. Besides
these his 650 Expository Homilies on all the Biblical books
and particular sections cover almost the whole of the Old
and New Testaments. Among his other dogmatical, polemical
and hortatory church addresses the most celebrated are the
21 _De Statuis ad populum Antiochen_, delivered in A.D. 387.
(The people of Antioch, roused on account of the exorbitant
tax demanded of them, had broken down the statues of
Theodosius I.) The _Demonstratio c. Julianum et Gentiles
quod Christus sit Deus_ and the _Liber in S. Babylam
c. Judæos et Gentiles_ are apologetical treatises. Of
his ethico-ascetic writings, in which he eagerly commends
virginity and asceticism, by far the most celebrated is
Περὶ ἱερωσύνης, _De Sacerdotis_, in 4 bks., in the form of
a dialogue with his Cappadocian friend Basil (the Great)
who in A.D. 370 had felt compelled to accept the bishopric
of Cæsarea after Chrysostom had escaped this honour by
flight.[140]
§ 47.9.
d. =Theodore, bishop of Mopsuestia= in Cilicia, was the
son of respectable parents in Antioch, the friend and
fellow-student of Chrysostom, first under Libanius, then
under Diodorus. He died in A.D. 429. It was he who gave
full development and consistent expression to the essential
dogmatic and hermeneutical principles of the Antiochean
theology. For this reason he was far more suspected of
heresy by his Alexandrian opponents than even his teacher
Diodorus, and they finally obtained their desire by the
formal condemnation of his person and writings at the fifth
œcumenical Synod in A.D. 553 (§ 52, 6). Leontius Byzantinus
formulated his exegetical offence by saying that in his
exposition he treated the Holy Scriptures precisely as
ordinary human writings, especially that he interpreted the
Song of Songs as a love poem, _libidinose pro sua et mente
et lingua meretricia_, explained the Psalms after the
manner of the Jews till he emptied them dry of all Messianic
contents, _Judaice ad Zorobabelem et Ezechiam retulit_,
denied the genuineness of the titles of the Psalms, rejected
the canonical authority of Job, the Chronicles and Ezra
as well as James and other Catholic Epistles, etc. In
every respect Theodore was one of the ablest exegetes of the
ancient church and the Syrian church has rightly celebrated
him as the _“Interpres” par excellence_. He set forth his
hermeneutical principles in the treatise: _De Allegoria
et Historia_. Of his exegetical writings we have still his
Comm. on the Minor Prophets, on Romans, fragments of those
on other parts of the New Testament. Latin translations of
his Comm. on the Minor Epp. of Paul, with the corresponding
Greek fragments, are edited by Swete, 2 vols., Cambr.,
1880, 1882. An introduction to Biblical Theology collected
from Theodore’s writings and reproduced in a Latin form by
Junilius Africanus (§ 48, 1) is still extant. His dogmatic,
polemical and apologetical works on the Incarnation
and Original Sin (§ 53, 4), against Eunomius (§ 50, 3),
Apollinaris (§ 52, 1) and the Emperor Julian (§ 42, 5),
are now known only from a few fragmentary quotations.
e. =Polychronius, bishop of Apamea=, was Theodore’s brother and
quite his equal in exegetical acuteness and productivity,
while he excelled him in his knowledge of the Hebrew and
Syriac. Tolerably complete scholia by him on Ezekiel, Daniel
and Job have been preserved in the Greek Catenæ (§ 48, 1).
In regard to Daniel he maintains firmly its historical
character and understands chap. vii. of Antiochus Epiphanes.
f. =Theodoret, bishop of Cyrus= in Syria, was Theodore’s ablest
disciple, the most versatile scholar and most productive
writer of his age, an original investigator and a diligent
pastor, an upright and noble character and a man who kept
the just mean amid the extreme tendencies of his times,--yet
even he could not escape the suspicion of heresy (§ 52, 3,
4, 6). He died in A.D. 457. As an exegete he followed the
course of grammatico-historical exposition marked out by
his Antiochean predecessors, but avoided the rationalistic
tendencies of his teacher. He commented on most of the
historical books of the Old Testament, on the Prophets, the
Song, which he understood allegorically of the church as
the bride of Christ, and on the Pauline Epistles. Among his
historical works the first place belongs to his continuation
of the history of Eusebius (§ 5, 1). His Φιλόθεος ἱστορία,
_Hist. religiosa_, gives a glowing description of the
lives of 33 celebrated ascetics of both sexes. Of higher
value is the Αἱρετικῆς κακομυθίας ἐπιτομή, _Hæreticarum
fabularum compendium_. His Ἑλληνικῶν θεραπευτικὴ παθημάτων,
_De Curandis Græcorum Affectionibus_, is an apologetical
treatise. His seven Dialogues _De s. Trinitate_ are polemics
against the Macedonians and Apollinarians. The _Reprehensio_
xii. _Anathematismorum_ is directed against Cyril of
Alexandria; and the Ἐρανιστὴς ἤτοι Πολύμορφος against
monophysitism as a heresy compounded of many heresies
(§ 52, 4). Besides these we have from him 179 Epistles.[141]
§ 47.10. =Other Teachers of the Greek Church during the 4th and
5th Centuries.=
a. =Cyril, bishop of Jerusalem=, from A.D. 351 to A.D. 386,
in the Arian controversy took the side of the conciliatory
semi-Arians and thus came into collision with his imperious
and decidedly Arian metropolitan Acacius of Cæsarea. During
a famine he sold the church furniture for distribution
among the needy, and was for this deposed by Acacius. Under
Julian he ventured to return, but under Valens he was again
driven out and found himself exposed to the persecution
of the Arians, which was all the more violent because in
the meantime he had assumed a more decided attitude toward
Nicene orthodoxy. At the death of Valens in A.D. 378 he
returned and became reconciled to the victorious maintainers
of the Homoousion by fully accepting the doctrine at the
Council of Constantinople in A.D. 381 (§ 50, 4). We still
have his 23 Catechetical Lectures delivered in A.D. 348 by
him as presbyter to the baptized at Jerusalem. The first
18 are entitled: Πρὸς τοὺς φωτιζομένους, _Ad Competentes_
(§ 35, 1); the last five: Πρὸς τοὺς νεοφωτίστους, _Catecheses
Mystagogicæ_, on Baptism, Anointing and the Lord’s Supper.
In their present form they afford but faint evidence of their
author having surmounted the semi-Arian standpoint.[142]
b. =Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis= or Constantia in Cyprus, was
born of Jewish parents in the Palestinian village Besanduce
and was baptized in his sixteenth year. His pious and
noble, but narrow and one-sided character was formed by his
education under the monks. He completed his ascetic training
by several years residence among the monks of the Scetic
desert, then founded a monastery in his native place over
which he presided for thirty years until in A.D. 367 he was
raised to the metropolitan’s chair at Salamis, where he died
in A.D. 403. In the discharge of his episcopal duties he
was a miracle of faithfulness and zeal, specially active and
self-denying in his care of the poor. But in the forefront
of all his thinking and acting there ever stood his glowing
zeal for ecclesiastical orthodoxy. The very soul of honour,
truth-loving and courageous, but credulous, positive, with
little knowledge of the world and human nature, and hence
not capable of penetrating to the bottom of complicated
affairs, he was all his days misused as a tool of the
intriguing Alexandrian Theophilus in the Origenistic
controversies (§ 51, 3). He was all the more easily won
to this from the fact that he had brought with him from
the Scetic desert the conviction that Origen was the prime
mover in the Arian and all other heresies. In spite of all
defects in form and contents his writings have proved most
serviceable for the history of the churches and heresies
of the first four centuries. The diligence and honourable
intention of his research in some measure compensate for
the bad taste and illogical character of his exposition and
for his narrow, one-sided and uncritical views. His Πανάριον
ἤτοι κιβώτιον κατὰ αἱρέσεων lxxx. is a full and learned
though confused and uncritical work, in which the idea
of heresy is so loosely defined that even the Samaritans,
Pharisees, Essenes, etc., find a place in it. He himself
composed an abridgment of it under the title: Ἀνακεφαλαίωσις.
His Ἀγκυρωτός is an exposition of the Catholic faith, which
during the tumults of the Arian controversy should serve
as an anchor of salvation to the Christians. The book Περὶ
μέτρων καὶ στάθμων, _De mensuris et ponderibus_, answers to
this title only in the last chapter, the 24th; the preceding
chapters treat of the Canon and translations of the Old
Testament. There are two old codices in the British Museum
which have in addition, in a Syriac translation, 37 chapters
on biblical weights and measures and 19 on the biblical
science of the heaven and the earth. The tract Περὶ τῶν
δώδεκα λίθων (on the high-priest’s breastplate) is of little
consequence.
c. =Palladius=, born in Galatia, retired at an early age into
the Nitrian desert, but lived afterwards in Palestine, where
he was accused of favouring the heresy of Origen (§ 51, 2).
Chrysostom consecrated him bishop of Hellenopolis in
Bithynia. Latterly he administered a small bishopric in
Galatia, where he died before A.D. 431. His chief writing
is the Πρὸς Λαῦσον ἱστορία, _Hist. Lausiaca_, a historical
romance on the hermit and monkish life of his times which is
dedicated to an eminent statesman called Lausus.
d. =Nilus=, sprung from a prominent family in Constantinople,
retired with his son Theodulus to the recluses of Mount
Sinai. By a murderous onslaught of the Saracens his beloved
son was snatched away from him, but an Arabian bishop bought
him and ordained both father and son as priests. He died
about A.D. 450. In his ascetical writings and specially
in the 4 books of his Epistles, about 1,000 in number,
he shows himself to be of like mind and character to his
companion Isidore, but with a deeper knowledge and more
sober conception of Holy Scripture. He himself describes
the capture of his son in _Narrationes de cæde monachorum
et captivitate Theoduli_.
§ 47.11. =Greek Church Fathers of the 6th and 7th Centuries.=
a. =Johannes Philoponus= was in the first half of the 6th
century teacher of grammar at Alexandria, and belonged to
the sect of tritheistic monophysites in that place (§ 52, 7).
Although trained in the Neo-Platonic school, he subsequently
applied himself enthusiastically to the Aristotelian
philosophy, composed many commentaries on Aristotle’s
writings, and was the first to apply the Aristotelian
categories to Christian theology. Notwithstanding many
heretical tendencies in his theology, among which is his
statement in a lost work, Περὶ ἀναστάσεως, that for the
saved at the last day entirely new bodies and an entirely
new world will be created, his philosophical writings
powerfully impelled the mediæval Greek Church to the study
of philosophy. His chief doctrinal treatise Διαιτητὴς ἢ περὶ
ἑνώσεως is known only from quotations in Leontius Byzantinus
and Johannes Damascenus. Of his other writings the most
important was the controversial treatise _Contra Procli
pro æternitate mundi argumenta_ in 18 bks. The 7 bks. Περὶ
κοσμοποίας treat of the six days’ work of creation with
great display of philosophical acuteness and acquaintance
with natural history.
b. =Dionysius the Areopagite.= Under this name (Acts xvii. 34)
an unknown writer, only a little earlier than the previously
named, published writings of a decidedly mystico-theosophical
kind. The first mention of them is at a conference of
the monophysite Severians (§ 52, 7) with the Catholics
at Constantinople in A.D. 533, where the former referred
to them, while the other side denied their authenticity.
Subsequently, however, they were universally received as
genuine, not only in the East but also in the West. They
comprise four tracts: 1. Περὶ τῆς ἱεραρχίας οὐρανίου;
2. Περὶ τῆς ἱεραρχίας ἐκκλησιαστικῆς; 3. Περὶ τῶν θείων
ὀνομάτων; 4. Περὶ τῆς μυστικῆς θεολογίας; and also 12 Epp.
to Apostolic men. Their author was a Monophysite-Christian
Neo-Platonist, who transferred the secret arts of the
Dionysian mysteries to Christian worship, monasticism,
hierarchy and church doctrines. He distinguished a θεολογία
καταφατική, which consisted in symbolic representations,
from a θεολογία ἀποφατική, which surmounted the symbolical
shell and rose to the perception of the pure idea by means
of ecstasy. Side by side with the revealed doctrine of Holy
Scripture he sets a secret doctrine, the knowledge of which
is reached only by initiation. The primal mystagogue, who
like the sun enlightens all spirits, is the divine hierarch
Christ, and the primitive type of all earthly order in the
heavenly hierarchy as represented in the courses of angels
and glorified spirits. There is constant intercourse between
the earthly and heavenly hierarchies by means of Christ the
highest hierarch incarnate. The purpose of this intercourse
is the drawing out of the θείωσις of man by means of
priestly consecration and the mysteries (_i.e._ the
Sacraments of which he reckons six, § 58). The θείωσις
has its foundation in baptism as consecration to the
divine birth, τελετὴ θεογενεσίας, and its completion in
consecration of the dead, the anointing of the body. The
historical Christ with His redeeming life, sufferings and
death is at no time the subject of the Areopagite mysticism.
It is always concerned with the heavenly Christ, not about
the reconciliation but only about the mystical living
fellowship of God and man, about the immediate vision and
enjoyment of God’s glory. The monophysite standpoint of the
author betrays itself in his tendency to think of the human
nature of Christ as absorbed by the divine. His Christian
Neo-Platonism appears in his fantastic speculations about
the nature of God, the orders of angels and spirits, etc.;
while his antagonism to the pagan Neo-Platonism is seen
in his regarding the θείωσις not as a natural power proper
to and dwelling in man, but as a supernatural power made
possible by the ἐνσάρκωσις of Christ, but still more
expressly by his emphatic assertion over against the
Neo-Platonic depreciation of the body, of the resurrection
of the flesh as the completion of the θείωσις. Hence also
the importance which he attaches to the sacrament of the
consecration of the dead.[143]
§ 47.12.
c. =Leontius Byzantinus=, at first an advocate at
Constantinople, subsequently a monk at Jerusalem, wrote
about the end of the 6th century controversial tracts against
Nestorians, Monophysites and Apollinarians, and in his
_Scholia s. Liber de sectis_ presented a historico-polemical
summary of all heresies up to that time.
d. =Maximus Confessor=, the scion of a well-known family of
Constantinople, was for a long time private secretary to
the Emperor Heraclius, but retired about A.D. 630 from love
of a contemplative life into a monastery at Chrysopolis
near Constantinople, where he was soon raised to the rank of
abbot. The further details of his story are given in § 52, 8.
He died in A.D. 662. In decision of character, fidelity
to his convictions and courage as a confessor during
the Monothelete controversy, he stands out among his
characterless countrymen and contemporaries as a rock in the
ocean. In scientific endowments and comprehensive learning,
in depth and wealth of thought there is none like him,
although even in him the weakness of the age, especially
slavish submission to authority, is quite apparent. His
scientific theology is built up mainly upon the three great
Cappadocians, among whom the speculative Nyssa has most
influence over him. His dialectic acuteness and subtlety he
derived from the study of Aristotle, while his imaginative
nature and the intensity of his emotional life which
predestined him to be a mystic, found abundant nourishment
and satisfaction in the writings of Dionysius. He was saved,
however, by the manysidedness of his mind and the soundness
of his whole life’s tendencies, from many eccentricities of
the Areopagite mysticism, so that in his humility he thought
that his soul was not pure enough to be able fully to
penetrate and comprehend these mysteries. His numerous
writings, of which more than fifty are extant, were in
great part occasioned by the struggle against Monophysitism
and Monotheletism. His mystico-ascetic writings are
also important, such as his Μυσταγωγία, treatises on the
symbolico-mystic meaning of the acts of church worship, his
epistles and several beautiful hymns. He also wrote scholia
and commentaries on the works of the Areopagite. He is
weakest in exegesis, where the most wilful allegorizing
prevails.
e. =Johannes Climacus=, abbot of the monastery at Sinai, died
at an extremely old age in A.D. 606. Under the title Κλίμαξ
τοῦ παραδείσου, _Heavenly Guide_, he composed a directory
toward perfection in the Christian life in thirty steps,
which became a favourite reading book of pious monks.
f. =Johannes Moschus= was a monk in a cloister at Jerusalem.
Accompanying his friend Sophronius, afterwards patriarch of
Jerusalem (§ 52, 8), he travelled through Egypt and the East,
visiting all the pious monks and clerics. At last he reached
Rome, where he wrote an account in his Λειμονάριον ἤτοι νέος
παραδείσος, _Pratum Spirituale_, of the edifying discourses
which he had had with famous monks during his travels, and
soon thereafter, in A.D. 619, he died.
g. =Anastasius Sinaita=, called the new Moses, because like
Moses he is said to have seen God, was priest and dweller
on Mount Sinai at the end of the 7th century. His chief work
Ὁδηγός, _Viæ duæ_, is directed against the _Acephalians_
(§ 52, 5) and his _Contemplationes_ preserved only in a
Latin translation give an allegorico-mystical exposition of
the Hexæmeron.
§ 47.13. =Syrian Church Fathers.=[144]
a. =Jacob of Nisibis=, as bishop of his native city and founder
of the theological school there, performed most important
services to the national Syrian Church. At the Council of
Nicæa in A.D. 325 he distinguished himself by vindicating
the homoüsion and also subsequently we find him sometimes in
the front rank of the champions of Nicene orthodoxy. Of his
writings none are known to us. He died in A.D. 338.
b. =Aphraates= was celebrated in his time as a Persian sage.
As bishop of St. Matthew near Mosul he adopted the Christian
name of =Mar Jacob=, and dedicated his 23 Homilies, which
are rather instructions or treatises, to a certain Gregory.
He wrote them between A.D. 336 and A.D. 345. The _Sermones_
ascribed even by Gennadius at the end of the 5th century
to Nisibis were composed by Aphraates. Although he lived
when the Arian controversy was at its height, there is no
reference to it in his treatises, which may be explained by
his geographical isolation. The polemic against the Jews to
which seven tracts are devoted _ex professo_, was one which
specially interested him.
c. =Ephraim the Syrian=,[145] called, on account of his
importance in the Syrian Church, _Propheta Syrorum_, was
born at Nisibis and was called by the bishop Jacob to
be teacher of the school founded there by him. When the
Persians under Sapor in A.D. 350 plundered the city and
destroyed the school, Ephraim retired to Edessa, founded a
school there, administered the office of deacon, and died
at a great age in A.D. 378. As an exegete he indulged to his
heart’s content in typology, but in other respects mostly
followed the grammatico-historical method with a constant
endeavour after what was edifying. Many of his writings have
been lost. Those remaining partly in the Syriac original,
partly in Greek and Latin translations, have been collected
by the brothers Assemani. They comprise Commentaries on
almost the whole Bible, Homilies and Discourses in metrical
form on a variety of themes, of these 56 are against
heretics (Gnostics, Manichæans, Eunomians, Audians, etc.),
and Hymns properly so called, especially funeral Odes.
d. =Ibas, bishop of Edessa=, at first teacher in the high
school there, translated the writings of Diodorus and
Theodore into Syriac, and thus brought down upon himself
the charge of being a Nestorian. Having been repeatedly
drawn into discussion, and being naturally outspoken, he was
excommunicated and deposed at the Robber Synod of Ephesus in
A.D. 449, but his orthodoxy was acknowledged by the Council
of Chalcedon in A.D. 451, after he had pronounced anathema
upon Nestorius. He died in A.D. 457. An epistle, in which
he gives an account of these proceedings to Bishop Meris of
Hardashir in Persia, led to a renewal of his condemnation
before the fifth œcumenical Council at Constantinople in
A.D. 553 (§ 52, 4, 6).
e. =Jacob, bishop of Edessa=, a monophysite, is the
most important and manysided among the later Syrians,
distinguished as theologian, historian, grammarian and
translator of the Greek fathers. He died in A.D. 708. Of his
works still extant in MS.--scholia on the Bible, liturgical
works and treatises on church law, revision of the Syrian
Old Testament according to the LXX., continuation of the
Eusebian Chronicle, etc.--only a few have been printed.
2. THE MOST IMPORTANT TEACHERS OF THE WESTERN CHURCH.
§ 47.14.
f. =During the Period of the Arian Controversy.=
a. =Jul. Firmicus Maternus.= Under this name we have a
treatise _De errore profanarum religionum_, addressed to
the sons of Constantine the Great, in which the writer
combats heathenism upon the Euhemerist theory (which
traces the worship of the heathen gods from the deifying
of famous ancestors), but besides reclaims many myths as
corruptions of the biblical history, and shows that the
violent overthrow of all idolatry is the sacred duty of
a Christian ruler from God’s command to Joshua to destroy
utterly the Canaanites.
b. =Lucifer of Calăris [Calaris]= in Sardinia, was a
violent, determined, and stubborn zealot for the Nicene
doctrine, whose excessive severity against the penitent
Arians and semi-Arians drove him into schism (§ 50, 8).
He died in A.D. 371. In his tract, _Ad Constantium
Augustum pro S. Athansio_, lb. ii., written in A.D. 360,
he upbraids the emperor with his faults so bitterly as
to describe him as a reckless apostate, antichrist, and
Satan. He boldly acknowledged the authorship and, in
prospect of a death sentence, wrote in A.D. 361 his
consolatory treatise, _Moriendum esse pro filio Dei_.
The early death of the emperor, however, permitted his
return from exile (§ 50, 2, 4), where he had written
_De regibus apostaticis_ and _De non conveniendo cum
hæreticis_.
c. =Marius Victorinus= from Africa, often confounded with
the martyr of the same name (§ 31, 12), was converted
to Christianity when advanced in life, about A.D. 360,
while occupying a distinguished position as a heathen
rhetorician in Rome. He gave proof of his zeal as a
neophyte by the composition of controversial treatises
against the Manichæans, _Ad Justinum Manichæum_, and
against the Arians, _Lb. iv. adv. Arium, De generatione
divina ad Candidum, De_ ὁμοουσίῳ _recipiendo_. In his
treatise, _De verbis scripturæ_, Gen. i. 5, he shows
that the creative days began not with the evening, but
with the morning. He composed three hymns _de Trinitate_,
and an epic poem on the seven brothers, the Maccabees.
d. =Hilary of Poitiers=--_Hilarius Pictavienses_--styled
the Athanasius of the West, and made _doctor ecclesiæ_
by Pius IX. in A.D. 1851, was sprung from a noble pagan
family of Poitiers (Pictavium). With wife and daughter
he embraced Christianity, and was soon thereafter,
about A.D. 350, made bishop of his native city. In
A.D. 356, however, as a zealous opponent of Arianism,
he was banished to Phrygia, from which he returned in
A.D. 360. Two years later he travelled to Milan, in
order if possible to win from his error the bishop of
that place, Auxentius, a zealous Arian. That bishop,
however, obtained an imperial edict which obliged him
instantly to withdraw. He died in A.D. 366. The study
of Origen seems to have had a decided influence upon
his theological development. His strength lay in the
speculative treatment of the groundworks of doctrine. At
the same time he is the first exegete proper among the
Western fathers writing the Latin language. He follows
exactly the allegorical method of the Alexandrians. His
works embrace commentaries on the Psalms and the Gospel
of Matthew, several polemical lectures (§ 50, 6), and
his speculative dogmatic masterpiece _de Trinitate_
in xii. books.
e. =Zeno, bishop of Verona=, who died about A.D. 380,
left behind ninety-three _Sermones_ which, in beautiful
language and spirited style, treat of various subjects
connected with faith and morals, combat paganism and
Arianism, and eagerly recommend virginity and monasticism.
f. =Philaster=, bishop of Brescia, contemporary of Zeno, in
his book _De hæresibus_, described in harsh and obscure
language, in an uncritical fashion and with an extremely
loose application of the word heresy, 28 pre-Christian
and 128 post-Christian systems of error.
g. =Martin of Tours=,[146] son of a soldier, had before
baptism, but after his heart had been filled with the
love of Christ, entered the Roman cavalry. Once, legend
relates, he parted his military cloak into two pieces in
order to shield a naked beggar from the cold, and on the
following night the Lord Jesus appeared to him clothed in
this very cloak. In his eighteenth year he was baptized,
and for some years thereafter attached himself to Hilary
of Poitiers, and then went to his parents in Pannonia.
He did not succeed in converting his father, but he
was successful with his mother and many of the people.
Scourged and driven away by the Arian party which there
prevailed, he turned to Milan where, however, he got
just as little welcome from the Arian bishop Auxentius.
He then lived some years on the island of Gallinaria,
near Genoa. When Hilary returned from banishment to
Pictavium, he followed him there, and founded in the
neighbourhood a monastery, the earliest in Gaul. He was
guilefully decoyed to Tours, and forced to mount the
episcopal chair there in A.D. 375. He converted whole
crowds of heathen peasants, and, according to the
legend given by Sulpicius Severus and Gregory of Tours
(§ 90, 2), wrought miracle after miracle. But he was
himself with his holy zeal, his activity in doing good,
his undoubted power over men’s hearts, and a countenance
before which even the emperor quailed (§ 54, 2), the
greatest and the most credible miracle. He died about
A.D. 400 in the monastery of Marmontiers [Marmoutiers],
which he had founded out from Tours. His tomb was
one of the most frequented places of pilgrimage. He
was wholly without scholarly culture, but the force
of intellect with which he was endowed lent him a
commanding eloquence. The _Confessio de s. Trinitate_
attributed to him is not genuine.
§ 47.15.
g. =Ambrose, bishop of Milan=, sprung from a prominent Roman
family, was governor of the province of Milan. After the
death of the Arian Auxentius in A.D. 374 violent quarrels
broke out over the choice of a successor. Then a child is
said to have cried from the midst of the crowd “Ambrose is
bishop,” and all the people, Arians as well as Catholics,
agreed. All objection was vain. Up to this time only a
catechumen, he received baptism, distributed his property
among the poor, and eight days after mounted the episcopal
chair. His new office he administered with truly apostolic
zeal, a father of the poor, a protector of all oppressed,
an unweariedly active pastor, a powerful opponent of heresy
and heathenism. His eloquence, which had won him a high
reputation in the forum, was yet more conspicuous in the
service of the church. To ransom the prisoners he spared not
even the furniture of the church. To a peculiarly winning
friendliness and gentleness he added great strength of
character, which prevented him being checked in his course
by any respect of persons, or by any threatening and danger.
He so decidedly opposed the intrigues of the Arian Empress
Justina, during the minority of her son Valentinian II.,
that she, powerless to execute her wrath, was obliged to
desist from her endeavours (§ 50, 4). With Theodosius the
Great he stood in the highest esteem. When the passionate
emperor had ordered a fearful massacre without distinction of
rank, age and sex, without enquiry as to guilt or innocence,
of the inhabitants of Thessalonica on account of a tumult
in which a general and several officers had been murdered,
Ambrose wrote him a letter with an earnest call to repentance,
and threatened him with exclusion from the communion of the
church and its services. The emperor, already repenting of
his hastiness, took patiently the rebuke administered, but
did nothing to atone for his crime. Some time after he went
as usual to church, but Ambrose met him at the entrance of
the house of God and refused him admission. For eight months
the emperor refrained from communion; then he applied for
absolution, which was granted him, after he had publicly done
penance before the congregation and promised never in future
to carry out a death sentence within thirty days of its being
pronounced. Theodosius afterwards declared that Ambrose was
the only one truly deserving the name of a bishop. Ambrose
was also a zealous promoter of monasticism in the West.
In his sermons he so powerfully recommended virginity
that many families forbade their daughters attending them.
He deserves special credit for his contributions to the
liturgical services (_Officium Ambrosianum_, _Cantus Ambr._,
Hymn Composition, § 59, 4-6). On all dogmatic questions he
strongly favoured the realism of the North African school,
while in exegesis he did not surmount the allegorical
method of the Alexandrians. To the department of morals
and ascetics belong the 3 bks. _De Officiis Ministrorum_,
a Christian construction of Cicero’s celebrated work and
the most important of all Ambrose’s writings; also several
treatises in recommendation of virginity. The book _De
Mysteriis_ explains baptism and the Lord’s Supper to the
neophytes. The 5 bks. _De fide_, the 3 bks. _De Spiritu S._
and the tract _De incarnatîonis sacramento_, treat of the
fundamental doctrines of the Christian faith in opposition
to Arians, Sabellians, Apollinarians, etc. These are
somewhat dependent upon the Greeks, especially Athanasius,
Didymus and Basil. His expositions of Old Testament histories
(_Hexaëmeron_, _De Paradiso_, _De Cain et Abel_, _De Noë
et arca_, _De Abraham_, _De Jacob et anima_, etc.) are
allegorical and typical in the highest degree. More important
are his _Sermones_ and 92 Epistles. But all his writings are
distinguished by their noble, powerful and popular eloquence.
h. =Ambrosiaster= is the name given to an unknown writer
whose allegorizing Commentary on Paul’s Epistles was long
attributed to Ambrose. This work, highly popular on account
of its pregnant brevity, was perhaps the joint work of
several writers. In its earliest portions it belongs to
the age of Damasus, bishop of Rome, who died in A.D. 384,
who is named as a contemporary. Augustine names a Hilary,
not otherwise known, as author of a passage quoted from it.
i. =Pacianus=,[147] bishop of Barcelona, who died about
A.D. 390, wrote in a clear style and correct Latinity three
Epistles against the Novatians, from the first of which,
_De Catholico nomine_, is borrowed the beautiful saying:
_Christianus mihi nomen est, Catholicus cognomen_. He also
wrote a _Liber exhortatorius ad pœnitentiam_ and a _Sermo
de baptismo_.
§ 47.16. =During the Period of Origenistic Controversy.=
a. =Jerome=[148]--_Sophronius Eusebius Hieronymus_--of Stridon
in Dalmatia, received his classical training under the
grammarian Donatus at Rome. In A.D. 360 he was baptized by
bishop Liberius, but afterwards fell into sensual excesses
which he atoned for by penitential pilgrimages to the
catacombs. During a journey through Gaul and the provinces
of the Rhine and Moselle he seems to have formed the fixed
resolve to devote himself to theology and an ascetic life.
Then for more than a year he stayed at Aquileia, A.D. 372,
where he formed an intimate friendship with Rufinus. He next
undertakes a journey to the East. At Antioch in a vision,
during a violent fever, placed before the throne of the
judge of all, having answered the question Who art thou? by
the confession that he was a Christian, he heard the words
distinctly uttered: Thou liest! thou art a Ciceronian and no
Christian! He then sentenced himself to severe castigation
and promised with an oath to give up the reading of the
heathen classics which he had so much enjoyed. He afterwards
indeed excused himself from the fulfilment of this twofold
obligation; but this had sealed his devotion to an ascetic
life, and the desert of Chalcis, the Syrian Thebaid, became
for him during many years the school of ascetic discipline.
Worn out with privations, penances and sensual temptations
he returned in A.D. 379 to Antioch, where he was ordained
presbyter but without any official district being assigned.
Urged by Gregory of Nazianzum [Nazianzen], he next spent
several years in Constantinople. From A.D. 382 to A.D. 385
he again lived in Rome, where bishop Damasus honoured him
with his implicit confidence. This aroused against him the
envy and enmity of many among the Roman clergy, while at
the same time his zeal for the spread of monasticism and
virginity, as well as his ascetic influence with women, drew
upon him the hatred of many prominent families (§ 44, 4). On
the death of his episcopal patron in A.D. 384 his position
in Rome thus became untenable. He now returned to the East,
visited all the holy places in Palestine, and also made
an excursion to Alexandria where he stayed for four weeks
in the school of the blind Didymus. He then settled down at
Bethlehem, founded there with the means of his Roman lady
friends an establishment for monks, over which he presided
till his death in A.D. 420; and an establishment for
nuns over which St. Paula presided, who with her daughter
Eustochium had accompanied him from Rome. As to his share
in the Origenistic controversies into which he allowed
himself to be drawn, see § 51, 2. His character was not
without defects: vanity, ambition, jealousy, passionateness,
impatience and intense bitterness in debate, are only all
too apparent in his life. But where these, as well as his
scrupulous anxiety for the maintaining of a reputation
for unwavering orthodoxy and by zeal for monasticism
and asceticism, did not stand in the way, we often find
in him an unexpected clearness and liberality of view.
Comp. § 17, 6; 57, 6; 59, 1; 61, 1. To the instructions
of the Jew Bar Hanina he was indebted for his knowledge
of Hebrew and Chaldee. The greatest and most enduring
service was rendered to the study of holy scripture by his
pioneer labours in this direction. He is at his weakest
in his dogmatic works, which mostly are disfigured by
immoderately passionate polemic. In exegesis he represents
the grammatico-historical method, but nevertheless
frequently falls back again into allegorico-mystical
explanations. His style is pure, flowing and elegant, but
in polemic often reckless and coarse even to vulgarity. In
the department of exegesis the first place belongs to his
translation of the bible (§ 59, 1). We have also a number
of Commentaries--on Genesis, Ecclesiastes, Isaiah, Jeremiah,
Ezekiel, Daniel, Minor Prophets, Matthew, Galatians,
Ephesians, Philippians and Philemon. His _Onomasticon s. de
situ et nominibus locorum Hebr._ is a Latin reproduction of
the Τοπικά of Eusebius. In the department of dogmatics we
have polemics against Lucifer of Calaris (§ 50, 3), against
Helvidius, Jovinian and Vigilantius (§ 63, 2), against John
of Jerusalem (§ 51, 2) and in several treatises against
Rufinus, and finally against the Pelagians (§ 53, 4). In
the department of history we have his Latin adaptation and
continuation of the second part of the Eusebian Chronicle,
his _Catalogus Scriptorum ecclest. s. de viris illustr._,
which tells in anecdotal form about the lives and writings
of biblical and ecclesiastical writers, 135 in number,
from Peter down to himself, with the avowed purpose of
proving the falseness of the reproach that only ignorant
and uncultured men had embraced Christianity. It was
afterwards continued by the Gaul =Gennadius= of Marseilles
down to the end of the fifth century. Finally, the romancing
legendary sketches of the lives of the famous monks Paul of
Thebes (§ 39, 4), Hilarion (§ 44, 3) and Malchus, were added.
His 150 Epistles are extremely important for the church
history of his times. Of his translations of the Greek
fathers only those of Didymus, _De Spiritu S._ and that
of 70 _Homilies_ of Origen, are now extant.
§ 47.17.
b. =Tyrannius Rufinus= of Aquileia after receiving baptism
lived for a long time in monastic retirement. His enthusiasm
for monasticism and asceticism led him in A.D. 373 to Egypt.
At Alexandria he spent several years in intercourse with
Didymus. He contracted there that enthusiastic admiration
of Origen which made his after life so full of debate and
strife. He next went in A.D. 379 to Jerusalem, where bishop
John ordained him presbyter. Here he found Jerome, with whom
he had become acquainted at Aquileia, and the two friends
were brought more closely together from their mutual love for
Origen, although afterwards this was to prove the occasion of
the most bitter enmity (§ 51, 2). About A.D. 397 he returned
to Italy. He died in A.D. 410. His literary activity was
mainly directed to the transplanting of the writings of
Greek fathers to Latin soil. To his zeal in this direction
we owe the preservation of Origen’s most important work Περὶ
ἀρχῶν, _De principiis_, and of no fewer than 124 Homilies.
The former, indeed, has been in many places altered in an
arbitrary manner. He also translated several Homilies of
Basil and Gregory Nazianzen, Pamphilus’ Apology for Origen,
the Pseudo-Clementine Recognitions (§ 28, 3), etc. There
are extant of his own works: the Continuation of his Latin
reproduction of the Church History of Eusebius, down to
A.D. 388, the romancing _Historia eremitica s. Vitæ Patrum_,
biographies of 33 saints of the Nitrian desert (§ 51, 1),
an _Apologia pro fide sua_, the _Invectivæ Hieron._ in
2 bks. the treatise _De benedictionibus Patriarcharum_,
an exposition of Genesis xlix. in the spirit and style of
Origen, and an _Expositio symboli apost._
c. =Sulpicius Severus=[149] from Aquitania in Gaul, had gained
great reputation by his eloquence as an advocate, when the
death of his young wife disgusted him with the world, and
led him to withdraw into a monastery. He died about A.D. 410.
In his _Chronica_ or _Historia sacra_ (§ 5, 1), a summary
of biblical and ecclesiastical history, he imitates not
unsuccessfully the eloquence of Sallust, so that he has
been called “the Christian Sallust.” His _Vita_ of Martin
of Tours is a panegyric overflowing with reports of miracles.
The three dialogues on the virtues of Eastern Monks and on
the merits of St. Martin, may be regarded as a supplement to
the _Vita_.
d. =Petrus [Peter] Chrysologus= is the name by which Peter,
bishop of Ravenna, is best known. He also received the title
_Chrysostomus Latinorum_. He died in A.D. 450. Among the
176 _Sermones_ ascribed to him, the discourses expository
of the baptismal formula are deserving of special mention.
Of his Epistles, one in Latin and Greek addressed to Eutyches
(§ 52, 4) is still preserved, in which the writer warns
Eutyches against doctrinal errors.
§ 47.18. =The Hero of the Soteriological
Controversy.=--=Augustine=--_Aurelius Augustinus_--was born in
A.D. 354 at Tagaste in Numidia. From his pious mother Monica he
early received Christian religious impressions which, however,
were again in great measure effaced by his pagan father the
_Decurio_ Patricius. While he studied in Carthage, he gave way
to sensuality and worldly pleasure. Cicero’s Hortensius first
awakened again in him a longing after higher things. From about
A.D. 374 he sought satisfaction in the tenets of the Manichæan
sect, strongly represented in Africa, and for ten years he
continued a catechumen of that order. But here, too, at last
finding himself cruelly deceived in his struggle after the
knowledge of the truth, he would have sunk into the most utter
scepticism, had not the study of the Platonic philosophy still for
awhile held him back. In A.D. 383 he left Africa and went to Rome,
and in the following year he took up his residence in Milan as a
teacher of eloquence. An African bishop, once himself a Manichæan,
had comforted his anxious mother, who followed him hither, by
assuring her that the son of so many sighs and prayers could
not be finally lost. At Milan too the sermons of Ambrose made
an impression on Augustine’s heart. He now began diligently to
search the scriptures. At last the hour arrived of his complete
renewal of heart and life. After an earnest conversation with
his friend Alypius, he hastened into the solitude of the garden.
While agonizing in prayer he heard the words thrice repeated:
_Tolle, lege_! He took up the scriptures, and his eye fell upon
the passage Rom. xiii. 13, 14. This utterance of stern Christian
morality seemed as if written for himself alone, and from this
moment he received into his wounded spirit a peace such as he had
never known before. In order to prepare for baptism he withdrew
with his mother and some friends to the country house of one of
them, where scientific studies, pious exercises and conversations
on the highest problems of life occupied his time. Out of
these conversations sprang his philosophical writings. At
Easter A.D. 387 Ambrose baptized him, and at the same time his
illegitimate son Adeodatus, who not long afterwards died. His
return journey to Africa was delayed by the death of his mother
at Ostia, and at last, after almost a year’s residence in Rome,
he reached his old home again. In Rome he applied himself to
combat the errors of Manichæism, arguing with many of his old
companions whom he met there. After his return to Africa in
A.D. 388, he spent some years on his small patrimonial estate
at Tagaste engaged in scientific work. During a casual visit to
Hippo in A.D. 391 he was, in spite of all resistance, ordained
presbyter, and in A.D. 395 colleague of the aged and feeble
bishop Valerius, whose successor he became in the following year.
Now began the brilliant period of his career, in which he stands
forth as a pillar of the church and the centre of all theological
and ecclesiastical life throughout the whole Western world. In
A.D. 400 began his battle against the Donatists (§ 63, 1). And
scarcely had he brought this to a successful end in a religious
discussion at Carthage in A.D. 411, when he was drawn into a far
more important Soteriological controversy by Pelagius and his
followers (§ 53), which he continued till the close of his life.
His death occurred in A.D. 430 during the siege of Carthage by
the Vandals. He has written his own life in his _Confessiones_
(Engl. translat., Oxf., 1838; Edin., 1876). In the form of an
address to God he here unfolds before the Omniscient One his
whole past life with all its errors and gracious providences
in the language of prayer full of the holiest earnestness and
most profound humility, a lively commentary on the opening
words: _Magnus es, Domine, et laudabilis valde.... Fecisti nos
ad te, et inquietum est cor nostrum, donec requiescat in te._
The biography of his disciple Possidius may serve as a supplement
to the Confessions.--Augustine was the greatest, most powerful,
and most influential of all the fathers. In consequence of his
thoroughly Western characteristics he was indeed less perfectly
understood and appreciated in the East; but all the greater was
his reputation in the West, where the whole development of church
and doctrine seemed always to move about him as its centre. The
main field of his literary activity in consequence of his own
peculiar mental qualities, his philosophical culture, speculative
faculty, and dialectic skill, as well as the ecclesiastical
conflicts of his time, to which his most important works are
devoted, was Systematic Theology, Dogmatics and Ethics, Polemics
and Apologetics. He is weakest as an exegete; for he had little
interest in philological and grammatico-historical research into
the simple literal sense of scripture. He was unacquainted with
the original language of the Old Testament, and even the New
Testament he treats only in a popular way according to the Latin
translations. Neither does he deal much with the exegetical
foundations of dogmatics, which he rather develops from the
Christian consciousness by means of speculation and dialectic,
and from the proof of its meeting the needs of humanity. Over
against philosophy he insisted upon the independence and
necessity of faith as the presupposition and basis of all
religious knowledge. _Rationabiliter dictum est per prophetam:
Nisi credideretis non intelligetis. Credamus ut id quod credimus
intelligere valeamus._
§ 47.19. =Augustine’s Works.=
a. =Philosophical Treatises= belonging to the period preceding
his ordination. The 3 bks. _Contra Academicos_ combat
their main position that men cannot attain to any certain
knowledge; the treatise _De Vita beata_ shows that true
happiness consists in the knowledge of God; the 2 bks. _De
Ordine_ treat of the relation of good and evil in the divine
order of the world; the 2 bks. _Soliloquia_ are monologues
on the means and conditions of the knowledge of supernatural
truths, and contain beside the main question an Appendix _De
immortalitate animæ_, etc.
b. =Dogmatic Treatises.= The most important are: _De Trinitate_
in 15 bks. (Engl. transl., Edin., 1874), a speculative
dogmatic construction of the dogma, of great importance
for its historical development; _De doctrina christiana_
in 4 bks. (Engl. transl., Edin., 1875), of which the first
three bks. form a guide to the exposition of scripture after
the analogy of faith, while the 4th book shows how the truth
thus discovered is to be used (Hermeneutics and Homiletics);
finally, the two bks. _Retractationes_, written in his
last years, in which he passes an unfavourable judgment
on his earlier writings, and withdraws or modifies much in
them. Among his =Moral-ascetic writings= the bk. _De bono
conjugali_ is of special interest, called forth by Jovinian’s
utterances on non-meritoriousness of the unmarried state
(§ 62, 2); he admits the high value of Christian marriage,
but yet sees in celibacy genuinely chosen as a means to
holiness a higher step in the Christian life. Also the
bk. _De adulterinis conjugis_ against second marriages,
and two treatises _De Mendacium_ and _Contra Mendacium ad
Consentium_, which in opposition to the contrary doctrine
of the Priscillianists (§ 54, 2), unconditionally repudiates
the admissibility of equivocation.
c. =Controversial Treatises.= Of 11 treatises against the
Manichæans (§ 54, 1) the most important is that _C. Faustum_
in 33 bks. (Engl. transl., Edin., 1875), interesting as
reproducing in quotations the greater part of the last work
of this great champion of the Manichæans. Then came the
discussion with the Donatists (§ 63, 1), which he engaged
in with great vigour. We have ten treatises directed against
them (Engl. transl., Edin., 1873). Of far greater importance
was the conflict which soon after broke out against the
Pelagians and then against the semi-Pelagians (§ 53, 4, 5),
in which he wrote fourteen treatises (Engl. transl.,
3 vols., Edin., 1873-1876). Also the Arians, Priscillianists,
Origenists and Marcionites were combated by him in special
treatises, and in the bk. _De hæresibus_ he gave a summary
account of the various heresies that had come under his
notice.
d. Among his =Apologetical Treatises= against pagans and
Jews, by far the ablest and most important is the work _De
Civitate Dei_, in 22 bks., a truly magnificent conception
(Engl. transl., 2 vols., Edin., 1873), the most substantial
of all apologetical works of Christian antiquity, called
forth by the reproach of the heathens that the repeated
successes of the barbarians resulted from the weakening and
deteriorating influence of Christianity upon the empire.
The author repels this reproach in the first four bks.
by showing how the Roman empire had previously in itself
the seeds of decay in its godless selfishness, and thence
advancing immorality; Ilium was and continued pagan, but
its gods could not save it from destruction. Ilium’s Epigone,
haughty Rome, meets the same fate. It owed its power only to
God’s will and His government of the world, and to His using
it as a scourge for the nations. The next five books show
the corruption of the heathen religions and the inadequacy
of heathen philosophy. Then the last 12 bks. point out
the contrast between the kingdom of God and the kingdom
of the world in respect of their diverse foundations,
their entirely different motive powers, their historical
development and their ultimate disposal in the last judgment.
e. The most important and complete of his =Exegetical Works=
are the 12 bks. _De Genesi ad litteram_, a gigantic
commentary on the three first chapters of Genesis, which
in spite of its title very often leaves the firm ground
of the literal sense to revel in the airy regions of
spiritualistic and mystical expatiation. Of his _Sermones_,
400 are recognised as genuine (Engl. transl., Hom. on N.T.,
2 vols., Oxf., 1844 f.; Hom. on John and 1st John, 2 vols.,
Oxf., 1848; Comm. on Psalms, 6 vols., Oxf., 1847 f.; Harmony
of Evangelists, and Serm. on Mt., Edin., 1874; Commentary
on John, 2 vols., Edin., 1875). His correspondence still
preserved comprises 270 Epistles (Engl. transl., 2 vols.,
Edin., 1874, 1876).
§ 47.20. =Augustine’s Disciples and Friends.=
a. =Paulinus=, deacon of Milan, who wrote, at Augustine’s
request, the life of Ambrose, awakened in A.D. 411 the
Pelagian controversy by the charges which he made, and
took part in it himself by writing in A.D. 417 the _Libellus
c. Cœlestium ad Zosimum Papam_.
b. =Paulus [Paul] Orosius=, a Spanish presbyter, who visited
Augustine in Africa in A.D. 415 to urge him to combat
Priscillianism, took part with him there in his conflict
with the Pelagians. He has left behind a _Commonitorium de
errore Priscillianistarum et Origenistarum ad Augustinum_;
an _Apologeticus de arbitrii libertate c. Pelagium_ and
_Hist. adv. Paganos_ in 7 bks. The last named work was
written at Augustine’s urgent entreaty, and pursues in a
purely historical manner the same end which Augustine in his
_City of God_ sought to reach in a dogmatico-apologetic way.
c. =Marius Mercator= was a learned and acute layman, belonging
to the West, but latterly resident in Constantinople. He
made every effort to secure the condemnation of Pelagianism
even in the East, and so wrote not only against its Western
leaders but also against its Antiochean supporters, Nestorius
and Theodore of Mopsuestia (§ 53, 4).
d. =Prosper Aquitanicus=, also a layman and an enthusiastic
follower of Augustine, not only wrote several treatises
against the semi-Pelagians of his native Gaul (§ 53, 5),
but also poured out the vials of his wrath upon them in
poetic effusions (§ 48, 6). He died about A.D. 460.
e. =Cæsarius, bishop of Arelate=, now Arles in Gaul, originally
a monk in the monastery of Larinum, was one of the most
celebrated, most influential, and in church work most
serviceable of the men of his times. It is also mainly
due to him that in A.D. 529 moderate Augustinianism gained
the victory over semi-Pelagianism. He died in A.D. 543.
His treatise _De gratia et libero arbitrio_ is no longer
extant, but two rules for monks and nuns composed by him,
_Ad monachos_, _Ad virgines_, as well as a considerable
number of _Sermones_, the best of their time, are still
preserved.
f. =Fulgentius, bishop of Ruspe= in Africa, on account of
his zeal for the Catholic doctrine, was banished by the
Arian Vandal king Thrasimund, but returned after the
king’s death in A.D. 523. He was one of the stoutest
champions of Augustinianism. His writings against Arians
and semi-Pelagians have been often printed. He died in
A.D. 555. His scholar and biographer was =Fulgentius
Ferrandus=, deacon at Carthage about A.D. 547. Alongside
of and after him we meet with bishop =Facundus= of Hermiane,
and the archdeacon =Liberatus of Carthage=, who with
characteristic African energy defend the _Tria Capitula_
(§ 52, 6) basely surrendered by the Roman bishop Vigilius.
§ 47.21. =Pelagians and semi-Pelagians.=
I. =Pelagius=, a British monk, the originator of the heresy
named after him (§ 53, 3, 4), left behind a considerable
number of writings, of which, however, for the most part
we have now only fragments in the works of his opponents.
References in Augustine, Marius Mercator, and others show
that to him belong the _Lb._ xiv. _Expositionum in Epistt.
Pauli_, which have been ascribed to Jerome and included
among his works, scholia-like explanations with good sound
grammatico-historical exegesis. The wish to make this
useable and safe for the Catholic church led at an early
date to various omissions and alterations in it. Afterwards
its heretical origin was forgotten which notwithstanding
the purifying referred to is still quite discernible. Two
epistles addressed to Roman ladies recommending virginity
have also got a place among the works of Jerome.--=Julianus,
bishop of Eclanum= in Italy, is the only one among the
followers of Pelagius who can be regarded as of scientific
importance. He was an acute but frivolous and vulgar
opponent of Augustine, whom he honoured with the epithets
_amentissimus et bardissimus_ (comp. § 53, 4).
II. At the head of the semi-Pelagians or Massilians stands:
a. =Johannes Cassianus=. Gennadius designates him as
_natione Scythus_; but he received his early education
in a monastery at Bethlehem. He then undertook a
journey in company with the abbot to visit the Egyptian
monks, stayed next for a long time with Chrysostom at
Constantinople, and after his banishment resided some
years in Rome, and finally in A.D. 415 settled down at
Massilia (Marseilles), where he established a monastery
and a nunnery, and organised both after the Eastern
model. He died about A.D. 432. His writings were held
in high esteem throughout the Middle Ages. In the
_De institutis Cœnobiorum_ he describes the manner
of life of the Palestinian and Egyptian monks, and
then treats of the eight vices to which the monks were
specially exposed. The 24 _Collationes Patrum_ report
the conversations which he had with the Eastern monks
and hermits about the ways and means of attaining
Christian perfection. The 13th _Collatio_ is, without
naming him, directed against Augustine’s doctrine,
and develops semi-Pelagian Synergism (§ 53, 5). Both
writings, however are certainly calculated to serve
the development of his own monkish ideal as well as his
own dogmatic and ethical views, rather then to afford
a historically faithful representation of the life and
thinking of oriental monasticism of that time. The 7 bks.
_De incarnatione Christi_ combat not only Nestorianism
but also Pelagianism as in its consequences derogatory
to the divinity of Christ.
b. =Vincentius [Vincent] Lerinensis=, monk in the Gallic
monastery of Lerinum, was Cassianus’ most distinguished
disciple. He died about A.D. 450. On his often printed
_Commonitorium pro cath. fidei antiquit. et universit._,
comp. § 53, 5.
c. =Eucherius, bishop of Lyons=, left behind him several
ascetical works (_De laude eremi; De contemtu mundi_),
Homilies, and a _Liber formularum spiritualis
intelligentiæ_ as guide to the mystico-allegorical
interpretation of Scripture. He died about A.D. 450.
d. =Salvianus=, presbyter at Marseilles, was in his
earlier days married to a heathen woman whom he
converted, and with her took the vow of continency.
He died about A.D. 485. He wrote _Adv. avaritiam_
Lb. iv., in which the support of the poor and surrender
of property to the church for pious uses are recommended
as means of furthering the salvation of one’s own soul.
In consequence of the oppression of the times during
the convulsions of the migration of the peoples and
the reproach of the heathen again loudly raised that
the weakness of the Roman empire was occasioned by the
introduction of Christianity, he wrote _De providentia
s. de gubernatione Dei et de justo præsentique judicio_,
Lb. viii., which in rhetorical and flowery language
depicted the dreadful moral condition of the Roman
world of that day.
e. =Faustus of Rhegium=, now Riez in Provence, in his
earlier years an advocate, then monk and abbot of the
cloister of Lerinum, and finally bishop of Rhegium, was
the head of the Gallic semi-Pelagians of his times. In
his writings he stated this doctrine in a moderate form.
He died in A.D. 493.
f. =Arnobius the Younger=, the contemporary and
fellow-countryman of Faustus, wrote a very important
work entitled _Prædestinatus_, which in a very thorough
and elaborate manner contests the doctrines of Augustine.
Comp. § 53, 5.
§ 47.22. =The Most Important Church Teachers among the Roman
Popes.=
a. =Leo the Great= occupied the papal chair from A.D. 440 to
A.D. 461. While but a deacon he was the most distinguished
personage in Rome. On assuming the bishopric he gave the
whole powers of his mind to the administration of his office
in all directions. By the energy and consistency with which
he carried out the idea of the Roman primacy, he became the
virtual founder of the spiritual sovereignty of Rome. With
a strong arm he guided the helm of the church, reformed
and organized on every side, settled order and discipline,
defended orthodoxy, contended against heretics (Manichæans,
Priscillianists, Pelagians, Eutychians), and appeased the
barbarians (Attila). Of his writings we have 96 _Sermones_
and 173 Epistles, which last are of the utmost importance
for the church history of his times. He is also supposed
to be the author of a talented work _De vocatione Gentium_
(§ 53, 5).
b. =Gelasius I.=, A.D. 492 to A.D. 496, left behind him a
treatise _Adv. hæresin Pelagianem_, another _De duabus
in Christo naturis_, and a work against the observance of
the Lupercalia which some prominent Romans wished to have
continued. He also wrote 18 Decretals. The celebrated
_Decretum de libris recipiendis et non recipiendis_, in
a sense the oldest _Index prohibitorum_, is ascribed to
him. The first section, wanting in the best MSS., contains
a biblical canon corresponding to that of the Synod of
Hippo, A.D. 393 (§ 59, 1); the second section treats of
the pre-eminence of the Church of Rome granted by our Lord
Himself in the person of Peter; the third enumerates the
œcumenical Councils; and the fourth, the writings of the
fathers received by the Roman Church; the Chronicle and
Church History of Eusebius are found fault with (_quod
tepuerit_) but not rejected; in respect to the writings of
Origen and Rufinus the opinion of Jerome is approved. The
fifth section gives a list of books not to be received--the
New Testament Apocrypha, Tertullian, Clement of Alexandria,
Arnobius, Cassianus, Faustus of Rhegium, etc.
c. =Gregory the Great=, A.D. 590 to A.D. 604, born in Rome
about A.D. 540, sprung from a distinguished old Roman
family, held about A.D. 574 the office of city prefect,
after his father’s death founded on his inherited estates,
six monasteries, and himself withdrew into a seventh,
which he built in Rome. Ordained deacon against his will in
A.D. 579, he was entrusted with the important and difficult
office of a papal _apocrisiarius_ in Constantinople, and was
constrained in A.D. 590, after a long persisted-in refusal,
to mount the papal chair, which obliged him to abandon
the long-cherished plan of his life, the preaching of the
gospel to the Anglo-Saxons (§ 77, 4). Gregory united a rare
power and energy of will with real mildness and gentleness
of character, deep humility and genuine piety with the
full consciousness of his position as a successor of Peter,
insight, circumspection, yea even an unexpected measure of
liberal-mindedness (comp. _e.g._ § 57, 4; 75, 3) with all
monkish narrowness and stiff adherence to the traditional
forms, doctrines and views of the Roman Church. He himself
lived in extremest poverty and simplicity according to
the strictest monastic asceticism, and applied all that he
possessed and received to the support of the poor and the
help of the needy. It was a hard time in which he lived,
the age of the birth throes of a new epoch of the world’s
history. There is therefore much cause to thank the good
providence which set such a man as spiritual father, teacher
and pastor at the head of the Western Church. He took special
interest in fostering monasticism and such-like institutions,
which were, indeed, most conducive to the well-being of
the world, for during this dangerous period of convulsion,
monasticism was almost the only nursery of intellectual
culture. The Roman Catholic church ranks him as the last
of the Fathers, and places him alongside of Ambrose, Jerome
and Augustine, the four greatest teachers of the church,
_Doctores ecclesiæ_, whose writings have been long reverenced
as the purest and most complete vehicles of the Catholic
tradition. Among the Greeks a similar position is given to
Athanasius, Basil, Gregory Nazianzen and Chrysostom. The
rank thus assigned to Gregory is justifiable inasmuch as
in him the formation and malformation of doctrine, worship,
discipline and constitution peculiar to the ancient church
are gathered up, completed and closed. His most complete
work is the _Expositio in b. Jobum s. Moralium_, Ll. xxxv.,
(Engl. transl., Lib. of Fath., 3 vols., Oxf., 1844-1850)
which, by dragging in all possible relations of life which
an allegorical interpretation can furnish, is expanded into
a repertory of moral reflections. His _Regula pastoralis
s. Liber curæ pastoralis_ obtained in the West a position
of almost canonical authority. In his “Dialogues,” of which
the first three books treat “_de vita et miraculis Patrum
Italicorum_,” and the 4th book mostly of visionary views of
the hereafter (heaven, hell and purgatory), “_de æternitate
animarum_,” we meet with a very singular display of the most
uncritical credulousness and the most curious superstition.
Besides these we have from him Homilies on Ezekiel and
the Gospels, as well as a voluminous correspondence in
880 Epistles of great importance for the history of the
age. To Gregory also is attributed the oft quoted saying
which compares holy scripture to a stream _in quo agnus
peditat et elephas natat_.
§ 47.23. =The Conservators and Continuators of Patristic Culture.=
a. =Boëthius=, Anicius Manlius Torquatus Severinus, was
descended from a distinguished Roman family, and stood high
in favour with the Ostrogoth Arian king Theodoric. Accused,
however, by his enemies of treasonable correspondence with
the Byzantine court, he was, after a long imprisonment,
condemned unheard and executed, A.D. 525. In prison
he composed the celebrated treatise, _De consolatione
philosophiæ_, which, written in pure and noble language,
was the favourite book of the Latin Middle Ages, and was
translated into all European languages: first of all by
Alfred the Great into Anglo-Saxon, and often reprinted in
its original form. The book owed its great popularity to the
mediæval tradition which made its author a martyr for the
Catholic faith under Arian persecution; but modern criticism
has sought to prove that in all probability he was not even
a Christian. Still more decidedly the theological writings
on the Trinity and the Two Natures of Christ bearing his
name are repudiated as irreconcileable with the contents
and character of the _De consolatione_; though, on the
other hand, their authenticity has again found several
most capable defenders. Finally, Usener has conclusively,
as it seems, in a newly discovered fragment of Cassiodorus,
brought forward a quite incontestable witness for their
authenticity. In any case Boëthius did great service in
preserving the continuity of Western culture by his hearty
encouragement and careful prosecution of classical studies
at a time when these were threatened with utter neglect. Of
special importance was his translation of a commentary on
the logical works of Aristotle as the first and for a long
time almost the only philosophical groundwork of mediæval
scholasticism (§ 99, 2).
c. Magnus Aurelius =Cassiodorus=, surnamed Senator, belonged
to Southern Italy and held the highest civil offices under
Odoacer and Theodoric for fifty years. About A.D. 540,
he retired to the cloister of Vivarium founded by him in
Southern Italy, and devoted the rest of his life to the
sciences and the instruction of the monks. He collected a
great library in his monastery, and employed the monks in
transcribing classical and patristic writings. He died about
A.D. 575 when almost a hundred years old. His own writings
show indeed no independence and originality, but are all
the more important as concentrated collections of classical
and patristic learning for the later Latin Middle Ages. His
twelve books of the History of the Goths have come down only
in the condensed reproduction of Jordanes or Jornandes. His
twelve books _Variarum_ (_sc. epistolarum et formularum_),
which consist of a collection of acts and ordinances of the
period of his civil service, are important for the history
of his age. His _Historia ecclest. tripartita_ (§ 5, 1),
was for many centuries almost the only text book of church
history, and his _Institutiones divinarum et sæcularum
litterarum_ had a similar position as a guide to the study
of theology and the seven liberal arts (§ 90, 8). Also his
commentary on the Psalms and the most of the books of the
New Testament, made up of compilations, was held in high
esteem.
c. =Dionysius Exiguus=, a Scythian by birth, who became a Roman
abbot, and died about A.D. 566, may also be placed in this
group. He translated many Greek patristic writings, by his
_Cyclus paschalis_ became founder of the Western reckoning
of Easter (§ 56, 3), and also the more universally adopted
so-called Dionysian era. By his _Codex Canonum_ he is also
the founder of the Western system of Canon Law (§ 43, 3).
§ 48. BRANCHES OF THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND CHRISTIAN POETRY.
§ 48.1. =Exegetical Theology.=--Nothing was done in the way
of criticism of the original biblical text. Even Jerome was
only a translator. For the Old Testament the LXX. sufficed,
and the divergences of the Hebrew text were explained as
Jewish alterations. Hebrew was a _terra incognita_ to the
fathers, Polychronius and Jerome only are notable exceptions.
The allegorical method of interpretation was and continued to be
the prevalent one. The Antiocheans, however, put limits to it by
their theory and practice of the right of historico-grammatical
interpretation. Diodorus of Tarsus and Theodore of Mopsuestia
contested the principles of Origen, while Gregory of Nyssa in his
_Proemium in Cant._ undertook their defence. The first attempt
at a system of =Hermeneutics= was made by the learned Donatist
Tychonius in his book the _Regulæ_ vii. _ad investigandam
intelligentiam ss. Scr._ More profound is Augustine’s _De
Doctrina Chr._ The Εἰσαγωγὴ τῆς θείας γραφῆς of the Greek
Adrianus with its opposition to the immoderate allegorizing
that then prevailed, deserves mention here. Jerome contributed
to biblical =Introduction= by his various _Proœmia_. The
first attempt at a scientific introduction to biblical study
(isagogical and biblico-theological in the form of question
and answer), is met with in the 2 bks. _Instituta regularia
div. legis_ of the African Junilius, a prominent courtier at
Constantinople, about A.D. 550. There is a Latin rendering made
by Junilius at the request of Primasius, bishop of Adrumetum,
of a treatise composed originally in Syriac, by Paul the Persian,
teacher of the Nestorian seminary at Nisibis, which he had
collected from the works of Theodore of Mopsuestia, for the
purposes of instruction. The title _Departibus div. legis_,
usually given to the whole, properly belongs only to the first
part of the treatise. A more popular guide is Cassiodorus’
_Institutio divinarum litt._ Some contributions were made
to biblical archaeology by Eusebius and Epiphanius. Of the
allegorical =Exegetes= of the East, the most productive was
Cyril of Alexandria. The Antiochean school produced a whole
series of able expositors of the grammatico-historical sense
of scripture. In the commentaries of Chrysostom and Ephraem
[Ephraim] the Syrian, that method of interpretation is applied
in a directly practical interest. The Westerns Hilary, Ambrose,
Ambrosiaster, Jerome and Augustine, as well as their later
imitators, all allegorize; yet Jerome also applied himself very
diligently to the elucidation of the grammatical sense. Only
Pelagius is content to rest in the plain literal meaning of
scripture. From the 6th century, almost all independent work in
the department of exegesis ceased. We have from this time only
_Catenæ_, collections of passages from commentaries and homilies
of distinguished fathers. The first Greek writer of Catenæ, was
Procopius of Gaza, in the 6th century; and the first Latin writer
of these was Primasius of Adrumetum, about A.D. 560.
§ 48.2. =Historical Theology.=--The writing of Church history
flourished especially during the 4th and 5th centuries (§ 5, 1).
For the history of heresies we have Epiphanius, Theodoret,
Leontius of Byzantium; and among the Latins, Augustine,
Philastrius [Philaster], and the author of _Prædestinatus_
(§ 47, 21f). There are numerous biographies of distinguished
fathers. On these compare the so-called _Liber pontificalis_, see
§ 90, 6. Jerome laid the foundation of a history of theological
literature in a series of biographies, and Gennadius of
Massilia continued this work. With special reference to monkish
history, we have among the Greeks, Palladius, Theodoret and
Joh. Moschus; and among the Latins, Rufinus, Jerome, Gregory
the Great and Gregory of Tours (§ 90, 2). Of great importance
for ecclesiastical statistics is the Τοπογραφία χριστιανική
in 12 bks., whose author _Cosmas Indicopleustes_, monk in the
Sinai peninsula about A.D. 540, had in his earlier years as an
Alexandrian merchant travelled much in the East. The connection
of biblical and profane history is treated of in the Chronicle
of Eusebius. Orosius too treats of profane history from the
Christian standpoint. The _Hist. persecutionis Vandalorum_
(§ 76, 3), of Victor, bishop of Vita in Africa, about A.D. 487,
is of great value for the church history of Africa. For chronology
the so-called _Chronicon paschale_, in the Greek language, is of
great importance. It is the work of two unknown authors; the work
of the one reaching down to A.D. 354, that of the other, down to
A.D. 630. These chronological tables obtained their name from the
fact that the Easter cycles and indictions are always carefully
determined in them.
§ 48.3. =Systematic Theology.=
a. =Apologetics.= The controversial treatises of Porphyry
and Hierocles were answered by many (§ 23, 3); that of
the Emperor Julian also (§ 42, 5), especially by Gregory
Nazianzen, Chrysostum [Chrysostom] (in the Discourse on
St. Babylas), and most powerfully by Cyril of Alexandria.
Ambrose and the poet Prudentius answered the tract of
Symmachus, referred to in § 42, 4. The insinuations of
Zosimus, Eunapius, and others (§ 42, 5) were met by Orosius
with his _Historiæ_, by Augustine with his _Civ. Dei_,
and by Salvian [Salvianus] with his _De gubernatione
Dei_. Johannes Philoponus wrote against Proclus’ denial
of the biblical doctrine of creation. The vindication of
Christianity against the charges of the Jews was undertaken
by Aphraates, Chrysostom, Augustine, and Gregentius, bishop
of Taphne in Arabia, who, in A.D. 540, disputed for four
days amid a great crowd with the Jew Herban. Apologies of
a general character were written by Eusebius of Cæsarea,
Athanasius, Theodoret and Firmicus Maternus.
b. In =Polemics= against earlier and later heretics, the
utmost energy and an abundance of acuteness and depth of
thought were displayed. See under the history of theological
discussions, § 50 ff.
c. Positive =Dogmatics=. Origen’s example in the construction
of a complete scientific system of doctrine has no imitator.
For practical purposes, however, the whole range of Christian
doctrine was treated by Cyril of Jerusalem, Gregory of
Nyssa, Apollinaris, Epiphanius, Rufinus (_Expositio Symboli
Apost._), Augustine (in the last book of the _Civ. Dei_, in
first book of his _De Doctrina Chr._, and in the _Enchiridium
ad Laurentium_). The African Fulgentius of Ruspe (_De regula
veræ fidei_), Gennadius of Massilia (_De fide sua_), and
Vincentius [Vincent] of Lerinum in his _Commonitorium_. Much
more important results for the development of particular
dogmas were secured by means of polemics. Of supreme
influence on subsequent ages were the mystico-theosophical
writings of the Pseudo-Areopagite. This mysticism, so far
as adopted, was combined by the acute and profound thinker
Maximus Confessor with the orthodox theology of the Councils.
d. =Morals.= The _De officiis ministr._ of Ambrose is a system
of moral instruction for the clergy; and of the same sort
is Chrysostom’s Περὶ ἱερωσύνης; while Cassianus’ writings
form a moral system for the monks, and Gregory’s _Exposit.
in Jobum_ a vast repertory on general morality.
§ 48.4. =Practical Theology.=--The whole period is peculiarly
rich in distinguished homilists. The most brilliant of the Greek
preachers were: Macarius the Great, Basil the Great, Gregory
Nazianzen, Ephraem [Ephraim] the Syrian, and above all Chrysostom.
Of the Latins the most distinguished were Ambrose, Augustine,
Zeno of Verona, Petrus [Peter] Chrysologus, Leo the Great, and
Cæsarius of Arles. A sort of Homiletics is found in the 4th of
Augustine’s _De Doctr. Chr._, and a directory for pastoral work,
in the _Regula pastoralia_ of Gregory the Great. On Liturgical
writings, comp. § 59, 6; on Constitutional works, § 43, 3-5.
§ 48.5. =Christian Poetry.=--The beginning of the prevalence of
Christianity occurred at a time when the poetic art had already
ceased to be consecrated to the national life of the ancient
world. But it proved an intellectual power which could cause to
swell out again the poetic vein, relaxed by the weakness of age.
In spite of the depraved taste and deteriorated language, it
called forth a new period of brilliancy in the history of poetry
which could rival classical poetry, not indeed in purity and
elegance of form, but in intensity and depth. The Latins in
this far excelled the Greeks; for to them Christianity was more
a matter of experience, emotion, the inner life, to the Greeks
a matter of knowledge and speculation. Among the =Greeks= the
most distinguished are these: =Gregory Nazianzen=. He deserves
notice mainly for his satirical _Carmen de vita sua_, περὶ ἑαυτοῦ.
Among his numerous other poems are some beautiful hymns and
many striking phrases, but also much that is weak and flat.
The drama Χριστὸς πάσχων, perhaps wrongly bearing his name,
modelled on the tragedies of Euripides and in great part made
up of Euripidean verses, is not without interest as the first
Christian passion-play, and contains some beautiful passages;
_e.g._ the lament of Mary; but it is on the whole insipid
and confused. =Nonnus of Panopolis=, about A.D. 400, wrote
a Παράφρασις ἐπικὴ τοῦ Εὐαγγ. κατὰ Ἰωάννην, somewhat more
useful for textual criticism and archaeology, than likely
to afford enjoyment as poetry. Of the poetical works of the
Empress =Eudocia=, wife of Theodosius II., daughter of the
pagan rhetorician Leontius of Athens, hence called Athenais
(she died about the year 460), only fragments of their renderings
in the Cyprian legends have come down to us. The loss of her
_Homero-centoes_ celebrated by Photius, _i.e._ reproductions
of the biblical books of the New Testament in pure Homeric words
and verses, is not perhaps to be very sorely lamented. On the
other hand, the poetic description of the church of Sophia, built
by Justinian I. and of the ambo of that church which =Paulus
Silentiarius= left behind him, is not only of archaeological
value, but also is not without poetic merit.
§ 48.6. =Christian Latin Poetry= reached its highest excellence
in the composition of hymns (§ 59, 4). But also in the more
ambitious forms of epic, didactic, panegyric, and hortatory
poems, it has respectable representatives, especially in Spain
and Gaul, whose excellence of workmanship during such a period
of restlessness and confusion is truly wonderful. To the fourth
century belongs the Spaniard =Juvencus=, about A.D. 330. His
_Hist. evangelica_ in 4 books, is the first Christian epic;
a work of sublime simplicity, free of all bombast or rhetorical
rant, which obtained for him the name of “the Christian Virgil.”
His _Liber in Genesin_ versifies in a similar manner the Mosaic
history of the patriarchs. His countryman =Prudentius=, who died
about A.D. 410, was a poet of the first rank, distinguished for
depth of sensibility, glowing enthusiasm, high lyrical flow,
and singular skill in versification. His _Liber Cathemerinon_
consists of 12 hymns, for the 12 hours of the day, and his
_Liber Peristephanon_, 14 hymns on the same number of saints who
had won the martyr’s crown; his _Apotheosis_ is an Anti-Arian
glorification of Christ; the _Hamartigenia_ treats of the origin
of sin; the _Psychomachia_ describes the conflict of the virtues
and vices of the human soul; and his 2 bks. _Contra Symmachum_
combat the views of Symmachus, referred to in § 42, 4.--In the
fifth century flourished: =Paulinus=, bishop of Nola in Campania,
who died in A.D. 431. He left behind him 30 poems, of which
13 celebrate in noble, enthusiastic language, the life of Felix
of Nola, martyr during the Decian persecution. =Coelius Sedulius=,
an Irishman (?), composed in smooth dignified verse the Life of
Jesus, and the _Mirabilia divina s. Opus paschale_, so called
from 1 Cor. v. 7 in 5 bks.; and a Collatio V. et N.T. in elegiac
verse. The _De libero arbitrio c. ingratos_ of the Gaul =Prosper
Aquitanicus= lashes with poetic fury the thankless despisers of
grace (§ 53, 5).--The most important poet of the sixth century
was =Venantius Fortunatus=, bishop of Poitiers, _Vita Martini_,
hymns, elegies, etc.
§ 48.7. In the =National Syrian= Church, the first place as a
poet belongs to =Ephraem= [Ephraim], the _Propheta Syrorum_. In
poetic endowment, lyrical flow, depth and intensity of feeling,
he leaves all later writers far behind. Next to him stands
=Cyrillonas=, about A.D. 400, a poet whose very name, until quite
recently, was unknown, of whose poems six are extant, two being
metrical homilies. Of =Rabulas of Edessa=, who died in A.D. 435,
the notorious partisan of Cyril of Alexandria (§ 53, 3), and of
=Baläus=, about A.D. 430, we possess only a number of liturgical
odes, which are not altogether destitute of poetic merit.
This cannot, however, be said of the poetic works of =Isaac of
Antioch=, who died about A.D. 460, filled with frigid polemics
against Nestorius and Eutyches, of which their Catholic editor
(Opp. ed. G. Bickell, Giess., 1873 f.) has to confess they are
thoroughly “insipid, flat and wearisome, and move backwards and
forwards in endless tautologies.” Less empty and tiresome are
the poetic effusions of the famous =Jacob of Sarug=, who died
in A.D. 521; biblical stories, metrical homilies, hymns, etc.
Most of the numerous liturgical odes are the compositions of
unknown authors.
§ 48.8. =The Legendary History of Cyprian.=--At the basis of the
poetic rendering of this legend in 3 bks. by the Empress Eudocia,
about A.D. 440, lay three little works in prose, still extant in
the Greek original and in various translations. In early youth
Cyprian, impelled by an insatiable craving after knowledge, power
and enjoyment, seeks to obtain all the wisdom of the Greeks, all
the mysteries of the East, and for this purpose travels through
Greece, Egypt, and Chaldæa. But when he gets all this he is
not satisfied; he makes a compact with the devil, to whom he
unreservedly surrenders himself, who in turn places at his
disposal now a great multitude of demons, and promises to make
him hereafter one of his chief princes. Then comes he to Antioch.
There Aglaidas, an eminent heathen sophist, who in vain abandoned
all to win the love of a maiden named Justina, who had taken
vows of perpetual virginity, calls in his magical arts, in order
thereby to gain the end so ardently desired. Cyprian enters into
the affair all the more eagerly since he himself also meanwhile
has entertained a strong passion for the fair maiden. But the
demons sent by him, at last the devil himself, are forced to flee
from her, through her calling on the name of Jesus and making
the sign of the cross, and are obliged to own their powerlessness
before the Christians’ God. Now Cyprian repents, repudiates his
covenant with the devil, lays before an assembly of Antiochean
Christians a confession inspired by the most profound despairing
sorrow of the innumerable mischiefs wrought by him with the help
of the demons, is comforted by the Christians present by means
of consolatory words of scripture, receives baptism, enters
the ranks of the clergy as reader, passes quickly through the
various clerical offices, and suffers the death of a martyr
as bishop of Antioch, along with Justina, under the Emperor
Claudius II.--Gregory Nazianzen too in a discourse delivered at
Constantinople in A.D. 379, “on the day of the holy martyr and
bishop Cyprian,” treated of the legend, in which without more ado
he identifies the converted Antiochean sorcerer with the famous
Carthaginian bishop of that name, and makes him suffer martyrdom
under Decius (?).--The romance may have borrowed the name of its
hero from an old wizard; but his type of character is certainly
to be looked for in the philosophico-theurgical efforts of
the Syrio-Neoplatonic school of Iamblichus (§ 24, 2), in which
the then expiring heathenism gathered up its last energies
for conflict with victorious Christianity. The conception of
the heroine on the other hand, is with slight modifications
borrowed from the Thecla legend (§ 32, 6). By the _Legenda aurea_
(§ 104, 8), which is just an adaptation of this earlier one,
the legend of Cyprian was carried down even beyond the time of
the Reformation. Calderon’s “Wonder-working Magician” presents
a Spanish-Catholic, as the Faustus legend of the 16th century
presents a German Protestant construction, which latter, however,
in direct opposition to the tendency of the early Christian
legend, allows the magician to drop into hell because his
repentance came too late. The Romish Church, however, still
maintains the historical genuineness of the old legend, and
celebrates both of the supposed saints on one day, 25th September.
IV. DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES AND HERESIES.
§ 49. THE DEVELOPMENT OF DOCTRINE GENERALLY.
When a considerable fulness of Christian doctrine had already in
previous periods found subjective and therefore variously diversified
development, it had now, besides being required by the altered condition
of things, become necessary that the church should sift and confirm
what was already developed or was still in the course of development.
The endeavour after universal scientific comprehension and accurate
definition became stronger every day. The lively intercourse between
the churches, which prevented the various doctrinal types from being
restricted to particular countries, brought opposite views into contact
and conflict with one another. The court, the people, the monks took
parts, and so the church became the scene of passionate and distracting
struggles, which led to the issuing of a canon of orthodoxy recognised
by the whole Catholic church of the West and of the East, and to the
branding every deviation therefrom with the mark of heresy.
The =Heresies= of the previous period were mainly of a syncretic
kind (§ 26). Those of the period now under consideration have
an evolutionary or formatory character. They consist in the
construction of the system of doctrine by exclusive attention
and extreme estimation of the one side of the Christian
truth that is being developed, which thus passes over into
errors; while it is the task of orthodoxy to give proportionate
development to both sides and to bring them into harmony. Of
syncratic heresies only sporadic traces from the previous period
are found in this (§ 54). The third possible form of heresies is
the revolutionary or reformatory. Heretics of this class fancy
that they see in the developed and fixed system of the Catholic
church excrescences and degenerations which either do not exist,
so that by their removal the church is injured and hindered in
her essential and normal functions, or do really exist, but for
the most part are not now duly distinguished from the results of
sound and normal development, so that the good would be removed
with the bad. During the period under consideration only isolated
instances of this kind of heresy are met with (§ 62).
§ 50. THE TRINITARIAN CONTROVERSY, A.D. 318-381.[150]
The series of doctrinal contendings opened with the Trinitarian or
Arian controversy. It first of all dealt with the nature and being
of the Logos become man in Christ and the relation of this Logos to
the Father. From the time of the controversy of the two Dionysiuses
(§ 33, 7) the idea of the consubstantiality of the Son and the Father
had found supporters even in Alexandria and a new school was formed
with it as the fundamental doctrine (§ 47, 1). But the fear excited
by Sabellius and the Samosatians (§ 33, 8), that the acknowledgment
of the Homoousia might lead to Monarchianism, caused a strong reaction
and doomed many excellent fathers to the bonds of subordinationism.
It was pre-eminently the school of the Antiochean Lucian (§ 31, 9)
that furnished able contenders against the Homoousia. In Origen the
two contraries, subordination and the eternal generation from the
substance of the Father, had been still maintained together (§ 33, 6).
Now they are brought forward apart from one another. On the one side,
Athanasius and his party repudiate subordination but hold firmly by
the eternal generation, and perfected their theory by the adoption
of the Homoousia; but on the other side, Arius and his party gave up
the eternal generation, and held fast to the subordination, and went
to the extreme of proclaiming the Heteroousia. A third intermediate
party, the semi-Arians, mostly Origenists, wished to bind the separated
contraries together with the newly discovered cement of the ὁμοιουσία.
In the further course of the controversies that now broke out and raged
throughout the whole church for almost a century, the question of the
trinitarian position of the Holy Spirit was of necessity dragged into
the discussion. After various experiences of victory and discomfiture,
the Homoousia of the Son and of the Spirit was at last affirmed and
became the watchword of inviolable orthodoxy.
§ 50.1. =Preliminary Victory of the Homoousia,
A.D. 318-325=--=Arius=, a disciple of Lucian, from A.D. 313
presbyter at Alexandria, a man of clear intellect and subtle
critical spirit, was in A.D. 318 charged with the denial of the
divinity of Christ, because he publicly taught that while the
Son was indeed before all time yet He was not from eternity (ἦν
ὅτε οὐκ ἦν), that by the will of the Father (θελήματι θεοῦ) He
was created out of nothing (κτίσμα ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων), and that by
His mediating activity the world was called into being; as the
most perfect created image of the Father and as executor of the
Divine plan of creation, He might indeed in an inexact way be
called θεός and λόγος. =Alexander=, bishop of Alexandria at that
time, who maintained the doctrine of the eternal generation and
consubstantiality, convened a synod at Alexandria in A.D. 321,
which condemned the doctrine of Arius and deposed him. But the
people, who revered him as a strict ascetic, and many bishops,
who shared his views, took part with him. He also applied for
protection to famous bishops in other places, especially to his
former fellow student (Συλλουκιανίστης) Eusebius of Nicomedia,
and to the very influential Eusebius of Cæsarea (§ 47, 2).
The former unreservedly declared himself in favour of the
Arian doctrine; the latter regarded it as at least not dangerous.
Arius spread his views among the people by means of popular songs
for men of various crafts and callings, for millers, sailors,
travellers, etc. In this way a serious schism spread through
almost all the East. In Alexandria the controversy was carried
on so passionately that the pagans made it the subject of reproach
in the theatre. When Constantine the Great received news of
this general commotion he was greatly displeased. He commanded,
fruitlessly, as might be expected, that all needless quarrels
(ἐλάχισται ζητήσεις) should be avoided. Hosius, bishop of Cordŏva,
who carried the imperial injunction to Alexandria, learnt the
state of matters there and the serious nature of the conflict,
and brought the emperor to see the matter in another light.
Constantine now summoned in A.D. 325 an =Œcumenical Council at
Nicæa=, where he himself and 318 bishops met. The majority, with
Eusebius of Cæsarea at their head, were Origenists and sought,
as did also the =Eusebians=, the party of Eusebius of Nicomedia,
to mediate between the opposing views, the latter, however,
being much more favourable to the Arians. The maintainers of the
Homoousia were in a decided minority, but the vigorous eloquence
of the young deacon =Athanasius=, whom Alexander brought with
him, and the favour of the emperor, secured complete ascendancy
to their doctrine. Upon the basis of the baptismal formula
proposed by Eusebius of Cæsarea to his own congregation, a new
confession of faith was sketched out, which was henceforth used
to mark the limits of this trinitarian discussion. In this creed
several expressions were avoided which, though biblical, had
been understood by the Arians in a sense of their own, such as
πρωτότοκος πάσης τῆς κτίσεως πρὸ πάντων τῶν αἰώνιων, and in their
place strictly Homoousian formulæ were substituted, ἐκ τῆς οὐσίας
τοῦ πατρός, γεννηθεὶς οὐ ποιηθεὶς, ὁμοούσιος τῷ πατρί; while with
added anathemas those entertaining opposite views were condemned.
This was the =Symbolum Nicænum=. Arius was excommunicated and
his writings condemned to be burnt. Dread of deposition and love
of peace induced many to subscribe who were not convinced. Only
Arius himself and two Egyptian bishops, Theonas and Secundus,
refused and went into exile to Illyria. Also Eusebius of Nicomedia
and Theognis of Nicæa, who subscribed the Symbol but refused to
sign the anathematizing formula, were three months afterwards
banished to Gaul.[151]
§ 50.2. =Victory of Eusebianism, A.D. 328-356.=--This unity
under the Nicene Symbol was merely artificial and could not
therefore be enduring. The emperor’s dying sister Constantia and
the persuasion of distinguished bishops induced Constantine to
return to his earlier view of the controversy. Arius agreed to
a Confession drawn up in general terms and was, along with the
other banished ones, restored in A.D. 328. Soon thereafter, in
A.D. 330, the emperor commanded that Arius should be restored to
office. But meanwhile, in A.D. 328, Athanasius himself had become
bishop and replied with unfaltering determination that he would
not comply. The emperor threatened him with deposition, but by
a personal conference Athanasius made such an impression upon him
that he gave way. The enemies of Athanasius, however, especially
the Meletians driven on by Eusebius of Nicomedia (§ 41, 4),
ceased not to excite suspicion about him as a disturber of the
peace, and got the emperor to reopen the question at a Synod at
Tyre, in A.D. 335. consisting of pure Arians. Athanasius appealed
against its verdict of deposition. A new Synod was convened
at Constantinople in A.D. 335 and the emperor banished him to
Treves in A.D. 336. It was now enjoined that, notwithstanding
the opposition of the bishop of Constantinople, Arius should
be there received back again into church fellowship, but on
the evening before the day appointed he died suddenly, being
over eighty years old. Constantine the Great soon followed him,
A.D. 337, and Constantine II. restored Athanasius to his church
which received him with enthusiasm. Constantius, however, was
decidedly favourable to the Eusebians, and this gave tone to the
court and to the capital where in all the streets and markets,
in all the shops and houses, the questions referred to were
considered and discussed. The Eastern bishops for the most part
vacillated between the two extremes and let themselves be led by
Eusebius of Nicomedia. He and his party managed for a time to set
aside the Homoousian formula and yet to preserve an appearance of
orthodoxy. Eusebius, who from A.D. 338 was bishop in the capital,
died in A.D. 341, but his party continued to intrigue in his
spirit. The whole West, on the other hand, was strictly Nicæan.
The Eusebians in A.D. 340 opened a Council at Antioch, which
anew deposed Athanasius, and put in his place a rude Cappadocian,
Gregorius [Gregory]. Athanasius fled to Rome, where a Council
under bishop Julius in A.D. 341 solemnly acknowledged his
orthodoxy and innocence. A new Council convened at Antioch in
A.D. 340 for the consecration of a church, sketched four creeds
one after another, approaching indeed, in order to conciliate
the West, as closely as possible that of Nicæa, but carefully
avoiding the term ὁμοούσιος. In the interests of unity Constantius
and Constans jointly convened an Œcumenical Council at Sardica in
Illyria in A.D. 344. But when the Westerns under the presidency
of Hosius, disregarding the Antiochean anathema, allowed a seat
and vote to Athanasius, the Easterns withdrew and formed an
opposition Council at Philippopolis in Thrace. At Sardica where
important privileges were granted to the Roman bishop Julius
(§ 46, 3), the Nicene creed was renewed and Athanasius was
restored. Constantius, after Gregorius [Gregory] had died, who
meanwhile had become doubly hated because of his violent deeds,
confirmed Athanasius’ restoration, and the Alexandrian church
received again their old pastor with shouts of joy. But after the
death of Constans in A.D. 350, Constantius was again won over to
the side of the Arians. They assembled at the Council of Sirmium
in Pannonia in A.D. 351, where, however, they did not strike
directly at Athanasius but at first only at a friend of his who
presented to them a weak spot. The bishop =Marcellus of Ancyra=
in Galatia by his zealous defence of the Nicene _Homoousia_ had
been betrayed into the use of Sabellian expressions and views.
At a Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 336 he was on this account
suspended, and then contended with by Eusebius of Cæsarea in the
course of this Council; but in the West and at the Council of
Sardica he had been defended. Afterwards, however, one of his
own scholars =Photinus=, bishop of Sirmium, had drifted into
unmistakable, and indeed into dynamic Monarchianism (§ 33, 1).
His doctrine had been already rejected as heretical at a Council
at Antioch in A.D. 344 and also in the West at a distinctly
Nicæan Council at Milan in A.D. 345. The Council of Sirmium
now formally deposed him and with his condemned also Marcellus’
doctrine.[152] The Eusebians, however, were not satisfied with
this. So soon as Constantius by the conquest of the usurper
Magnentius got an absolutely free hand, he arranged at their
instigation for two Eusebian Synods, one at Arles in Gaul,
A.D. 353, the other at Milan, A.D. 355, where Athanasius was
again condemned. The emperor now commanded that all Western
bishops should subscribe his condemnation. Those who refused were
deposed and banished. Among them were, the Roman bishop Liberius,
Hosius of Cordova, Hilary of Poitiers, Eusebius of Vercelli,
and Lucifer of Calăris [Calaris]. And now a second Gregorius
[Gregory], a Cappadocian, not less rude and passionate than the
first, was forcibly installed bishop of Alexandria. Athanasius
performed the service in a quiet and dignified manner, and then
withdrew to the monks in the Egyptian desert in A.D. 356. Thus
it seemed that Arianism in the modified or rather concealed form
of Eusebianism had secured a final victory throughout the whole
range of the Roman Empire.
§ 50.3. =Victory of Homoiousianism, A.D. 357-361.=--The Eusebians
now, however, fell out among themselves. The more extreme party,
with the Antiochean deacon Aëtius and bishop Eunomius of Cyzicus
at their head, carried their heresy so far as to declare that
the Son is unlike to the Father (ἀνόμοιος). They were hence
called =Anomœans=, also _Exucontians_ (ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων). But also
the distinctly moderate party, called =semi-Arians=[153] or
_Homoiousians_, from their adoption of the formula ὁμοιούσιος,
made preparations for a decisive conflict. At their head stood
Basil, bishop of Ancyra, and Constantius too was favourable
to them. But the intriguing court bishops, Ursacius and Valens,
strictly Arian at heart, knew how to gain their ends by secret
paths. With the emperor’s consent they held a second Council at
Sirmium in A.D. 357, where it was resolved to avoid wholly the
non-biblical phrase οὐσία, which caused all the contention, to
abandon all definitions of the nature of God which to man is
incomprehensible, and to unite upon the simple formula, that
the Son is _like_ the Father (ὅμοιος hence the name =Homoians=).
Hosius of Cordova, facile through age and sufferings, bought his
reprieve by subscription. He died, after a bitter repentance,
in A.D. 361, when almost a hundred years old. The rest of
the Westerns, however, at the Synod of Agenum renewed their
Nicene Confession; the semi-Arians under Basil at Ancyra their
Antiochean Confession. The latter, too, found access to the
emperor, who let their Confession be confirmed at a third Synod
at Sirmium in A.D. 358, and obliged the court bishops to sign it.
The latter then came to a compromise with the semi-Arians in the
formula: τὸν Υἱὸν ὅμοιον τῷ Πατρὶ εἶναι κατὰ πάντα ὡς αἱ ἅγιαι
γραφαὶ λέγουσιν. Liberius of Rome, too, worn out with three
years’ exile, agreed to sign this symbol and ventured to return
to Rome (§ 46, 4). The formula pleased the emperor so well that
he decided to have it confirmed by an œcumenical Council. But in
order to prevent the dreaded combination of the Homoousians and
Homoiousians in the West, Ursacius and Valens contrived to have
two Councils instead of one, an Eastern Council at Seleucia and
a Western Council at Rimini, A.D. 359. Both rejected the formula
of Sirmium; the Easterns holding by that of Antioch, the Westerns
by that of Nicæa. But Ursacius knew how by cunning intrigues to
weary them out. When the bishops had spent two years at Seleucia
and Rimini, which seemed to them no better than banishment, and
their messengers after a half year’s journey had not succeeded
in obtaining an audience of the emperor, they at last subscribed
the _Homoian_ symbol. Those who refused, Aëtius and Eunomius,
were persecuted as disturbers of the church’s peace. Thus
the Homoian creed prevailed through the whole Roman empire.
Constantius’ death, however, in A.D. 361, soon broke up this
artificial bond.
§ 50.4. =Final Victory of the Nicene Creed, A.D. 361-381.=--Julian
gave equal rights to all parties and recalled all the banished
bishops, so that many churches had two or three bishops.
Athanasius also returned. For the restoration of church order
he called a Synod at Alexandria in A.D. 362, and here in the
exercise of a gentle and wise temper he received back into church
fellowship the penitent Arian bishops, in spite of the protest
of the strict zealot Lucifer of Calaris. The happy results of
Athanasius’ procedure led the emperor again to banish him, on the
pretext that he was a disturber of the peace. Julian’s successor,
Jovian, was favourable to the Nicene doctrine and immediately
restored Athanasius, A.D. 364, meanwhile extending toleration
to the Arians. But Valens, to whom his brother Valentinian I.
surrendered the East, A.D. 364-378, proved a zealous Arian. He
raged with equal violence against the Athanasians and against
the semi-Arians, and thus drove the two into close relations
with one another. Athanasius was obliged to flee, but ventured
after four months to return, and lived in peace to the end of
his days. He died in A.D. 373. Valens was meanwhile restricted
in his persecutions on two sides, by the pressing representations
of his brother Valentinian, and by the manly resistance of
eminent bishops, especially the three Cappadocians (§ 47, 4).
The machinations of the Western empress Justinia, during
the minority of her son Valentinian II., were successfully
checkmated by Ambrose of Milan. He passively but victoriously
opposed the soldiers who were to take possession of his church
for the Arians by a congregation praying and singing psalms.
Theodosius the Great gave its deathblow to Arianism. He called
Gregory Nazianzen to the patriarchal chair at Constantinople.
To Gregory also at a subsequent time he assigned the presidency
of the so-called =Second Œcumenical Council at Constantinople
in A.D. 381=.[154]--When, however, his patriarchate was attacked,
because he had changed his bishopric (§ 45), he resigned
his office. No new Symbol was here drawn up, but only the
Nicene Symbol was confirmed as irrefragable. On the so-called
Nicæan-Constantinopolitan Symbol, comp. § 59, 2. After this
the Arians ventured only to hold services outside of the cities.
Subsequently all churches in the empire were taken from them.--The
Constantinopolitan Council of A.D. 381 did not fairly represent
parties. Being called by the then merely Eastern emperor, and
so consisting only of Eastern bishops, it was not properly an
œcumenical synod, and for a long time even in the East itself was
not regarded as such. Still it was of importance to the bishop of
Constantinople that it should have this rank, and his endeavours
were favoured by the circumstance that it had been called
by Theodosius who was honoured both in East and West as Sole
Potentate and “second Constantine.” After the Council of
Chalcedon in A.D. 451 (§ 46, 1) the whole East was unanimous
in recognising it. The West, however, at least Rome, still
rejected it, until finally under Justinian I., in consequence
of the Roman chair becoming dependent upon the Byzantine court
(§ 46, 9), the dispute was here no longer agitated.
§ 50.5. =The Pneumatomachians, A.D. 362-381.=--Arius and the
Arians had described the Holy Spirit as the first creature
produced by the Son. But even zealous defenders of the Homoousia
of the Son vacillated. The Nicene Symbol was satisfied with
a bare καὶ εἰς τὸ Πνεῦμα ἅγιον; and even Hilary of Poitiers,
avoiding all exact definition, contented himself with recording
the phrases of Scripture. But Athanasius, at the Synod of
Alexandria in A.D. 362, Didymus the Blind, and the three
Cappadocians, consistently applied their idea of the Homoousia
to the Spirit and won the adhesion of the Nicene theologians.
It was hardest for the semi-Arians who had accepted the
Nicene platform, at whose head stood Macedonius, bishop
of Constantinople, who had been deposed by the Homoians
in A.D. 360, to acquiesce in this conclusion (Macedonians,
Pneumatomachians). The so-called second œcumenical Council
of A.D. 381 sanctioned in a now lost doctrinal “Tome” the full
Homoousia of the Holy Spirit. The West had already in A.D. 380
at a Roman Synod under the presidency of Bishop Damasus condemned
in 24 anathemas, along with all other trinitarian errors, every
sort of opposition to the perfect Homoousia of the Spirit.[155]
§ 50.6. =The Literature of the Controversy.=--Arius himself
developed his doctrine in a half poetical writing, the Θάλεια,
fragments of which are given by Athanasius. Arianism found a
zealous apologist in the Sophist Asterius, whose treatise is lost.
The church historian, Philostorgius (§ 5, 1), sought to vindicate
it historically. On the semi-Arian side Eusebius of Cæsarea wrote
against Marcellus--Κατὰ Μαρκέλλου and Περὶ τῆς ἐκκλησιαστικῆς
θεολογίας. The Ἀπολογητικός of Eunomius is lost. Among the
opponents of Arianism, Athanasius occupies by a long way the
first place (IV. Orations against the Arians, Ep. concerning
Councils of Seleucia and Ariminum, Hist. of Arians to the Monks,
Apology against the Arians, etc., all included in Hist. Tracts
of Athanasius, “Lib. of Fath.,” 2 vols., Oxf., 1843 f.). On the
works of Apollinaris belonging to this controversy see § 47, 5.
Basil the Great wrote 4 bks. against Eunomius; Περὶ τοῦ ἁγίου
Πνεῦματος, Ad Amphilochium, against the Pneumatomachians.
Gregory Nazianzen wrote five Λόγοι θεολογικοί. Gregory of Nyssa
12 Λόγοι ἀντιῤῥητικοὶ κατὰ Εὐνομίου. Didymus the Blind, 3 bks.
_De Trinitate_. Epiphanius, the Ἀγκυρώτος. Cyril of Alexandria
a θησαυρὸς περὶ τῆς ἁγίας καὶ ὁμοούσιας Τριάδος. Chrysostom
delivered twelve addresses against the Anomoians. Theodoret
wrote _Dialogi VII. d. s. Trinitate_. Ephraëm [Ephraim] Syrus,
too, combated the Arians frequently in his sermons. Among the
Latins the most celebrated polemists are: Lucifer of Calaris
(_Ad Constantium p. Lb. II. pro Athen._); Hilary of Poitiers
(_De Trinitate Lb. I., de Synodus s. de fide Orientalium, contra
Constantium Aug._; _C. Auxentium_); Phœbadius, bishop of Agenum
about A.D. 359 (_C. Arianos_); Ambrose (_De fide ad Gratianum
Aug. Lb. V._); Augustine (_C. Sermonem Arianorum_; _Collatio
cum Maximo Arianorum episc._; _C. Maximinum_); Fulgentius of
Ruspe (_C. Arianos_, and 3 bks. against the Arian Vandal king
Thrasimund).
§ 50.7. =Post-Nicene Development of the Dogma.=--Even the
Nicene Symbol did not completely surmount every trace of
subordinationism. It is at least capable of a subordinationist
interpretation when the Father alone is called εἷς θεός and so
identified with the Monas. Augustine completely surmounted this
defect (_De Trinitate Lb. XV._). The personality of the Spirit,
too, as well as His relation to the Father and the Son, had not
yet been determined. A step was taken towards the formulating of
the doctrine of the Spirit’s personality by the acknowledgment
in the now lost Tome of the Council of Constantinople of A.D. 381
of the full Homoousia of the Spirit with the Father and the
Son.[156] But the doctrine of the Spirit’s relations to Father
and Son still continued undetermined and even by the addition
(to the εἰς τὸ πν. ἅγ.) of: τὸ κυρίον, τὸ ζωοποιὸν, τὸ ἐκ πατρὸς
ἐκπορευόμενον, τὸ σὺν τῷ πατρὶ καὶ τῷ υἱῷ συνπροσκυνούμενον
καὶ συνδοξαζόμενον in the so-called _Symbolum Nic.-Constant._
(§ 59, 2), a definition so incomplete was obtained, that even
five hundred years afterwards the great schism that rent the
church into an Eastern and a Western division found in this
its doctrinal basis (§ 67, 1). Augustine, too, had meanwhile
come forward with a further development of this doctrine,
and taught in his speculation upon the Spirit that He proceeded
from the Son as well as from the Father (John xv. 26).
Fulgentius of Ruspe was the next most famous representative
of the further development of the dogma (_De s. Trinitate_).
The so-called Athanasian Creed (§ 59, 2) simply adopted this
advanced development in the proposition: _qui procedit a
Patre et Filio_. Similarly the _Filioque_ is found also in the
so-called Nic.-Constant. Creed laid before the Synod of Toledo
in A.D. 589 (§ 76, 2).--Continuation § 67, 1; § 91, 2.
§ 50.8. =Schisms in consequence of the Arian Controversy.=
I. =The Meletian Schism at Antioch.= The Arians at Antioch
had already in A.D. 330 driven away Eustathius, the bishop
of the see, who favoured the Nicene doctrine. A portion
of his people, however, remained attached to him and
Homoousianism under the leadership of the Presbyter
Paulinus, and were called Eustathians. When in A.D. 360
Eudoxius, the Arian bishop, left Antioch, in order to
take possession of the episcopal chair of the capital,
his former congregation chose Meletius, bishop of Sebaste,
formerly a Eusebian, but for some time friendly to the
Nicene party, as his successor. His first sermon, however,
served to undeceive those who had chosen him, so that after
a few weeks they drove him away and put Euzoius, a decided
Arian, in his place. Yet he had already won a following
in the congregation which, when Julian’s succession made
it possible for him to return, took him back as bishop.
Athanasius and the Alexandrian Synod of A.D. 362 had
meanwhile made every effort to reconcile these Meletians
and the Eustathians and to unite them under the banner of
Nicæanism. But Lucifer, bishop of Calaris, sent to Antioch
for this purpose, confirmed the schism instead of healing
it by ordaining Paulinus bishop on the death of Eustathius
in A.D. 360. The whole church now took sides, the East that
of Meletius, the West along with Egypt, that of Paulinus.
The Council of Constantinople in A.D. 381 gave to Meletius
the presidency as the oldest bishop present. When, after
two days, he died, Gregory Nazianzen, his successor in the
presidency, recommended that the next election should be
postponed till the death of the aged Paulinus and that then
both parties should join the election. It was, however, all
in vain. Flavian was appointed successor to Meletius, and
when Paulinus died in A.D. 388, the Presbyter Evagrius was
chosen opposition bishop in his stead. Theodosius I., from
A.D. 392 sole ruler, insisted upon the West recognising
Flavian. But in Antioch itself the schism lasted down
to the death of Evagrius. Finally, in A.D. 415, the
able successor of Flavian, bishop Alexander, effected
a reconciliation, by taking part on a feast day along with
his congregation in the public worship of the Eustathians,
joining with them in singing and prayer, and in this way
won them over to join him in the principal church.
II. =The Schism of the Luciferians.= After Lucifer by his
irrational zeal had caused so much discord in Antioch,
he returned in A.D. 362 to Alexandria, and there protested
against Athanasius for receiving back penitent Arians and
semi-Arians. He and his fanatical adherents formed the
sect of Luciferians, which renewed the Novatianist demands
for Church purity, and continued to exist down to the fifth
century.
III. On the =Schism of Damasus and Ursacius at Rome=, see
§ 46, 4.
§ 51. THE ORIGENIST CONTROVERSIES, A.D. 394-438.
Naturally and necessarily the Christological are closely connected
with the Trinitarian controversies (§ 52). But between the two comes in
another controversy, the Origenistic, which was indeed more of personal
than of ecclesiastical interest, but still strengthened the church in
the conviction that Origen was an arch-heretic.
§ 51.1. =The Monks of the Scetic and Nitrian Deserts.=--The most
distinguished defenders of Nicene orthodoxy, Athanasius, the three
Cappadocians, Didymus, Hilary, etc., had all held Origen in high
esteem. But the constant references of the Arians to his authority
brought him into discredit, not only among the more narrow-minded
opposers of Arius, especially in the West, but also among the
monks of the Scetic desert in Egypt, with Pachomius at their
head. These repudiated the speculation of Origen as the source
of all heresy, and in their views of God and divine things
adopted a crude anthropomorphism. Epiphanius, bishop of Salamis,
also belonged originally to this party (§ 47, 10). In direct
opposition to them, another Egyptian monkish order in the Nitrian
desert adhered to Origen with enthusiastic reverence and occupied
themselves in a pious contemplative mysticism that tended to a
somewhat extreme spiritualism.
§ 51.2. =The Controversy in Palestine and Italy,
A.D. 394-399.=--In Palestine Origen had a warm supporter in
=bishop of Jerusalem=, and in the two Latins =Jerome= and
=Rufinus= who were staying there (§ 47, 16, 17). But when
in A.D. 394 a couple of Westerns who happened to come there
expressed their surprise, Jerome, anxious for his reputation
for orthodoxy, was at once prepared to condemn the errors of
Origen. Meanwhile the Scetic monks had called the attention
of the old zealot =Epiphanius= to the Palestinian nursery of
heresy. Immediately he made his way thither and took advantage
of John’s friendly invitation to occupy his pulpit by preaching
a violent sermon against Origenism. John then preached against
anthropomorphism. Epiphanius pronounced an anathema against that
tendency but desired John to do the same in regard to Origenism.
When John refused, then Epiphanius, together with Jerome and the
Bethlehemite monks withdrew from communion with John and Rufinus,
and invaded John’s episcopal rights by ordaining a presbyter
over the Bethlehemite monks. Now sprang up a violent controversy,
which Theophilus of Alexandria, by sending the presbyter Isidore,
sought to allay. Jerome and Rufinus were reconciled at the altar
in A.D. 396. The latter soon again returned to the West. He
translated, omitting objectionable passages, Origen’s work Περὶ
ἀρχῶν, and was indiscreet enough to remark in the preface that
even the orthodox Jerome was an admirer of Origen. Stirred up
by his Roman friends, Jerome began with unmeasured violence
a passionate polemic against Origenism and the friend of his
youth. He produced at the same time a literal rendering, no
longer extant, of the Περὶ ἀρχῶν. Rufinus replied with equal
bitterness, and the passion displayed by both led to further
causes of offence. The Roman bishop Siricius took part with
Rufinus, but his successor Anastasius summoned him to answer
for his opinions at Rome. Rufinus did not appear, but sent
an apology which so little satisfied Anastasius that he rather
consented to send letters to John of Jerusalem and other oriental
bishops in condemnation of Origenism, A.D. 399. Rufinus withdrew
to Aquileia and there continued to translate the writings of
Origen and others of the Greeks.
§ 51.3. =The Controversy in Alexandria and Constantinople,
A.D. 399-438.=--=Theophilus=, patriarch of Alexandria, a pompous,
ambitious and strong-handed ecclesiastical prince, had down to
A.D. 399 been on good terms with the Origenist monks and even
in the Easter address of that year expressed himself in strong
terms against the heresy of the anthropomorphists. The monks rose
in rebellion over this, attacked him with clubs and forced him
to pronounce an anathema upon Origen. Soon thereafter he had a
personal dispute with his former friends. The aged and venerable
presbyter Isidore and the four so-called “long brothers,” ἀδελφοὶ
μακροί, two of whom served in his church as _œconomi_, refused to
pay him pupils’ and legates’ money and fled from his passionate
displeasure to their companions in the Nitrian desert. In
A.D. 399, however, at an endemic Synod at Alexandria he condemned
Origen, and in A.D. 401 published a violent manifesto against
the Origenists.[157] The noble but shortsighted Epiphanius
approved it and Jerome hastened to translate it into Latin. With
rude military force the Nitrian monks were scattered and driven
away. Persecuted by the warrants issued by the patriarch, they
sought protection from bishop =John Chrysostom= at Constantinople
(§ 47, 8), whose intercession, however, Theophilus contemptuously
rejected. For peace sake Chrysostom now wished to retire. But the
monks found access to the Empress Eudoxia, and upon her appeal
to the Emperor Arcadius, Theophilus was cited before a Synod at
Constantinople over which Chrysostom presided. Theophilus foamed
with rage. He succeeded by misrepresentation of the facts to win
to his side the zealot Epiphanius. The noble old man hasted full
of zeal and prejudice to Constantinople, but coming to see things
in their true light, he withdrew from them with the words, “I
leave to you the court and hypocrisy.” Theophilus, however, knew
well how to get on with the court and hypocrisy. Chrysostom,
by severe and searching preaching, had aroused the anger of
the Empress. Relying upon this, Theophilus landed with a great
retinue at Constantinople, and organized at the Empress’s estate
of Drus, the Oak, near Chalcedon, a Council, _Synodus ad Quercum_,
A.D. 403, which pronounced Chrysostom guilty of immorality,
offences against the church and high treason. The Emperor
condemned him to exile. Chrysostom soothed the people excited
in his favour, and allowed himself quietly to be sent away. A
violent earthquake, however, next night and the incontrollable
excitement of the populace, led the Emperor to entreat the
exile by special messenger immediately to return. After three
days’ absence he had a triumphal entrance again into the city.
Theophilus fled precipitately to Alexandria. Soon thereafter
Chrysostom very solemnly denounced the noisy inauguration of
a statue of the empress during the celebration of worship, and
when on this account her rage flamed up against him afresh, the
unfortunate words were uttered by him in a sermon on the day of
John the Baptist: Πάλιν Ἡρωδίας μαίνεται, πάλιν πράσσεται, πάλιν
ἐπὶ πίνακι τὴν κεφαλὴν τοῦ Ἰωάννου ζητεῖ λαβεῖν. Now the game
was again in Theophilus’ favour. His party fanned the flame at
the court. During the Easter vigils, A.D. 404, armed men burst
into the church of Chrysostom and carried him away an exile to
Cucusus in Armenia. With heroic courage he bore all the miseries
of the journey, the climate and the wild lawless neighbourhood.
With his people from the place of his banishment he maintained
regular pastoral intercourse.--Soon after the outbreak of
the conflict, Theophilus as well as Chrysostom had diligently
sought to obtain the support of the West. Both sent letters and
messengers to Rome, Milan and Aquileia, seeking to justify their
cases before the churches. Innocent I. of Rome urged the deciding
of the controversy at an œcumenical Council, but did not carry
his point. After the disgraceful banishment of Chrysostom the
whole West took his side, and Innocent got Honorius to apply to
Arcadius for his recall; but the only result was that in A.D. 407
he was sent to still more severe banishment at Pityus, on the
Black Sea. He succumbed to the fatigues of the journey and
died on the way with words on his lips that had been the motto
of his life: Δόξα τῷ θεῷ πάντων ἕνεκεν. A great part of his
congregation at Constantinople refused to acknowledge the new
patriarch Arsacius and his successor Atticus, and continued apart,
notwithstanding all persecutions, under the name of Johannites,
until Theodosius II. in A.D. 438 fetched back with honour the
bones of their revered pastor and laid them in the imperial vault.
Amid personal animosities and embittered feelings the Origenist
controversy was long lost to view, but we must return to it again
further on (§ 52, 6).[158]
§ 52. THE CHRISTOLOGICAL CONTROVERSY.[159]
In the Trinitarian controversy we dealt with the pre- and
extra-historical existence of the Son of God, with His divine nature
in itself; but now, at the crucial point of Christian speculation and
ecclesiastical conflict, we come to treat of His historical existence
as that of the incarnate Son of God, of the connection of the divine
nature of the Logos with the human nature of the Son of Mary, and of
the mutual relations of both to one another. Even during the Arian
controversy the conflict was begun, and while the church maintained
against Arius the full divinity of Christ, it also affirmed against
Apollinaris the completeness of His humanity. In three further phases
this conflict was continued. In the Dyoprosopic controversy the church
maintained the unity of the Person of Christ against the Antiochean
extreme represented by Nestorius, which hold both natures so far
apart that the result seemed to be two persons. In the Monophysite
controversy the opposite extreme of the new Alexandrian school
was combated, which in the unity of the person lost sight of the
distinctness of the natures. In the Monothelite controversy a unionistic
effort was resisted which indeed allowed the duality of natures to be
affirmed nominally, but practically denied it by the acknowledgment of
only one will.
§ 52.1. =The Apollinarian Controversy,
A.D. 362-381.=[160]--Previously the older _Modalists_, _e.g._,
Beryllus and Sabellius, had taught that by the incarnation the
Logos had received merely a human body. Marcellus shared this
view; but also his antipodes Arius had adopted it in order
to avoid postulating two creatures in Christ. Athanasius held
by the doctrine of Origen, that the human soul in Christ is
a necessary bond between the Logos and the body, as well as
an organ for giving expression to the Logos through the body.
At the Synod of Alexandria, A.D. 362, therefore, he obtained
ecclesiastical sanction for the recognition of a complete human
nature in Christ. =Apollinaris= of Laodicea (§ 47, 5), who had
helped to arrange for this Council, also disapproved of the
expression σῶμα ἄψυχον, but yet thought that the doctrine of
the completeness of the human nature must be denied. He was led
to this position by his adoption of trichotomic principles. He
maintained that Christ has taken merely a σῶμα with a ψυχὴ ἄλογος,
and that the place of the ψυχὴ λογικὴ (ὁ νοῦς) was represented
in him by the divine Logos. If this were not so then, he thought,
one must assume two persons in Christ or let Christ sink down
to the position of a mere ἄνθρωπος ἔνθεος. Only in this way
too could absolute sinlessness be affirmed of him. On the other
hand, Athanasius and the two Gregories saw that in this way
the substantiality of the incarnation and the completeness of
redemption were lost. The so-called second œcumenical Council of
A.D. 381 rejected the doctrine of Apollinaris, who with his party
was excluded from the Church. The Apollinarians subsequently
joined the Monophysites.
§ 52.2. =Christology of the Opposing Theological Schools.=--In
consequence of the Arian controversy the perfect divinity, and in
consequence of the Apollinarian controversy the perfect humanity,
of Christ were finally established. On the relation between
the two natures conditioned by the union there was definite
result attained unto. Apollinaris had taught a connection of
the divinity with the _incomplete_ manhood so intimate that
he had unwittingly destroyed the duality of the natures, and
by means of an ἀντιμεθίστασις τῶν ὀνομάτων transferred the
attributes of the one nature to the other; so that not only
the body of Christ must have been deified and have been therefore
worthy of worship, but also birth, suffering and death must be
referred to His divinity. In his treatise: Κατὰ μέρος πίστις,
he teaches: οὐ δύο πρόσωπα, οὐδὲ δύο φύσεις, οὐδὲ γὰρ τέσσαρα
προσκυνεῖν λέγομεν, θεὸν καὶ υἱὸν θεοῦ καὶ ἄνθρωπον καὶ πνεῦμα
ἅγιον, and in the tract _De incarnatione Verbi_, wrongly
attributed to Athanasius: Ὁμολογοῦμεν εἶναι αὐτὸν υἱὸν τοῦ
θεοῦ καὶ θεὸν κατὰ πνεῦμα, υἱὸν ἀνθρώπου κατὰ σάρκα· οὐ δύο
φύσεις τὸν ἕνα υἱὸν, μίαν προσκυνητὴν καὶ μίαν ἀπροσκύνητον,
ἀλλὰ μίαν φύσιν τοῦ θεοῦ λόγου σεσαρκομένην καὶ προσκυνομένην
μετὰ τῆς σάρκος αὐτοῦ μίᾳ προσκυνήσει. So, too, in the Epistle
ascribed to Julius of Rome. The =Alexandrian Theology=, although
rejecting the mutilation of the human nature favoured by
Apollinaris, sympathized with him in his love for the mystical,
the inconceivable and the transcendental. In opposition to the
Arian heresy it gave special emphasis to the divinity of Christ
and taught a ἕνωσις φυσική of both natures. Only before the
union and _in abstracto_ can we speak of two natures; after
the incarnation and _in concreto_ we can speak only of one
divine-human nature. Mary was therefore spoken of as the mother
of God, θεοτόκος. Athanasius in his treatise against Apollinaris
acknowledged an ἀσύγχυτος φυσικὴ ἕνωσις τοῦ λόγου πρὸς τὴν ἰδίαν
αὐτοῦ γενομένην σάρκα, and explained this φυσικὴ ἕνωσις as a
ἕνωσις κατὰ φύσιν. The Cappadocians (§ 47, 4) indeed expressly
admitted two natures, ἄλλο καὶ ἄλλα, but yet taught a commingling
of them, σύγκρασις, κατάμιξις, a συνδραμεῖν of the two natures,
εἰς ἕν, a μεταποιηθῆναι of the σὰρξ πρὸς τὴν θεότητα. Cyril of
Alexandria taught that the ἐνσάρκωσις was a φυσικὴ ἕνωσις, an
incarnation in the proper sense. Christ consists ἐκ δύο φύσεων,
but not ἐκ δύο φύσεσι, _i.e._ only before the incarnation and
_in abstracto_ (κατὰ μόνην τὴν θεωρίαν) can we speak of two
natures. In the God-man two natures would be two subjects, and
so there would be two Christs; the redeemer would then only be
an ἄνθρωπος θεοφόρος and not a θεάνθρωπος, and could thus afford
no guarantee of a complete redemption, etc. The =Antiochean
Theology= (§ 47, 8, 9), in opposition to Apollinaris, affirmed
most emphatically the complete and unchangeable reality of the
human nature of Christ at and after its union with the divine.
It would therefore only admit of a συναφεία or a ἕνωσις σχετική,
by which both are brought into the relation (σχέσις) of common
being and common action. Expressions like θεοτόκος, θεὸς
ἐγγέννηθεν, θεὸς ἔπαθεν, seemed to the thinkers of this school
blasphemous, or at least absurd. They acknowledged indeed that
the σάρξ of Christ is worthy of adoration but only in so far as
it is the organ of the redeeming Logos, not because in itself
it shares in the divine attributes. The most developed form of
this doctrine was presented by Theodore of Mopsuestia in strict
connection with his anthropology and soteriology. The historical
development of the God-man is with him the type and pattern of
the historical redemption of mankind. Christ assumed a complete
human nature, with all its sinful affections and tendencies,
but he fought these down and raised His human nature by constant
conflict and victory to that absolute perfection to which by the
same way He leads us through the communication of His Spirit.
He expressly guarded himself against the charge of making Christ
into two persons: Christ is ἄλλο καὶ ἄλλο, but not ἄλλος καὶ
ἄλλος for the human nature has in the incarnation renounced
personality and independence.--Each of these two schools
represented one side of the truth of the church’s doctrine;
in the union of the two sides the church proclaimed the full
truth. On the other hand the two schools proceeded more and more
one-sidedly to emphasise each its own side of the truth, and so
tended toward positive error. Thus arose two opposite errors, the
separating of the natures and the confusing of the natures, which
the church rejected one after the other, and proclaimed the truth
that lay at the root of both.--During this discussion arose the
=Western Theology= as the regulator of the debate. So long as it
dealt with the one-sided extreme of the Antiocheans it stood side
by side with the Alexandrians. Augustine, _e.g._ used indeed the
expression _mixture_, but in reality he explains the relation
of both natures to one another quite in accordance with the
afterwards settled orthodoxy. But when at last the method of
exclusions reached the error of the Alexandrians, the Westerns
turned quite as decidedly to the other side and maintained the
union of the two sides of the truth (Leo the Great). The conflict
attracted great attention when it broke out at first in the West,
but it was so quickly settled that soon no trace of it remained.
In Southern Gaul a monk Leporius came forward teaching the
Antiochean doctrine of the union of the two natures. In A.D. 426
he went to Africa, entered into conflict with Augustine, but
retracted his errors almost immediately.
§ 52.3. =The Dyoprosopic or Nestorian Controversy,
A.D. 428-444.=[161]--In A.D. 428 a monk of Antioch called
=Nestorius=, a distinguished orator, was appointed patriarch of
Constantinople. He was an eloquent and pious man but hasty and
imprudent, with little knowledge of the world and human nature,
and immoderately severe against heretics. The hatred of an
unsuccessful rival in Constantinople called Proclus and the
rivalry of the patriarch of Alexandria, who hated him not only as
a rival but as an Antiochean, made the position of the unsupported
monk a very hard one, and his protection of the expatriated
Pelagians (§ 53, 4) excited the Roman bishop Cœlestine against
him. Anastasius, a presbyter brought with him by Nestorius,
was annoyed at the frequent use of the expression θεοτόκος and
preached against it. Nestorius took his part against people and
monks, sentenced the monks who had insulted him personally to
endure corporal punishment, and at an endemic Synod in A.D. 439
condemned the doctrine objected to. And now Cyril of Alexandria
(§ 47, 6) entered the lists as champion of the Alexandrian
dogmatics. He won to himself Cœlestine of Rome (§ 46, 6), as
well as bishops Memnon of Ephesus and Juvenalis [Juvenal] of
Jerusalem, and at the court, Pulcheria (sister of Theodosius II.
A.D. 408-450); while the empress Eudocia (§ 48, 5) and the Syrian
bishops took the side of Nestorius. All conciliatory attempts
were frustrated by the stiffness of the two patriarchs. Cœlestine
of Rome in A.D. 430 demanded of Nestorius a recantation within
ten days, and Cyril at a Synod of Alexandria in A.D. 430 produced
twelve strong counterpropositions containing anathemas, which
Nestorius answered immediately by twelve counteranathemas. Thus
the controversy and the parties engaged in it became more and
more violent. For its settlement the emperor called the so-called
=Third= (properly =Second=, comp. § 50, 4) =Œcumenical Council
at Ephesus in A.D. 431=. Nestorius enjoyed the decided favour
of the emperor, the imperial plenipotentiary was his personal
friend, and a portion of the emperor’s bodyguard accompanied him
to Ephesus. But Cyril appeared with a great retinue of bishops
and a faithful guard of servants of the church and seamen, who
should in case of need prove the correctness of the Alexandrian
dogmatics with their fists. In addition Memnon of Ephesus had in
readiness a crowd of clergy, monks and people from Asia Minor.
Before the Roman legates and the Syrian bishops had arrived Cyril
opened the Council without them with 200 bishops. Nestorianism
was condemned, Nestorius excommunicated and deposed, and
Cyril’s anathematizing propositions adopted as the standard
of ecclesiastical orthodoxy. The Roman legate recognised the
Council, but the imperial commissioner refused his approval;
and the Syrian bishops, under the presidency of John of Antioch
proceeded, on their arrival, to hold an opposition Council, which
excommunicated Cyril and Memnon. Nestorius of his own accord
retired into a monastery. Meanwhile in Constantinople, at the
instigation of Pulcheria, a popular tumult was raised in favour
of Cyril. The emperor set aside all the three leaders, Nestorius,
Cyril and Memnon, and authorised a mediating creed drawn up by
Theodoret (§ 47, 9) in which the θεοτόκος was recognised but an
ἀσύγχυτος ἕνωσις was affirmed. Cyril and Memnon still remained
in their offices. They subscribed Theodoret’s formula and John
subscribed the condemnation of Nestorius, A.D. 433, who was
deposed and given over to the vengeance of his enemies. Driven
from his monastic retreat and in many ways ill-treated, he died
in destitution in A.D. 440. The compromise of the two leaders
called forth opposition on every side. The Syrian church
was in revolt over their patriarch’s betrayal of the person
of Nestorius. John avenged himself by deposing his opponents.
This had well-nigh been the fate of the noble Theodoret;
but the patriarch exempted him from condemning the person
of Nestorius in consideration of his condemnation of the
doctrine.--The Egyptians also charged their patriarch with
the denial of the true doctrine. He was at pains, however, to
give proof of his zeal by the vindictiveness of his persecutions.
Not without an eye to results he wrought to have the anathema
of the church pronounced upon the heads of the Antiochean school,
and one of their partisans, bishop Rabulas of Edessa, pounced
upon the famous theological school at Edessa, at the head of
which then stood the distinguished presbyter Ibas (§ 47, 13).
After the death of Rabulas, however, in A.D. 436, the school
again rose to great eminence. Theodoret and Cyril meanwhile
contended with one another in violent writings. Death closed
the mouth of Cyril in A.D. 444. But Rabulas unweariedly sought
out and burnt the writings of Theodore of Mopsuestia, which
Ibas had translated into Syriac. The latter published a letter
to Maris bishop of Hardashir in Persia, which at a subsequent
period obtained symbolical rank among the Nestorians, and Thomas
Barsumas, bishop of Nisibis, wrought successfully for the spread
of Nestorianism in the Persian church. In A.D. 489 the school of
Edessa was again destroyed by order of the emperor Zeno. Teachers
and scholars migrated to Persia, and founded at Nisibis a school
that long continued famous. At a Synod in Seleucia in A.D. 499,
under the patriarch Babäus of Seleucia, the whole Persian
church finally broke off from the orthodox church of the Roman
empire (§ 64, 2). They called themselves according to their
ecclesiastical language Chaldean Christians. Their patriarch
bore the title Jazelich, καθολικός. The Nestorian church passed
on from Persia into India, where its adherents, appropriating the
old legend that the apostle Thomas had introduced Christianity
into India (§ 16, 4), called themselves Thomas-Christians.
§ 52.4. =The Monophysite Controversy.=
I. =Eutychianism, A.D. 444-451.=--Cyril’s successor was
=Dioscurus=, who was inferior to his predecessor in
acuteness, but in passionateness and tyrannical cruelty
left him far behind. An old archimandrite in Constantinople
called =Eutyches= taught not only that after His incarnation
Christ had only one nature, but also that the body of
Christ as the body of God is not of like substance with
our own. The patriarch Domnus of Antioch accused him without
success to Theodosius II., and Theodoret wrote against him
a controversial treatise under the title Ἐρανιστὴς ἤτοι
Πολύμορφος, in which he opposed the doctrine of Eutyches
as a conglomeration of many heresies. Dioscurus now joined
in the fray, and wrought upon the emperor, whose minister
the eunuch Chrysaphius and whose consort Eudocia he had
won over to his side, to pass severe measures against the
Syrians, and especially Theodoret, whom the emperor forbade
to pass beyond the range of his diocese. Eusebius, bishop
of Doryläum, in Phrygia, however, accused Eutyches before
an endemic Synod at Constantinople, in A.D. 448, presided
over by the patriarch Flavian. Eutyches, though under
imperial protection, was nevertheless, upon his refusal
to retract, excommunicated and deposed. He appealed to
an œcumenical Synod and betook himself to =Leo the Great=
(§ 46, 7) at Rome. Flavian also appeared before the Roman
bishop. Leo took the side of Flavian, and in a letter to
that patriarch developed with great acuteness and clearness
the doctrine of the two natures in Christ. The emperor,
however, convoked an œcumenical Council at Ephesus, A.D. 449,
at which Dioscurus presided, while Flavian and his party had
no vote and Theodoret was not even present, but at which for
the first time there was a representative of the monastic
order in the person of the zealous monophysite, the Abbot
Barsumas. The Council was conducted in an extremely arbitrary
and violent manner. The doctrine of two natures was rejected,
and when Eusebius stepped forward to defend it, the Egyptians
shouted: Away with him! Burn him! Tear him in two pieces, as
he has torn the Christ! Flavian as well as Eusebius appealed
to the bishop of Rome; but the Synod pronounced on both the
sentence of excommunication. When now some bishops sprang
forward, and embracing Dioscurus’ knees entreated him to
desist from such injustice, he called in the soldiers to
his help who with chains and unsheathed swords rushed into
the church, after them a crowd of fanatical monks, stout
parabolani and a raging rabble. Flavian was sorely injured
by blows and kicks, and died soon afterwards in banishment.
The Roman legates and Eusebius escaped similar maltreatment
only by speedy flight. During the later sittings Eutyches
was restored, but the chiefs of the opposite party, Ibas,
Theodoret, Domnus, etc., were deposed and excommunicated.
Leo the Great addressed to the emperor a vigorous protest
against the decisions of this =Robber Synod=, _Latrocinium
Ephesinum_, σύνοδος ληστρική. The result was that Theodosius
quarrelled with Eudocia, was reconciled to Pulcheria, and
dismissed his minister. Flavian’s body was now taken in
state to Constantinople, and honourably buried. Theodosius’
death in A.D. 450 prevented any further steps being taken.
His sister Pulcheria, with her husband Marcian, ascended
the throne. A new =Œcumenical Council= (the so-called
=fourth=) =at Chalcedon in A.D. 451=, deposed Dioscurus,
who was banished to Gangra in Paphlagonia, but spared the
other party leaders of the Monophysites, and condemned
Nestorianism as well as Eutychianism. Cyril’s synodal
rescripts against Nestorius and Leo’s Epistle were
made the basis of the formal statement of the orthodox
doctrine: “that Christ is true God and true man, according
to His Godhead begotten from eternity and like the Father
in everything, according to his humanity born of Mary
the Virgin and God bearer in time and like to us men in
everything, only without sin; and that after His incarnation
the unity of the person consists in two natures which
are conjoined without confusion (ἀσυγχύτως) and without
change (ἀτρέπτως), but also without rending (ἀδιαιρέτως)
and without separation (ἀχωρίστως).” In this Synod too
there were frequently scenes which in unruly violence were
little behind those of the Robber Synod. When, for example,
Theodoret entered amid the loud cheers of the orientals,
the Egyptians saluted him with wild shouts (δι’ εὐσέβειαν
κράζομεν, said they): “Away with the Jew, the blasphemer
of God!” A scene of wild confusion and tumult followed
which only with the greatest difficulty was quelled by
the imperial commissioners. Then at the eighth session,
when the Egyptians demanded not only the express and special
condemnation of the doctrine but also that of the person
of Nestorius, and Theodoret sought to justify him, the storm
broke out afresh, and this time the Egyptians gained their
point, but they were again defeated after violent debate,
in their attempt to secure the condemnation of the person
and writings of Ibas.[162]
§ 52.5.
II. =Imperial Attempts at Union, A.D. 451-519.=--The supporters
of the Alexandrian dogmatics left the Council full of
resentment at the defeat which they had sustained. They
were henceforth called Monophysites. The whole church was
now in a state of feverish excitement. In Palestine the
monk Theodosius, secretly co-operating with the dowager
empress Eudocia living there in exile, roused the mob into
rebellion. In Egypt the uproar was still more violent.
Timotheus Aëlurus assumed the position of an opposition
patriarch and drove out the orthodox patriarch Proterius.
The same thing was done in Antioch by the monk Petrus
[Peter] Fullo (ὁ γραφεύς). In order to give a Monophysite
colour to the liturgy he added to the Trishagion (Is. vi. 3),
which had been liturgically used in the oldest churches, the
formula θεὸς ὁ σταυρωθεὶς δι’ ἡμᾶς. Party violence meanwhile
went the length of insurrections and blood-shedding on both
sides. The new emperor Leo I. the Thracian, A.D. 457-474,
a powerful and prudent ruler, interposed to bring about
a pacification. In accordance with the advice of the most
distinguished bishops of the empire the two mutinous leaders
of the Monophysites were banished, and the patriarchal
sees thus vacated filled by moderate Dyophysites. But after
Leo’s death and the dethronement of his son-in-law Zeno in
A.D. 475, the usurper Basiliscus issued an edict in A.D. 476,
under the name of an =Encyclion=, by which the Chalcedonian
Symbol, along with Leo’s Epistle, was condemned, and
Monophysitism was proclaimed to be the universal national
religion. Fullo and Aëlurus were also reinstated. The
patriarch Acacius of Constantinople, on the other hand,
organized a Dyophysite counter-revolution, Basiliscus was
overthrown, and the emperor Zeno again placed upon the
throne in A.D. 477. About this time Aëlurus died, and his
party chose Petrus [Peter] Mongus (μογγός, stammering) as
his successor; but the court appointed a Dyophysite Johannes
Talaja. Acacius, when Talaja took up a hostile position
towards him, joined with his opponent Mongus. Both agreed
upon a treaty of union, which also found favour with the
emperor Zeno, and by an edict, the so-called =Henoticon=
of A.D. 482 obtained the force of a law. Nestorianism
and Eutychianism were condemned, Cyril’s anathematisms
were renewed, the Chalcedonian decisions abrogated,
and the Nicene faith alone declared valid, while all
controverted points were to be carefully avoided in teaching
and preaching. Naturally protests were made from both sides.
The strict Monophysites of Egypt threw off Mongus, and were
now called Ἀκέφαλοι. Felix III. of Rome, at the head of the
Dyophysites, refused to have church fellowship with Acacius.
Thus arose a 35 years’ schism, A.D. 484-519, between East
and West. Only the Acoimetæ monks in Constantinople (§ 44, 3)
continued to hold communion with Rome. Church fellowship
between the parties was not restored until Justin I.,
who thought that the schism would hinder his projected
reconquest of Italy, in conjunction with the Roman bishop
Hormisdas in A.D. 519, cancelled the Henoticon, and deposed
those who adhered to it.
§ 52.6.
III. =Justinian’s Decrees, A.D. 527-553.=--During the violent
conflict of parties Justinian I. entered upon his long
and politically considered glorious reign, A.D. 527-565.
He regarded it as his life task permanently to establish
orthodoxy, and to win back heretics to the church, above
all the numerous Monophysites. But the well-disposed emperor,
who moreover had no deep insight into the thorny questions
of theological controversy, was in various ways misled by
the intrigues of court theologians, and the machinations
of his crafty consort Theodora, who was herself secretly
a Monophysite. The =Theopaschite Controversy= first called
forth from him a decree. The addition made to the Trishagion
by Petrus [Peter] Fullo, θεὸς ὁ σταυρωθεὶς δι’ ἡμᾶς,
had been smuggled into the Constantinopolitan liturgy
about A.D. 512. The Acoimetæ pronounced it heretical, and
Hormisdas of Rome admitted that it was at least capable of
being misunderstood and useless. But Justinian sanctioned
it in A.D. 533. Encouraged by this first success, Theodora
used her influence to raise the Monophysite Anthimus to
the episcopal chair of the capital. But the Roman bishop
Agapetus, who stayed in Constantinople as ambassador
of the Goths, unmasked him, and obtained his deposition.
Mennas, a friend of Agapetus, was appointed his successor
in A.D. 536. All Monophysite writings were ordered to be
burnt, their transcribers were punished by the loss of their
hand. Two Palestinian abbots, Domitian and Theodore Ascidas,
secret Monophysites and zealous friends of Origen, lived at
court in high favour. To compass their overthrow, Mennas at
an endemic Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 543 renewed the
condemnation of the arch-heretic and his writings. The court
theologians, however, subscribed without objection, and in
concert with Theodora plotted their revenge. Justinian had
long regarded Egypt with peculiar interest as the granary
of the empire. He felt that something must be done to pacify
the Monophysites who abounded in that country. Theodora
persuaded him that the Monophysites would be satisfied
if it were resolved, along with the writings of Theodore,
the father of the Nestorian heresy, to condemn also the
controversial writings of Theodoret against the venerated
Cyril and the Epistle of Ibas to Maris. The supposed errors
of these were collected before him in the _Three Chapters_.
The emperor did this by an edict in A.D. 544, and demanded
the consenting subscription of all the bishops. The
orientals obeyed; but in the West opposition was shown
on all sides, and thus broke out the violent =Controversy
of the Three Chapters=. Vigilius of Rome, a creature of
Theodora (§ 46, 9), had secretly promised his co-operation,
but, not feeling able to face the storm in the West, he
broke his word. Justinian had him brought to Constantinople
in A.D. 547 and forced from him a written declaration,
the so-called _Judicatum_, in which he agreed to the
condemnation of the _Three Chapters_. The Africans,
under Reparatus of Carthage excommunicated the successor
of Peter, and fought manfully for the rights and honour of
the calumniated fathers. Fulgentius Farrandus [Ferrandus]
wrote _Pro tribus capitt._, Facundus of Hermiane, _Defensío
III. capitt._, and the deacon Liberatus of Carthage,
a _Breviarium causæ Nestorian. et Eutychianorum_, an
important source of information for the history of the
Christological Controversies. Justinian finally convened
the =Fifth Œcumenical Council at Constantinople in A.D. 553=,
which confirmed all the imperial edicts. Vigilius issued
a _Constitum ad Imp._, in which he indeed rejected the
doctrines of the Three Chapters but refused to condemn
the persons. Under imprisonment and exile he became pliable,
and subscribed in A.D. 554. He died in A.D. 555 on his
return to his bishopric. His successor Pelagius formally
acknowledged the Constantinopolitan decrees, and North
Africa, North Italy and Illyria renounced the dishonoured
chair of Peter. At last Gregory the Great, with much
difficulty, gradually brought this schism to an end.
§ 52.7.
IV. =The Monophysite Churches.=--Justinian, however, did not
thereby reach the end he had in view. The Monophysites
continued their separation because the hated Chalcedonian
Symbol was still acknowledged. But more injurious to them
than the persecutions of the orthodox national church
were the endless quarrels and divisions among themselves.
First of all the two leaders in Alexandria, Julianus and
Severus, became heads of rival parties. The =Severians= or
φθαρτολάτραι taught that the body of Christ in itself had
been subject to corruption (the φθορά); the =Julianists=
denied it. This first split was followed by many others.
By transferring the Monophysite confusion of οὐσία
and ὑπόστασις to the doctrine of the Trinity arose the
Monophysite sect of the =Tritheists=, who taught that
in Christ there is one nature, and that in the Trinity
a separate nature is to be ascribed to each of the three
persons. Among them was the celebrated philosopher, Johannes
Philoponus (§ 47, 11), who supported this doctrine by the
Aristotelian categories. He also vindicated the notion that
the present world as to form and matter would perish at the
last day, and an entirely new world with new bodies would
be created. In opposition to this Conon, bishop of Tarsus,
affirmed that the overthrow of the world would be in form
only, and that the risen saints would again possess the
same bodies though in a glorified form. His followers the
so-called =Cononites= separated from the main stem of the
Tritheists and formed an independent sect.--The Monophysites
were most numerous in Egypt. Out of hatred to the Greek
Catholics they forbade the use of the Greek language in
their churches, and chose a Coptic patriarch for themselves.
They aided the Saracens in their conquest of Egypt in
A.D. 640, who out of gratitude for this drove away the
Catholic patriarch. From Egypt Monophysitism spread into
Abyssinia (§ 64, 1). Already in A.D. 536 Byzantine Armenia
had been conquered by the Persians, who showed favour to
the previously oppressed Monophysites (§ 64, 3). In Syria
and Mesopotamia, during Justinian’s persecutions, the
unwearied activity of a monk, Jacob Zanzalus, commonly
called el Baradai, because he went about clad as a beggar,
ordained by the Monophysites as bishop of Edessa and the
whole East, saved the Monophysite church from extinction.
He died in A.D. 538. After him the Monophysites were
called =Jacobites=. They called the Catholics Melchites,
_Royalists_. Their patriarch resided at Guba in Mesopotamia.
Subordinate to him was a suffragan bishop at Tagrit with the
title of _Maphrian_, _i.e._ the Fruit-bearer. At the head of
the Armenian Monophysites stood the patriarch of Aschtarag
with the title _Catholicus_. The Abyssinian church had a
metropolitan with the title _Abbuna_[163]--_Continuation_
§ 72, 2.
§ 52.8. =The Monothelite Controversy, A.D. 633-680.=--The
increasing political embarrassments of the emperor made a
union with the Monophysites all the more desirable. The emperor
Heraclius, A.D. 611-641, was advised to attempt a union of
parties under the formula: that Christ accomplished His work
of redemption by the exercise of one divine human will (μιᾷ
θεανδρικῇ ἐνεργείᾳ). Several Catholic bishops found nothing
objectionable in this formula which had already been used by
the Pseudo-Dionysius (§ 47, 11). In A.D. 633 the patriarchs
Sergius of Constantinople and Cyrus of Alexandria on the basis
of this concluded a treaty, in consequence of which most of
the Severians attached themselves again to the national church.
Honorius of Rome also was won over. But the monk Sophronius, who
soon thereafter in A.D. 634 became patriarch of Jerusalem, came
forward as the decided opponent Of this union, which led back
to Monophysitism. The conquest of Jerusalem, however, soon
after this, A.D. 637, by the Saracens put him outside of the
scene of conflict. In A.D. 638 the emperor issued an edict,
the =Ecthesis=, by which it was sought to make an end of the
strife by substituting for the offensive expression ἐνέργεια the
less objectionable term θέλημα, and confirming the Monothelite
doctrine as alone admissible. Now the monk Maximus (§ 47, 12)
entered the lists as the champion of orthodoxy. He betook
himself to Africa, where since Justinian’s time zeal for the
maintenance of the Chalcedonian faith was strongest, and here
secured political support in Gregorius [Gregory] the imperial
governor who sought to make himself independent of Byzantium.
This statesman arranged for a public disputation at Carthage
in A.D. 645 between Maximus and the ex-patriarch Pyrrhus of
Constantinople, the successor of Sergius, who, implicated in
a palace intrigue, deposed from his office and driven from
Constantinople, sought refuge in Africa. Pyrrhus willingly
submitted and abjured his error. An African General Synod in
A.D. 646 unanimously condemned Monothelitism, renounced church
fellowship with Paulus, the new patriarch of Constantinople, and
demanded of Pope Theodorus, A.D. 642-649, a fulmination against
the heresy. In order to give this demand greater emphasis,
Maximus and Pyrrhus travelled together to Rome. The latter was
recognised by the pope as legitimate patriarch of Constantinople,
but, being induced by the exarch of Ravenna to recant his
recantation, he was excommunicated by the pope, with a pen
dipped in the sacramental wine, returned to Constantinople and
was, after the death of Paulus, reinstated in his former office.
Maximus remained in Rome and there won the highest reputation
as the shield of orthodoxy.--The proper end of the union, namely
the saving of Syria and Egypt, was meanwhile frustrated by
the Mohammedan conquest of Syria in A.D. 638, and of Egypt
in A.D. 640. The court, however, for its own honour still
persevered in it. Africa and Italy occupied a position of
open revolt. Then emperor Constans II., A.D. 642-668, resolved
to annul the Ecthesis. In its place he put another enactment
about the faith, the =Typus=, A.D. 648, which sought to get back
to the state of matters before the Monothelite movement; that
neither one nor two wills should be taught. But Martin I. of
Rome at the first Lateran Synod at Rome in A.D. 649 condemned
in the strongest terms the Typus as well as the Ecthesis along
with its original maintainers, and sent the Acts to the emperor.
The exarch of Ravenna, Olympius, was now ordered to take the
bold prelate prisoner, but did not obey. His successor sent the
pope in chains to Constantinople. In A.D. 653 he was banished
for high treason to the Chersonese, where he literally suffered
hunger, and died in A.D. 655 six months after his arrival.
Still more dreadful was the fate of the abbot Maximus. At
the same time with Martin or soon after he too was brought
to Constantinople a prisoner from Rome. Here for a whole year
every effort imaginable was made, entreaties, promises, threats,
imprisonment, hunger, etc., in order to induce him to acknowledge
the Typus, but all in vain. The emperor then lost all patience.
In a towering rage at the unparalleled obstinacy of the monk’s
resistance he doomed him, A.D. 662, to dreadful scourging, to
have his tongue wrenched out and his hand hewn off, and to be
sent into the wildest parts of Thrace, where he died a few weeks
after his arrival at the age of 82 years. Such barbaric severity
was effectual for a long time. But under the next emperor
Constantinus Pogonnatus, A.D. 668-685, the two parties prepared
for a new conflict. The emperor resolved to make an end of it
by a General Council. Pope Agatho held a brilliant Synod at Rome
in A.D. 679, where it was laid down that not one iota should
be abated from the decisions of the Lateran Synod. With these
decisions and a missive from the pope himself, the papal legates
appeared at the =Sixth Œcumenical Council at Constantinople in
A.D. 680=, called also _Concil. Trullanum I._, because it was
held in the mussel-shaped vaulted hall Trullus in the imperial
castle, under the presidency of the emperor. As at Chalcedon
the Epistle of Leo I., so also here that of Agatho lay at the
basis of the Council’s doctrinal decrees: δύο φυσικὰ θελήματα
ἀδιαιρέτως, ἀτρέπτως, ἀμερίστως, ἀσυγχύτως, οὐχ ὑπεναντία, ἀλλὰ
ἑπόμενον τὸ ἀνθρώπινον καὶ ὑποτασσόμενον τῷ θείῳ. The Synod even
condescended to grant the pope a report of the proceedings and
to request his confirmation of its decisions. But the Greeks,
finding a malicious pleasure in the confusion of their rivals,
contrived to mix in the sweet drink a strong infusion of bitter
wormwood, for the Council among the other representatives of
Monothelite error ostentatiously and expressly condemned pope
Honorius as an accursed heretic. Pope Leo II. in a letter
to the emperor confirmed the decisions of the Council,
expressly homologating the condemnation of Honorius, “_qui
profana proditione immaculatam fidem subvertere conatus
est_.”--Henceforth Dyothelitism prevailed universally. Only
in one little corner of Asia, to which the arm of the state
did not reach, a vestige of Monothelitism continued to exist.
Its scattered adherents gathered in the monastery of St. Maro
in Lebanon, and acknowledged the abbot of this cloister as
their ecclesiastical head. They called themselves Maronites, and
with sword in hand maintained their ecclesiastical as well as
political independence against Byzantines and Saracens (§ 72, 3).
§ 52.9. =The Case of Honorius.=--The two Roman Synods, A.D. 649
and 679, had simply ignored the notorious fact of the complicity
of Honorius in the furtherance of Monothelite error, and Agatho
might hope by the casual statement in his letter, that the Roman
chair never had taken the side of heretical novelties, to beguile
the approaching œcumenical Synod into the same obliviousness. But
the Greeks paid no heed to the hint. His successor Leo II. could
not do otherwise than homologate the Eastern leaders’ condemnation
of heresy, even that of Honorius, hard though this must have
been to him. On the other hand, the biographies of the popes from
Honorius to Agatho in the Roman _Liber pontificalis_ (§ 90, 6)
help themselves out of this dilemma again by preserving a dead
silence about any active or passive interference of Honorius
in the Monothelite controversy. In the biography of Leo II. for
the first time is Honorius’ name mentioned among those of the
condemned Monothelites, but without any particular remark about
him as an individual. So too in the formulary of a profession of
faith in the _Liber diurnus_ of the Roman church made by every
new pope and in use down to the 11th century (§ 46, 11). From
the biography of Leo in the Pontifical book was copied the simple
name into the readings of the Roman Breviary for the day of
this saint, and so it remained down to the 17th century. It had
then been quite forgotten in the West that by this name a pope
was designated. Oftentimes it had been affirmed that even Roman
popes might fall and actually had fallen into error; but only
such cases as those of Liberius (§ 46, 4), Anastasius (§ 46, 8),
Vigilius (§ 52, 6), John XXII. (§ 110, 3; 112, 2) were adduced;
that of Honorius occurred to nobody. It was only in the 15th
century, through more careful examination of Acts of Synods that
the true state of matters was discovered, and in the 16th century
when the question of the infallibility of the pope had become
a burning one (§ 149, 4), the case of Honorius became the real
Sisyphus rock of Roman Catholic theology. The most laborious
attempts have been made by most venturesome means to get it out
of the way. The condemnation of Honorius by the sixth œcumenical
Council has been described as merely a spiteful invention of
later Greeks, who falsified everything relating to him in the
Acts of the Council; so, _e.g._ Baronius, Bellarmine, etc.--The
condemnation actually took place but not at the œcumenical first,
but at the schismatical second, Trullan Council of A.D. 692
(§ 63, 2), and the record of procedure has been by the malice
of later Greeks transferred from the record of the second to
that of the first.--Forged epistles of Honorius were laid before
the sixth œcumenical Council, by means of which it was misled
into passing sentence upon him.--The condemnation of the pope
did not turn upon his doctrine but upon his unseasonable love
of peace.--The pope meant well, but expressed himself so as
to be misunderstood; so _e.g._ the Jesuit Garnier in his ed.
of the _Liber diurnus_, the Vatican Council, and Hefele in
the 2nd ed. of his Hist. of the Councils.--In the epistles
referred to he spoke as a private individual and not officially,
_ex cathedra_.--It is, however, fatal to all such explanations
that the infallible pope Leo II. solemnly denounced _ex cathedra_
his infallible predecessor Honorius as a heretic. Besides the
only other possible escape by distinguishing the _question du
fait_ and the _question du droit_ has been formally condemned
_ex cathedra_ in connection with another case (§ 156, 5).[164]
§ 53. THE SOTERIOLOGICAL CONTROVERSIES, A.D. 412-529.[165]
While the Trinitarian and Christological controversies had their
origin in the East and there gave rise to the most violent conflicts,
the West taking indeed a lively interest in the discussion and by the
decisive voice of Rome giving the victory to orthodoxy at almost every
stage of the struggle, it was in the West that a controversy broke
out, which for a full century proceeded alongside of the Christological
controversy, without awakening in the East more than a passing and even
then only a secondary interest. It dealt with the fundamental questions
of sin and grace. In opposition to the Pelagian _Monergism_ of human
freedom, as well as the semi-Pelagian _Synergism_ of divine grace and
human freedom, the Augustinian _Monergism_ of divine grace finally
obtained the victory.
§ 53.1. =Preliminary History.=--From the earliest times the
actual universality of sin and the need of divine grace in
Christ for redemption from sin received universal acknowledgment
throughout the whole church. But as to whether and how far the
moral freedom of men was weakened or lost by sin, and in what
relation human conduct stood to divine grace, great uncertainty
prevailed. Opposition to Gnosticism and Manichæism led the older
fathers to emphasise as strongly as possible the moral freedom
of men, and induced them to deny inborn sinfulness as well
as the doctrine that sin was imprinted in men in creation,
and to account for man’s present condition by bad training,
evil example, the agency of evil spirits, etc. This tendency
was most vigorously expressed by the Alexandrians. The new
Alexandrian school showed an unmistakable inclination to connect
the universality of sin with Adam’s sin, without going the length
of affirming the doctrine of inherited sinfulness. In Soteriology
it remained faithful to its traditional synergism (comp., however,
§ 47, 7k, l.) The Antiochean school sought to give due place to
the co-operation of the human will alongside of the necessity of
divine grace, and reduced the idea of inherited sin to that of
inherited evil. So especially Chrysostom, who was indeed able to
conceive that Adam by his actual sin become mortal could beget
only mortal children, but not that the sinner could beget only
sinners. The first man brought death into the world, we confirm
and renew the doom by our own sin. Man by his moral will does
his part, the divine grace does its part. The whole East is
unanimous in most distinctly repudiating all predestinational
wilfulness in God. In the West, on the other hand, by Traducianism
or Generationism introduced by Tertullian, which regards
the soul as begotten with the body, the way was prepared
for recognising the doctrine of inherited sin (_Tradux animæ,
tradux peccati_) and consequently also of monergism. Tertullian,
himself, proceeding from the experience, that in every man
from birth there is present an unconquerable tendency to sin,
spoke with great decidedness of a _Vitium originis_. In this
he was followed by Cyprian, Ambrose and Hilary. Yet even these
teachers of the church had not altogether been emancipated
from synergism, and alongside of expressions which breathe the
hardest predestinationism, are found others which seem to give
equal weight to the opposite doctrine of human co-operation in
conversion. Augustine was the first to state with the utmost
consistency the doctrine of the divine monergism; while Pelagius
carried out the synergism of the earlier fathers until it became
scarcely less than human monergism.--Meanwhile Traducianism did
not succeed in obtaining universal recognition even in the West.
Augustine vacillates; Jerome and Leo the Great prefer Creationism,
which represents God as creating a new soul for each human being
begotten. Most of the later church fathers, too, are creationists,
without, however, prejudicing the doctrine of inherited sin.
Those of them who supported the trichotomic theory (§ 52, 1)
held that it was the cobegotten ψυχὴ ἄλογος, _anima sensitiva_
as opposed to the _anima intellectualis_, while those who
supported the dichotomic theory, which posits merely body and
soul, held that it was the soul created good by God, which was
infected on its passing into the body begotten by human parents
with its inherited sin. The theory of Pre existence, which
Origen had brought forward (§ 31, 5) had, even in the East,
only occasional representatives (§ 47, 7m, n, o.).[166]
§ 53.2. =The Doctrine of Augustine.=--During the first period
of his Christian life, when the conflict with Manichæism still
stood in the forefront of his thinking and controversial activity,
Augustine, looking at faith as a self-determining of the human
will, had thought a certain measure of free co-operation on the
part of man in his conversion to be necessary and had therefore
refused to maintain his absolute want of merit. But by his whole
life’s experience he was irresistibly led to acknowledge man’s
natural inability for any positive co-operation and to make faith
together with conversion depend solely upon the grace of God. The
perfect and full development of this doctrine was brought about
by means of his controversy with the Pelagians. Augustine’s
doctrinal system in its most characteristic features is as
follows: Man was created free and in the image of God, destined
to and capable of attaining immortality, holiness and blessedness,
but also with the possibility of sinning and dying. By the
exercise of his freedom he must determine his own career. Had
he determined himself for God, the being able not to sin and not
to die, would have become an impossibility of sinning and dying,
the _Posse non peccare et mori_ would have become a _Non posse
peccare et mori_. But tempted by Satan he fell, and thus it
became for him impossible that he should not sin and die, _non
posse non peccare et non mori_. All prerogatives of the Divine
image were lost; he retained only the capacity for outward civil
righteousness, _Justitia civilis_, and a capacity for redemption.
In Adam, moreover, all mankind sinned, for he was all mankind. By
generation Adam’s nature as it was after sin, with sin and guilt,
death and condemnation, but also the capacity for redemption,
passed over to all his posterity. Divine grace, which alone can
redeem and save man, attached itself to the remnant of the divine
image which expressed itself in the need of redemption and the
capacity for redemption. Grace is therefore absolutely necessary,
in the beginning, middle and end of the Christian life. It is
granted man, not because he believes, but that he may believe;
for faith too is the work of God’s grace. First of all grace
awakens through the law the consciousness of sin and the desire
for redemption, and leads by the gospel to faith in the Redeemer
(_gratia præveniens_). By means of faith it thus secures the
forgiveness of sin as _primum beneficium_ through appropriating
the merits of Christ and in part the powers of the divine
life through the implanting of living fellowship with Christ
(in baptism). Thus is free will restored to the good (_Gratia
operans_) and evidences itself in a holy life in love. But
even in the regenerate the old man with his sinful lusts is
still present. In the struggle of the new with the old he is
continually supported by Divine grace (_Gratia co-operans_)
unto his justification (_Justificatio_) which is completed in
the making righteous of his whole life and being through the
Divine impartation (_Infusio_) of new powers of will. The final
act of grace, which, however, according to the educative wisdom
of God is not attained in this life, is the absolute removal
of evil desire (_Concupiscentia_) and transfiguration into the
perfect likeness of Christ through resurrection and eternal
life (_Non posse peccare et mori_). Apart from the inconsistent
theory of justification proposed, this view of nature and grace
is thoroughly Pauline. Augustine, however, connects with it the
doctrine of an absolute predestination. Experience shows that not
all men attain to conversion and redemption. Since man himself
can contribute nothing to his conversion, the ground of this must
be sought not in the conduct of the man but only in an eternal
unconditional decree of God, _Decretum absolutum_, according
to which He has determined out of the whole fallen race of man,
_Massa perditionis_, to save some to the glory of His grace and
to leave others to their deserved doom to the glory of His penal
righteousness. The ground of this election is only the wise and
mysterious good pleasure of the divine will without reference to
man’s faith, which is indeed only a gift of God. If it is said:
“God wills that all men should be saved,” that can only mean,
“all who are predestinated.” As the outcasts (_Reprobati_)
can in no way appropriate grace unto themselves, the elect
(_Electi_) cannot in any way resist it (_Gratia irresistibilis_).
The one sure sign that one is elected is, therefore, undisturbed
perseverance in the possession of grace (_Donum perseverantiæ_).
To the heathens, even the noblest of them, he refused salvation,
but made a distinction in the degrees of their penal tortures.
So too unbaptized children were all regarded as lost. Although
over against this he also set down the proposition: _Contemtus,
non defectus sacramenti damnat_, the resolution of this
contradiction lay in the special divine election of grace, which
secures to the elect the dispensation of the sacrament.[167]
§ 53.3. =Pelagius and his Doctrine.=--Pelagius (§ 47, 21),
a British monk of respectable learning and decided moral
earnestness, living far away from the storms and strife of life,
without any strong inward temptations, without any inclination
to manifest sins and without deep experience of the Christian
life, knowing and striving after no higher ideal than that of
monkish asceticism, had developed a theory quite antagonistic
to that of Augustine. He was strengthened in his opposition to
Augustine’s doctrine of the corruption of human nature and its
unfitness for all co-operation in conversion and sanctification,
by observing that this doctrine was often misused by careless men
as an excuse for carnal confidence and moral selfishness. He was
thus made more resolute in maintaining that it is more wholesome
to preach to men an imperative moral law whose demands they, as
he thought, could satisfy by determined will and moral endeavour.
Man at first was created mortal by God, and not temporal but
spiritual death is the consequence and punishment of sin. Adam’s
fall has changed nothing in human nature and has had no influence
upon his descendants. Every man now is born just as God created
the first man, _i.e._ without sin and without virtue. By his
wholly unweakened freedom he decides for himself on the one
side or the other. The universality of sin results from the
power of seduction, of mere example and habit. Still there may
be completely sinless men; and there have been such. God’s grace
facilitates man’s accomplishment of his purpose. It is, therefore,
not absolutely, but by the actual universality of sin, relatively
necessary. Grace consists in enlightenment by revelation, in
forgiveness of sin as the expression of divine forbearance, and
in the strengthening of our moral powers by the incentive of
the law and the promise of eternal life. God’s grace is destined
for all men, but man must make himself worthy of it by honest
striving after virtue. Christ became man, in order by His perfect
teaching and by the perfect pattern of His life to give us the
most powerful incentive to reformation and the redeeming of
ourselves thereby. As in sin we are Adam’s offspring, so in
virtue shall we be Christ’s offspring. He regarded baptism as
necessary (infant baptism _in remissionem futurorum peccatorum_).
Children dying unbaptized he placed in a lower stage of
blessedness. The same inconsistent submission to the fathers
of ecclesiastical tradition shows itself in the acceptance of
ecclesiastical views of revelation, miracles, prophecy, the
Trinity and the Divinity of Christ, whereas a more consistent
and systematic thinker would have felt compelled from his
anthropological principles to set aside or at least modify these
supernaturalistic elements.
§ 53.4. =The Pelagian Controversy, A.D. 411-431.=--From A.D. 409
Pelagius resided in Rome. Here he gained over to his views
Cœlestius, a man of greater acuteness and scientific attainments
than himself. Both won high respect in Rome for their zeal for
morality and asceticism and promulgated their doctrine without
opposition. In A.D. 411 both went to Carthage, whence Pelagius
went and settled in Palestine. Cœlestius remained behind
and obtained the office of presbyter. Now for the first time
his errors were opposed. Paulinus deacon of Milan (§ 47, 20)
happening to be there formally complained against him, and a
provincial Synod at Carthage A.D. 412 excommunicated him, on
his refusal to retract. In the same year too Augustine published
his first controversial treatise: _De peccatorum meritis et
remissione et de baptismo parvulorum, Lb. III._ In =Palestine=
Pelagius had attached himself to the Origenists. Jerome, besides
passing a depreciatory judgment upon his literary productions,
contested his doctrine as an expounder of the Origenist heresy
(_Ep. ad Ctesiphontem_ and _Dialog. c. Pelagium, Lb. III._),
and a young Spanish presbyter Paulus [Paul] Orosius (§ 47, 20)
complained of him to the Synod of Jerusalem A.D. 415, under the
presidency of bishop John of that city. The synergistic orientals,
however, could not be convinced of the dangerous character of
his carefully guarded doctrine. Such too was the result of the
Synod of Diospolis or Lydda in A.D. 415 under bishop Eulogius of
Cæsarea, where two Gallic bishops appeared as accusers. Augustine
proved to the Palestinians in _De gestis Pelagii_ that they had
allowed themselves to be kept in the dark by Pelagius. Orosius
too published a controversial tract, _Apologeticus c. Pelag._,
in reply to which, or more probably to Jerome, Theodore of
Mopsuestia wrote the book now lost, Περὶ τοὺς λέγοντας, φύσει
καὶ οὐ γνώμη πταίειν τοὺς ἀνθρώπους. Then the Africans again
took up the controversy. Two Synods at Mileve and Carthage, in
A.D. 416, reiterated their condemnation and sent their decree
to Innocent I. at Rome. The Pope acquiesced in the proceedings
of the Africans. Pelagius sent a veiled confession of faith and
Cœlestius appeared personally in Rome. Innocent died, however,
in A.D. 417, before his arrival. His successor Zozimus [Zosimus],
perhaps a Greek and certainly weak as a dogmatist, allowed
himself to be won over by Cœlestius and brought severe charges
against the Africans, against which again these entered a
vigorous protest. In A.D. 418 the emperor Honorius issued his
_Sacrum rescriptum_ against the Pelagians and a general Synod
at Carthage in the same year emphatically condemned them. Now
Zozimus [Zosimus] was prevailed on also to condemn them in his
_Epistola tractatoria_. Eighteen Italian bishops, among them
Julian of Eclanum in Apulia, the most acute and able apologist
of Pelagianism, refused to subscribe and were banished. They
sought and obtained protection from the Constantinopolitan bishop
Nestorius. But this connection did harm to both. The Roman bishop
Cœlestine took part with those who opposed the Christological
views of Nestorius (§ 52, 3), and at the =Œcumenical Council
of Ephesus in A.D. 431=, the orientals condemned along with
Nestorius also Pelagius and Cœlestius, without, however,
determining anything positive in regard to the doctrine under
discussion. To this end with unwearied zeal laboured Marius
Mercator, a learned layman of Constantinople, who published
two _Commonitoria_ against Pelagius and Cœlestius, and a
controversial treatise against Julian of Eclanum. Meanwhile
too Augustine rested not from his energetic polemic. In A.D. 413
he wrote _De spiritu et littera ad Marcellinum_; in A.D. 415
against Pelagius, _De natura et gratia_; against Cœlestius,
_De perfectione justitiæ hominis_. In A.D. 416, _De gestis
Pelagii_. In A.D. 418, _De gratia Dei et de peccato originali
Lb. II. c. Pelag. et Cœl._ In A.D. 419, _De nuptiis et
concupiscentia Lb. II._, against the charge that his doctrine
was a reviling of God-appointed marriage. In A.D. 420, _C. duas
epistolas Pelagianorum et Bonifatium I._, against the vindicatory
writings of Julian and his friends. In A.D. 421, _Lb. VI.
c. Julianum_. And later still, _Opus imperfectum c. secundam
Juliani responsionem_. Engl. Transl.; Ante-Nicene Lib.:
Anti-Pelag. Wr., 3 vols., Edin., 1867 ff.
§ 53.5. =The Semi-Pelagian Controversy, A.D. 427-529.=--Bald
Pelagianism was overthrown, but the excessive crudeness of the
predestination theory, as set forth by Augustine, called forth
new forms of opposition. The monks of the monastery of Adrumetum
in North Africa, by severely carrying out the predestination
theory to its last consequences, had fallen, some into
sore distress of soul and despair, others into security and
carelessness, while others again thought that to avoid such
consequences, one must ascribe to human activity in the work
of salvation a certain degree of meritoriousness. The abbot of
the monastery in this dilemma applied to Augustine, who in two
treatises, written in A.D. 427, _De gratia et libero arbitrio_
and _De correptione et gratia_, sought to overcome the scruples
and misconceptions of the monks. But about this time in Southern
Gaul there was a whole theological school which rejected the
doctrine of predestination, and maintained the necessity of
according to human freedom a certain measure of co-operation
with divine grace, in consequence of which sometimes the one,
sometimes the other, is fundamental in conversion. At the head
of this school was Johannes Cassianus († A.D. 432), a disciple
and friend of Chrysostom, founder and president of the monastery
at Massilia. His followers are thence called Massilians or
Semi-Pelagians. He had himself contested Augustine’s doctrine,
without naming it, in the 13th of his _Collationes Patrum_
(§ 47, 21). Of his disciples the most famous was Vincentius
[Vincent] Lerinensis (of the monastery of Lerinum), who in his
_Commonitorium pro Catholicæ fidei antiquitate et universitate_
(Engl. Transl., Oxford, 1836) laid down the principle that the
catholic faith is, _quod semper, ubique et ab omnibus creditum
est_. Judged by this standard Augustine’s doctrine was by no
means catholic. The second book of this work, now lost, probably
contested Augustinianism expressly and was, therefore, suppressed.
But Augustine had talented supporters even in Gaul, such as
the two laymen Hilarius and Prosper Aquitanicus (§ 47, 20). What
took place around them they reported to Augustine, who wrote
against the Massilians _De predestinatione Sanctorum_ and
_De dono perseverantiæ_. He was prevented by his death, which
took place in A.D. 430, from taking part longer in the contest.
Hilarius and Prosper, however, continued it. Since the Roman
bishop Cœlestine, before whom in A.D. 431 they personally made
complaint, answered with a Yes and No theology, Prosper himself
took up the battle in an able work _De gratia Dei et libero
arbitrio contra Collatorem_, but in doing so unwittingly smoothed
off the sharpest points of the Augustinian system. This happened
yet more decidedly in the ingenious treatise _De Vocatione
gentium_, whose author was perhaps Leo the Great, afterwards
pope but then only a deacon. On the other side, opponents
(Arnobius the younger?) used the artifice of presenting, in
the notable work entitled _Prædestinatus_, pretending to be
written by a follower of Augustine, a caricature of the doctrine
of predestination carried to the utmost extreme of absurdity,
and these sought to justify their own position. The first book
contains a description of ninety heresies, the last of which is
predestinationism; the second gives as supplement to the first
the pretended treatise of such a predestinarian; and the third
confutes it. A certain presbyter Lucidus, a zealous adherent of
the doctrine of predestination, was by a semi-Pelagian synod at
Aries in A.D. 475 forced to recant. Faustus, bishop of Rhegium
(§ 47, 21), sent after him by order of the Council a controversial
treatise _De gratia Dei et humanæ mentis libero arbitrio_, and
also in the same year A.D. 475, a Synod at Lyons sanctioned
semi-Pelagianism. The treatise of Faustus, although moderate
and conciliatory, caused violent agitation among a community
of Scythian monks in Constantinople, A.D. 520. They complained
through bishop Possessor of Carthage to pope Hormisdas, but
he too answered with a Yes and No theology. Then the Africans
banished by the Vandals to Sardinia took up the matter. They
held a Council in A.D. 523, by whose order Fulgentius of Ruspe
(§ 47, 20), a zealous apologist of Augustinianism composed his
_De veritate prædest. et gratia Dei Lb. III._, which made an
impression even in Gaul. And now two able Gallic bishops, Avitus
of Vienne and Cæsarius of Arles (§ 47, 20) entered the lists in
behalf of a moderate Augustinianism, and won for it at the Synod
of Oranges in A.D. 529 a decided victory over semi-Pelagianism.
Augustine’s doctrine of original sin in its strictest form,
and his assertions about the utter want of merit in every human
act and the unconditional necessity of grace were acknowledged,
faith was extolled as exclusively the effect of grace, but
predestination in regard to the _Reprobati_ was reduced to
mere foreknowledge, and predestination to evil was rejected as
blasphemy against God. A synod held in the same year, A.D. 529,
at Valence confirmed the decrees of Oranges. Boniface II. of Rome
did the same in A.D. 530.[168]--Continuation § 91, 5.
§ 54. REAPPEARANCE AND REMODELLING OF EARLIER HERETICAL SECTS.
Manichæism (§ 29) had still numerous adherents not merely in the far
off eastern provinces but also in Italy and North Africa; and isolated
Marcionite churches (§ 27, 11) were still to be found in almost all the
countries within the empire and also beyond its bounds. An independent
reawakening of Gnostic-Manichæan tendencies arose in Spain under the
name of Priscillianism.
§ 54.1. =Manichæism.=--The universal toleration of religion,
which Constantine introduced, was also extended to the Manichæans
of his empire (§ 29, 3). But from the time of Valentinian I.
the emperors issued repeatedly severe penal laws against them.
The favour which they obtained in Syria and Palestine led bishop
Titus of Bostra in Arabia Petræa, about A.D. 370, to write
his 4 Bks. against the Manichæans. The Manichæan church stood
in particularly high repute in North Africa, even to the 4th
and 5th centuries. Its most important representative there,
Faustus of Mileve, published a controversial treatise against
the Catholic church, which Augustine, who had earlier been
himself an adherent of the Manichæans, expressly answered in
33 Bks. (Engl. Transl.: “Ante-Nicene Lib.” Treatises against
Faustus the Manichæan, Edin., 1868). When the Manichæan Felix,
in order to advance the cause of his church, came to Hippo,
Augustine challenged him to a public disputation, and after two
days’ debate drove him into such straits that he at last admitted
himself defeated, and was obliged to pronounce anathema on Mani
and his doctrine. With still greater zeal than by the imperial
government were the African Manichæans persecuted by the Vandals,
whose king Hunerich (§ 76, 3) burnt many, and transported whole
ships’ loads to the continent of Europe. In the time of Leo
the Great († A.D. 461) they were very numerous in Rome. His
investigations tend to show that they entertained antinomian
views, and in their mysteries indulged in lustful practices.
Also in the time of Gregory the Great († A.D. 604) the church
of Italy was still threatened by their increase. Since then,
however, nothing more is heard of Manichæan tendencies in
the West down to the 11th century, when suddenly they again
burst forth with fearfully threatening and contagious power
(§ 108, 1). In the eastern parts of the empire, too, numerous
Gnostic-Manichæan remnants continued to exist in secret, and
from the 9th to the 12th century reappeared in a new form (§ 71).
Still more widely about this time did such views spread among the
Mussulman rulers of the Eastern borderlands, as far as China and
India, as the Arabian historians of this period testify (§ 29, 1).
§ 54.2. =Priscillianism, A.D. 383-563.=--The first seeds of the
Gnostic-Manichæan creed were brought to Spain in the 4th century
by an Egyptian Marcus. A rich and cultured layman Priscillian
let himself be drawn away in this direction, and developed
it independently into a dualistic and emanationistic system.
Marriage and carnal pleasures were forbidden, yet under an
outward show of strict asceticism were concealed antinomian
tendencies with impure orgies. At the same time the sect
encouraged and required lies and perjury, hypocrisy and
dissimulation for the spread and preservation of their community.
“_Jura, perjura, secretum perdere noli._” Soon Priscillianists
spread over all Spain; even some bishops joined them. Bishop
Idacius of Emerida by his passionate zeal against them fanned
the flickering fire into a bright flame. A synod at Saragossa
in A.D. 380 excommunicated them, and committed the execution of
its decrees to Bishop Ithacius of Sossuba, a violent and besides
an immoral man. Along with Idacius he had obtained from the
emperor Gratian an edict which pronounced on all Priscillianists
the sentence of banishment. Priscillian’s bribes, however, not
only rendered this edict inoperative, but also an order for the
arrest of Ithacius, which he avoided only by flight into Gaul.
Here he won over the usurper Maximus, the murderer of Gratian,
who, greedy for their property, used the torture against the
sect, and had Priscillian as well as some of his followers
beheaded at Treves in A.D. 385. This was the first instance
of capital punishment used against heretics. The noble bishop,
Martin of Tours (§ 47, 14), to whom the emperor had previously
promised that he would act mildly, hastened to Treves and
renounced church fellowship with Ithacius and all bishops
who had assented to the death sentence. Ambrose too and other
bishops expressed their decided disapproval. This led Maximus
to stop the military inquisition against them. But the glory of
martyrdom had fired the enthusiasm of the sect, and among the
barbarians who made their way into Spain from A.D. 409 they
won a rich harvest. Paulus [Paul] Orosius (§ 47, 20) wrote his
_Commonitorium de errore Priscillianist._ in A.D. 415, looking
for help to Augustine, whom, however, concern and contests
in other directions allowed to take but little part in this
controversy. Of more consequence was the later interference
of Leo the Great, occasioned by a call for help from bishop
Turribius of Astorga. Following his instructions, a _Concilium
Hispanicum_ in A.D. 447 and still more distinctly a Council
at Braga in A.D. 563 passed vigorous rules for the suppression
of heresy. Since then the name of the Priscillianists has
disappeared, but their doctrine was maintained in secret for
some centuries longer.[169]
V. WORSHIP, LIFE, DISCIPLINE AND MORALS.
§ 55. WORSHIP IN GENERAL.
Christian worship freed by Constantine from the pressure of
persecution developed a great wealth of forms with corresponding
stateliness of expression. But doctrinal controversies claimed so
much attention that neither space nor time was left for carrying the
other developments in the same way through the fire of conflict and
sifting. Hence forms of worship were left to be moulded in particular
ways by the spirit of the age, nationality and popular taste. The public
spirit of the church, however, gave to the development an essential
unity, and early differences were by and by brought more and more into
harmony. Only between East and West was the distinction strong enough
to make in various ways an impression in opposition to the levelling
endeavours of catholicity.
The age of Cyril of Alexandria marks an important turning point
in the development of worship. It was natural that Cyril’s
prevailing doctrine of the intimate connection of the divine
and human natures in the person of Christ should have embodied
itself in the services of the church. But this doctrine was
yet at least one-sided theory which did not wholly exclude
its perversion into error. In the dogma, indeed, thanks to
the exertions of Leo and Theodoret, the still extant Monophysite
error had no place given it. But in the worship of the church
it had embedded itself, and here it was not overcome, and its
presence was not even suspected, so, it could now not only
develop itself undisturbed in the direction of worship of saints,
images, relics, of pilgrimages, of sacrifice of the mass, etc.,
but also it could decisively deduce therefrom a development of
dogmas not yet established, _e.g._ in the doctrine of the church,
of the priesthood, of the sacraments, especially of the Lord’s
Supper, etc., etc.
§ 56. FESTIVALS AND SEASONS FOR PUBLIC WORSHIP.
The idea of having particular days of the week consecrated in memory
of special incidents in the work of redemption had even in the previous
period found expression (§ 37), but it now passed into the background
all the more as the church began to apply itself to the construction in
the richest possible form of a Christian year. The previous difference
in the development of East and West occasioned each to take its
own particular course, determined in the one case very much by a
Jewish-Christian, in the other by a Gentile-Christian, tendency.
Nevertheless in the 4th century we find a considerable levelling
of these divergences. This at least was attained unto thereby that
the three chief festivals received an essentially common form in both
churches. But in the 5th and 6th centuries, in the further development
of the Christian year, the two churches parted all the more decidedly
from one another. The Western church especially gave way more and more
unreservedly to the tendency to make the natural year the type and
pattern for the Christian year. Thus the Western Christian year obtained
a richer development and grew up into an institution more vitally and
inwardly related to the life of the people. The luxuriant overgrowth
of saints’ days, however, prevented the church from here reaching its
ideal.
§ 56.1. =The Weekly Cycle.=--Constantine the Great issued a law
in A.D. 321, according to which all magisterial, judicial and
municipal business was stopped on =Sunday=. At a later period
he also forbade military exercises. His successors extended the
prohibition to the public spectacles. Alongside of Sunday the
=Sabbath= was long celebrated in the East by meetings in the
churches, avoidance of fasting and by standing at prayers. The
_Dies stationum_, Wednesday and Friday (§ 37), were observed in
the East as fast days. The West gave up the Wednesday fast, and
introduced in its place the anti-Judaic Sabbath fast.
§ 56.2. =Hours and Quarterly Fasts.=--The number of appointed
_hours of prayer_ (the 3rd, 6th and 9th hours, comp. Dan.
vi. 10-14; Acts ii. 15; iii. 1; x. 9) were increased during
the 5th century to eight (_Horæ canonicæ: Matutina_ or matins
at 3 a.m.; _Prima_ at 6 a.m.; _Tertia_ at 9 a.m.; _Sexta_ at
12 noon; _Nona_ at 3 p.m.; _Vesper_ at 6 p.m.; _Completorium_
at 9 p.m.; and _Mesonyktion_ or Vigils at 12 midnight); yet
generally two of the night hours were combined, so as to
preserve the seven times required in Ps. cxix. 164. This
arrangement of hours was strictly observed by monks and clerics.
The common basis of prayer for devotions at these hours was the
Psalter divided among the seven days of the week. The rest of the
material adapted to the course of the Christian year, consisting
of scripture and patristic readings, legends of martyrs and
saints, prayers, hymns, doxologies, etc. gradually accumulated
so that it had to be abbreviated, and hence the name _Breviarium_
commonly given to such selections. The Roman Breviary, arranged
mainly by Leo the Great, Gelasius and Gregory the Great, gradually
throughout the West drove all other such compositions from the
field. An abbreviation by Haymo, General of the Minorites, in
A.D. 1241 was sanctioned by Gregory IX., but had subsequently
many alterations made upon it. The Council of Trent finally
charged the Papal chair with the task of preparing a new
redaction which the clergy of the whole catholic church would
be obliged to use. Such a production was issued by Pius V. in
A.D. 1568, and then in A.D. 1631 Urban VIII. gave it the form
in which it is still current.--In the West the year was divided
into three-monthly periods, _quatuor tempora_, corresponding to
the seasons of prayer recurring every three hours. There were
harvest prayer and thanksgiving seasons, occupied, in accordance
with Joel ii., with penance, fasting and almsgiving. Leo the
Great brought this institution to perfection. The _quatuor
tempora_, ember days, occur in the beginning of the Quadragesima,
in the week after Pentecost, and in the middle of the 7th and
10th months (Sept. and Dec.), and were kept by a strict fast on
Wednesday, Friday and Saturday with a Sabbath vigil.
§ 56.3. =The Reckoning of Easter.=--At the Council of Nicæa in
A.D. 325 the Roman mode of observing Easter prevailed over that
of Asia Minor (§ 37, 2). Those who adhered to the latter method
were regarded as a sect (_Quartadecimani_ Τεσσαρεσκαιδεκατῖται).
The Council decreed that the first day of full moon after the
spring equinox should be regarded as the 14th Nisan, and that the
festival of the resurrection should be celebrated on the Sunday
following. The bishop of Alexandria undertook the astronomical
determination of the festival on each occasion, because there
astronomical studies were most diligently prosecuted. He
published yearly, usually about Epiphany, a circular letter,
_Liber paschalis_, giving to the other churches the result of
the calculation, and took advantage generally of the opportunity
to discuss the ecclesiastical questions of the day. First of all
at Alexandria, probably to prevent for all time a combination
of the Jewish and Christian Easter festivals, the practice was
introduced of keeping the feast when the 14th and 16th of the
new moon fell upon Friday and Sunday, not on the same Sunday
but eight days later,--a practice which Rome also, and with her
a great part of the West, adopted in the 5th century (§ 77, 3).
A further difference existed as to the point of time with
which the day of full moon was to be regarded as beginning.
The Easter Canon of Hippolytus (§ 31, 3) had calculated it in
a very unsatisfactory manner according to a sixteen-years’ cycle
of the moon, after the course of which the day of full moon would
again occur on the same day of the year. In Alexandria the more
exact nineteen-years’ cycle of Anatolius was adopted, according
to which the day of full moon had an aberration of about one
day only in 310 years, and even this was caused rather by
the imperfection of the Julian year of 365 days with three
intercalary days in 400 years. But in Rome the reckoning was
made as the basis of an eighty-four years’ cycle which had indeed
the advantage of completing itself not only on the same day of
the year but on the same day of the week; while, on the other
hand, it had this drawback that after eighty-four years it had
fallen about a day behind the actual day of full moon. There was
also this further difference that in Alexandria the 21st of March
was regarded as the day when day and night were equal, and at
Rome, but wrongly, the 18th of March. The cycle of 532 (28 ✕ 19)
years reckoned in A.D. 452 by Victorius, a bishop of Aquitaine,
was assimilated to the Alexandrian, without, however, losing
the advantage of the eighty-four years’ cycle above referred
to, which, however, it succeeded in obtaining only by once in
every period of nineteen years fixing the equinox on the 20th
of March. The Roman abbot Dionysius Exiguus (§ 47, 23), finally,
in A.D. 525 harmonized the Roman and the Alexandrian reckoning
by setting up a ninety-five years’ cycle (5 ✕ 19), and this cycle
was introduced throughout all the West by Isidore of Seville
and the Venerable Bede (§ 90, 2). The error occasioned by the
inexactness of the Julian calendar continued till the Gregorian
reform of the calendar (§ 149, 3).
§ 56.4. =The Easter Festivals.=--The pre-eminence of the
Christian festival of victory (the resurrection) over that
of suffering, especially among the Greeks, led, even in the
4th century to the former as the fruit of the latter being drawn
into the paschal season, and distinguished as πάσχα ἀναστάσιμον
from that as πάσχα σταυρώσιμον, and also at last to the adoption
of the one name of Paschal or Easter Festival and to the regarding
of the whole Quadragesima season as a preparation for Easter.
The Saxon name Easter is derived from the old German festival
of Ostara the goddess of spring which was celebrated at the same
season.--With the beginning of the Quadragesima the whole mode
of life assumes a new form. All amusements were stopped, all
criminal trials sisted and the din of traffic in streets and
markets as far as possible restricted. The East exempted Sunday
and Sabbath from the obligation of fasting, with the exception
of the last Sabbath as the day of Christ’s rest in the grave,
but the West exempted only Sunday. Gregory the Great, therefore,
fixed the beginning of the Quadragesima on Wednesday of the
seventh week before Easter, _Caput jejunii, Dies cinerum_, Ash
Wednesday, so called because the bishop strewed ashes on the
heads of believers with a warning reference to Gen. iii. 19,
comp. xviii. 27. With the Tuesday preceding, Shrove Tuesday
(from _shrive_, to confess), ended the carnival season (_carni
valedicere_) which, beginning with 6th Jan. or the feast of the
three holy kings, reached its climax in the last days, from three
to eight, before Ash Wednesday. On this closing day the people
generally sought indemnification for the approaching strict
fast by an unmeasured abandoning of themselves to pleasure. From
Italy where this custom arose and was most fully carried out,
it subsequently found its way into the other lands of the West.
In opposition to these unspiritual proceedings the period of
the Easter festivals was begun three weeks earlier with the 10th
Sunday before Easter (_Septuagesima_). The Hallelujah of the Mass
was silenced, weddings were no more celebrated (_Tempus clausum_),
monks and clerics already began the fast. The Quadragesima
festival reached its climax in the last, the _great_ week. It
began with Palm Sunday (ἑορτὴ τῶν βαΐων) and ended with the great
Sabbath, the favourite time for baptisms (Rom. vi. 3). Thursday
as the memorial day of the institution of the Lord’s Supper,
and Friday as the day of Christ’s death, Good Friday, were days
of special importance. A solemn night service, Easter vigils,
marked the transition to the joyous Easter celebrations. The old
legend that on this night Christ’s second coming would take place
rendered the service peculiarly solemn. Easter morning began with
the jubilant greeting: The Lord is risen, and the response, He is
risen indeed. On the following Sunday, the Easter Octave, _Pascha
clausum_, ἀντίπασχα, the Easter festival was brought to a close.
Those baptized on the great Sabbath wore for the last time their
white baptismal dress. Hence this sabbath was called _Dominica
in albis_; subsequently, in accordance with the Introitus
from 1 Pet. ii. 2, Quasimodogeniti; and by the Greeks, καινὴ
κυριακή. The joyous celebrations of Easter extended over all
the Quinquagesima period between Easter and Pentecost. Ascension
day, _Festum ascensionis_, ἑορτὴ τῆς ἀναλήψεως, and Pentecost,
πεντεκοστή, were introduced as high festivals by vigil services;
and the latter was concluded by the Pentecost-Octave, by the
Greeks called κυριακὴ τῶν ἁγίων μαρτυρησάντων and at a much later
date styled by the Latins Trinity Sunday. The Festival-Octaves,
ἀπολύσεις, had an Old Testament pattern in the עֲצֶרֶת of the Feast
of Tabernacles, Lev. xxiii. 26.
§ 56.5. =The Christmas Festivals.=--The first traces of the
Christmas festival (_Natalis Christi_, γενέθλια) in the Roman
church are found about A.D. 360. Some decades later they appear
in the Eastern church. The late introduction of this festival
is to be explained from the disregard of the birthday and the
prominence given to the day of the death of Christ in the ancient
church; but Chrysostom even regarded it as the μητρόπολις πασῶν
τῶν ἑορτῶν. Since the 25th of March as the spring equinox was
held as the day of creation, the day of the incarnation, the
conception of Christ, the second Adam, as the beginning of the
new creation was held on the same day, and hence 25th Dec. was
chosen as the day of Christ’s birth. The Christian festival thus
coincided nearly with the heathen _Saturnalia_, in memory of
the Golden Age, from 17th to 23rd Dec., the _Sigillaria_, on
the 24th Dec., when children were presented with dolls and images
of clay and wax, sigilla, and the _Brumalia_, on 25th Dec., _Dies
natalis invicti solis_, the winter solstice. It was considered
no mere chance coincidence that Christ, the eternal Sun,
should be born just on this day. The Christmas festival too
was introduced by a vigil and lasted for eight days, which in
the 6th century became the _Festum circumcisionis_. The revelling
that characterised the New Year Festival of the pagans, caused
the ancient church, to observe that day as a day of penance and
fasting. The feast of the Epiphany on the 6th Jan. (§ 37, 1) was
also introduced in the West during the 4th century but obtained
there a Gentile-Christian colouring from Luke ii. 21 and was
kept as the festival of the first fruits of the Gentiles and
received the name of the Festival of the three holy kings. For
even Tertullian in accordance with Ps. lxxii. 10 had made the
Magi kings; it was concluded that they were three because of
the three gifts spoken of; and Bede, about A.D. 700, gives their
names as Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar. By others this festival
was associated with Christ’s first miracle at the marriage in
Cana, and also with the feeding of the 5,000 in the wilderness.
After the analogy of the Easter festival since the 6th century
a longer preliminary celebration has been connected with the
Christmas festival. In the Eastern church, beginning with the
14th of Nov., it embraced six Sundays with forty fast days, as
the second Quadragesima of the year. In the Latin church, as
the season of Advent, it had only four Sundays, with a three
weeks’ fast.
§ 56.6. =The Church Year= was in the East a symbolic adaptation
of the natural year only in so far as it brought with it the
Christianising of the Jewish festivals and the early recognition
of Western ideas about the feasts. Only on the high festivals,
Christmas, Easter and Pentecost are they retained; on the
other Sundays and festivals they never obtained expression.
The Easter festival was considered the beginning of the church
year; thereafter the Quadragesima or Epiphany; and finally,
the Old Testament beginning of the year in September. The whole
church year was divided into four parts according to the _Lectio
continua_ of the gospel, and the Sundays were named thereafter.
The κυριακὴ πρώτη τοῦ Ματθαίου was immediately after Pentecost.
The =Latin Church Year= begins with the season of Advent, and
distinguishes a _Semestre Domini_ and a _Semestre ecclesiæ_.
But only the former was fully developed: Christmas, Easter,
Pentecost with the Sundays belonging to them, representing the
founding, developing and completing of the history of salvation.
To a corresponding development of the second half we find early
contributions, _e.g._ the Feast of Peter and Paul on 29th June
as festival of the founding of the church by the Apostles, the
Feast of the leading martyr Laurentius (§ 22, 5) on 10th August
as memorial of the struggle prescribed to the _Ecclesia militans_,
and the Feast of Michael on 29th September with reference to the
completion in the _Ecclesia triumphans_. That in these feasts we
have already the germs of the three festivals of the community
of the church which were to correspond to the three festivals of
the Lord’s history appears significantly in the early designation
of the Sundays after Pentecost as _Dominica post Apostolos, post
Laurentium, post Angelos_. But it never was distinctly further
carried out. This deeply significant distribution was overlaid
by saint worship, which overflowed the _Semestre Domini_. The
principle of Christianising the Pagan rites was legitimated by
Gregory the Great. He instructed the Anglo-Saxon missionaries
to the effect (§ 77, 4), that they should convert the heathen
temples into churches and heathen festivals into ecclesiastical
festivals and days of martyrs, _ut duræ mentes gradibus vel
passibus non autem saltibus eleventur_. The saints henceforth
take the place of gods of nature and the church year reproduced
with a Christian colouring all the outstanding points in the
natural year.--As the last festival connected with the history
of the Lord, the Feast of the Glorification, ἁγία μεταμόρφωσις,
was held in the East on 6th August. According to tradition
the scene was enacted on Mt. Tabor, hence the feast was called
Θαβώριον. The Latin church adopted it first in the 15th century
(_F. transfigurationis_).[170]
§ 56.7. =The Church Fasts= (§ 37, 3).--In the Greek church the
ordinance of fasting was more strict than in the Latin. In one
period, however, we have a system of fasts embracing four great
fasting seasons: The Quadragesima of Easter and of Christmas, the
period of from three to five weeks from the Pentecost Octave (the
Greek Feast of All Saints) to that of Peter and Paul on 29th June,
and the fourteen days before the Ascension of Mary on 15th August.
There were also the νηστεῖαι προεόρτιοι on the evenings previous
to other festivals; and finally, the weekly recurring fasts
of Wednesday and Friday. The strictest was the pre-Easter fast,
observed with gradually advancing rigidness. On Sexagesima Sunday
flesh was eaten for the last time, then followed the so-called
Butter week, when butter, cheese, milk and eggs were still
allowed; but thereafter complete avoidance of all fattening
food was enjoined, reaching during the great week to the
utmost possible degree of abstinence. In the West instead
of Wednesday, Saturday was taken along with Friday, and down
to the 13th century it was enjoined that nothing should be
eaten on these two days of the week, as also on the quarterly
days (_quatuor tempora_) and the evenings preceding the feasts
of the most famous Apostles and martyrs, the vigil fasts, until
3 p.m. (_Semijejunium_) or even till 6 p.m. (_Plenum jejunium_);
while in the longer seasons of fasting before Easter and before
Christmas the injunction was restricted to avoidance of all fat
foods (_Abstinentia_).--Continuation § 115, 1.
§ 57. WORSHIP OF SAINTS, RELICS AND IMAGES.[171]
Though with the times of persecution martyrdom had ceased, asceticism
where it was preached with unusual severity gave a claim to canonisation
which was still bestowed by the people’s voice regarded as the voice of
God. Forgotten saints were discovered by visions, and legend insensibly
eked out the poverty of historical reminiscences with names and facts.
The veneration of martyrs rose all the higher the more pitiable the
present generation showed in its lukewarmness and worldliness over
against the world-conquering faith of that great cloud of witnesses.
The worship of Mary, which came in as a result of the Nestorian
controversy, was later of being introduced than that of the martyrs,
but it almost immediately shot far ahead and ranked above the adoration
of all the other saints. The adoration of Angels, of which we find the
beginnings even in Justin and Origen, remained far behind the worship
of the saints. Pilgrimages were zealously undertaken, from the time
when the emperor’s mother Helena, in A.D. 326, went as a pilgrim to
holy places in Palestine and afterwards marked these out by building
on them beautiful churches. The worship of images was introduced first
in the age of Cyril of Alexandria and was carried out with peculiar
eagerness in the art-loving East. The Western teachers, however,
and even Gregory the Great himself, only went the length of becoming
decoration, using images to secure more impressiveness in teaching and
greater liveliness in devotion. In the West, however, still more than
in the East, veneration of relics came into vogue.
§ 57.1. =The Worship of Martyrs and Saints= (§ 39, 5).[172]--At
a very early period churches were built upon the graves of
Martyrs (_Memoria_, _Confessio_, μαρτύριον), or their bones
were brought into churches previously built (_Translationes_).
New edifices were dedicated in their names, those receiving
baptism were named after them. The days of their death were
observed as special holy seasons with vigil services, Agape
and oblations at their graves. In glowing discourses the orators
of the church, in melodious hymns the poets, sounded forth
their praises. The bones of the martyrs were sought out with
extraordinary zeal and were looked upon and venerated as
supremely sacred. Each province, each city and each calling
had its own patron saint (_Patronus_). Perhaps as early as the
3rd century several churches had their martyr calendars, _i.e._
lists of those who were to have the day of their death celebrated.
In the 4th century this custom had become universal, and from the
collection of the most celebrated calendars, with the addition
of legendary stories of the lives and sufferings of martyrs or
saints (_Legendæ_, so called because they were wont to be _read_
at the memorial services of the individuals referred to), sprang
up the _Martyrologies and Legends of the Saints_, among the
Greeks called _Menologies_ from μήν, a month. Most esteemed
in the West was the martyrology of the Roman church, whose
composition has been recently put down, equally with and upon
the same grounds as that of the so called _Liber Comitis_,
§ 59, 3, to the time of Jerome as the chief representative of
Western theological learning. This collection formed the basis
of the numerous Latin martyrologies of the Middle Ages (§ 90, 9).
A rich choice was afforded by these catalogues of saints to
those wishing names to use at baptism or confirmation; the saint
preferred became thereby the patron of him who took his name. The
three great Cappadocians in the East and Ambrose in the West were
the first to open the floodgates for the invocation of saints
by their proclaiming that the glorified saints through communion
with the Lord shared in His attribute of omniprescence and
omniscience; while Augustine rather assigned to the angels
the task of communicating the invocations of men to the saints.
In the liturgies prayers for the saints were now displaced by
invocations for their intercession. In this the people found
a compensation for the loss of hero, genius and _manes_ worship.
The church teachers at least wished indeed to make a marked
distinction between _Adoratio_ and _Invocatio_, λατρεία and
δουλεία, rendering the former to God only. A festival of All the
Martyrs was celebrated in the East as early as the 4th century
on the Pentecost octave (§ 56, 4). In the West, Pope Boniface IV.,
in A.D. 610, having received from the Emperor Phocas the Pantheon
as a gift and having converted it into a church of the most
Blessed Virgin and all the Martyrs, founded a _Festum omnium
Sanctorum_, which was not, however, generally recognised before
the 9th century (1st Nov.). Owing to the great number of saints
one or more had to be assigned to each day in the calendar. The
day fixed was usually that of the death of the saint. The only
instance of the celebration of a birthday was the festival
of John the Baptist (_Natalis S. Joannis_). The 24th June was
fixed upon by calculating from Christmas (acc. to Luke i. 26),
and its occurring in the other half of the year from that of
Christ afforded a symbolical parallel to John iii. 30. As an
appendage to this we meet even in the 5th century with the
_F. decollationis S. Joannis_ on 29th Aug. On the second day
of the Christmas festival the Feast of the Proto-martyr Stephen
was celebrated as the first fruits of the incarnation of God;
on the third, the memory of the disciple who lay on the Master’s
breast; on the fourth, the innocent children of Bethlehem
(_F. innocentium_) as the _flores_ or _primitiæ martyrum_. The
festival of the Maccabees (πανήγυρις τῶν Μακκαβαίων) leads yet
further back as the memorial of the heroic mother and her seven
sons under Antiochus Epiphanes. It was observed as early as the
4th century and did not pass out of use till the 13th. Among the
festivals of Apostles that of Peter and Paul (_F. Apost. Petri
et Pauli_) on 29th June, as the solemnization of their common
martyrdom at Rome, was universally observed. But Rome celebrated
besides a double _F. Cathedræ Petri_, for the _Cathedra Romana_
on 18th Jan., and for the _Cathedra Antiochena_ on 22nd Feb.
For a long time a symbolical arrangement of the calendar days
prevailed; the patriarchs of the Old Testament were put in the
time before Christmas, the later saints of the old dispensation
in the Quadragesima, and the Apostles and Founders of the church
after Pentecost, then the Martyrs, next the Confessors, and
finally, the Virgins as prototype of the perfected church.
§ 57.2. =The Worship of Mary and Anna.=[173]--The εὐλογουμένη ἐν
γυναιξί who herself full of the Holy Ghost had prophesied: ἰδοὺ
γὰρ, ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν μακαριοῦσι με πᾶσαι αἱ γενεαί, was regarded
as the highest ideal of all virginity. All the reverence, which
the church accorded to virginity, culminated therefore in her.
Even Tertullian alongside of the Pauline contrasts Adam and
Christ, placed this other, Eve and Mary. The _perpetua virginitas
b. Mariæ_ was an uncontested article of faith from the 4th century.
Ambrose understood of her Ezek. xliv. 3, and affirmed that she
was born _utero clauso_; Gregory the Great saw an analogy between
this and the entering of the Risen One through closed doors
(John xx. 19); and the second Trullan Council, in A.D. 692,
confessed: ἀλόχευτον τὸν ἐκ τῆς παρθένου θεῖον τόκον εἶναι.
Irenæus, Tertullian, Origen, Basil, Chrysostom, had indeed
still found something in her worthy of blame, but even Augustine
refuses to admit that she should be reckoned among sinners: _Unde
enim scimus, quid ei plus gratiæ collatum fuerit ad vincendum
omni ex parte peccatum?_ Yet for a long time this veneration of
Mary made little progress. This was caused partly by the absence
of the glory of martyrdom, partly by its development in the
church being forestalled and distorted by the heathenish and
godless Mariolatry of the Collyridians, an Arabian female sect
of the 4th century, which offered to the Holy Virgin, as in
heathen times to Ceres, cakes of bread (κολλυρίδα). Epiphanius,
who opposed them, taught: ἐν τιμῇ ἔστω Μαρία, ὁ δὲ Πατὴρ καὶ Υἱὸς
καὶ ἅγιον Πνεῦμα προσκυνείσθω, τὴν δὲ Μαρίαν οὐδεὶς προσκυνείτω.
On the Antidicomarianites, see § 62, 2. The victory of those who
used the term θεοτόκος in the Nestorian controversy gave a great
impulse to Mariolatry. Even in the 5th century, the festival
of the Annunciation, _F. annunciationis, incarnationis_, ἑορτὴ
τοῦ εὐαγγελισμοῦ, τοῦ ἀσπασμοῦ, was held on the 25th March.
With this was also connected in the West the festival of the
Purification of Mary, _F. purificationis_ on 2nd Feb., according
to Luke ii. 22. On account of the candles used in the service
it was called the Candlemas of Mary, _F. candelarum, luminum_,
Luke ii. 32. In consequence of an earthquake and pestilence in
A.D. 542, Justinian founded the corresponding ἑορτὴ τῆς ὑπαπάντης,
_F. occursus_, only that here the meeting with Simeon and Anna
(Luke ii. 24) is put in the foreground. Both festivals, the
Annunciation and the Purification, had the same dignity as those
dedicated to the memory of our Lord. From the endeavour to put
alongside of each of the festivals of the Lord a corresponding
festival of Mary, about the end of the 6th century the Feast
of the Ascension of Mary (πανήγυρις κοιμήτεως, _F. assumptionis,
dormitionis M._) was introduced and celebrated on 15th Aug.;
and in the 7th century, the Feast of the Birth of Mary (_F.
nativitatis M._), on 8th Sept. The former was founded on the
apocryphal legend (§ 32, 4), according to which Christ with the
angels brought the soul of his just departed mother, and, on the
following day, its glorified body, to heaven, and there united
it again with the soul.--The first traces of a =veneration of
Anna= around whom, as the supposed wife of Joachim and mother of
the Virgin, the apocryphal gospels of the childhood had already
gathered a mass of romantic details, are found in the 4th century
in Gregory of Nyssa and Epiphanius. Justinian I. in A.D. 550
built a church of St. Anna in Constantinople. In the East the
25th of July was celebrated as the day of her death, the 9th Sept.
as the day of her marriage, and the 9th Dec. as the day of her
conception. In the West the veneration of Anna was later of being
introduced. It became popular in the later Middle Ages and was
made obligatory on the whole catholic church by Gregory XIII.
in A.D. 1584. The day fixed was 26th July. Yet Leo III. in the
8th century had allowed a pictorial representation of the legend
of St. Joachim and St. Anna to be put in the church of St. Paul
in Rome.--Continuation § 104, 7, 8.
§ 57.3. =Worship of Angels.=--The idea of guardian angels
of nations, cities, individuals, was based on Deut. xxxii. 8
(in the LXX.); Dan. x. 13, 20, 21; xii. 1; Matt. xviii. 10;
Acts xii. 15, even as early as the 2nd century. Ambrose
required the invocation of angels. But when the Phrygian sect
of the Angelians carried the practice the length of idolatrous
worship, the Council at Laodicea in the 4th century opposed
it, and Epiphanius placed it in his list of heresies. Supposed
manifestations of the Archangel Michael led to the institution
from the 5th century of the feast of Michael observed on 29th
Sept., as a festival of the angels collectively representing
the idea of the church triumphant.
§ 57.4. =Worship of Images= (§ 38, 3).--The disinclination of
the ancient church to the pictorial representations of the person
of Christ as such, and also the unwillingness to allow religious
pictures in the churches, based upon the prohibition of images
in the decalogue, was not yet wholly overcome in the 4th century.
Eusebius of Cæsarea, with reference to the statues of Paneas
(§ 13, 2) and other images of Christ and the Apostles, speaks
of an ἐθνικὴ συνηθεία. He administered a severe reproof to the
emperor’s sister, Constantia, and referred to the prohibition
of the decalogue, when she expressed a wish to have an image
of Christ. Asterius, bishop of Amasa in Pontus († A.D. 410),
earnestly declaimed against the custom of people of distinction
wearing clothes embroidered with pictures from the gospel history,
and recommends them rather to have Christ in their hearts. The
violent zealot, Epiphanius, the most decided opponent of all
religious idealism, tore the painted curtain of a Palestinian
village church in Anablatha with the injunction to wrap therewith
a beggar’s corpse. But Greek love of art and the religious needs
of the people gained the victory over Judaic-legal rigorism
and abstract spiritualism. Here too the age of Cyril marks
the turning point. In the 5th century authentic miraculous
pictures of Christ, the Apostles and the God-mother (εἰκόνες
ἀχειροποίητοι), made their appearance, and with them began image
worship properly so called, with lighting of candles, kissing,
burning incense, bowing of the knee, prostrations (προσκύνησις
τιμητική). Soon all churches and church books, all palaces
and cottages, were filled with images of Christ and the saints
painted or drawn by the monks. Miracle after miracle was wrought
beside, upon or through them. In this, however, the West did not
keep pace with the East. Augustine complains of image worship
and advises to seek Christ in the bible rather than in images.
Gregory the Great, while blaming the violence of Serenus, bishop
of Massilia in breaking the images, wishes that in churches
images should be made to serve _ad instruendas solummodo mentes
nescientium_. The Nestorians who were strongly opposed to images,
expressly declared that the hated Cyril was the originator of
_Iconolatry_.
§ 57.5. =Worship of Relics= (§ 39, 5).--The veneration for
relics (λείψανα) proceeded from a pious feeling in human nature
and is closely associated with that higher reverence which the
church paid to its martyrs. It began with public assemblies
at the graves of martyrs, memorial celebrations and services
in connection with the translations of their bones held in
the churches. Soon no church, no altar (Rev. vi. 9), could be
built without relics. When the small number of known martyrs
proved insufficient, single parts of their bodies were divided
to different churches. But dreams and visions showed rich stores
previously unthought of in remnants of the bones of martyrs
and saints. The catacombs especially proved inexhaustible mines.
Miracles and signs vouched for their genuineness. Theodosius I.
already found it necessary in A.D. 386, to prohibit the traffic
in relics. Besides bones, were included also clothes, utensils,
instruments of torture. They healed the sick, cast out devils,
raised the dead, averted plagues, and led to the discovery of
offenders. The healed expressed their gratitude in votive tablets
and in presentations of silver and golden figures of the healed
parts. A scriptural foundation was sought for this veneration of
relics in 2 Kings xiii. 21; Ecclesiastic. xlvi. 14; Acts xix. 12.
According to a legend commonly believed in the 5th century,
but unknown to Eusebius and the Bordeaux pilgrim of A.D. 333,
Helena, mother of Constantine, found in A.D. 326 the Cross of
Christ along with the crosses of the two thieves. The one was
distinguished from the others by a miracle of healing or of
raising from the dead. The pious lady left one half of the cross
to the church of the Holy Sepulchre and sent the rest with the
nails to her son, who inlaid the wood in his statues and some of
the nails in his diadem, while of the rest he made a bit for his
horse. Since the publication of the _Doctrina Addaei_, § 32, 6,
it has become apparent that this Helena legend is just another
version of the old Edessa legend about the Byzantine saint,
according to which the wife of the emperor Claudius converted
by Peter is represented in precisely similar circumstances as
having found the cross. To pious and distinguished pilgrims
permission was given to take small splinters of the wood
kept in Jerusalem, so that soon bits of the cross were spread
and received veneration throughout all the world. According
to a much later report a σταυρώσιμος ἡμέρα on 14th Sept. was
observed in the East as early as the 4th century in memory of
the finding of the cross. From the time of Gregory the Great a
_F. inventionis S. Crucis_ was observed in the West on 3rd May.
The festival of the exaltation of the cross, σταυροφανεία, _F.
exaltationis S. Crucis_, on 14th Sept., was instituted by the
emperor Heraclius when the Persians on their being conquered
in A.D. 629, were obliged to restore the cross which they had
taken away.
§ 57.6. =The Making of Pilgrimages.=--The habit of making
pilgrimages (pilgrim=peregrinus) to sacred places also rested
upon a common tendency in human nature. The pilgrimage of Helena
in A.D. 326 found numerous imitators, and even the conquest
of Palestine by the Saracens in the 7th century did not quench
pilgrims’ ardour. Next to the sacred places in Palestine, Sinai,
the grave of Peter and Paul at Rome (_Limina Apostolorum_), the
grave of Martin of Tours (§ 47, 14) and the supposed scene in
Arabia of the sufferings of Job, as a foreshadowing of Christ’s,
were the spots most frequented by pilgrims. Gregory of Nyssa
in an Epistle Περὶ τῶν ἀπιόντων εἰς Ἱεροσόλυμα most vigorously
opposed the immoderate love of pilgrimages, especially among
monks and women. In the strongest language he pointed out the
danger to true religion and morality; and even Jerome so far
gave way to reason as to say: _Et de Hierosolymis et de Brittania
æqualiter patet aula cœlestis_. Chrysostom and Augustine, too,
opposed the over estimating of this expression of pious feeling.
§ 58. THE DISPENSATION OF THE SACRAMENTS.
During this period nothing was definitely established as to the idea
and number of the sacraments (μυστήρια). The name was applied to the
doctrines of grace in so far as they transcended the comprehension of
the human understanding, as well as to those solemn acts of worship by
which grace was communicated and appropriated in an incomprehensible
manner to believers, so that only in the 12th century (§ 104, 2) were
the consecrations and blessings hitherto included therein definitely
excluded from the idea of the sacrament under the name Sacramentalia.
It was, however, from the first clearly understood that Baptism and the
Lord’s Supper were essentially the sacramental means of grace. Yet even
in the 3rd century, anointing and laying on of hands as an independent
sacrament of Confirmation (_Confirmatio_, χρίσμα) was separated
from the idea of baptism, and in the West, from the administration
of baptism. The reappearance of the idea of a special priesthood as
a divine institution (§ 34, 4) gave also to Ordination the importance
of a sacrament (§ 45, 1). Augustine whom the Pelagians accused
of teaching by his doctrine of original sin and concupiscence that
God-ordained marriage was sinful, designated Christian marriage, with
reference to Eph. v. 32, a sacrament (§ 61, 2) in order more decidedly
to have it placed under the point of view of the nature sanctified by
grace. Pseudo-Dionysius, in the 6th century (§ 47, 11), enumerates six
sacraments: Baptism, Chrism, Lord’s Supper, Consecration of Priests
and Monks and the Anointing of the Dead (τῶν κεκοιμημένων). On Extreme
Unction, comp. § 61, 3.
§ 58.1. =Administration of Baptism= (§ 35, 4).--The postponing
of baptism from lukewarmness, superstition or doctrinal prejudice,
was a very frequent occurrence. The same obstacles down to the
6th century stood in the way of infant baptism being regarded
as necessary. Gregory of Nyssa wrote Πρὸς τοὺς βραδύνοντας
εἰς τὸ βάπτισμα, and with him all the church fathers earnestly
opposed the error. In case of need (_in periculo mortis_) it
was allowed even by Tertullian that baptism might be dispensed
by any baptized layman, but not by women. The institution of
godfather was universal and founded a spiritual relationship
within which marriage was prohibited not only between the
godparents themselves, but also between those and the baptized
and their children. The usual ceremonies preceding baptism were:
The covering of the head by the catechumens and the uncovering
on the day of baptism; the former to signify the warding
off every distraction and the withdrawing into oneself. With
exorcism was connected the ceremony of breathing upon (John
xx. 22), the touching of the ears with the exclamation: Ephphatha
(Mark vii. 34), marking the brow and breast with the sign of
the cross; in Africa also the giving of salt acc. to Mark ix. 50,
in Italy the handing over of a gold piece as a symbol of the
pound (Luke xiii. 12 f.) entrusted in the grace of baptism. The
conferring of a new name signified entrance into a new life.
At the renunciation the baptized one turned him to the setting
sun with the words: Ἀποτάσσομαί σοι Σατανᾶ καὶ πασῇ τῇ λατρείᾳ
σου; to the rising sun with the words: Συντάσσομαί σοι Χριστέ.
The dipping was thrice repeated: in the Spanish church, in the
anti-Arian interest, only once. Sprinkling was still confined
to _Baptismus Clinicorum_ and was first generally used in the
West in infant baptism in the 12th century, while the East still
retained the custom of immersion.
§ 58.2. =The Doctrine of the Supper= (§ 36, 5).--The doctrine
of the Lord’s Supper was never the subject of Synodal discussion,
and its conception on the part of the fathers was still in a high
degree uncertain and vacillating. All regarded the holy supper as
a supremely holy, ineffable mystery (φρικτόν, _tremendum_), and
all were convinced that bread and wine in a supernatural manner
were brought into relation to the body and blood of Christ; but
some conceived of this relation spiritualistically as a dynamic
effect, others realistically as a substantial importation to
the elements, while most vacillated still between these two
views. Almost all regarded the miracle thus wrought as μεταβολή,
_Transfiguratio_, using this expression, however, also of the
water of baptism and the anointing oil. The spiritualistic theory
prevailed among the Origenists, most decidedly with Eusebius of
Cæsarea, less decidedly with Athanasius and Gregory Nazianzen,
and again very decidedly with Pseudo-Dionysius. In the West
Augustine and his disciples, even including Leo the Great, favour
the spiritualistic view. With Augustine the spiritualistic view
was a consequence of his doctrine of predestination; only to the
believer, _i.e._ to the elect can the heavenly food be imparted.
Yet he often expresses himself very strongly in a realistic
manner. The realistic view was divided into a dyophysitic or
consubstantial and a monophysitic or transubstantial theory.
A decided tendency toward the idea of transubstantiation was
shown by Cyril of Jerusalem, Chrysostom, Hilary of Poitiers,
and Ambrose. The view of Gregory of Nyssa is peculiar: As by
Christ during His earthly life food and drink by assimilation
passed into the substance of His body, so now bread and wine
by the almighty operation of God by means of consecration is
changed into the glorified body of Christ and by our partaking
of them are assimilated to our bodies. The opposing views were
more sharply distinguished in consequence of the Nestorian
controversy, but the consistent development of dyophysitism
in the eucharistic field was first carried out by Theodoret
and Pope Gelasius († A.D. 496). The former says: μένει γὰρ
ἐπὶ τῆς προτέρας οὐσίας; and the latter: _Esse non desinit
substantia vel natura panis et vini.... Hoc nobis in ipso Christo
Domino sentiendum_ (Christological), _quod in ejus imagine_
(Eucharistical), _profitemur_. The massive concrete popular
faith had long before converted the μεταβολή into an essential,
substantial transformation. Thence this view passed over into
the liturgies. Gallican and Syrian liturgies of the 5th century
express themselves unhesitatingly in this direction. Also
the tendency to lose the creaturely in the divine which still
continued after the victory of Dyophysitism at Chalcedon, told
in favour of the development of the dogma and about the end of
our period the doctrine of Transubstantiation was everywhere
prevalent.[174]--Continuation § 91, 3.
§ 58.3. =The Sacrifice of the Mass= (§ 36, 6).--Even in the
4th century the body of Christ presented by consecration in
the Supper was designated a sacrifice, but only in the sense
of a representation of the sacrifice of Christ once offered.
Gradually, however, the theory prevailed of a sacramental
memorial celebration of the sacrifice of Christ in that of
an unbloody but actual repetition of the same. To this end
many other elements than those mentioned in § 36, 6 co-operated.
Such were especially the rhetorical figures and descriptions
of ecclesiastical orators, who transferred the attributes of the
one sacrifice to its repeated representations; the re-adoption of
the idea of a priesthood (§ 34, 4) which demanded a corresponding
conception of sacrifice; the pre-eminent place given to the
doctrine of sacraments; the tendency to place the sacrament
under the point of view of a magically acting divine power, etc.
The sacrificial idea, however, obtained its completion in its
application to the doctrine of Purgatory by Gregory the Great
(§ 61, 4). The _oblationes pro defunctis_ which had been in use
from early times became now masses for the souls of individuals;
their purpose was not the enjoyment of the body and blood
of Christ by the living and the securing thereby continued
communion with the departed, but only the renewing and repeating
of the atoning sacrifice for the salvation of the souls of the
dead, _i.e._ for the moderating and shortening of purgatorial
sufferings. The redeeming power of the sacrifice of the eucharist
was then in an analogous manner applied to the alleviation of
earthly calamities, sufferings and misfortunes, in so far as
these were viewed as punishments for sin. For such ends, then,
it was enough that the sacrificing priest should perform the
service (_Missæ solitariæ_, Private Masses). The partaking
of the membership was at last completely withdrawn from the
regular public services and confined to special festival
seasons.--Continuation § 88, 3.
§ 58.4. =The Administration of the Lord’s Supper.=--The sharp
distinction between the _Missa Catechumenorum_ and the _Missa
Fidelium_ (§ 36, 2, 3) lost its significance after the general
introduction of infant baptism, and the name _Missa_, mass, was
now restricted to the ordinance of the Lord’s Supper properly so
called. In the Eastern and North African churches the communion
of children continued common; the Western church forbade it in
accordance with 1 Cor. xi. 28, 29. The _Communis sub una_ (sc.
_specie_), _i.e._ with bread only, was regarded as a Manichæan
heresy (§ 29, 3). Only in North Africa was it exceptionally
allowed in children’s communion, after a little girl from natural
aversion to wine had vomited it up. In the East, as early as the
4th century, one observance of the Lord’s Supper in the year was
regarded as sufficient; but Western Councils of the 5th century
insisted upon its observance every Sunday and threatened with
excommunication everyone who did not communicate at least on
the three great festivals. The elements of the supper were still
brought as presents by the members of the church. The bread
was that in common use, therefore usually leavened. The East
continued this practice, but the West subsequently, on symbolical
grounds, introduced the use of unleavened bread. The colour of
the wine was regarded as immaterial. Subsequently white wine was
preferred as being free from the red colouring matter. The mixing
of the wine with water was held to be essential, and was grounded
upon John xix. 34; or regarded as significant of the two natures
in Christ. Only the Armenian Monophysites used unmixed wine.
The bread was broken. To the sick was often brought in the
East instead of the separate elements bread dipped in wine.
Subsequently also, first in children’s communion and in the
Greek church only, bread and wine together were presented in
a spoon. The consecrated elements were called εὐλογίαι after
1 Cor. x. 16. The εὐλογίαι left over (περισσεύουσα) were after
communion divided among the clergy. At a later period only so
much was consecrated as it was thought would be needed for use
at one time. The overplus of unconsecrated oblations was blessed
and distributed among the non-communicants, the catechumens
and penitents. The name εὐλογίαι was now applied to those
elements that had only been blessed which were also designated
ἀντίδωρα. The old custom of sending to other churches or bishops
consecrated sacramental elements as a sign of ecclesiastical
fellowship was forbidden by the Council at Laodicea in the
4th century.--Continuation § 104, 3.
§ 59. PUBLIC WORSHIP IN WORD AND SYMBOL.
The text of the sermon was generally taken from the bible portion
previously read. The liturgy attained a rich development, but the
liturgies of the Latin and Greek churches were fundamentally different
from one another. Scripture Psalms, Songs of Praise with Doxologies
formed the main components of the church service of song. Gnostics
(§ 27, 5), Arians (§ 50, 1), Apollinarians and Donatists found hymns
of their own composition very popular. The church was obliged to outbid
them in this. The Council at Laodicea, however, in A.D. 360, sought to
have all ψαλμοὶ ἰδιωτικοί banished from the church, probably in order
to prevent heretical poems being smuggled in. The Western church did
not discuss the subject; and Chrysostom at least adorned the nightly
processions which the rivalry of the Arians in Constantinople obliged
him to make, with the solemn singing of hymns.
§ 59.1. =The Holy Scriptures= (§ 36, 7, 8).--The doubts about
the genuineness of particular New Testament writings which
had existed in the days of Eusebius, had now greatly lessened.
Fourteen years after Eusebius, Athanasius in his 39th Festal
Letter of A.D. 367 gave a list of canonical scriptures in which
the Eusebian antilegomena of the first class (§ 36, 8) were
without more ado enumerated among the κανονιζόμενα. From these
he distinguished the Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus, Esther,
Judith, and Tobit, as well as the Διδαχὴ καλουμένη τῶν Ἀποστόλων
and the Shepherd of Hermas as ἀναγινωσκόμενα, _i.e._ as books
which from their excellent moral contents had been used by
the fathers in teaching the catechumens and which should be
recommended as affording godly reading. The Council at Laodicea
gave a Canon in which we miss only the Apocalypse of John,
objected to probably on account of the unfavourable view of
chiliasm entertained by the church at that time (§ 33, 9);
as regards the Old Testament it expressly limited the public
readings in churches to the 22 bks. of the Hebrew canon. The
Council at Hippo, in A.D. 393, gave synodic sanction for the
first time in the West to that Canon of the New Testament which
has from that time been accepted.--The question as to the value
of the books added to the Old Testament in the LXX. remained
undecided down to the time of the Reformation. The Greek church
kept to the Athanasian distinction of these as ἀναγινωσκόμενα
from the κανονιζόμενοι, until the confession of Dositheus in
A.D. 1629 (§ 152, 3) in its anti-Calvinistic zeal maintained
that even those books should be acknowledged as γνήσια τῆς
γραφῆς μέρη. In the North African church Tertullian and Cyprian
had characterized them without distinction as holy scripture.
Augustine followed them, though not altogether without hesitation:
_Maccab. scripturam non habent Judæi ... sed recepta est ab
ecclesia non inutilitor, si sobrie legatur vel audiatur_; and
the Synods at Hippo in A.D. 393 and at Carthage in A.D. 397 and
A.D. 419 put them without question into their list of canonical
books, adding this, however, that they would ask the opinion of
the transmarine churches on the matter. Meanwhile too in Rome
this view had prevailed and Innocent I. in A.D. 405 expressly
homologated the African list. Hilary of Poitiers and Rufinus on
the other hand upheld the view of Athanasius, and Jerome in his
_Prologus galeatus_ after enumerating the books of the Hebrew
Canon went so far as to say: _Quidquid extra hos est, inter
Apocrypha ponendum_, and elsewhere calls the addition to Daniel
merely _næniæ_. In the _Præfatio in libros Salom._, he expresses
himself more favourably of the Wisdom of Solomon, Ecclesiasticus,
Judith, Tobit and Maccabees: _legit quidem ecclesia, sed inter
canonicas scripturas non recipit ... legat ad ædificationem
plebis sed non ad auctoritatem dogmatum confirmandam_. This
view prevailed throughout the whole of the Middle Ages among
the most prominent churches down to the meeting of the Council
of Trent (§ 136, 4); whereas the Tridentine fathers owing
to the rejection of the books referred to by the Protestants
(§ 161, 8), and their actual or supposed usefulness in supporting
anti-Protestant dogmas, _e.g._ the meritoriousness of good works,
Tob. iv. 11, 12; intercession of saints, 2 Macc. xv. 12-14;
veneration of relics, Ecclus. xlvi. 14; xlix. 12; masses
for souls and prayers for the dead, 2 Macc. xii. 43-46, felt
themselves constrained to pronounce them canonical.--The
inconvenient _Scriptio continua_ in the biblical Codices led
first of all the Alexandrian deacon Euthalius, about A.D. 460,
by stichometric copies of the New Testament in which every line
(στίχος) embraced as much as with regard to the sense could
be read without a pause. He also undertook a division of the
Apostolic Epistles and the Acts into chapters (κεφάλαια). An
Alexandrian church teacher, Ammonius, even earlier than this,
in arranging for a harmony of the gospels had divided the gospels
in 1,165 chapters and added to the 355 chapters of Matthew’s
gospel the number of the chapter of parallel passages in the
other gospels. Eusebius of Cæsarea completed the work by his
“Evang. Canon,” for he represents in ten tables which chapters
are found in all the four, in three, in two or in one of the
gospels.[175]--Jerome made emendations upon the corrupt text
of the Itala by order of Damasus, bishop of Rome, and then made
from the Hebrew a translation of the =Old Testament= of his own,
which, joined to the revised translation of the New Testament,
after much opposition gradually secured supremacy throughout all
the West under the name of the =Vulgata=. The Monophysite Syrians
got from Polycarp in A.D. 508 at the request of bishop Xenajas
or Philoxenus of Mabug, a new slavishly literal translation of
the New Testament. This so-called Philoxenian translation was,
in A.D. 616, corrected by Thomas of Charcal, provided after
the manner of the Hexapla of Origen with notes--the Harclensian
translation--and in A.D. 617 enlarged by a translation of the
Old Testament executed by bishop Paulus of Tella in Mesopotamia
according to the Hexapla text of the LXX.--Diligent =Scripture
Reading= was recommended by all the fathers, with special fervour
by Chrysostom, to the laity as well as the clergy. Yet the
idea gained ground that the study of Scripture was the business
of monks and clerics. The second Trullan Council, in A.D. 692,
forbade under severe penalties that scripture should be understood
and expounded otherwise than had been done by the old fathers.
§ 59.2. =The Creeds of the Church.=
I. =The Nicæno-Constantinopolitan Creed.=--The Nicene Creed
(§ 50, 1, 7) did not =in the East= succeed in dislodging
the various forms of the Baptismal formula (§ 35, 2);
indeed, owing to the statement of this third article
restricting itself to a mere καὶ εἰς τὸ πνεῦμα ἅγιον
it was little fitted to become a universal symbol. But
what the _Nicænum_ in spite of its unexampled pretensions
never won, the so-called _Nicæno-Constantinopolitanum_
of A.D. 451, not being chargeable with the deficiency
referred to, actually achieved. The idea prevailing
until quite recently that this Symbol originated at
the so-called second œcumenical Council at Constantinople
in A.D. 381 as an enlargement of the Nicene confession,
has now been shown to be quite erroneous. After the Romish
theologian Vincenzi laboured to prove that this was a
production forged by the Greeks in the interests of their
“heretical” doctrine of the procedure of the Holy Spirit
from the Father only (§ 50, 7), Harnack on the basis of
the researches of Caspari and Hort reached the following
results: The so-called Nicæno-Constantinopolitan Creed is
identical with the creed recommended by Epiphanius in his
_Anchoratus_, about A.D. 373, as genuinely apostolic-Nicene;
the creed of the Anchoratus is that which forms the subject
of Cyril’s Catechetical Lectures (§ 47, 10), probably at
a later date revised, enriched by the introduction of the
most important phrases from the Nicænum and an additional
section on the Holy Spirit (comp. § 50, 5, 7), and
issued in his own name by Cyril while bishop of Jerusalem
(A.D. 351-386) as a Baptismal formula for the church of
Jerusalem; this new recension of the Jerusalem Symbol
was probably laid before the Council at Constantinople
in A.D. 381 by Cyril as a proof of his own orthodoxy that
had always been somewhat questionable and as such passed
over into the Acts which are now lost; thus at least is
it most simply explained how even in A.D. 451 it could be
quoted in the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon alongside
of the Nicene as the Constantinopolitan; in proportion
then as the Council of Constantinople of A.D. 381 came
to be regarded as an œcumenical Council (§ 50, 4), this
creed, erroneously ascribed to that Council, had accorded
to it the rank of an œcumenical Symbol.
II. =The Apostles’ Creed.=--The Roman church and with it the
whole =West=, standing upon the supposed Apostolic origin
of their symbol, did not suffer it to be dislodged by the
Nicænum nor to be assimilated by any importations from
it. Nevertheless during the period when the Roman chair
was dominated by the Byzantine court theology (§ 52, 3)
the so-called _Nicæno-Constantinopolitanum_ succeeded in
displacing the old Western creed, aided by the opposition
to the Arianism that was being driven forward by the
Visigoths and Ostrogoths in Italy and Spain (§ 76, 2, 7),
which demanded a more decidedly anti-Arian formula.
After this danger had been long overcome, the desire
was expressed in the 9th century for a shorter creed
that might serve as a baptismal formula and as the basis
of catechetical teaching. They fell back, however, not
upon the old Roman creed, but upon a more modern Gallic
expansion of it, which forms what is called by us now
the Apostles’ Creed. Owing to the reverence shown to the
Roman church this creed soon found its way throughout
all the West, and arrogated to itself here the name
of an œcumenical Symbol, although it has never been
acknowledged by the Greek church. The legend of its
apostolic origin was carried out still further by the
assertion that each of the twelve Apostles composed one
article as his contribution to the formula (συμβολή).
Laurentius Valla and Erasmus were the first to dispute
its apostolic origin.
III. =The Athanasian Creed.=--The so-called Athanasian Symbol,
which from its opening words is also known as _Symb._
“_Quicunque_,” sprang up in the end of the 5th century
out of the opposition of Western Catholicism to German
Arianism, so that it is doubtful whether it had its
origin in Gaul, Spain or North Africa. In short, sharply
accentuated propositions it sets forth first of all the
Nicene-Constant. doctrine of the Trinity in its fuller
form as developed by Augustine (§ 50, 7), then in the
second part the dogmatic results of the Nestorian and
Eutychian controversies (§ 52, 3, 4), and in the severest
terms makes eternal salvation dependent on the acceptance
of all these beliefs. The earliest certain trace of its
existence is found in Cæsarius of Arles (A.D. 503-543) who
quotes some sentences borrowed from it as of acknowledged
authority. The idea that Athanasius was its author arose
in the 8th century and was soon accepted throughout the
West as an undoubted truth. It was first taken notice of
by the Greek church in the 11th century, and on account
of the _filioque_ (§ 67, 1) was pronounced heretical.[176]
§ 59.3. =Bible Reading in Church and Preaching.=--The =Reading=
of non-canonical books in church, which had previously been
customary (§ 36, 3), was now forbidden. The _Lectio continua_,
_i.e._ the reading of entire biblical books was the common
practice down to the 5th century. In the Latin church at each
service there were usually two readings, one from the Gospels,
the other from the Epistles or the Prophets. The _Apostolic
Constitutions_ (§ 43, 4) have three, the Prophets, Epistles,
and Gospels; so too the Gallican and Spanish churches; while
the Syrian had four, the additional one being from Acts. As
the idea of the Christian Year was carried out, however, the
_Lectio continua_ gave place to the _Lectio propria_, _i.e._
a selection of passages which correspond to the character
of the particular festival. In the West this selection was
fixed by the _Lectionaries_ among which the so-called _Liber
comitis_, which tradition assigned to Jerome, in various
forms and modifications, found acceptance generally throughout
the West. In the East where the _Lectio continua_ continued
much more prevalent, lectionaries came into use first in the
8th century. The lesson was read by a reader from a reading desk;
as a mark of distinction, however, the gospel was often read by
the deacon. For the same purpose, too, lights were often kindled
during this reading.--The =Sermon= was generally by the bishop,
who might, however, transfer the duty to a presbyter or deacon.
Monks were forbidden to preach in the church. They were not
hindered from doing so in the streets and markets, from roofs,
pillars and trees. The bishop preached from his episcopal throne,
but often, in order to be better heard, stood at the railing of
the choir (_Cancelli_). Augustine and Chrysostom often preached
from the reading desk. In the East preaching came very much to
the front, lasted often for an hour, and aimed at theatrical
effects. Very distracting was the practice, specially common
in Greece of giving loud applause with waving of handkerchiefs
and clapping of hands (κρότος, _Acclamatio_). In the West the
sermon consisted generally of short simple addresses (_Sermones_).
Extempore discourses (ὁμιλίαι σχεδιασθεῖσαι) were greatly
appreciated, more so than those repeated from memory; reading
was quite an exceptional occurrence. Even the emperors after
Constantine’s example gave sometimes sermonic lectures in
extra-ecclesiastical assemblies. Among the Syrians sermons in
verse and strophically arranged, with equal number of syllables
in the lines but unrhymed, were very popular.
§ 59.4. =Hymnology.=[177]--Ephraëm [Ephraim] the Syrian
(† A.D. 378) introduced melodious orthodox hymns in place
of the heterodox hymns of the Syrian Gnostics Bardesanes and
Harmonius (§ 27, 5). On the later Syrian hymn writers, see
§ 48, 7. The introduction of their hymns into the public service
caused no trouble. For the Greeks orthodox hymns were composed
by Gregory Nazianzen and Synesius of Ptolemais. The want of
popularity and the ban of the Laodicean Council hindered their
introduction into the services of the church; but this ban was
removed as early as the 5th century. Under the name of Troparies,
from τρόπος=art of music, shorter, and soon also longer, poems
of their own composition were introduced alongside of the church
service of Psalms (§ 70, 2). But unquestionably the palm for
church hymn composition belongs to the Latin church. With Hilary
of Poitiers († A.D. 368) begins a series of poets (Ambrose,
Damasus, Augustine, Sedulius, Eunodius, Prudentius, Fortunatus,
Gregory the Great) who bequeathed to their church a precious
legacy of spiritual songs of great beauty, spirituality, depth,
power, grandeur and simplicity.
§ 59.5. =Psalmody and Hymn Music.=[178]--From the time when
clerical _cantores_ (§ 34, 3) were appointed the symphonic
singing of psalms by the congregation seems to have been on
the wane. The Council of Laodicea forbade it altogether, without,
however, being able quite to accomplish that. Antiphonal or
responsive singing was much enjoyed. Hypophonic singing of the
congregation in the responses with which the people answered the
clerical intonings, readings and prayers, and in the beating of
time with which they answered the clerical singing of psalms, was
long persisted in in spite of clerical exclusiveness. The singing
of prayers, readings and consecrations was first introduced
in the 6th century. At first church music was simple, artless,
recitative. But the rivalry of heretics forced the orthodox
church to pay greater attention to the requirements of art.
Chrysostom had to declaim against the secularisation of Church
music. More lasting was the opposition of the church to the
introduction of instrumental accompaniments. Even part singing
was at this time excluded from the church. In the West psalmody
took a high flight with a true ecclesiastical character. Even in
A.D. 330, bishop Sylvester erected a school at Rome for training
singers for the churches. Ambrose of Milan was the author of a
new kind of church music full of melodious flow, with rhythmical
accent and rich modulation, nobly popular and grandly simple
(_Cantus Ambrosianus_). Augustine speaks with enthusiasm of the
powerful impression made on him by this lively style of singing,
but expresses also the fear that the senses might be spellbound
by the pleasant sound of the tune, and thus the effect of
the words on the mind be weakened. And in fact the Ambrosian
chant was in danger during the 6th century through increasing
secularisation of losing its ecclesiastical character. Then
appeared Gregory the Great as reformer and founder of a new
style of music (_Cantus Romanus, ferinus, choralis_) for which
at the same time, in order that he might fix it in a tune book
(_Antiphonarium_), he invented a special notation, the so-called
_Neumæ_, either from πνεῦμα as characterizing the music, or from
νεῦμα as characterizing the musical notes, a wonderful mixture
of points, strokes and hooks. The Gregorian music is in unison,
slow, measured and uniform without rhythm and beat, so that
it approaches again the old recitative mode of psalm singing,
while still at the same time its elaboration of the art with
much richer modulation marks an important step in advance. The
Ambrosian briskness, freshness and popular style were indeed
lost, but all the more certainly the earnestness, dignity and
solemnity of Church music were preserved. But it was a very great
defect that the Gregorian music was assigned exclusively to well
equipped choirs of clerical singers, hence _Cantus choralis_, for
the training of which Gregory founded a school of music in Rome.
The congregation was thus deprived of that lively participation
in the public service which up to that time it had enjoyed.
§ 59.6. =The Liturgy.=--The numerous liturgies that had sprung
up since the 4th century were reared on the basis of one common
type which we find in the liturgy of the Apostolic Constitutions
(§ 43, 4). The most important orthodox liturgies are: the
Jerusalem liturgy which is ascribed to the Apostle James, the
Alexandrian which claims as its author Mark, disciple of the
Apostles (§ 16, 4), the Byzantine which professes to have been
composed by Basil and abbreviated by Chrysostom, which ultimately
dislodged all others from the orthodox church of the East.
Among Western liturgies the following are distinguished for
antiquity, reputation and significance: the Gallican Masses
of the 5th century, the Milan liturgy, professedly by Barnabas,
probably by Ambrose, and the Roman or that of St. Peter, to the
successive revisions of which are attached the names of the great
popes Leo the Great, † A.D. 461, Gelasius I., † A.D. 496, and
Gregory the Great, † A.D. 604. It gradually obtained universal
ascendancy in the West. Its components are: The _sacramentarium_,
prayers for the service of the Mass, the _antiphonarium_, the
_lectionarium_, and the _Ordo Romanus_, guide to the dispensation
of the Mass. The uniting of these several writings to the _Missale
Romanum_ belongs to a later period.--=The Greek Liturgy= in the
combining of the vesper, matins and principal service of worship
represents a threefold religious drama in which the whole course
of the sacred history from the creation of the world to the
ascension of our Lord is brought to view. In the lighting and
extinguishing of candles, in opening and closing of doors,
in the figured cloth covering the altar space, (§ 60, 1), in
burning of incense and presentations, in the successive putting
on of various liturgical vestments, in the processions and
genuflections of the inferior clergy, in the handling of the
sacramental elements, etc., the chief points of the gospel
history are symbolically set forth. The word accompanying the
ceremonies (intonations, responses, prayers, readings, singing)
has a subordinate significance and forms only a running commentary
on the drama.--=The Latin Church= changed the dramatic character
of the liturgy into a dogmatic one. It is no longer the objective
history of salvation which is here represented, but the subjective
appropriation of salvation. The sinner in need of redemption
comes to the altar of the Lord, seeks and finds quickening and
instruction, forgiveness and grace. The real pillar of the whole
service is therefore the word, and to the symbol is assigned only
the subordinate part of accompanying the word with a pictorial
representation. The components of the liturgy are partly such
as invariably are repeated in every Mass, partly such as change
with the calendar and the requirements of particular festivals.
Among the former the canon of the Mass forms the real centre of
the whole Mass. It embraces the eucharistic forms of consecration
with the prayer offered up in connection with the offering of it
up.--Among the liturgical writings are specially to be named the
=Diptychs= (δὶς ἀπτύσσω, to fold twice), writing tablets which
were covered on the inside with wax. They were the official lists
of persons of the ancient church, and were of importance for the
liturgy inasmuch as the names written upon them were the subject
of special liturgical intercession. We have to distinguish,
δίπτυχα ἐπισκόπων, in which are written the names of the foreign
bishops with whom church fellowship is maintained, and δίπτυχα
ζώντων or lists of their own church members as the offerers, and
δίπτυχα νεκρῶν.[179]
§ 59.7. =Liturgical Vestments.=--A special clerical costume which
made the clergy recognisable even in civil life arose from their
scorning to submit to the whims of fashion. The transition from
this to a compulsory liturgical style of dress was probably
owing to the fact that the clergy in discharging their official
functions wore not their every-day attire, but a better suit
reserved for the purpose. If in this way the idea of sacred
vestments was arrived at it was an easy step to associate
them with the official costume of the Old Testament priesthood,
attributing to them, as to the dress of the Jewish priests, a
symbolico-mystical significance, to be diversified according to
their patterns as well as according to the needs of the worship
and their hierarchical rank. In the West the proper dress for
Mass was and continued the so-called _Alba_, among the Greeks
στοιχάριον or στιχάριον, a white linen shirt reaching down
to the feet after the pattern of the old Roman _Tunica_ and
corresponding to the long coat of the Old Testament priest,
with a girdle (_Cingulum_). The shorter _Casula_ or _Pineta_,
among the Greeks φελώνιον, over the Alba took the place of the
_Toga_. It was originally without sleeves, simply a coloured
garment of costly material furnished with an opening for the
head, but in later times made more convenient by being slit half
way down on both sides. The _Orarium_, ὀράριον, afterwards called
_Stola_, is a long wide strip of costly cloth which the deacon
threw over his left shoulder and on his right thigh, but the
priest and the bishop wore it over both shoulders and at the
sacrifice of the Mass in the form of the cross over the breast.
Over these priestly vestments the bishop wore as representing
the high priest’s ephod the so-called _Dalmatica_, among the
Greeks σάκκος, a costly sleeved robe; and the archbishop also
the _Pallium_, ὠμοφόριον. This last was originally a complete
robe, but in order not to conceal the episcopal and priestly
ornaments it was reduced to a small white woollen cape with two
strips hanging down on the breast and the back. To episcopal
ornaments of the Greeks besides belonged the ἐπιγονάτιον, a
square-shaped piece of cloth, hanging down from the σάκκος on
the left side, ornamented with a picture of Christ sewed on
stiff pasteboard; and to correspond to the high priest’s Urim
and Thummim, the πανάγιον, a painting in enamel of a saint,
hung to the breast by a golden chain. Among the Latins the place
of the latter is taken by the golden cross for the breast or
_Pectorale_. As covering of the head the priest had the Barretta
(_birretum_), the bishop the mitre, _mitra_ (§ 84, 1). The ring
and staff (marriage ring and shepherd’s staff) were in very early
times made the insignia of the episcopal office. The settling of
the various liturgical colours for the successive festivals of
the Christian year was first made during the 12th century.[180]
§ 59.8. =Symbolical Acts in Worship.=--The fraternal kiss
was a general custom throughout the whole period. On entering,
the church door or threshold was kissed; during the liturgical
service the priest kissed the altar, the reader the Gospel. Even
relics and images were kissed. When one confessed sin he beat
upon his breast. The sign of the cross was made during every
ecclesiastical action and even in private life was frequently
used. The custom of washing the hands on entering God’s house
and lighting candles in it, was very ancient. No quite certain
trace of sprinkling with holy water is found before the 9th
century. The burning of incense (_thurificari_) is first found
late in the 4th century. In earlier times it was supposed to draw
on and feed the demons; afterwards it was regarded as the surest
means of driving them away. The consecration of churches and the
annual commemoration thereof are referred to even by Eusebius
(ἐγκαινίων ἑορταί). Even so early as the times of Ambrose the
possession of relics was regarded as an indispensable condition
to such services.
§ 59.9. =Processions= are of early date and had their
prototypes in the heathen worship in the solemn marches
at the high festivals of Dionysos, Athene, etc., etc. First at
burials and weddings, they were practised since the 4th century
at the reception of bishops or relics, at thanksgivings for
victories, especially at seasons of public distress and calamity
(_Rogationes_, _Supplicationes_). Bishop Mamertus of Vienna about
A.D. 450 and Gregory the Great developed them into regularly
recurring institutions whose celebration was rendered more solemn
by carrying the gospels in front, costly crosses and banners,
blazing torches and wax candles, relics, images of Mary and the
saints, by psalm and hymn singing. The prayers arranged for the
purpose with invocation of saints, and angels and the popular
refrain, _Ora pro nobis!_ were called _Litanies_.
§ 60. PLACES OF PUBLIC WORSHIP, BUILDINGS
AND WORKS OF ART.[181]
Church architecture made rapid advance as a science in the times
of Constantine the Great. The earliest architectural style thus
developed is found in the Christian _Basilicas_. Whether this was
a purely original kind of building called forth by the requirements
of congregational worship, or whether and how far it was based upon
previously existing styles, is still a subject of discussion. In later,
and especially oriental, church buildings the flat roof of the basilica
was often changed into a cupola. Of the plastic arts painting was the
next to be represented.
§ 60.1. =The Basilica.=--The original form of the Christian
basilica was that of an oblong four-sided building running from
west to east. It was divided lengthwise by rows of pillars, into
three parts or aisles, in such a way as to leave the middle aisle
at least double the breadth of each of the other two. The middle
aisle led up to a semicircular recess (κόγχη, ἀψίς, _Concha_,
_Absida_), curved out of the eastern side wall, which was
separated from the middle aisle proper by a railing (κιγκλίδες,
_Cancelli_) and a curtain (καταπέτασμα, _Velum_), and, because
raised a few steps, was called βῆμα (from βαίνω). From the 5th
century the pillars running down the length of the house were
not carried on to the eastern gable, and thus a cross passage
or transept was formed, which was raised to the level of the
Bema and added to it. This transept now in connection with the
middle aisle and the recess imprints upon the ground plan of the
church the significant form of the cross. At the entrance at the
western end there was a porch which occupied the whole breadth
of the house. Thus then the whole fell into three divisions.
The =Bema= was reserved for the clergy. The elevated seat of
the bishop (θρόνος, _Cathedra_) stood in the middle of the
round wall forming the recess, lower seats for the presbyters
on both sides (σύνθρονοι), the altar in the centre or in front
of the recess. As a place reserved for the altar and the clergy
the βῆμα had also the names ἅγιον, ἄδυτον, ἱερατεῖον, _Sacrarium_,
_Sanctuarium_, the name “Handbook of Painting: Italian Schools.
Based on Kügler’s Handbook.” by Eastlake; new ed. by Layard,
2 vols., Lond., 1886.] of Choir being first given it in the Middle
Ages. Under the Apse or Bema there was usually a subterranean
chamber, κρυπτή, _Memoria_, _Confessio_, containing the bones of
martyrs. The altar space in later times in the Eastern churches
instead of being marked off by railings or curtains was separated
by a wooden partition which because adorned with sacred pictures
painted often on a golden ground and inlaid with most precious
stones, was called the picture screen (εἰκονόστασις). It had
usually three doors of which the middle one, the largest of the
three, the so-called “Royal” door, was reserved for the bishop
and for the emperor when he communicated. The =Nave= or main
part of the building, consisting of three, less frequently of
five, aisles (νάος, ναῦς, _Navis_, so called partly from its
oblong form, partly and chiefly on account of the symbolical
significance of the ship as a figure of the means of salvation,
Gen. vii. 23), was the place where the baptized laity met, and
were arranged in the different aisles according to sex, age
and rank. In the Eastern churches galleries (ὑπερῶα) were often
introduced along the sides for the women. The =Porch= (πρόναος,
_Vestibulum_) which from its great width was also called νάρθηξ
or _Ferula_, properly the hollow stalk of an umbelliferous plant,
was the place occupied by the catechumens and penitents. In front
of it, in earlier times unroofed, afterwards covered, was the
enclosure (αἴθριον, αὐλή, _Atrium_, _Area_) where a basin of
water stood for washing the hands. Here too the penitents during
the first stage of their discipline, as well as the _energumeni_,
had to stand. That the Atrium was also called _Paradisus_, as
Athanasius tells us, is best explained by supposing that here
for the warning of penitents there was a picture of Adam and
Eve being driven out of Paradise. The porch and the side aisles
just to the height of the pillars, were shut in with tesselated
rafters and covered with a one-sided slanting roof. But middle
aisle and transept were heightened by side walls resting on the
pillars and rising high above the side roofs and covered with a
two-sided slanting roof. In order that the pillars might be able
to bear this burden, they were bound one to another by an arched
binding. The walls of the middle aisle and transepts rising above
the side roofs were supplied with windows, which were usually
wanting in the lower walls.--Utility was the main consideration
in the development of the plan of the basilicas, but nevertheless
at the same time the idea of symbolical significance was also
in many ways very fully carried out, such as the form of the
cross in the ground plan, and the threefold division into middle
and side aisles. In the bow-shaped binding of the pillars the
idea of pressing forward (Phil. iii. 13, 14) was represented,
for there the eye was carried on from one pillar to the other
and led uninterruptedly forward to the recess at the east end,
where stood the altar, where the Sun of righteousness had risen
(Mal. iv. 2). The semicircle of the recess to which the eye was
carried forward reminded of the horizon from which the sun rose
in his beauty; and the bold rising of the walls of the middle
aisle, which rested on the arched pillars, pointed the eye
upwards and gave the liturgical _sursum corda_ which the bishop
called out to the congregation a corresponding expression in
architectural form. This significance was further intensified
by the light falling down from above into the sacred place.
§ 60.2. =Secular Basilicas.=--All spaces adorned with pillared
courts were called among the ancient Romans basilicas. In
the private houses of distinguished Romans the name _Basilica
domestica_ was given to the so-called Oëcus, _i.e._ the chamber
reserved for solemn occasions with the peristyle in front,
the inner open court surrounded by covered pillared halls;
while public markets and courts of justice were called _Basilicæ
forenses_. The latter were oblong in shape; at the end opposite
the entrance the dividing wall was broken through and in the
opening a semicircular recess was carved out with an elevated
platform, and in this were the tribunal of the prætor and seats
for the assessors and the jury. In the covered pillared courts
along the two sides were the wares exposed for sale and in the
usually uncovered large middle space the buyers and lookers-on
moved about. Outside of the enclosing wall before the entrance
was often a pillared porch standing by itself for a lobby.--From
having the same name and many correspondences in construction
the later Christian basilica was supposed to have been copied
from the forensic basilica. Zestermann was the first to contest
this theory and in this found hearty support especially on
the Catholic side. According to him the Christian basilica
had nothing in common with the forensic, but was called forth
quite independently of any earlier style of building by the
requirements of Christian worship. Now certainly on the one
side the similarity had been quite unduly over-estimated.
For almost everything that gave its symbolically significant
character to the ecclesiastical basilica,--the transept and
the form of the cross brought out by it, the bow-shaped binding
of the pillars, the walls of the middle aisle resting on the
pillars rising sheer into the heights, as well as the entirely
new arrangement of the whole house, are the essential and
independent product of the Christian spirit. But on the other
hand, differences have been greatly exaggerated and features
which the ecclesiastical basilica had in common with the forensic,
which were demonstrably copied from the latter, have been ignored.
On both sides, too, the importance for our question of the
_basilicæ domesticæ_ used for worship before regular churches
were built, has been overlooked. Here the peristyle with its
pillared courts with the oëcus attached supplied the divisions
needed for the different classes attending divine service (clergy,
congregation, penitents, catechumens). What was more natural
than that this form of building, brought indeed into more perfect
accord with the Christian idea and congregational requirements,
should be adopted in church building and with it also the name
with a new application to Christ the heavenly King? But one
and indeed a very essential feature in the later basilica style
is wanting generally in the oëcus of private houses, viz. the
Apse. One would naturally suppose that it was borrowed from the
forensic basilica in consideration of its purpose there, scruples
against such procedure being lessened as the heathen state passed
over to Christianity. Thus too it is easily explained how the
earliest basilicas, like that of Tyre consecrated in A.D. 313,
of which Eusebius’ description gives us full information, have
as yet no Apse.
§ 60.3. =The Cupola Style.=--We meet with the first example of
the cupola style among Christian buildings in the form of Roman
mausoleums in chapels or churches raised over martyrs’ graves.
This style, however, was in many ways unsuitable for regular
parish churches. The necessarily limited inner space embraced
within the circular or polygonal walls would not admit of
the significant shape of the nave being preserved; it could
not be proportionally partitioned among clergy, congregation,
catechumens and penitents. In an ideal point of view only
the centre of the whole space was suitable for the bema with
the altar, bishop’s throne, etc. In that case, however, the
half of the congregation present would have to stand behind
the officiating clergy and so this arrangement was not to be
thought of. In the later ecclesiastical buildings, therefore,
of the cupola style the ground plan of the basilica was adopted,
with atrium and narthex at the west end and bema and apse at
the east end. The old basilica style, though capable of so
much artistic adornment, passed now indeed more and more into
desuetude before the overpowering impression made upon one
entering the building by the cupola (θόλος, _Cuppula_) like
a cloud of heaven overspanning at a giddy height the middle
space, pierced by many windows and resting on four pillars
bound by arches one to another. Besides this main and complete
cupola there were often a number of semi- and secondary cupolas,
which gave to the whole building from without the appearance
of a rich well ordered organism. The greatest masterpiece
in this style, which Byzantine love of art and beauty valued
far more than the simple basilica, is the church of Sophia at
Constantinople (Σοφία=Λόγος), at the completion of which in
A.D. 587 Justinian I. cried out: Νενίκηκά σε Σαλομών.
§ 60.4. =Accessory and Special Buildings.=--Alongside of the main
building there generally were additional buildings for special
purposes (ἐξέδραι), surrounded by an enclosing wall. Among these
isolated extra buildings _Baptistries_ (βαπτιστήρια, φωτιστήρια)
held the first rank. They were built in rotunda form after the
pattern of the Roman baths. The baptismal basin (κολυμβήθρα,
_Piscina_) in the middle of the inner space was surrounded by
a series of pillars. In front there was frequently a roomy porch
used for the instruction of catechumens. When infant baptism
became general, separate baptistries were no longer needed. Their
place was taken by the baptismal font in the church itself on the
north side of the main entrance. For the custody of church jewels,
ornaments, robes, books, archives, etc. in the larger churches
there were special buildings provided. The spirit of brotherhood,
the _Philadelphia_, expressed itself in the πτωχοτροφεῖα,
ὀρφανοτροφεῖα, γηροκομεῖα, βρεφοτροφεῖα (Foundling Hospitals),
νοσοκομεῖα, ξενοδοχεῖα. The burying ground (κοιμητήριον,
_Cimeterium_, _Dormitorium_, _Area_) was also usually within
the wall enclosing the church property. The privilege of burial
within the church was granted only to emperors and bishops. When
clocks came into vogue towers were introduced, but these were at
first simply attached to the churches, occasionally even standing
quite apart.
§ 60.5. =Church furniture.=--The centre of the whole house of
God was the _Altar_ (ἁγία τράπεζα, θυσιαστήριον, _Ara_, _Altare_),
since the 5th century commonly of stone, often overlaid with gold
and silver. The altar stood out at the east end, the officiating
priest behind it facing the congregation. The introduction of
the _Missæ solitariæ_ (§ 58, 3) made it necessary in the West to
have a large number of altars. In the Greek church the rule was
to have one altar. Moveable altars, for missionaries, crusaders,
etc., were necessary since the consecration of the altar had
been pronounced indispensable. The Latins used for this purpose
a consecrated stone plate with a cover (_Palla_); the Greeks
only a consecrated altar cloth (ἀντιμήνσιον). The altar cloth
was regarded as essential, a _denudatio alteris_ as impious
desecration; according to liturgical rule, however, the altar
was bared on Friday and Saturday of Passion Week. From the
altar cloth was distinguished the _Corporale_, εἰλητόν, for
covering the oblations. On the altar stood the _Ciborium_, a
canopy supported by four feet, to which by a golden chain was
attached a dove-shaped vessel (περιστήριον) with the consecrated
sacramental elements for the communion of the sick. The
_Thuribulum_ was for the burning of incense, cross for marches
and processions (_Cruces stationales_) and banners (_Vexilla_).
In the nave were seats for the congregation; in the narthex
there were none. The pulpit or reading desk (_Pulpitum_) at
first movable, afterwards permanently fixed to the railings
in the middle of the bema in the basilica was called the _Ambo_
from ἀναβαίνω, or _Lectorium_, our English Lectern. In many
churches two ambos were erected, on the north or left side for
the gospel, and on the south or right side for the epistle. In
larger churches, however, the ambo was often brought forward into
the nave. Our chancel had its origin late in the Middle Ages by
a separate preaching Ambo being erected beside the lectern, and
raised aloft in order that the preacher might be better seen and
heard.--The introduction of church clocks (_Nolæ_, _Campanulæ_,
because commonly made of Campanian brass which was regarded as
the best) is sometimes ascribed to bishop Paulinus of Nola in
Campania, who died in A.D. 431, sometimes to Pope Sabinianus,
who died in A.D. 606. In the East they were first introduced
in the 9th century. In early times the hours of service were
announced by _Cursores_, ἀνάδρομοι, afterwards by trumpets or
beating of gongs.
§ 60.6. =The Graphic and Plastic Arts= (§ 38, 3; § 57, 4).--The
Greek church forbade all nudity; only face, hands and feet
could be left uncovered. This narrowness was overcome in the
West. Brilliancy of colour, costliness of material and showy
overloading of costume made up for artistic deficiencies.
The εἰκόνες ἀχειροποίητοι afforded stereotyped forms for the
countenances of images of Christ, Mary and the Apostles. The
_Nimbus_, originally a soft mist or transparent cloud, with which
pagan poets and painters surrounded the persons or heads of the
gods, in later times also those of the Roman emperors, made its
appearance during the 5th century in Christian painting as the
_halo_, in the form of rays, of a diadem or of a circle, first
of all in figures of Christ. Images of the Saviour bound to the
cross were first introduced about the end of the 6th century.
The symbol was previously restricted to the representation of
a lamb at the foot of the cross, a bust of Christ at the top or
in the middle of the cross, or the full figure of Christ holding
His cross before Him. _Anastasius Sinaita_ in the 7th century,
to show his opposition to the monophysite doctrine that only the
body had been crucified, painted a figure of the crucified which
straightway came to be regarded in the Eastern church as the
pattern figure, without the crown of thorns, with nimbus, the
wound of the spear with blood streaming forth, the cross with an
inscription on both sides--JC. XC.--and a sloping peg as support
for the feet, and under the cross the skull of Adam. The Western
crucifix figures, on the other hand, though likewise governed
by a special type, show greater freedom in artistic development.
Wall or fresco painting was most extensively carried on in
the Catacombs during the 4th-6th centuries. Mosaic painting,
_Musivum_, λιθοστράτια, with its imperishable beauty of colouring,
was used to decorate the long flat walls of the basilicas,
the vaulted ceilings of the cupolas and the curving sides of
the apse (glass-mosaic on a gold ground). Liturgical books were
adorned with miniature figures. Sublimity came more and more
to characterize ecclesiastical art; it became more majestic,
dignified and dispassionate, but also stiffer and less natural.
Statues seemed to the ancient church heathenish, sensuous and
realistic. The Greek church at last prohibited them entirely
and would not suffer even a single crucifix, but only simple
crosses with a sloping transverse beam at the foot. The West
had more liberal views, yet even there Christian statues were
only quite isolated phenomena. There was less scruple in regard
to bas-reliefs and alto-reliefs (ἀναγλυφαί) especially on
sarcophagi and ecclesiastical furniture.
§ 61. LIFE, DISCIPLINE AND MORALS.[182]
When whole crowds of worldly-minded men, who only sought worldly
advantages from professing Christ, were drawn into the church after
the State had become Christian, the Christian life lost much of the
earnestness, power and purity, by which it had conquered the old
world of heathenism. More and more the church became assimilated
and conformed to the world, church discipline grew more lax, and moral
decay made rapid progress. Passionate contentions, quarrels and schisms
among bishops and clergy filled also public life with party strife,
animosity and bitterness. The immorality of the court poisoned by its
example the capital and the provinces. Savagery and licentiousness
grew rampant amid the devastating raids of the barbarians. Hypocrisy
and bigotry speedily took the place of piety among those who strove
after something higher, while the masses consoled themselves with
the reflection that every man could not be a monk. But in spite of
all Christianity still continued to act as a leaven. In public and
civil life, in the administration of justice and the habits of the
people, the Christian spirit, theoretically at least, and often also
practically, was still everywhere present. The requirements of humanity
and the rights of man were recognised; slavery was more and more
restricted; gladiatorial shows and immoral exhibitions were abolished;
the limits of proud exclusive nationality were broken through; polygamy
was never tolerated, and the sanctity of marriage was insisted upon,
the female sex obtained its long unacknowledged rights; benevolent
institutions (§ 60, 4) flourished; and the inveterate vices of ancient
paganism could at least be no longer regarded as the sound, legitimate
and natural conditions and expressions of civil and social life. Even
the pagan, who, adopting the profession of Christianity, remained
pagan at heart, was obliged at least to submit himself to the forms
and requirements of the church, to its discipline and morals. The shady
side of this period is glaring enough, but a bright side and noble
personages of deep piety, moral earnestness, resolute denial of self
and the world, are certainly not wanting.
§ 61.1. =Church Discipline.=--The Penitential Discipline of
the 3rd century (§ 39, 2) dealt only with public offences which
had become common scandal. But even those who were burdened in
conscience with heavy but hidden sins and thereby felt themselves
excluded from church fellowship, were advised to seek deliverance
from this secret excommunication by public confession of sin
before the church in the form of _exomologesis_ and to submit to
whatever humiliation the church should lay upon them. In presence
of this hard and unreasonable demand the need must have soon
become apparent of a secret and private tribunal in place of
this public one, which when once introduced would soon drive
the earlier out of the field. The first step in this direction
was taken in the end of the 3rd and beginning of the 4th century
in the Eastern church by the appointment of a special penitential
presbytery (πρεσβ. ἐπὶ τῆς μετανοίας), who under an oath of
secresy heard the confession of such sinners and laid upon them
the proper penances. But when in A.D. 391, a female penitent, a
married lady of good family in Constantinople, having committed
adultery in the church with a deacon during her time of penance,
confessed this sin also to a priestly confessor and so brought
about the excommunication of the guilty deacon, the Patriarch
Nectarius was obliged on account of the popular feeling excited
to again abolish the whole institution and to leave to the
consciences of such sinners themselves the question of partaking
in the sacraments. But it was evident that this could not
exclude pastoral advice and guidance by the clergy. In the
West, notwithstanding the confident assertions of Socrates,
we never meet with a penitential priest expressly appointed
to such duties. Jerome on Matt. xvi. 19 calls it pharisaic
pride in a bishop or presbyter to arrogate the judicial function
of forgiving sins, “_cum apud Deum non sententia sacerdotum, sed
reorum vita quæratur_.” Augustine distinguishes three kinds of
penance corresponding to the three classes in the congregation.
1. The penance of catechumens; all their previous sins are
atoned for by baptism.
2. The penance of believers whose venial sins (_peccata
venialia_) occasioned by the universal sinfulness of human
nature obtain forgiveness in daily prayer.
3. The penance of those who on account of serious actual
breaches of the decalogue (_peccata gravia s. mortalia_)
are punished with ecclesiastical excommunication.
In estimating the church discipline to be exacted of this last
class of offenders he lays down the principle that the degree
of its publicity is to be measured in accordance with the degree
of publicity of the offence committed, and according to the
magnitude of the scandal which it has occasioned. And when
some Italian bishops demanded “_in pœnitentia, quæ a fidelibus
postulatur_” the reading before the congregation of a written
confession of their sin, Leo the Great forbade this extreme
practice, as unevangelical as it was unreasonable, declaring
that it was quite enough to confess the sin first to God and
then in secret confession to the priest. But when Leo added the
assertion: _divina bonitate ordinatum esse, ut indulgentia Dei
nisi supplicationibus sacerdotum nequeat obtineri; et salvatorem
ipsum, qui hane præpositis ecclesiæ tradidit potestatem, ut
et confidentibus actionem pœnitentiæ durent, et eosdem salubri
satisfactione purgatos ad communionem sacramentorum per januam
reconciliationis admitterent, huic utique operi incessabiliter
intervenire_,--we have here the first foundation laid of the
present Roman Catholic doctrine of penance. But this _confessio
secreta_ is still something very different from the later
so-called Auricular Confession. Leo’s ordinance treats only of
the confession of grave offences, which, if openly committed or
proclaimed, would have called forth punishment from the judicial
tribunal; _quibus_, says Leo, _possint legum constitutione
percelli_. But still more important is the distinction that even
Leo does not confer upon the priest absolute power of forgiving
sin as God’s vicegerent, but only allows him to officiate as
“_peccator pro delictis pœnitentium_.” Besides Leo’s view of
the unconditional necessity of confession in order to obtain
divine forgiveness of heinous sins by no means gained universal
acceptance in the church. The opinion that it was enough to
confess sins to God alone, and that confession to a priest,
while helpful and wholesome, was not absolutely necessary, was
universally prevalent in the East, where Chrysostom especially
maintained it, and even in the West down to the time of Gratian,
A.D. 1150, and Petrus [Peter] Lombardus [Lombard], † A.D. 1164,
had numerous and important representatives among the teachers
of the church (§ 104, 4). An important step onwards on the path
opened up by Leo was taken soon after him in the West when not
merely actual sins but even sinful dispositions and desires,
ambition, anger, pride, lust, etc., of which Joh. Cassianus
enumerates eight as _vitia principalia_, as well as the sinful
thoughts springing from them, were included in the province
of secret confession. A system of confession as a regular
and necessary preparation for observing the sacrament did
not as yet exist.--The so-called Penitential books from the
6th century afforded a guide to determine the penances to
be imposed upon the penitents in the form of fasts, prayers,
almsgiving, etc., according to the degree of their guilt. The
first Penitential book for the Greek church is ascribed to
the Patriarch of Constantinople, Joh. the Faster or Jejunator,
† A.D. 595, and is entitled: Ἀκολουθία καὶ τάξις ἐπὶ τῶν
ἐξομολογουμένων.[183]--Continuation § 89, 6.
§ 61.2. =Christian Marriage.=--The ecclesiastical consecration
of the marriage tie (§ 39, 1) performed after, as well as before,
civil marriage by mutual consent before two secular witnesses,
was made more solemn by being separated from the ordinary
worship and celebrated at a special week-day service (_missa
pro sponsis_), and a rich ritual grew up which gradually
developed itself into an independent liturgy. Into this many
bridal customs hitherto despised as heathenish were introduced,
the wedding ring, veiling the bride, the crowning both betrothed
parties with wreaths, bridal sashes, bridal torches, bridesmaids
or παράνυμφοι. The granting of the wedding ceremony was regarded
as an honour which would be refused in the case of marriages not
approved by the church. But neither the refusal nor the neglect
of the ceremony on the part of those newly married interfered
with the validity of the marriage. Charlemagne was the first
in the West and Leo VI. (§ 70, 2) was the first in the East,
to make the church ceremony obligatory. Marriage between free
and bond, which was regarded by the state as concubinage, was
regarded by the church as perfectly valid. Blood relationship by
consanguinity and affinity was regarded as hindrance to marriage;
artificial relationship by adoption and spiritual relationship
by baptismal and confirmational sponsorship (§ 58, 1) were also
hindrances. Marriage between brothers’ or sisters’ children was
pronounced unbecoming by Augustine. Gregory the Great forbade
it on physiological grounds, and permitted marriage only in the
third or fourth degree of relationship. With gradually increasing
strictness the prohibition was extended even to the seventh
degree, but finally was fixed at the fourth by Innocent III.
in A.D. 1215. In direct opposition to the Roman law of hereditary
claims which established the degree of relationship according
to the number of actual descendants, so that father and son were
counted as related in the first degree to one another, brothers
and sisters as in the second degree, uncle and niece or nephew
as in the third, brothers’ or sisters’ children as in the fourth
degree, the canon law on hindrances to marriage begins this
reckoning after the withdrawal of the common parents, so that
brother and sister are related in the first degree, uncle and
niece in the second, etc. Several Councils of the 4th century
wished to make the contracting of a second marriage occasion
of church discipline; subsequently this demand was abandoned.
Many canonists, however, contest even yet the legitimacy of a
third marriage, and a fourth was almost universally admitted to
be sinful and unallowable (§ 67, 2). The contracting of mixed
marriages, with heathens, Jews or heretics, demanded penance,
and was strictly forbidden by the second Trullan Council in
A.D. 692. Only adultery was usually admitted as affording ground
for divorce; and also for the most part, unnatural vice, murder
and apostasy. The Council at Mileve in Africa in A.D. 416 for
the first time forbade divorced persons marrying again, even
the innocent party, and Pope Innocent I. † A.D. 417, made this
prohibition applicable universally.--Continuation § 89, 4.
§ 61.3. =Sickness, Death and Burial.=--The anointing the sick
with oil (Mk. vi. 13; Jas. v. 14) as means of charismatic bodily
healing is met with down to the 5th century. Innocent I. put
it in a decretal of A.D. 416, for the first time as a sacrament
for the dispensation of spiritual blessing to the sick. But many
centuries passed before the anointing of the sick was generally
observed as the sacrament of Extreme Unction (§ 70, 2; 104, 5).
On the other hand, the Areopagite (§ 47, 11) reckoned the
anointing of the dead a sacrament. The closing of the eyes
implied that death was a sleep with the hope of an awakening
in the resurrection. The fraternal kiss sealed the communion
of Christians even beyond the grave. The putting garlands on
the corpse as expressive of victory still met with opposition.
Several Synods found it necessary to forbid the absurdity of
squeezing the consecrated elements into the lips of the dead
or laying them in the coffin. Passionate lamentation, rending
of garments, wearing sackcloth and ashes, hired mourners, cypress
branches, etc., were regarded as despairing, heathenish customs.
So too festivals of the dead by night were condemned, while on
the contrary funeral processions by day, with torches, lamps,
palm and olive branches, were in high repute. Julian and the
Vandals prohibited them. In the 4th century the celebration of
the Agape and Supper at the grave was still frequent. In their
place afterwards we find mourning feasts, but these, on account
of their being abused, were disallowed by the church.
§ 61.4. =Purgatory and Masses for Souls.=--The connection of the
custom already referred to by Tertullian of not only praying in
family worship for members of the family that had fallen asleep,
but also by oblations of sacramental elements on the memorial
days of the dead (_Oblationes pro defunctis_) of giving to the
intercessions at the Supper in public worship a special direction
to them, with the doctrine of =Purgatory= (_Ignis purgatorius_)
which had developed itself in the West since the 5th century,
gave rise to the institution of masses for souls (§ 58, 3). The
idea of a place of punishment between death and the resurrection,
in which the venial sins (_peccata venialia_) of believers must
be atoned for, was quite unknown to the whole ancient church down
to the age of Augustine and to the Greek church till even after
his day (§ 67, 6). Mention is made indeed even by Origen of a
future πῦρ καθάρσιον or καθαρτικόν; but he means by it a mere
spiritual burning, from which even a Paul and a Peter were not
exempted. In the West it was first Augustine who deduced from
Matt. xii. 32, that even in the hereafter forgiveness of sins
is possible, holding in accordance with 1 Cor. iii. 13-15 that
it is not incredible, but yet always questionable, that many
believers who took over with them into the hereafter a sinful
connection with their earthly past life, might there he purified
by an “_ignis purgatorius_” of longer or shorter duration
as the continuation and completion of the earthly “_ignis
tribulationis_,” fiery trial, from the earthly dross still
adhering to them, and so might be saved. With greater confidence
_Cæsarius of Arles_ teaches that believers who during their
earthly life had neglected to atone for their minor offences
by almsgiving and other good works, must be purified by a
lingering fire in the next world, in order to win admission
into eternal blessedness. Finally, Gregory the Great raised
this idea into an established dogma of the Western church, while
he, at the same time, taught that by the intercession of the
living for the dead, and especially by the sacrifices of the
mass offered for them their purgatorial pains would be moderated
and curtailed. He too referred to Matt. xii. and 1 Cor. iii.
The reference to 2 Maccabees xii. 41-46 belongs to a later
period.--Continuation, § 106, 2, 3.
§ 62. HERETICAL REFORMERS.
During the 4th century a spirit of opposition to the dominant
ecclesiastical system was awakened, but as it manifested itself in
isolated forms, it had no abiding result and was soon stamped out.
This spirit showed itself in various attempts which passed beyond what
evangelical principles could vindicate. It directed its attacks partly
against the secularization of the church, branching out often into
wild fanaticism and rigorism, and partly against superstition and
externalism. Disgusted with the interminable theological controversies
and heresy huntings of that age, many came to regard the distinction
between orthodoxy and heresy as a matter of indifference so far
as religion is concerned, and to look for the core and essence of
Christianity not so much in doctrine as in morals.
§ 62.1. =Audians and Apostolics.=--As fanatical opponents of the
secularizing of the church, besides the Montanists (§ 40, 1) and
the Novatians (§ 41, 3) still surviving as isolated communities
down to the 5th century, we meet during the 4th century with the
Donatists (§ 63, 1), the Audians and the Apostolics. The sect
of the =Audians= was founded about A.D. 340 by a layman, a monk,
Audius or Udo from Mesopotamia. Having been challenged for his
crude anthropomorphic views, in support of which he referred to
Gen. i. 26 and other passages, he allowed himself to be chosen
and ordained bishop over his adherents. Placed thus in a directly
hostile relation to the Catholic church, they accused the church
of most arrant worldliness and degeneracy, called for a return
to apostolic poverty and avoided all communion with its members.
They also rejected the Nicene canon on the observance of Easter
and adopted the quartodeciman practice (§ 56, 3). On the motion
of several Catholic bishops the emperor banished the founder
of the sect to Scythia, where he laboured earnestly for the
conversion of the Goths, founded also some bishoprics and
monasteries with strict rules, and died in A.D. 372. The
persecution of the Christians under Athanaric, in A.D. 370
(§ 76, 1), pressed sorely upon the Audians. Still remnants of
them continued to exist down to the end of the 5th century.--The
so-called =Apostolics= of Asia Minor in the 4th century went
even further than the Audians. Of their origin nothing certain
is known. They declared that the holding of private property and
marriage are sinful, and unconditionally refused readmission to
all excommunicated persons.
§ 62.2. =Protests against Superstition and External
Observances.=--About the end of the 4th century lively protests
were made against the superstitions and shallow externalism of
the church. They were directed first of all to the worship of
Mary, especially the now wide-spread belief in her _perpetua
virginitas_ as mother of Jesus (§ 57, 2). The first protesters
against this doctrine that we meet with are the so-called
=Antidicomarianites= in Arabia, whom Epiphanius sought to turn
from their heresy by a doctrinal epistle incorporated in his
history of heresies. In the West too there sprang up several
opponents of this dogma of the church. One of the most prominent
of these was a layman =Helvidius= in Rome in A.D. 380, a scholar
of Auxentius, the Arian bishop of Milan. Then about A.D. 388 the
Roman monk =Jovinian= opposed on substantial doctrinal grounds
the prevailing notions about the merit of works and external
observances, especially monasticism, asceticism, celibacy
and fasting. And finally, =Bonosus=, bishop of Sardica, about
A.D. 390, wrought in the same direction, though at a later period
he seems to have given his adhesion to the Ebionite error that
Jesus had been an ordinary man whom God adopted as His Son on
account of His merit (_Filius Dei adoptivus_). At least his
younger contemporary Marius Mercator describes him as an advocate
of these views alongside of Paul of Samosata and Photinus. We
also find many allusions during the 7th century to a sect of
Bonosians teaching similar doctrines in Spain and Gaul, who are
frequently associated with the Photinians. Even before Jovinian,
=Aërius=, a presbyter of Sebaste in Armenia, about A.D. 360,
entered his protest against the doctrine of the merit of external
observances. He objected to prayer and oblations for the dead,
would have no compulsory fasting, and no distinction of rank
between bishops and presbyters. In this way he was brought into
collision with his bishop Eustathius (§ 44, 3). Persecuted on all
sides, his adherents betook themselves to the caves and forests.
The two monks of Milan, Sarmatio and Barbatianus, about A.D. 396,
were perhaps scholars of Jovinian, were at least of the same
mind with him. Finally, =Vigilantius=, presbyter at Barcelona
about A.D. 400, with passionate violence opposed the veneration
of relics, the invocation of saints, the prevailing love of
miracles, the vigil services, the celibacy of the clergy and the
merit of outward observances.--The counterblast of the church was
hot and violent. Epiphanius wrote against the Audians and Aërians;
Ambrose against Bonosus and the followers of Jovinian; Jerome
with unparalleled bitterness and passion against Helvidius,
Jovinian and Vigilantius; Augustine with greater moderation
discussed the views of Jovinian which in their starting point
were related to his own soteriological views.[184]
§ 62.3. =Protests against the Over-Estimation of Doctrine.=--Even
in the times of Athanasius a certain Rhetorius made his appearance
with the assertion that all heretics had a right to their opinion,
and Philastrius [Philaster] speaks of a sect of =Rhetorians= in
Egypt who, perhaps with a reference to Phil. i. 18, set aside
altogether the idea of heresy and placed the essence of orthodoxy
in fidelity to convictions. The =Gnosimachians= were related to
them in the depreciation of dogma, but went beyond them by wholly
withdrawing themselves from the domain of dogmatics and occupying
themselves exclusively with morals. They are put in the list of
heretics by Joh. Damascenus. This sect had sprung up during the
monophysite and monothelite controversies, and maintained that
since God requires of a Christian nothing more than a righteous
life (πράξεις καλάς), all striving after theoretical knowledge
is useless and fruitless.
§ 63. SCHISMS.
The Novatian and the Alexandrian Meletian Schisms (§ 41, 3, 4)
continued to rage down into our period. Then in consequence of the
Arian controversy there arose among the orthodox three new schisms
(§ 50, 8). Among them was a Roman schism, followed later by several
others that grew out of double elections (§ 46, 4, 6, 8, 11). The
most threatening of all the schisms of this period was the Donatist in
North Africa. On the Johannite schism in Constantinople, see § 51, 3.
Owing to various diversities in the development of doctrine (§ 50, 7),
constitution (§ 46), worship (§ 56 ff.), and discipline (§ 61, 1),
material was accumulating for the grand explosion that was to burst
up the connection of East and West (§ 67). The imperial union attempts
during the Monophysite controversy caused a thirty-five years’ schism
between the two halves of the Christian world (§ 52, 5), and want of
character in the Roman bishop Vigilius split off the West for half a
century (§ 52, 6). The split between the East and West over the union
with the Monothelite party (§ 52, 8) was soon indeed overcome. But
soon thereafter the second Trullan Council at Constantinople, A.D. 692,
which, as the continuation of the 5th and 6th œcumenical Councils
(σύνοδος πενθέκτη, _Concilium quinisextum_), occupied itself exclusively
with questions of constitution, worship, and discipline, which had
not there been discussed, gave occasion to the later incurable and
disastrous schism.
§ 63.1. =The Donatist Schism, A.D. 311-415.=--In North Africa,
where echoes of the Montanist enthusiasm were still heard, many
voluntarily and needlessly gave themselves up to martyrdom during
the Diocletian persecution. The sensible bishop of Carthage
Mensurius and his archdeacon Cæcilian [Cæcilius] opposed this
fanaticism. Both had given up heretical books instead of the
sacred books demanded of them. This was sufficient to make the
opposite party denounce them as _traditores_. Mensurius died
in A.D. 311, and his followers chose Cæcilian [Cæcilius] as
his successor, and had him hastily ordained by bishop Felix
of Aptunga, being sorely pressed by the machinations of the
other party. The opposition, with a bigoted rich widow Lucilla
at its head, denounced Felix as a traditor, and so treated his
ordination as invalid. It put up a rival bishop in the person of
the reader Majorinus, who soon got, in A.D. 313, a more powerful
successor in Donatus, called by his own followers the Great. The
schism spread from Carthage over all North Africa. The peasants,
sorely oppressed by exorbitant taxes and heavy villeinage,
took the side of the Donatists (_Pars Donati_). Constantine
the Great at the very first declared himself against them. When
they complained of this, the emperor convened for the purpose of
special investigation a clerical commission at Rome in A.D. 313,
under the presidency of the Roman bishop Melchiades, and then a
great Western Synod at Arles in A.D. 314. Both decided against
the Donatists. They appealed to the immediate decision of the
emperor, who also heard the two parties at Milan, but decided
in accordance with previous judgments in A.D. 316. Now followed
severe measures, taking churches from them and banishing
their bishops which powerfully excited and increased their
fanaticism. Constantine resorted therefore to milder and
more tolerant procedure, but in their fanatical zeal they
repudiated all compromises. Under Constans the matter became
still more formidable. Ascetics mad with enthusiasm, drawn from
the very dregs of the people, who called themselves _Milites
Christi_, _Agonistici_, swarmed as beggars through the country,
_Circumcelliones_, roused the oppressed peasants to revolt,
preached freedom and fraternity, forced masters to do the work
of slaves, robbed, murdered, and burned. Political revolution
was carried on under the cover of a religious movement. An
imperial army put down the revolt, and an attempt was made
in A.D. 348 to pacify the needy Donatists by imperial gold.
But Donatus flung back the money with indignation, and the
rebellion was renewed. A severe sentence was now passed upon
the heads of the party, and all Donatist churches were closed
or taken from them. Julian restored the churches and recalled
the exiled bishops. He allowed the Donatists with impunity to
take violent revenge upon the Catholics. Julian’s successor
however again issued strict laws against the sectaries, and
schisms arose among themselves. Toward the end of the 4th
century bishop Optatus of Mileve opposed them in his treatise
_De Schismate Donatistarum Ll. VII._ In A.D. 400 Augustine,
bishop of Hippo Regius, began his unwearied attacks upon this
sect. The mildest terms were offered to induce the Donatists to
return to the church. Many of the more moderate took advantage
of the opportunity; but this only made the others all the
more bitter. They refused repeated invitations to a discussion,
fearing Augustine’s masterly dialectic. Augustine, who at first
maintained that force should not be used in matters of faith, was
moved by the persistent stiffneckedness and senseless fanaticism
of his opponents to change his opinion, and to confess that
in order to restore such heretics to the church, to salvation,
recourse must be had to violent compulsion (_coge intrare_,
Lk. xiv. 23). A synod at Carthage in A.D. 405 called upon the
Emperor Honorius to take proceedings against this stiffnecked
sect. He did so by imposing fines, banishing their clergy,
and taking their churches. Augustine renewed the challenge to
a public disputation. The Donatists were at last compelled by
the emperor to enter the lists. Thus came about the three days’
_Collatio cum Donatistis_ of A.D. 411 at Carthage. There appeared
279 Donatist and 286 Catholic bishops. Petilian and Primian were
the chief speakers on the side of the Donatists, Augustine and
Aurelian of Carthage on the other. The imperial commissioner
assigned the victory to the Catholics. In vain the Donatists
appealed. In A.D. 414 the Emperor declared that they had
forfeited all civil rights, and in A.D. 415 he threatened
all who attended their meetings with death. The Vandals, who
conquered Africa in A.D. 429, persecuted Catholics and Donatists
alike, and a common need furthered their reconciliation and
secured a good mutual understanding.--The Donatists started from
the principle that no one who is excommunicated or deserves to
be excommunicated is fit for the performance of any sacramental
action. With the Novatians they demanded the absolute purity
of the church, but admitted that repentance was a means for
regaining church fellowship. They maintained that they were
the pure and the Catholics were schismatics, who had nothing
in common with Christ, whose administration of the sacraments
was therefore invalid and useless, so that they even rebaptized
those who had Catholic baptism. The partiality of the state for
their opponents and confused blending of the ideas of the visible
and invisible church led them to adopt the view that church
and state, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of the world, had
nothing in common with one another, and that the state should not
interfere in religious matters.
§ 63.2. =The _Concilium Quinisextum_, A.D. 692.=--This Council
claimed to be regarded as œcumenical and was recognised as such
even by Pope Sergius I. The Greeks had not yet got over their
vexation at the triumph which Rome had won at the last œcumenical
Council (§ 52, 8). It thus happened that among the multitude of
harmless decrees the following six were smuggled in which were
in flat contradiction to the Roman practice.
1. In enumerating the sources of the canon law alone valid
almost all the Latin Councils and Papal Decretals were
omitted, and the whole 85 _Canones Apostt._ (§ 43, 4)
included, whereas Rome had pronounced only the first
50 valid.
2. The Roman custom of enforcing celibacy on presbyters and
bishops is condemned as unjustifiable and inhuman (§ 45, 2).
3. Fasting on the Saturdays of the Quadragesima is forbidden
(§ 56, 4).
4. The 28th Canon of the Council of Chalcedon which makes the
patriarch of Constantinople equal to the bishop of Rome is
repeated and anew enforced (§ 46, 1, 7).
5. The Levitical prohibition against blood and things strangled
is sanctioned as still binding upon Christians, although it
had never been enforced by the Roman church.
6. Images of Christ in the shape of a lamb, which were very
common in the West, were forbidden. The papal legates
subscribed the decrees of the Council; but the Pope forbade
their publication in all the churches of the West. Compare
further § 46, 11.
VI. THE CHURCH OUTSIDE OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE.[185]
§ 64. MISSIONARY OPERATIONS IN THE EAST.
The real missionarizing church of this period was the Western
(§ 75 ff.). It was pre-eminently fitted for this by its practical
tendency and called to it by its intimate connection with the hordes
of the migrating peoples. Examples of organized missionary activity in
the East are rare. Yet other more occasional ways were opened for the
spread of Christianity outside of the empire, by Christian fugitives
and prisoners of war, political embassies and trade associations.
Anchorets, monks and stylites, too, who settled on the borders of
the empire or in deserts outside, by their extraordinary appearance
made a powerful impression on the surrounding savage tribes. These
streamed in in crowds, and those strange saints preached Christ to
them by word and work.
§ 64.1. =The Ethiopic-Abyssinian Church.=[186]--About A.D. 316
a certain Meropius of Tyre on a voyage of discovery to the
countries south of Egypt was murdered with his whole ship’s
company. Only his two nephews Frumentius and Aedesius were spared.
They won the favour of the Abyssinian king and became the tutors
of the heir apparent, Aizanas. Frumentius was subsequently, in
A.D. 438, ordained by Athanasius bishop of the country. Aizanas
was baptised, the church spread rapidly from Abyssinia to
Ethiopia and Numidia. A translation of the bible into the Geez
dialect, the language of the country, is attributed to Frumentius.
Closely connected with the Egyptian mother church, it fell with
it into Monophysitism (§ 52, 7). In worship and discipline,
besides much that is primitive, it has borrowed many things
from Judaism, and retained many of the old habits of the country,
_e.g._ observing the Sabbath alongside of the Sunday, forbidding
certain meats, circumcision, covenanting. Their canon comprised
81 books: besides the biblical, there are 16 patristic writings
of the Pre-Chalcedonian age.
§ 64.2. =The Persian Church.=--The church had taken root in
Persia as early as the 3rd century. With the 4th century there
came a sore time of bloody persecution, which was constantly fed
partly by the fanatical Magians, partly by the almost incessant
wars with the Christian Roman empire, which aroused suspicion of
foreign sympathies hostile to the country. The first great and
extensive persecution of the Christians broke out in A.D. 343
under Shapur or Sapores [Sapor] II. It lasted 35 years and during
this dreadful time 16,000 of the clergy, monks and nuns were
put to death, but the number of martyrs from the laity was far
beyond reckoning. Only shortly before his death Shapur [Sapor]
stopped the persecution and proclaimed universal religious
toleration. During 40 years’ rest the Persian church attained
to new vigour; but the fanaticism of Bishop Abdas of Susa who
caused a fire-temple to be torn down in A.D. 418, occasioned
a new persecution, which reached its height in A.D. 420 under
Bahram or Baranes V. and was carried on for 30 years with the
most fiendish ingenuity of cruel tortures. The generosity of a
Christian bishop, Acacius of Amida in Mesopotamia, who by the
sale of the church property redeemed a multitude of Persian
prisoners of war and sent them to their homes, at last moved
the king to stop the persecution. The Nestorians driven from the
Roman empire found among the Persians protection and toleration,
but were the occasion under king Firuz or Peroz of a new
persecution of the Catholics, A.D. 465. In A.D. 498 the whole
Persian church declared in favour of Nestorianism (§ 52, 3),
and enjoyed forthwith undisturbed toleration, developed to an
unexpected extent, retained its bloom for centuries, gave itself
zealously to scientific studies in the seminaries at Nisibis,
and undertook successfully mission work among the Asiatic tribes.
The war with the Byzantines continued without interruption.
Chosroes II. advanced victoriously as far as Chalcedon in
A.D. 616 and persecuted with renewed cruelty the Catholic
Christians of the conquered provinces. Finally the emperor
Heraclius plucked up courage. By the utter rout of A.D. 628
the power of the Persians was broken (§ 57, 5), and in A.D. 651
the Khalifs overthrew the dynasty of the Sassanidæ.
§ 64.3. =The Armenian Church.=--There were flourishing Christian
churches in Armenia so early as Tertullian’s time. The Arsacian
ruler Tiridates III., from A.D. 286, was a violent persecutor
of the Christians. During his reign, however, Gregory the
Illuminator, the Apostle of Armenia, carried on his successful
labours. He was the son of a Parthian prince, who, snatched
when a child of two years’ old by his nurse from the midst
of a massacre of his whole family, received in Cappadocia a
Christian training. In A.D. 302 he succeeded in winning over
to Christianity the king and the whole country. He left behind
him the church which he thus founded in a most prosperous
condition. His grandson Husig, his great grandson Nerses I.
and his son Isaac the Great held possession of the patriarchal
dignity and flourished even in the hard times, when Byzantines,
Arsacides, and Sassanidæ fought for possession of the country.
Mesrop, with the help of Isaac, whose successor he became in
A.D. 440 (dying in A.D. 441), gave to his church a translation
of the bible into their own tongue, for which he had to invent
a national alphabet. Under his successor, the patriarch Joseph,
the famous religious war with the Persian Sassanidæ broke
out, who wished to lead back the Armenians to the doctrine
of Zoroaster. In the fierce battle at the river Dechmud in
A.D. 451 the holy league was defeated. But Armenia still
maintained amid sore persecution its Christian confession.
In A.D. 651 the overthrow of the Sassanidæ brought it under
the rule of the Khalifs.--The Armenian church had vigorously
and earnestly warded off Nestorianism, but willingly opened
its arms to Monophysitism introduced from Byzantine Armenia.
At a synod at Feyin, in A.D. 527, it condemned the Chalcedonian
dogma.--Gregory the Illuminator had excited among the Armenians
an exceedingly lively interest in culture and science, and when
Mesrop gave them an independent system of writing, the golden age
of Armenian literature dawned (the 5th century). Not only were
many works of classical and patristic Greek and Syrian literature
made the property of the Armenians through translations, but
numerous writers built up a literature of their own. The history
of the conversion of Armenia was written in the 4th century
by Agathangelos, private secretary of the king. Whether this
was composed in Greek or in Armenian is doubtful; both texts
are still extant, evidently much interpolated with fabulous
matter and also in many points conflicting with one another.
In the 5th century Eznik in his “Overthrow of Heretics” addressed
a vigorous polemic against pagans, Persians, Marcionites and
Manichæans. Moses of Chorene, also a scholar of Mesrop, composed
from the archives a history of Armenia, and Elisaeus described
the Armeno-Persian religious war, in which, as secretary of the
Armenian commander in chief, he had taken part. On the service
done by the Mechitarists to the old Armenian literature, see
§ 164, 2.[187]
§ 64.4. =The Iberians=, in what is now called Georgia and Grusia,
received Christianity about A.D. 326 through an Armenian female
slave Nunia, whose prayer had healed many sick. The church then
extended from Iberia to the =Lazians= in what is now Colchias
and among the neighbouring =Abasgians=. In =India= Theophilus
of Diu (an island of the Arabian Gulf?) found in the middle
of the 4th century several isolated Christian communities. He
was sent by his fellow-citizens as hostage to Constantinople and
there was educated for the Arian priesthood. He then returned
home and carried on a successful mission among the Indians.
The relations of the Indian to the Persian church led to the
former becoming affected with Nestorianism (§ 52, 3). Cosmas
Indicopleustes (§ 48, 2) found in the 6th century three Christian
churches still surviving in India. Theophilus also wrought in
=Arabia=. He succeeded in converting the king of the Himyarite
kingdom at Yemen. In the 6th century, however, a Jew Dhu-Nowas
obtained for himself the sovereignty of Yemen and persecuted the
Christians with unheard of barbarity. At last Eleesban king of
Abyssinia interfered; the crowned Jew was slain, and from that
time Yemen had Christian kings till the Persian Chosroes II. made
it a Persian province in A.D. 616. Anchorets, monks and stylites
wrought successfully among the Arab nomadic hordes.
§ 65. THE COUNTER-MISSION OF THE MOHAMMEDANS.[188]
Abu Al’ Kasem Mohammed from Mecca made his appearance as a prophet in
A.D. 611, and founded a mixed religion of arid Monotheism and sensual
Endæmonism drawn from Judaism, Christianity and Arabian paganism.
His work first gained importance when driven from Mecca he fled to
Medina (Hejira, 15th July, A.D. 622). In A.D. 630 he conquered Mecca,
consecrated the old Heathen Kaaba as the chief temple of the new
religion, Islam (hence Moslems), and composed the Coran, consisting
of 114 suras, which had been collected by his father-in-law, Abu Bekr.
At his death all Arabia had accepted his faith and his rule. As he made
it the most sacred duty of his adherents to spread the new religion by
the sword and had inspired them with a wild fanaticism, his successors
snatched one province after another from the Roman empire and the
Christian church. Within a few years, A.D. 633-651, they conquered
all Syria, Palestine, Egypt and Persia, then, in A.D. 707, North Africa,
and, in A.D. 711, Spain. Farther, however, they could not go for the
present. Twice they unsuccessfully besieged Constantinople, A.D. 669-676,
and A.D. 717-718, and, in A.D. 732, Charles Martel at Tours completely
crushed all their hopes of extending further into the West. But the
whole Asiatic church was already reduced by their oppressions to the
most miserable condition, and three patriarchates, those of Alexandria,
Antioch and Jerusalem, were forced to submit to their caprices. Amid
manifold oppressions the Christians in those conquered lands were
tolerated on the payment of a tax, but fear and an eye to worldly
advantages led whole crowds of nominal Christians to profess Islam.
§ 65.1. =The Fundamental Principle of Islam= is an arid
Monotheism. Abraham, Moses and Jesus are regarded as God-sent
prophets. The miraculous birth of Jesus, by a virgin, is also
accepted, and Mary is identified with Miriam the sister of Moses.
The ascension of Christ is also received. Mohammed, the last and
highest of all the prophets, of whom Moses and Christ prophesied,
has restored to its original purity his doctrine, which had
been corrupted by Jews and Christians. At the end of the days
Christ will come again to conquer Antichrist and give universal
sovereignty to Islam. Most conspicuous among the corruptions
of the doctrine of Jesus is the dogma of the Trinity, which
is without more ado pronounced Tritheism, and conceived of as
including the mother of Jesus as the third person. So too the
incarnation of God is regarded as a falsification. The doctrine
of divine providence is strongly emphasized, but is contorted
into the grossest fatalism. The Mussulman is in need of no
atonement. Faith in the one God and His prophet Mohammed secure
for him the divine favour, and his good works win for him the
most abundant fulness of eternal blessedness, which consists in
absolutely unrestricted sensual enjoyments. The constitution is
theocratic; the prophet and his successors the Khalifs are God’s
vicegerents on earth. Worship is restricted to prayers, fastings
and washings. The Sunna or tradition of oral utterances of the
prophet is acknowledged as a second principal source for Islam,
alongside of the Coran. The opposition of the Shiites to the
Sunnites is rooted in the non-recognition of the first three
Khalifs and the prophet’s utterances only witnessed to by them.
Mysticism was first fostered among the Ssufis. The Wechabites,
who first appear in the 12th century, are the Puritans of Islam.
§ 65.2. =The Providential Place of Islam.=--The service under
Providence rendered by Mohammedanism which first attracts
attention is the doom which it executed upon the debased church
and state of the East. But it seems also to have had a positive
task which must be sought mainly in its relation to heathenism.
It regarded the abolition of idolatry as its principal task.
Neither the prophet nor his successors gave any toleration to
paganism. Islam converted a mass of savage races in Asia and
Africa from the most senseless and immoral idolatries to the
worship of the one God, and raised them to a certain stage of
culture and morality to which they could never have risen of
themselves. But also upon yet another side, though only in a
passing way, it has served a providential purpose, in spurring
on mediæval Christianity by its example of devotion to scientific
pursuits. Syncretic, as its religious and intellectual life
originally was, during its flourishing period from A.D. 750,
under the brilliant dynasty of the Abassidean Khalifs at Bagdad
in Asia, and from A.D. 756 (comp. § 81) under the no less
brilliant dynasty of the Ommaiadean Khalifs at Cordova in Spain,
driven out by the Abassidæ from Damascus, it readily appropriated
the elements of culture which the classical literature of
the ancient Greeks afforded it (§ 42, 4), and with youthful
enthusiasm its scholars for centuries on this foundation kept
alive and advanced scientific studies--philosophy, astronomy,
mathematics, natural science, medicine, geography, history--and
by their appropriation of those researches the Latin Middle Ages
reached to the height of their scientific culture (§ 103, 1).
But also the reawakening of classical studies in the Byzantine
Middle Ages (§ 68, 1), which is of still more importance for the
West (§ 120, 1), is preeminently due to the impetus given by the
scientific enthusiasm of the Moslems of Bagdad, who shamed the
Greeks into the study of their own literature. With the overthrow
of those two dynasties, the culture period of the Moslems closed
suddenly and for ever, but not until it had accomplished its task
for the Christian world.[189]
THIRD SECTION.
HISTORY OF THE GRÆCO-BYZANTINE CHURCH
IN THE 8TH-15TH CENTURIES
(A.D. 692-1453).
I. Developments of the Greek Church in Combination
with the Western.
§ 66. ICONOCLASM OF THE BYZANTINE CHURCH (A.D. 726-842).[190]
The worship of images (§ 57, 4) had reached its climax in the East
in the beginning of the 8th century. Even the most zealous defenders
of images had to admit that there had been exaggerations and abuses.
Some, _e.g._, had taken images as their godfathers, scraped paint off
them to mix in the communion wine, laid the consecrated bread first
on the images so as to receive the body of the Lord from their hands,
etc. A powerful Byzantine ruler, who was opposed to image worship from
personal dislike as well as on political grounds, applied the whole
strength of his energetic will to the uprooting of this superstition.
Thus arose a struggle that lasted more than a hundred years between
the enemies of images (εἰκονοκλάσται) and the friends of images
(εἰκονολάτραι), in which there stood, on the one side, the emperor
and the army, on the other, the monks and the people. Twice it seemed
as if image worship had been completely and for ever stamped out;
but on both occasions a royal lady secured its restoration. In practice
indeed the Roman church remained behind the Greek, but in theory
they were agreed, and in the struggle it gave the whole weight of
its authority to the friends of images. On the part taken by the
Frankish church, see § 92, 1.
§ 66.1. =Leo III., the Isaurian, A.D. 717-741.=--Leo, who was
one of the most powerful of the Byzantine emperors, after the
attack of the Saracens on Constantinople, in A.D. 718, had
been successfully repelled, felt himself obliged to take other
measures against the aggressions of Islam. In the worship of
images abhorred by Jews and Moslems he perceived the greatest
obstacle to their conversion, and, being personally averse to
image worship, he issued an edict, in A.D. 726, which first
ordered the images to be placed higher in the churches that
it might be impossible for the people to kiss them. But the
peaceable overcoming of this deeply rooted form of devotion
was frustrated by the unconquerable firmness of the ninety-year
old patriarch Germanus in Constantinople, as well as by the
opposition of the people and the monks. The greatest dogmatist
of this age, Joh. Damascenus, who was secured from the rage
of the emperor in Palestine under Saracen rule, issued three
spirited tracts in defence of the images. A certain Cosmas
took advantage of a popular rising in the Cyclades, had himself
proclaimed emperor and went with a fleet against Constantinople.
But Leo conquered and had him executed, and now in a second edict
of A.D. 730 ordered all images to be removed from the churches.
Now began a war against images by military force, which went
to great excess in fanatical violence. Repeated popular tumults
were quelled in blood. Only in Rome and North Italy did the
powerful arm of the emperor make no impression. Pope Gregory II.,
A.D. 715-731, treated him in his letters like a stupid,
ill-mannered school-boy. In proportion as the bitterness
against the emperor increased enthusiasm for the pope increased,
and gave expression to itself in the most vehement revolts
against the imperial Council. A great part of the exarchate
(§ 46, 9) surrendered voluntarily to the Longobards and so
much of it in the north as remained with the emperor proved
more obedient to the pope than to the sovereign. Gregory III.,
A.D. 731-741, at a Synod in Rome in A.D. 731 excommunicated
all enemies of images. The emperor fitted out a powerful fleet
to chastise him, but a storm broke it up. He now deprived the
pope of all his revenues from Southern Italy, severed Illyria
(§ 46, 5) in A.D. 732 from the papal chair and gave it to the
patriarch of Constantinople, but in doing so he cut the last
cord that bound the Roman chair to the interests of the Byzantine
Court (§ 82, 1).
§ 66.2. =Constantine V. A.D. 741-775.=--To the son and successor
of Leo the monks gave the unsavoury names of Copronymus and
Caballinus in token of their hatred, the latter on account
of his love of horses, the former because it was said that
at his baptism he had defiled the water. He was like his father
a powerful ruler and soldier, and in the battle against images
yet more reckless and determined. He conquered his brother-in-law
who had rebelled with the aid of the friends of the images, and
caused him to be cruelly treated and blinded. As popular tumults
still continued, he thought to get ecclesiastical sanction
for his principles from an œcumenical Council. About 350 bishops
assembled in Constantinople, A.D. 754. But, as the chair of
Constantinople had just become vacant, while Rome, which had
excommunicated the enemies of images, refused to answer the
summons, and Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem were under Saracen
rule, there was not a single patriarch present at the Synod.
The Council excommunicated all who made images of Christ, for
it declared that the Supper was the only true image of Christ,
and condemned every kind of veneration of images. These decrees
were now relentlessly carried out with savage violence. Thousands
of monks were scourged, imprisoned, banished, chased through
the circus with nuns in their arms for the sport of the people,
or forced into marriage, many had their eyes gouged out, or had
their nose or ears cut off, and the monasteries were turned into
barracks or stables. Even in private houses no image of a saint
was any longer to be seen. From Rome Stephen II. protested
against the decisions of the Council, and Stephen III. from
a Lateran Synod of A.D. 769 thundered a fearful anathema against
the enemies of images. But in the Byzantine empire monkery and
image worship were well nigh extinguished.
§ 66.3. =Leo IV., Chazarus, A.D. 775-780.=--The son of
Constantine was of the same mind with his father, but wanted
his energy. His wife =Irene= was an eager friend of the images.
When the emperor discovered this, he began to take active
measures, but his suspiciously sudden death put a stop to
operations. Irene now used the freedom which the minority
of her son Constantine VI. afforded her for the introduction
of image worship. She called a new Council at Constantinople
in A.D. 786, which also Hadrian I. of Rome attended, while the
other patriarchs, being under Saracen rule, took no part in it.
But the imperial guard attacked the place where they were sitting,
and broke up the Council. Irene now arranged for the =Seventh
Œcumenical Council at Nicæa, A.D. 787=. The eighth and last
session was held in the imperial palace at Constantinople, after
the guards had been withdrawn from the city and disarmed. The
Council annulled the decisions of A.D. 754, and sanctioned image
worship for it allowed the bowing and prostration before the
images (τιμητικὴ προσκύνησις) as a token of the reverence
which was due to the original, and declared that this in no
way interfered with that worship (λατρεία) which was due to
God alone.[191]
§ 66.4. The next emperors were friendly to image worship, but
the victory had departed from their standards. Then the army,
which had always been hostile to images, proclaimed =Leo V.,
the Armenian, A.D. 813-820=, emperor, an avowed opponent of
images. He proceeded very cautiously, but the soldiers set aside
his prudence and launched out into violent raids against images.
At the head of the patrons of images was Theodorus Studita, abbot
of the monastery of Studion (§ 44, 2), a man of unfeigned piety
and unfaltering decision of character, the most acute apologist
of image worship, who had even in exile been eagerly promoting
the interests of his party. He died in A.D. 826. Leo lost his
life at the hand of conspirators. His successor, =Michael II.,
Balbus, A.D. 820-829=, allowed at least that images should be
reverenced in private. His son =Theophilus, A.D. 829-842=, on
the other hand, made it the business of his life to root out
entirely every trace of image worship. But his wife =Theodora=,
who after his death conducted the government as regent, had it
formally reintroduced by a Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 842.
Since then all opposition to it has ceased in the Greek church,
and the day of the Synodal decision, 19th February, was appointed
a standing festival of orthodoxy.
§ 67. DIVISION BETWEEN GREEK AND ROMAN CHURCHES AND
ATTEMPTS AT UNION, A.D. 857-1453.[192]
The second Trullan Council in A.D. 692 had given the first occasion
to the great schism which rent the Christian world into two halves
(§ 63, 2); Photius gave it a doctrinal basis in A.D. 867; and Michael
Cærularius in A.D. 1053 completed its development. The increasing
need of the Byzantine government drove it to make repeated attempts
at reconciliation, but these either were never concluded or the union,
if at all completed, proved a mere paper union. The Sisyphus labour of
union efforts ended only with the overthrow of the Byzantine empire in
A.D. 1453. The three stages referred to--the early misunderstandings,
the avowed doctrinal divergence, and the final decisive separation--as
well as the persistent rejection of attempts at reunion, were not
wholly owing to the importance of ceremonial differences. After as
well as before there had been free church communion between them.
It was not owing to the importance of the almost solitary point of
doctrinal difference between them, in reference to the _filioque_
(§ 50, 7), where if there had been good will a common understanding
might easily have been won. It was really the papal claims to the
primacy to which the Greeks absolutely refused to submit.
§ 67.1. =Foundation of the Schism, A.D. 867.=--During the
minority of the emperor Michael III., son of Theodora (§ 66, 4),
surnamed the Drunkard, his uncle Bardas, Theodora’s brother,
directed the government. Ignatius, patriarch of Constantinople
at that time, himself descended from the imperial family, lashed
severely the godless, vicious life of the court, and in A.D. 857
kept back from the communion the all-powerful Bardas, who lived
in incestuous intercourse with his own daughter-in-law. He was
then deposed and banished. =Photius=, the most learned man of his
age, previously commander of the imperial bodyguard, was raised
to the vacant chair, and inherited the hatred of all the friends
of Ignatius. He made proposals of agreement which were proudly
and scornfully rejected. He then held a Synod in A.D. 859, which
confirmed the deposition of Ignatius and excommunicated him. But
nothing in the world could make his party abandon his claims. Now
Photius wished to be able to lay in the scales the Roman bishop’s
approval of his questionable proceedings. He therefore laid
an account of matters highly favourable to himself before Pope
=Nicholas I.=, and sought his brotherly love and intercessions.
The pope answered that he must first examine the whole affair.
His two legates, Rhodoald of Porto and Zacharias of Anagni, were
bribed and at a Council at Constantinople in A.D. 861 gave their
consent to the deposition of Ignatius. Nicholas, however, had
other reporters. He excommunicated his own legates and pronounced
Ignatius the lawful patriarch. Bitterness of feeling reached its
height in Constantinople, when soon thereafter the Bulgarians
broke their connection with the Byzantine mother church and
submitted to the pope (§ 73, 3). Photius now by an Encyclica
of A.D. 866 called the patriarchs of the East to a Council
at Constantinople, and charged the Roman church with the most
extreme heresies; that it enjoined fasting on Saturday (§ 56, 1),
allowed milk, butter and cheese to be eaten during the first
week of the Quadragesima (§ 56, 7), did not acknowledge married
priests (§ 45, 2), did not prohibit the clergy from shaving the
beard (§ 45, 1), pronounced anointing by a presbyter invalid
(§ 35, 4), but above all, that by the addition of the _filioque_
(§ 50, 7) it had falsified the creed, recognising thus two
principles and so falling back into dualism. With such heresies
too the pope had now infected the Bulgarians. The meeting of the
Council took place in A.D. 867. Three monks, tutored by Photius,
represented the patriarchs under Saracen rule. Excommunication
and deposition were hurled against the pope, and this sentence
was communicated to the Western churches. The pope was evidently
alarmed. He justified himself before the Frankish clergy and
insisted that they should answer the charges of the Greeks
in a scholarly reply. This was done by several, most ably by
Ratramnus, monk at Corbie. But during that year, A.D. 867, the
emperor Michael was murdered. His murderer and successor Basil
the Macedonian undertook the patronage of the party of Ignatius,
and asked of Pope Hadrian II. a new investigation and decision.
A =Synod at Constantinople, A.D. 869=, counted by the Latins
the 8th œcumenical, condemned Photius and restored Ignatius.
The deciding about the Bulgarians, however, was not committed
to the Council but to the reputed representatives of the Saracen
patriarchs as impartial umpires. They naturally decided in favour
of the Byzantine patriarch. In vain the legates remonstrated.
Photius in other respects under misfortune displays a character
worthy of our esteem. For several years he languished without
company, without books, under the strictest monastic rules.
Yet he reconciled himself to Ignatius. Basil entrusted him with
the education of his children, and on the death of Ignatius in
A.D. 878, restored him to the patriarchate. But still the ban of
an œcumenical Council lay upon him. Only a new œcumenical Council
could vindicate him. John VIII. agreed to this against the
remonstrances of the Bulgarians. But at the ninth =Council
at Constantinople, A.D. 879=, the eighth according to the Greeks,
the papal legates were completely duped. There was no mention of
the Bulgarians, the Council of A.D. 869 was repudiated, and every
one excommunicated who dared add anything to the creed. The pope
afterwards indeed launched an anathema against the patriarch,
his Council, and his followers. The succeeding emperor, Leo the
Philosopher, A.D. 886-911, again deposed Photius in A.D. 886, but
only that he might put an imperial prince in his place. Photius
died in monastic exile in A.D. 891.
§ 67.2. =Leo VI., the Philosopher, A.D. 886-911.=--This emperor
was three times married without having any children. He married
the fourth only when he had assured himself that she would not
be barren. The patriarch Nicolaus [Nicolas] Mysticus refused
(§ 61, 2) to celebrate the marriage and was deposed. A Synod
at Constantinople in A.D. 906, attended by the legates of Pope
Sergius III., approved the marriage and the deposition. But
on his deathbed Leo repented of his violence. His brother and
successor Alexander restored the patriarch Nicolas, and Pope
John X. attended a Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 920, which
condemned the Council of A.D. 906, and pronounced a fourth
marriage absolutely unallowable, but showed no inclination to
make any concessions to the pope. New negociations were begun
by the emperor =Basil II.= In consideration of a large sum of
money the venal pope John XIX. was willing to acknowledge the
Byzantines as œcumenical patriarchs of the East, and to resign
all claims of the chair of Peter upon the Eastern church. But the
affair became known before it was concluded. The removal of the
new Judas was loudly demanded throughout the West, and the pope
was compelled to break off his negociations.
§ 67.3. =Completion of the Schism, A.D. 1054.=-Though so many
anathemas had been flung at Rome by Byzantium and at Byzantium
by Rome, they had hitherto been directed only against the persons
and their followers, not against the respective churches as
such. This defect was now to be supplied. The emperor Constantine
Monómachus sought the papal friendship which he thought necessary
to the success of his warlike undertakings. But the patriarch
=Michael Cærularius= frustrated his efforts. In company with the
Metropolitan of the Bulgarians, Leo of Achrida, he addressed in
A.D. 1053 an epistle to bishop John of Trani in Apulia, in which
he charged the Latins with the worst heresies, and adjured the
Western bishops to separate from them. To the heresies already
enumerated by Photius, he added certain others; the use of blood
and things strangled, the withdrawal of the Hallelujah during
the fast season, and above all the use of unleavened bread in
the Supper (§ 58, 4), on account of which he invented for the
heretics the name of Azymites. This letter fell into the hands
of Cardinal =Humbert=, who translated it and laid it before pope
Leo IX. A violent correspondence followed. The emperor offered
to do anything to restore peace. At his request the pope sent
three legates to Constantinople, among them the occasion of the
strife, Humbert (§ 101, 2), and Cardinal Frederick of Lothringen,
afterwards pope Stephen IX. (§ 96, 6). These fanned the flame,
instead of quenching it. Imperial pressure indeed brought the
abbot of Studion, Nicetas Pectoratus to burn his controversial
treatise before the legates, but no threat nor violence could
move to submission the patriarchs, on whose side were the people
and the clergy. The legates finally laid a formal decree of
excommunication on the altar of the church of Sophia, which
Michael together with the other Eastern patriarchs solemnly
returned, A.D. 1054.
§ 67.4. =Attempts at Reunion.=--The crusades increased the breach
instead of healing it. Many negociations were begun but none of
them came to much. At a Synod at Bari in Naples, in A.D. 1098,
Anselm of Canterbury (§ 101, 1), who then lived as a fugitive
in Italy, proved to the Greeks there present the correctness
of the Latin doctrine of the Procession of the Holy Spirit.
In A.D. 1113, Petrus [Peter] Chrysologus, Archbishop of Milan,
vindicated it in a complete discourse before the emperor at
Constantinople. And in A.D. 1135, Anselm of Havelberg, who
went to Constantinople as ambassador for Lothair II., disputed
with the Archbishop Nicetas of Nicomedia, and afterwards at the
command of the pope wrote down the disputation with creditable
faithfulness. The hatred and abhorrence of the Greeks reached
its climax on the erection of the Latin empire at Constantinople,
A.D. 1204-1261 (comp. § 94, 4). Nevertheless =Michael Palæologus,
A.D. 1260-1282=, who brought this dynasty to an end, strove
on political grounds in every way possible to overcome this
ecclesiastical schism. The patriarch Joseph of Constantinople
and his librarian, the celebrated =Joannes Beccus=, stubbornly
withstood him. The latter indeed in imprisonment became convinced
that the differences were unessential and that a union was
possible. This change of mind secured for him the patriarch’s
chair. Meanwhile the negotiations of the emperor with the pope,
Gregory X., in which he acknowledged the Roman chair to be the
highest court of appeal in doctrinal controversies, were brought
to a point in the œcumenical =Council at Lyons, A.D. 1274=,
reckoned by the Latins the fourteenth. The imperial legates here
acknowledged the primacy of the pope and subscribed a Roman creed,
while to them was granted liberty to use their creed without the
addition and to practise their peculiar ecclesiastical customs.
Beccus vindicated this union in several treatises. But a change
of dynasty overthrew him in A.D. 1283. Joseph was restored and
the union of Lyons was broken up leaving no trace behind.
§ 67.5. The advance of the Turks made it absolutely necessary
for the East Roman emperors to secure the support of the West
by reconciling and uniting themselves with the papacy. But the
powerful party of the monks, supported by popular prejudice
against the proposal, thwarted the imperial wishes on all sides.
The patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch and Jerusalem too were
zealous opponents, not only animated by the old bitterness toward
their more prosperous rivals on the chair of Peter, but also
influenced against the views of the emperor by the policy of
their Saracen rulers. The emperor =Andronicus III. Palæologus=
won to his side the abbot =Barlaam= of Constantinople, hitherto,
though born in Calabria and there educated in the Roman Catholic
faith, a zealous opponent of the Western doctrine. Barlaam went
at the head of an imperial embassy to Avignon where the pope
at that time, Benedict XIII., resided, A.D. 1339. Negotiations,
however, broke down through the obstinacy of the pope, who
demanded of the Greeks above all unconditional submission in
doctrine and constitution, and also showed not once any wish
for renewing the conference.--On Barlaam, comp. § 69, 2.--The
political difficulties of the emperor, however, continually
increased, and so =Joannes V. Palæologus= took further steps.
He himself in A.D. 1369 in Rome passed over to the Latin church,
but neither did he get his people to follow him, nor did pope
Urban V. get the Western princes to give help against the Turks.
§ 67.6. The union attempts of =Joannes VII. Palæologus= had more
appearance of success. The emperor had won over the patriarch
Joseph of Constantinople, as well as the clever and highly
cultured archbishop =Bessarion= of Nicæa, and went personally
in company with the latter and many bishops, in A.D. 1438,
to the papal Council at =Ferrara= (§ 110, 8), where the pope,
Eugenius IV., fearing lest the Greeks might join the reformatory
Council at Basel, showed himself very gracious. The Council,
nominally on account of the outbreak of a plague at Ferrara
was transferred to =Florence=, and here the union was actually
consummated in A.D. 1439. The primacy of the pope was acknowledged,
though not altogether without dubiety of expression, the ritual
differences as well as the priestly marriages of the Greeks
tolerated, the doctrinal difference reduced to a misunderstanding
and the orthodoxy of both churches maintained. In the Latin text
of the decree referred to the pope was acknowledged as “Successor
of Peter, the chief of the Apostles, and the vicar of Christ,”
as “head of the whole Church, and father and teacher of all
Christians, to whom plenary power was given by our Lord Jesus
Christ to feed, rule, and govern the universal Church”--yet
with the significant addition “in such a way as it is set forth
in the œcumenical Councils and in the sacred Canons,” by which
certainly the Greeks thought only of the Canons of Nicæa and
Chalcedon referred to in § 46, 1, but the Latins mainly of the
Pseudo-Decretals of § 87, 2; and thus it happens that in most
of the Greek texts the propositions that define the universal
primacy of the pope are either wanting, or essentially modified.
The first place after the pope is given to the patriarch of
Constantinople. In regard to the doctrine of the Procession
of the Holy Spirit it was admitted that the Greek formula “_ex
Patre per Filium_” was essentially the same as the Latin “_ex
Patre Filioque_,” and by the definition “_quod Sp. S. ex P. simul
et F. et ex utroque æternaliter tanquam ab uno principio et unica
spiratione procedit_,” the latter was saved from the charge of
dualism. A new difference, however, came to light in reference
to Purgatory (§ 61, 4). The intercessions of the living and the
presenting of masses for the dead were allowed by the Greeks as
helping to secure the forgiveness of their still unatoned for
venial sins, but they decidedly opposed the view that any of the
dead could obtain this by his own temporary endurance of penal
sufferings, and they would not hear of a fire as a means for its
attainment. The Latins also taught that the unbaptized or those
dying in mortal sin immediately pass into eternal condemnation
and the perfectly pious immediately pass into God’s presence;
while the Greeks maintained that this happens only at the last
judgment. After long disputes, the Greeks, urged by their emperor,
at last gave in on both points. Without much difficulty they
accepted the seven sacraments of the Westerns (§ 104, 2). Thus
was the union consummated amid embracings and jubilant shoutings.
But in reality everything remained as of old. A powerful party at
whose head stood archbishop Marcus Eugenicus of Ephesus, who had
been shouted down at Florence, roused the whole East against the
union that had been made on paper. The new patriarch Metrophanes,
whom they repudiated, was ridiculed as Μητροφόνος, and in
A.D. 1443 the rest of the Eastern patriarchs at a Synod at
Jerusalem excommunicated all who maintained the union. When
moreover the hoped for help from the West did not come even
the union party lost their interest in it. Bessarion passed
over to the Roman church, became cardinal and bishop of Tuscoli,
and was as such on two occasions very near being made pope.[193]
§ 67.7. The Byzantine Christian empire went meanwhile rapidly
to decay. On the 29th May, 1453, Constantinople was stormed by
Mohammed II. The last emperor, Constantine XI., fell in a heroic
struggle against tremendous odds. Mohammed conferred upon the
patriarch Gennadius (§ 68, 5) the spiritual primacy and even
temporal supremacy and full jurisdiction over the whole orthodox
inhabitants of the empire, making him, however, answerable for
their conduct. The other two patriarchates of Jerusalem and
Antioch were in religious matters co-ordinate, in political
matters subordinate, to him. For the executing of his spiritual
power he had around him a Synod of twelve archbishops, of whom
four as holders of the four divisions of the patriarchal diocese
resided in Constantinople. The Synod chose the patriarchs and
the Sultan confirmed the elections.--All union negociations were
now at an end, for the Porte could only wish for the continuance
of the schism. The enormous crowds of Greek refugees who sought
protection in foreign lands, especially in Italy, Hungary,
Galicia, Poland, Lithuania, either went directly over to the
Roman Catholic church, or formed churches of their own under
the name of United Greeks, purchasing liberty to observe their
old church constitution and liturgy by accepting the Romish
doctrine and the papal primacy.
II. Developments in the Eastern Church without the
Co-operation of the Western.
§ 68. THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE AND LITERATURE.
The iconoclastic struggle, A.D. 726-842, was to some extent a war
against art and science. At least no period in the history of the Greek
Middle Ages is so poor in these as this. But about the middle of the
9th century Byzantine culture awoke from its deep torpor to a vigour
of which no one would have thought it capable. What is still more
wonderful, for six hundred years it maintained its position without
a break at this elevation and prosecuted literary and scientific
studies with a zeal that seemed to be quickened as its political
condition became more and more desperate. What specially characterized
the scholarly efforts of this time was the revival of classical studies
which from the 6th century had been almost entirely neglected. Now all
at once the decaying Greeks, who were threatened with intellectual as
well as political bankruptcy, began to realize the rich heritage which
their pagan forefathers had bequeathed them. They searched out these
treasures amid the dust of libraries and applied to them a diligence,
an enthusiasm, a pride, which fills us with astonishment. The Hellenic
intellect had, indeed, long lost its genial creative power. The most
ambitious effort of this age did not go beyond explanatory reproduction
and scholarship. Upon theology, however, bound hard and fast in
traditional propositions and Aristotelian formulæ, the revival of
classical studies had relatively little influence, and where it did
break the fetters it only gave entrance to a deluge of heathen Hellenic
views that paganized Christianity.
§ 68.1. The shame caused by the zeal with which the Khalifs
of the Abassidean line at the end of the 8th century applied
themselves to the classical Greek literature seems to have given
the first impulse to the =Revival of Classical Studies=. Behind
this we must suppose there was the influence of the Byzantine
rulers, unless they had lost all trace of national feeling.
Bardas, the guardian and co-regent of Michael III. (§ 67, 1),
if there is nothing else in him worthy of praise, has the credit
of having been the first to lay anew the foundation of classical
studies by establishing schools and paying their teachers. Basil
the Macedonian, although himself no scholar, patronized and
protected the sciences. Photius was the teacher of his children,
and implanted in them a love of study which they transmitted to
their children and children’s children. Leo, the Philosopher, the
son, and Constantine Porphyrogenneta, the grandson, of Basil were
the brilliant scholars in the Macedonian dynasty. Their place was
taken by the line of the Comneni from A.D. 1057, which introduced
a most brilliant period in the history of scientific studies.
The princesses of this house, Eudocia and Anna Comnena, won high
fame as gifted and learned authors. What Photius was for the
age of the Macedonians, Psellus was for the age of the Comneni.
Thessalonica vied with Constantinople as a new Athens in
the brilliancy of its classical culture. The rudeness of
the crusaders threatened during the sixty years’ interregnum
of the Latin dynasty, to undo the work of the Comneni. But
when in A.D. 1261 the Palæologi again obtained possession of
Constantinople, learning rose once more to the front and won
an ever increasing significance. And when the Turks took it in
A.D. 1453 crowds of learned Greeks settled in Italy and spread
their carefully fostered culture all over the West.
§ 68.2. =Aristotle and Plato.=--The revival of classical studies
secured again a preference for Plato, who seemed more classical,
at least more Hellenic, than Aristotle. But the ecclesiastical
imprimatur that had been given to Aristotle, which had been
formally expressed by Joh. Damascenus, formed a barrier against
the overflowing of Platonism into the theological domain. The
church’s distrust of Plato, on the other hand, drove many of
the more enthusiastic friends of classical studies into a sort
of Hellenic paganism. The eagerness of the struggle reached its
height in the 15th century. Gemisthus Pletho moved heaven and
earth to drive the hated usurper Aristotle from the throne of
science. He called for unconditional surrender to the wisdom of
the divine Plato and expressed the confident hope that soon the
time would come when Christianity and Islam would be conquered
and the religion of pure humanity would have universal sway.
Of similar views were his numerous scholars, of whom the most
distinguished was Bessarion (§ 67, 6). But Aristotle also
had talented representatives in George of Trebizond and his
scholars. Numerous representatives of the two schools settled
in Italy and there carried on the conflict with increasing
bitterness.--Continuation § 120, 1.
§ 68.3. =Scholasticism and Mysticism= (μάθησις and
μυσταγωγία).--By the application of the Aristotelian
method which Joh. Philoponus (§ 47, 11) had suggested, and
Joh. Damascenus had carried out, the scientific treatment of
doctrine in the Greek church had taken a form which in many
respects resembles the scholasticism of the Latin Middle Ages,
without being able, however, to reach its wealth, power, subtlety
and depth. But alongside of the dialectic scholastic treatment
of dogma there was found, especially in the quiet life of the
monasteries, diligent fostering of the mysticism based upon
the pseudo-Areopagite (§ 47, 11). Its chief representative
was Nicolas Cabasilas. This mysticism never ran counter to
the worship or doctrine of the church, but rather rendered to
it unconditional acknowledgment, and was specially characterized
by its decided preference for the symbolical, to which it is
careful to attach a thoroughly sacramental significance. No
reason existed for any hostile encounters between dialectic
and mysticism.
§ 68.4. =The Branches of Theological Science.=--About the
beginning of our period Joh. Damascenus collected the results
of previous =Dogmatic= labours in the Greek church by the use
of the dialectic forms of Aristotle into an organic system. His
Ecdosis is the first and last complete dogmatic of the old Greek
church. The manifold intercourse with the Latin church occasioned
by the union efforts was not, however, without influence on
the Greek church. In spite of the keenest opposition on debated
questions, the far more thoroughly developed statement by Latin
scholasticism of doctrines in regard to which both were agreed
communicated itself to the Greek church, so that all unwittingly
it adopted on many points the same bases and tendencies of
belief. =Polemics= were constantly carried on with Nestorians,
Monophysites and Monothelites, and fresh subjects of debate were
found in the iconoclastic disputes, newly emerging dualistic
sects, the Latin schismatics and the defenders of the union. By
the changed circumstances of the time =Apologetics= again came
to the front as a theological necessity. The incessant advance
of Islam and the Jewish polemic, which was now gaining boldness
from the protection of the Saracens, urgently demanded the
work of the Apologist, but the dominant scholastic traditional
theology of the Greeks in its hardness and narrowness was little
fitted to avert the storm of God’s judgment. Finally, too, the
revival of classical studies and the introduction of pagan modes
of thought were followed by a renewal of anti-pagan Apologetics
(Nicolas of Methone). In =Exegesis= there was no independent
original work. Valuable catenas were compiled by Œcumenius,
Theophylact and Euthymius Zigabenus. =Church History= lay
completely fallow. Only Nicephorus Callisti in the 14th century
gave any attention to it (§ 5, 1). Incomparably more important
for the church history of those times are the numerous _Scriptores
hist. Byzantinæ_. As a writer of legends Simeon Metaphrastes in
the 10th century (?) gained a high reputation.
§ 68.5. The most distinguished theologian of the 8th century
was =Joannes Damascenus=. He was long in the civil service of
the Saracens, and died about A.D. 760 as monk in the monastery
of Sabas in Jerusalem. His admirers called him _Chrysorrhoas_;
the opponents of image worship who pronounced a thrice repeated
anathema upon him at the Council of Constantinople in A.D. 754,
called him Mansur. His chief work, which ranks in the Greek
church as an epoch-making production, is the Πηγὴ γνώσεως. Its
first part, Κεφάλαια φιλοσοφικά, forms the dialectic, the second
part, Περὶ αἱρέσεων, the historical, introduction to the third or
chief part: Ἔκδοσις ἀκριβὴς τῆς ὀρθοδόξου πίστεως, a systematic
collection of the doctrines of faith according to the Councils,
and the teachings of the ancient Fathers, especially of the three
Cappadocians. His Ἱερὰ παράλληλα contain a collection of _loci
classici_ from patristic writings on dogmatic and moral subjects
arranged in alphabetical order. He wrote besides controversial
tracts against Christological heretics, the Paulicians,
the opponents of image worship, etc., and composed several
hymns for church worship.[194]--Among the numerous writings
of =Photius=, who died in A.D. 891, undoubtedly the most
important is his Bibliotheca, Μυριοβίβλιον. It gives reports
about and extracts from 279 Christian and pagan works, which
have since in great part been lost. In addition to controversial
treatises against the Latins and against the Paulicians,
there are still extant his Ἀμφιλόχια, answers to more than
300 questions laid before him by bishop Amphilochius, and his
Nomo-canon (§ 43, 3) which is still the basis of Greek canon
law, and was, about A.D. 1180, commented on by the deacon of
Constantinople, Theodore Balsamon in his Ἐξήγησις τῶν ἱερῶν καὶ
θείων κανόνων.--The brilliant period of the Comnenian dynasty
was headed by =Michael Psellus=, teacher of philosophy at
Constantinople, a man of wide culture and possessed of an
astonishingly extensive store of information which was evinced
by numerous works on a variety of subjects, so that he was
designated φιλοσόφων ὕπατος. He died in A.D. 1105. Among his
theological writings the most important is Περὶ ἐνεργείας
δαιμόνων (comp. § 71, 3). As this work is of the utmost
importance for the demonology of the Middle Ages, so the
Διδασκαλία παντοδαπή, a compendium of universal science on
the basis of theology, is for the encyclopædic knowledge of that
period. His contemporary =Theophylact=, archbishop of Achrida,
in Bulgaria, left behind him an important commentary in the form
of a catena. Euthymius Zigabenus, monk at Constantinople, in the
beginning of the 12th century, composed, by order of the emperor
Alexius Comnenus, in reply to the heretics, a Πανοπλία δογματικὴ
τῆς ὀρθοδόξου πίστεως ἤτοι ὁπλοθήκη δογμάτων in 24 bks.,
which gained for him great repute in his times. It is a mere
compilation, and only where he combats the sects of his own
age is it of any importance. His exegetical compilations are of
greater value. The most important personality of the 12th century
was =Eustathius=, archbishop of Thessalonica. As commentator on
Homer and Pindar he has been long highly valued by philologists;
but from the publication of his theological _Opuscula_ it appears
that he is worthy of higher fame as a Christian, a theologian, a
church leader and reformer of the debased monasticism of his age
(§ 70, 4). His friend and pupil, =Michael Acominatus= of Chonæ,
archbishop of Athens, treated with equal enthusiasm of the church
and his fatherland, of Christian faith and Greek philosophy, of
patristic and classical literature, and in a beautiful panegyric
raised a becoming memorial to his departed teacher. His younger
brother, =Nicetas Acominatus=, a highly esteemed statesman of
Constantinople, wrote a Θεσαυρὸς ὀρθοδοξίας in 27 bks., which
consists of a justificatory statement of the orthodox doctrine
together with a refutation of heretics, much more independent
and important than the similar work of Euthymius. He died in
A.D. 1206. At the same time flourished the noble bishop =Nicolas
of Methone= in Messenia, whose refutation of the attacks of the
neo-Platonist Proclus, Ἀνάπτυξις τῆς θεολογικῆς στοιχειώσεως
Πρόκλου is one of the most valuable productions of this period.
His doctrine of redemption, which has a striking resemblance
to Anselm of Canterbury’s theory of satisfaction (§ 101, 1), is
worthy of attention. He also contributed several tracts to the
struggle against the Latins. During the times of the Palæologi,
A.D. 1250-1450, the chief subjects of theological authorship
were the vindication and denunciation of the union. =Nicolas
Cabasilas=, archbishop of Thessalonica and successor of Palamas,
deserves special mention. He was like his predecessor the
vindicator of the Hesychasts (§ 69, 2), and was himself one
of the noblest mystics of any age. He died about A.D. 1354.
His chief work is Περὶ τῆς ἐν Χριστῷ ζωῆς. His mysticism is
distinguished by depth and spirituality as well as by reformatory
struggling against a superficial externalism. He also shares the
partiality of Greek mysticism for the liturgy as his _Expositio
Missæ_ shows. From his contemporary =Demetrius Cydonius= we have
an able treatise _De Contemnenda Morte_. Archbishop =Simeon of
Thessalonica= belongs to a somewhat later time, about A.D. 1400,
a thorough expert in classical and patristic literature and a
distinguished church leader. His comprehensive work, _De Fide,
Ritibus et Mysteriis Ecclesiast._ is an important source of
information about the church affairs of the Greek Middle Ages.
=Marcus Eugenicus= of Ephesus, the most capable opponent of the
Florentine union (§ 67, 2), besides controversial tracts, wrote
a treatise Περὶ ἀσθενείας ἀνθρώπου as a philosophico-dogmatic
foundation of the doctrine of eternal punishment at which the
emperor John VII. Palæologus had taken offence as incompatible
with divine justice and human frailty. His disciple Gregorius
[Gregory] Scholarius, known as a monk by the name =Gennadius=,
was the first patriarch of Constantinople after it had been taken
by the Turks. At the Council of Florence he still supported the
union, but was afterwards its most vigorous assailant. In the
controversy of the philosophers he contended against Pletho for
the old-established predominance of Aristotle. At the request of
the Sultan, Mohammed II., he laid before him a _Professio fidei_.
§ 68.6. A religious romance entitled =Barlaam and Josaphat=
whose author is not named, but evidently belonged to the East,
was included, even in the Middle Ages, among the works of
Joh. Damascenus, read by many especially in the West, translated
into Latin and rendered often in metrical form. It describes
the history of the conversion of the Indian prince Josaphat
by the eremite Barlaam with the object of showing the power of
Christianity against the allurements of sin and its superiority
to other religions. An uncritical age accepted the story as
historical, and venerated its two heroes as saints. The Roman
martyrology celebrated the 27th Nov. in their memory. Liebrecht
has discovered that the romance so popular in its days was
but a Christianized form of a legendary history of the life
and conversion of the founder of Buddhism, which existed in
pre-Christian times, and has come down to us under the title
_Lalita ristara Purâna_, often copying its original even in the
minutest details.
§ 69. DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES IN THE 12TH-14TH CENTURIES.
With the mental activity of the Comnenian age there was also
reawakened a love of theological speculation and discussion, and
several doctrinal questions engaged considerable attention. Then there
came a lull in the controversial strife for two hundred years, to be
roused once more by a question of abstruse mysticism.
§ 69.1. =Dogmatic Questions.=--Under the emperor Manuel
Comnenus, A.D. 1143-1180, the question was discussed whether
Christ presented His sacrifice for the sins of the world only to
the Father and the Holy Spirit, or also at the same time to the
Logos, _i.e._ to Himself. A Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 1156
sanctioned the latter notion.--Ten years later a controversy
arose over the question whether the words of Christ: “The Father
is greater than I,” refer to His divine or to His human nature
or to the union of the two natures. The discussion was carried on
by all ranks with a liveliness and passionateness which reminds
one of the similar controversies of the 4th century (§ 50, 2).
The emperor’s opinion that the words applied to the God-man
gained the victory at a Synod at Constantinople in A.D. 1166.
The dissentients were punished with the confiscation of their
goods and banishment.--Manuel excited a third controversy by
objecting to the anathema of “the God of Mohammed” in the formula
of abjuration for converts from Mohammedanism. In vain did the
bishops show the emperor that the God of Mohammed was not the
true God. The formula had to be altered.
§ 69.2. =The Hesychast Controversy, A.D. 1341-1351.=--In the
monasteries of Mount Athos in Thessaly the Areopagite mysticism
had its most zealous promoters. Following the example given three
centuries earlier by Simeon, an abbot of the monastery of Mesnes
in Constantinople, the monks by artificial means put themselves
into a condition that would afford them the ecstatic vision
of God which the Areopagite had extolled as the highest end
of all mystic endeavours. Kneeling in a corner of the solitary
closed cell, the chin pressed firmly on the breast, the eyes set
fixedly on the navel, and the breath held in as long as possible,
they sank at first into melancholy and their eyes became dim.
Continuing longer in this position the depression of spirit which
they at first experienced gave way to an inexpressible rapture,
and at last they found themselves surrounded by a bright halo of
light. They called themselves _Resting Ones_, ἡσυχάζοντες, and
maintained that the brilliancy surrounding them was the uncreated
divine light which shone around Christ on Mount Tabor. Barlaam
(§ 67, 5), just returned from his unfortunate union expedition,
accused the monks and their defender, Gregorius [Gregory] Palamas,
afterwards archbishop of Thessalonica, as Ditheistic heretics,
scornfully styling them _navel-souls_, ὀμφαλόψυχοι. But a Council
at Constantinople, in A.D. 1341, the members of which were
unfavourable to Barlaam because of his union efforts, approved
the doctrine of uncreated divine light which as divine ἐνεργεία
is to be distinguished from the divine οὐσία. Barlaam, in order
to avoid condemnation, recanted, but withdrew soon afterwards
to Italy, where he joined the communion of the Latin church
in A.D. 1348, and died as a bishop in Calabria. A disciple
of Barlaam, Gregorius [Gregory] Acindynos and the historian
Nicephorus Gregoras [Gregory] continued the controversy against
the Hesychasts. Down to A.D. 1351 as many as three Synods had
been held, which all decidedly favoured the monks.
§ 70. CONSTITUTION, WORSHIP AND LIFE.
The Byzantine emperors had been long accustomed to carry out in a
very high-handed manner their own will even in regard to the internal
affairs of the church. The anointing with sacred oil gave them a
sacerdotal character and entitled them to be styled ἅγιος. Most of
the emperors, too, from Leo the Philosopher (§ 68, 1), possessed some
measure of theological culture. The patriarchate, however, if amid so
many arbitrary appointments and removals it fell into the proper hands,
was always a power which even emperors had to respect. What protected
it against all encroachments of the temporal power was the influence
of the monks and through them of the people. In consequence of the
controversies about images, Theodorus Studita (§ 66, 4) founded a
strong party which fought with all energy against every interference
of the State in ecclesiastical matters and against the appointing of
ecclesiastical officers by the temporal power, but only with temporary
success. The monks, who had been threatened by the iconoclastic
Isaurian with utter extermination, at the restoration grew and
prospered more than ever in outward appearance, but gave way more
and more to spiritual corruption and extravagance. The Eastern monks
had not that genial many-sided culture which was needed for the
cultivation of the fields and the minds of the barbarians. They
were deficient in those powers of tempering, renovating and ennobling,
whereby the monks of the West accomplished such wonderful results.
But, nevertheless, if in those debased and degenerate days one looks
for examples of fidelity to convictions, firmness of character,
independence and moral earnestness, he will always find the noblest
in the monasteries.--Public worship had already in the previous period
attained to almost complete development, but theory and practice
received enrichment in various particulars.
§ 70.1. =The Arsenian Schism, A.D. 1262-1312.=--Michael
Palæologus, after the death of the emperor Theodore Lascaris
in A.D. 1259, assumed the guardianship of his six years’ old
son John, had himself crowned joint ruler, and in A.D. 1261 had
the eyes of the young prince put out so as to make him unfit
for governing. The patriarch Arsenius then excommunicated him.
Michael besought absolution, and in order to obtain it submitted
to humiliating penances; but when the patriarch insisted that
he should resign the throne, the emperor deposed and exiled
him, A.D. 1267. The numerous adherents of Arsenius refused to
acknowledge the new patriarch Joseph (§ 67, 4), seceded from the
national church, and when their leader died in exile in A.D. 1273,
their veneration for him expressed itself in burning hatred
of his persecutors. When Joseph died in A.D. 1283, an attempt
was made to decide the controversy by a direct appeal to God’s
judgment. Each of the two parties cast a tract in defence of its
position into the fire, and both were consumed. The Arsenians,
who had expected a miracle, felt themselves for the moment
defeated and expressed a readiness to be reconciled. But on
the third day they recalled their admissions and the schism
continued, until the patriarch Niphon in A.D. 1312 had the bones
of Arsenius laid in the church of Sophia and pronounced a forty
days’ suspension on all the clergy who had taken part against him.
§ 70.2. =Public Worship.=--In the Greek church preaching retained
its early prominence; the homiletical productions, however, are
but of small value. The objection to hymns other than those found
in Scripture was more and more overcome. As in earlier times
(§ 59, 4) Troparies were added to the singing of psalms, so now
the New Testament hymns of praise and doxologies were formed
into a so-called Κανών, _i.e._ a collection of new odes arranged
for the several festivals and saints’ days. The 8th century was
the Augustan age of church song. To this period belonged the
celebrated ἅγιοι μελωδοί, Andrew of Crete, John of Damascus,
Cosmas of Jerusalem, and Theophanes of Nicæa. The singing after
this as well as before was without instrumental accompaniment and
also without harmonic arrangement.--There was a great diversity
of opinion in regard to the idea of the sacraments and their
number. Damascenus speaks only of two: Baptism and the Lord’s
Supper. Theodorus Studita, on the other hand, accepts the
six enumerated by the Pseudo-Areopagite (§ 58). Petrus [Peter]
Mogilas in his Anti-Protestant _Confessio orthodoxa_ of A.D. 1643
(§ 152, 3) is the first confidently to assert that even among
the Latins of the Middle Ages the Sacraments had been regarded
as seven in number. The Greeks differed from the Latins in
maintaining the necessity of immersion in baptism, in connecting
the chrism with the baptism, using leavened bread in the Supper
and giving both elements to all communicants. From the time of
Joh. Damascenus the teachers of the church decidedly subscribed
to the doctrine of Transubstantiation; but in regard to penance
and confession they stoutly maintained (§ 61, 1), that not the
priest but God alone can forgive sins. The _Unctio inferiorum_,
εὐχέλαιον, also made way in the Greek church, applied in the form
of the cross to forehead, breast, hands and feet; yet with this
difference that, expressly repudiating the designation “extreme”
unction, it was given not only in cases of mortal illness, but
also in less serious ailments, and had in view bodily cure as
well as spiritual benefit.--The emperor Leo VI. the Philosopher
made the benediction of the church (§ 61, 2) obligatory for a
legally valid marriage.
§ 70.3. =Monasticism.=--The most celebrated of all the monastic
associations were those of Mount Athos in Thessaly, which was
covered with monasteries and hermit cells, and as “the holy
mount” had become already a hallowed spot and the resort of
pilgrims for all Greek Christendom. The monastery of Studion,
too (§ 44, 3), was held in high repute. There was no want of
ascetic extravagances among the monks. There were numerous
stylites; many also spent their lives on high trees, δενδρίται,
or shut up in cages built on high platforms (κιονῖται), or
in subterranean caverns, etc. Others bound themselves to
perpetual silence. Many again wore constantly a shirt of iron
(σιδηρούμενοι), etc. A rare sort of pious monkish practice made
its appearance in the 12th century among the =Ecetæ=, Ἱκέται.
They were monks who danced and sang hymns with like-minded nuns
in their monasteries after the pattern of Exod. xv. 20, 21.
Although they continued orthodox in their doctrine and were
never charged with any act of immorality, Nicetas Acominatus
proceeded against them as heretics.
§ 70.4. =Endeavours at Reformation.=--In the beginning of
the 12th century a pious monk at Constantinople, Constantinus
Chrysomalus, protested against prevailing hypocrisy and formalism.
A decade later the monk Niphon took a similar stand. Around both
gathered groups of clergy and laymen who, putting themselves
under their pastoral direction and neglecting the outward
forms of the church, applied themselves to the deepening of
the spiritual life. Both brought down on themselves the anathema
of the church. The patriarch Cosmas, who was not convinced that
Niphon was a heretic and so received him into his house and at
his table, was deposed in A.D. 1150. Eustathius, archbishop of
Thessalonica (§ 68, 5), carried on his reformatory efforts quite
within the limits of the dominant institutions of the church,
and so kept himself safe from the machinations of his enemies.
Relentlessly and powerfully he struggled against the corruption
in the Christian life of the people, and especially against
the formalism and hypocrisy, the rudeness and vulgarity, the
spiritual blindness and pride, and the eccentric caricatures of
ascetism that were exhibited by the monks, though he was himself
in heart and soul a monk. Two hundred years later Nicolas
Cabasilas (§ 68, 5) yet more distinctly maintained that a
consistent life was the test and love the root of all virtue.
§ 71. DUALISTIC HERETICS.
Remnants of the Gnostic-Manichæan heresy lingered on into the 7th
century in Armenia and Syria, where the surrounding Parseeism gave them
a hold and support. Constantinus of Mananalis near Samosata gathered
these together about the middle of the 7th century and reformed them
somewhat in the spirit of Marcion (§ 27, 11). The Catholics, sneeringly
called by them Ῥομαῖοι, gave the name of =Paulicians= to them because
they regarded Paul alone as a true apostle. Even before the rise of the
Paulicians, a sect existed in Armenia called =Children of the Sun= who
had mixed up the Zoroastrian worship with Christian elements. They, too,
during the 9th and 10th centuries, by reorganization reached a position
of more importance, and represented, like the Paulicians, a reformatory
opposition to the formal institutions of the Catholic church. A similar
attitude was assumed by the =Euchites= in Thrace during the 11th
century. Like the old Euchites (§ 44, 7), they got their name from
the unceasing prayers which they regarded as the token of highest
perfection. Their dualistic-gnostic system is met with again among
the =Bogomili= in Bulgaria. These were still more decidedly hostile
to the Catholic church, and had adopted the anthropological views
of Saturninus and the Ophites as well as the trinitarian theory
of Sabellius (§ 27, 6, 9; 33, 7). All these sects were accused by
their Catholic opponents with entertaining antinomian doctrines and
practising licentious orgies and unnatural abominations.
§ 71.1. =The Paulicians.=--They called themselves only Χριστιανοί,
but were in the habit of giving to their leaders and churches the
names of Paul’s companions and mission stations. They combined
dualism, demiurgism and docetism with a mysticism that insisted
upon inward piety, demanded a strict but not rigorous asceticism,
forbade fasting and allowed marriage. Their worship was very
simple, their church constitution moulded after the apostolic
pattern, with the rejection of the hierarchy and priesthood. They
were specially averse to the accumulation of ceremonies and the
veneration of images, relics and saints in the Catholic church.
They also urged the diligent study of Scripture, rejecting,
however, the Old Testament, and the Jewish-Christian gospels
and epistles of the New Testament. The Catholic polemists
of the 9th century traced their origin and even their name
(=Παυλοϊωάννοι) to a Manichæan family of the fourth century,
a widow Callinice and her two sons Paul and John. None of the
distinctive marks of Manichæism, however, are discoverable
in them, and their founding by Constantine of Mananalis is a
historic fact, as also that he, in A.D. 657, assumed the Pauline
name of Sylvanus. The first church, which he called _Macedonia_,
was founded by him at Cibossa in Armenia. From this point he made
successful missionary journeys in all directions. The emperor
Constantinus Pogonnatus, A.D. 668-685, began a bloody persecution
of the Paulicians. But the martyr enthusiasm of Sylvanus, who
was stoned in A.D. 685, made such an impression upon the imperial
officer Symeon, that he himself joined the sect, was made their
chief under the name of Titus, and on the renewal of persecution
in A.D. 690 joyfully died at the stake. His successor Gegnesius,
who took the name of Timothy, was obliged by Leo the Isaurian to
undergo an examination under the patriarch of Constantinople, had
his orthodoxy attested, and received from the iconoclast emperor
a letter of protection. Soon, however, divisions sprang up within
the sect itself. One of their chiefs Baanes, on account of his
antinomian practices, was nicknamed ὁ ῥυπαρός the smutty. But,
about A.D. 801, Sergius Tychicus, converted in earlier years
by a Paulician woman, who directed him to the Bible, made his
appearance as a reformer and second founder of the sect. He
died in A.D. 835. Leo the Armenian, A.D. 813-820, organized an
expedition for their conversion. The penitents were received back
into the church, the obstinate were executed. A mob of Paulicians
murdered the judges, fled to the Saracen regions of Armenia, and
founded at Argaum, the ancient Colosse, a military colony which
made incessant predatory and retaliating raids upon the Byzantine
provinces. They were most numerous in Asia Minor. The empress
Theodora (§ 66, 4) carried out against them about A.D. 842 a
new and fearfully bloody persecution. Many thousands were put to
death. This too was the fate of an officer of high rank. His son,
Carbeas, also an officer, incited by an ardent desire for revenge,
gathered about 5,000 armed Paulicians around him in A.D. 844,
fled with them to Argaum, and became military chief of the sect.
New crowds of Paulicians streamed daily in, and the Khalifs
assigned to them two other fortified frontier cities. With a
well organized army, thirsting for revenge, Carbeas wasted the
Byzantine provinces far and wide, and repeatedly defeated the
imperial forces. Basil the Macedonian after two campaigns, at
last in A.D. 871, hemmed in the Paulician army in a narrow pass
and annihilated it. Their political power was now broken. The
sect, however, still continued to gather members in Syria and
Asia Minor. In A.D. 970, the emperor John Tzimisces transported
the greater part of them as watchers of the frontier of Thrace,
where Philippopolis became their Zion. They soon had possession
of all Thrace. Alexius Comnenus, A.D. 1081-1118, was the first
earnestly again to attempt their conversion. He himself appeared
at Philippopolis in A.D. 1115, disputed a whole day with their
leaders, promised and threatened, rewarded and punished, but
all his efforts were fruitless. From that time we hear nothing
more of them. Their remnants probably joined the Euchites and
the Bogomili.
§ 71.2. =The Children of the Sun=, or Arevendi were a sect
gathered and organized in the 9th century in Armenia by a
Paulician Sembat in the country town of Thontrace into a separate
community of Thontracians. In A.D. 1002 the metropolitan Jacob
of Harkh gave a Christian tinge to their doctrine, went through
the country preaching repentance and the performances of ritual
observances, and obtained much support from clergy and laity. The
Catholicus of the Armenian church caused him to be branded and
imprisoned. He made his escape, but was afterwards slain by his
opponents.
§ 71.3. =The Euchites=, Messelians [Messalians], Enthusiasts,
attracted the attention of the government in the beginning of
the 11th century as a sect widely spread in Thrace. In common
with the earlier Euchites (§ 44, 7) they had great enthusiasm
in prayer, but they were distinguished from them by their dualism.
Their doctrine of the two sons of God, Satanaël and Christ, shows
a certain relation to the form of Persian dualism, which derives
the two opposing principles, Ormuzd and Ahriman, from one eternal
primary essence, Zeruane Acerene. The germs of this sect may
have come from the transplanting of Paulicians to Thrace by the
emperor Tzimisces. The Byzantine government sent a legate to
Thrace to suppress them. This may have been Michael Psellus
(§ 68, 5) whose Διάλογος περὶ ἐνεργείας δαιμόνων is the only
source of information we have regarding them.
§ 71.4. =The Bogomili=, θεόφιλοι, taught: that Satanaël, the
firstborn son of God, as chief and head over all angels, clothed
with full glory of the Godhead, sat at the right hand of the
Father; but, swelling with pride, he thought to found an empire
independent of his Father and seduced a portion of the angels to
take part with him. Driven with them out of heaven, he determined
after the pattern of the creation of the Father (Gen. i. 1) to
create a new world out of chaos (Gen. ii. 3 ff.). He formed the
first man of earth mixed with water. When he set up the figure,
some of the water ran out of the great toe of the right foot
and spread out over the ground; and after he had breathed his
breath into it, that also escaped owing to the looseness of the
figure by the toe, permeated the soil moistened with the water
and animated it as a serpent. At Satanaël’s earnest entreaty the
heavenly Father took pity on the miserable creature, and gave
it life by breathing into it His own breath. Afterwards with
the Father’s help Eve, too, was created. Satanaël in the form
of the serpent seduced, deceived and lay with Eve in order that
by his seed, Cain and his twin sister Calomina, Adam’s future
descendants, Abel, Seth, etc., might be oppressed and brought
into bondage. Jealous lest the latter should obtain that heavenly
dwelling place from which they had been driven, Satanaël’s angels
seduced their daughters (Gen. vi.). From this union sprang giants
who rebelled against Satanaël, but were destroyed by him in the
flood. Henceforth he reigned unopposed as κοσμοκράτωρ, seduced
the greater part of mankind, and endowed Moses with the power of
working miracles as the instrument of his tyranny. Only a few men
under the oppression of his law attained the end of their being;
the sixteen prophets and those named in Matt. i. and Luke iii.
Finally, in the year 5,500 after the creation of man, the supreme
God moved with pity caused a second son, the Logos, to go forth
from His bosom, who as chief of the good angels is called Michael,
and sent Him to earth for man’s redemption. He entered in an
ethereal body through the right ear into the virgin to be born
of her with the semblance of an earthly body. Mary noticed
nothing of all this. Without knowing how or whence, she found
the child in swaddling clothes before her in the cave. His
death on the cross was naturally in appearance only. After his
resurrection he showed himself to Satanaël in his true form,
bound him with chains, robbed him of his divine power, and
compelled him to abandon his divine designation, by taking the
El from his name, so that he is henceforth called Satan. Then He
returned to the Father, took the seat that formerly was Satanaël’s
at His right hand, and sinks again into the bosom of the Father
out of which He had come. This, however, did not take place
before a new Aëon [Æon], the Holy Spirit, emanated from the
Godhead, and was sent forth as continuator and completer of the
work of redemption. This Spirit, too, after he has finished his
task will sink back again into the Father’s bosom.--Of the Old
Testament the Bogomili acknowledged only the Psalter and the
Prophets; of the New Testament books they valued most the
Gospel of John. Veneration of relics and images, as well as
the sign of the cross they abhorred as demoniacal inventions.
Church buildings were regarded by them as the residences of
demons. Satanaël himself in earlier days resided in the temple
of Jerusalem, later in the church of Sophia at Constantinople.
Water baptism, which was introduced by John the Baptist a
servant of Satanaël, they rejected; but the baptism of Christ is
spiritual baptism (παράκλησις=_Consolamentum_). It was imparted
by laying the Gospel of John on the head of the subject of
baptism, with invocation of the Holy Spirit and chanting the
Lord’s Prayer. They declared the Catholic mass to be a sacrifice
presented to demons; the true eucharist consists in the spiritual
nourishment by the bread of life brought down in Christ from
heaven, to which also the fourth petition in the Lord’s Prayer
refers. They placed great value upon prayer, especially the use
of the Lord’s Prayer. So too they valued fasting. Their ascetism
was strict and required abstinence from marriage and from
the eating of flesh. But prevarication and dissimulation they
regarded as permissible.--The emperor Alexius Comnenus caused
their chief Basil to be brought to Constantinople, under the
delusive pretext of wishing himself to become a proselyte of
the sect, got him to open all his heart, and enticed him under
the semblance of a purely private conference to make reckless
statements, while behind the curtain a judge of heresies was
taking notes. This first act in the drama was followed by a
second. The sentence of death was passed upon all adherents of
Basil who could be laid hold upon. Two great funeral piles were
erected, one of which was furnished with the figure of the cross.
The emperor exhorted them, at least to die as true Christians,
and in token of this to choose the place of death provided with
a cross. Those who did so were pardoned, the rest for the most
part condemned to imprisonment for life. Basil himself, however,
was actually burnt, A.D. 1118. The sect was not by any means thus
rooted out. The Bogomili hid themselves mostly in monasteries,
and Bulgaria long remained the haunt of dualistic heresy, which
spread thence through the Latin church of the West.
§ 72. THE NESTORIAN AND MONOPHYSITE CHURCHES OF THE EAST.
The Nestorian and Monophysite churches of the East owed the
protection and goodwill of their Moslem rulers to their hostile
position in regard to the Byzantine national church. Among the Persian
Nestorians as well as among the Syrian and Armenian Monophysites we find
an earnest endeavour after scholarship and great scientific activity.
They were the teachers of the Saracens in the classical, philosophical
and medical sciences, and with no little zeal pursued the study
of Christian theology. The Nestorians also long manifested great
earnestness in missions. Only when the science-loving Khalifs gave
place to Mongolian and Turkish barbarians did those churches lose
their prestige, and that stagnation and torpidity passed over them in
which they still lie. In order to crown the Florentine union attempts
of A.D. 1439 (§ 67, 6), Rome solemnly proclaimed in the immediately
following year the complete union with all the detached churches of
the East. But this was a vain self-delusion or a bit of jugglery. Men
pretending to be deputed by those churches treated about restoration to
the bosom of the church, which was accorded them amid great applause.
§ 72.1. =The Persian Nestorians=, or Chaldean Christians
(§ 64, 2), stood in peculiarly friendly relations to the Khalifs,
who, in the Nestorian opposition to Theotokism, worship of saints,
images and relics, and priestly celibacy, saw an approach to a
rational Christianity more in accordance with the Moslem ideal.
The Nestorian seminaries at Edessa, Nisibis, Seleucia, etc., were
in high repute. The rich literature issued by them is, however,
mostly lost, and what of it remains is known only by Asseman’s
[Assemani’s] quotations (_Biblioth. Orientalia_). Among the later
Nestorian authors the best known is Ebed Jesus, Metropolitan
of Nisibis, who died in A.D. 1318. His writings treat of all
subjects in the domain of theology. The missionary zeal of the
Nestorians continued unabated down to the 13th century. Their
chief mission fields were China and India. At the beginning
of the 11th century they converted the prince of the Karaites,
a Tartar tribe to the south of Lake Baikal, who as vassals of
the great Chinese empire had the name Ung-Khan. A large number
of the people followed their prince. The Mongol conqueror
Genghis-Khan married the daughter of the Karaite prince, but
quarrelled with him, drove him from his throne, and took his life,
A.D. 1202.--With the overthrow of the Khalifs by Genghis-Khan
in A.D. 1219, the prosperity of the Nestorian church came to an
end. At first the Nestorians attempted missionary operations not
unsuccessfully among the Mongols. But the savage Tamerlane, the
Scourge of Asia, A.D. 1369-1405, drove them into the inaccessible
mountains and wild ravines of the province of Kurdistan.[195]
§ 72.2. Among the =Monophysite Churches= the most important was
the =Armenian= (§ 64, 3). It boasted, at least temporarily and
partially, of political independence under national rulers. The
Armenian patriarch from the 12th century had his residence in
the monastery of Etshmiadzin at the foot of Ararat. The literary
activity in the translation of classical and patristic writings,
as well as in the production of original works, reached a
particularly high point in the 8th and then again in the 12th
century. To the earlier period belong the patriarch Johannes
Ozniensis and the metropolitan Stephen of Sünik, to the later,
the still more famous name of the patriarch Nerses IV. Clajensis,
whose epic “Jesus the Son” is regarded as the crown of Armenian
poetry, and his nephew, the metropolitan Nerses of Lampron. The
two last named readily aided the efforts for reunion with the
Byzantine church, but owing to the troubles of the time these
came to nothing. The Western endeavours after union which were
actively carried on from the beginning of the 13th century, split
upon the dislike of the Armenian church to the Western ritual,
and found acceptance with only a relatively small fragment of
the people. These _United Armenians_ acknowledged the primacy of
the pope and the catholic system of doctrine, but retained their
own constitution and liturgy.--In =the Jacobite-Syrian Church=
(§ 52, 7), too, theological and classical studies were prosecuted
with great vigour. The most distinguished of its scholars during
our period was George, bishop of the Arabs, who died in A.D. 740.
He translated and annotated the Organon of Aristotle, and wrote
exegetical, dogmatic, historical and chronological works, also
poems on various themes, and a number of epistles important for
the history of culture during these times, in which he answered
questions put to him by his friends and admirers. The brilliant
Gregory Abulfarajus is the last of the distinguished scholars of
the Jacobite-Syrian church. He was the son of a converted Jewish
physician, and hence he is usually called Barhebræus. He was
made bishop of Guba, afterwards Maphrian of Mosul, and died
in A.D. 1286. His noble and truly benevolent disposition, his
extraordinary learning, the rich and attractive productions
of his pen, and his skill as a physician made him universally
revered by Christians, Mohammedans and Jews. Among his writings,
for the most part still in manuscript, the most important
and best known is the _Chronicon Syriacum_.--The Jacobite
church suffered most in =Egypt=. The perfidy of the Copts, who
surrendered the country to the Saracens, was terribly avenged.
From A.D. 1254 the Fatimide Khalifs held them down under the
most severe oppression, and this became yet more severe under
the Mamelukes. The Copts were completely driven out of the
cities, and even in the villages maintained only a miserable
existence. Their church was now in a condition of utter
stagnation. In =Abyssinia= (§ 64, 1) the national rulers
maintained their position, though pressed within narrower
limits from time to time by the Saracens. But here, too, church
life became fossilized. At the head of the church was an Abbuna
consecrated by the Coptic patriarch (§ 64, 1; 165, 3).
§ 72.3. =The Maronites= (§ 52, 8) attached themselves to the
Western church on the appearance of the crusades in A.D. 1182,
renouncing their Monothelite heresy and acknowledging the primacy
of the pope, but retaining their own ritual. In consequence of
the Florentine union measures they renewed their connection in
A.D. 1445, and subsequently adopted also the doctrinal conclusions
of the Council of Trent. Their numbers at the present day amount
to somewhere about 200,000.
§ 72.4. =The Legend of Prester John.=--In A.D. 1144 Bishop Otto
of Freisingen obtained from the bishop of Cabala in Palestine,
whom he met at Viterbo, information about a powerful Christian
empire in Central Asia, and published it in A.D. 1145 in his
widely-read Chronicle. According to this story the king of that
region, a Nestorian Christian, who was named Prester John, had
not long before driven to flight the Mohammedan kings of the
Persians and Medes, and thus delivered from great danger the
crusaders in the Holy Land. He had also wished to go to the
help of the church of Jerusalem, but was prevented by the Tigris
which overflowed its banks. Twenty years later appeared a writing
attributed to Prester John, first referred to by the Chronicler
Alberich. It was addressed to the European princes in a Latin
translation which contained the most fabulous stories, borrowed
from the Alexander legends, about the extent and glory of
his empire and the many wonders in nature, white lions, the
phœnix, giants and pigmies, dog-headed and horned men, fauns,
satyrs, cyclops, etc., which were to be seen in his country; and
notwithstanding all these absurdities it was received as genuine.
The pope, Alexander III., took occasion from its appearance to
send an answer to Prester John by his own physician Philip, of
whose fate nothing more is known. When in A.D. 1219 the first
news reached Palestine of the irrepressible advance of Mongolian
hordes under Genghis Khan, the crusaders felt justified in
assuming that he was the successor of the celebrated Prester John,
and was now to accomplish what his distinguished predecessor
had wished to undertake. But they were soon cruelly undeceived.
The missionaries sent to the Mongols about the middle of
the 13th century (§ 93, 15), reported that the last Prester
John had lost his kingdom and his life in battle with Genghis
Khan. Nevertheless the belief in the continued existence of an
exceedingly glorious and powerful empire ruled by a Christian
priest in further India was not by any means overthrown; but it
was no longer sought in an Asiatic but in an African “India,” and
the Portuguese actually believed that at last the famed Prester
John had been found in the Christian king of Abyssinia, so that
that country was known down to the 17th century as _Regnum presb.
Joannis_.--The Jacobite historian Barhebræus had identified the
first Presbyter-king with the prince of the Mongolian Karaites
converted by the Nestorians. His name Ung-Khan or Owang-Khan
corresponded both to the name Joannes and to the Chaldean
כַּהֲנָא=priest. This notion prevailed until recently the Orientalist
Oppert by careful examination and comparison of all Oriental
and Western reports reached the conclusion (§ 93, 16) that these
legends are to be referred to the kingdom established about
A.D. 1125 by Kur-Khan, prince of the tribe of the Caracitai in
the Mandshuria of to-day. This prince, who was probably himself
a Nestorian Christian, favoured the establishment of Christianity
in his country; but this was utterly destroyed by Genghis Khan so
early as A.D. 1208. The title Prester or Presbyter given to the
prince of this tribe is to be explained perhaps by the statement
of the missionary Ruysbroek that almost all male Nestorians in
Central Asia received priestly consecration.[196]
§ 73. THE SLAVONIC CHURCHES ADHERING TO THE ORTHODOX
GREEK CONFESSION.
Among the crowds of immigrants whom the wanderings of the people had
set in motion, the Germans and the Slavs are those whose future is of
most historic interest. The former went at once in a body over to the
Roman Catholic church, and at first it appeared as if the Slavs were
with similar unanimity to attach themselves to the Byzantine orthodox
church. But only the Slavs of the Eastern countries remained true to
that communion, though they were mostly with it brought under the yoke
of the Turkish power. So was it with the specially promising Bulgarian
church. All the more important was the incomparably more significant
gain which the Greek church made in the conversion of the Russians.
§ 73.1. Soon after Justinian’s time the Slavic hordes began to
overflow the =Greek Provinces=--Macedonia, Thessaly, Hellas and
Peloponnesus. The old Hellenic population was mostly rooted out;
only in well fortified cities, especially coast towns, as well as
on the islands, did the Greek people and the Christian confession
remain undisturbed. The empress Irene made the first successful
attempt to restore Slavic Greece to the allegiance of the empire
and the church, and Basil the Macedonian, A.D. 867-886, completed
the work so thoroughly that at last even the old pagan Mainottes
(§ 42, 4) in the Peloponnesus bent their necks to the double yoke.
Regenerated Hellenism by its higher culture and national, as well
as ecclesiastical, tenacity, completely absorbed by assimilation
the numerically larger Slavic element of the population, and
Mount Athos with its hermits and monasteries (§ 70, 3) became
the Zion of the new church.
§ 73.2. The =Chazari= in the Crimea asked about A.D. 850 for
Christian missionaries from Constantinople. The court sent them
a celebrated monk Constantine, surnamed the Philosopher, better
known under his monkish name of =Cyril=. Born at Thessalonica,
and so probably of Slavic descent, at least acquainted with the
language of the Slavs, he converted in a few years a great part
of the people. In A.D. 1016, however, the kingdom of the Chazari
was destroyed by the Russians.
§ 73.3. =The Bulgarians= in Thrace and Mœsia had obtained a
knowledge of Christianity from Greek prisoners, but its first
sowing was watered with blood. A sister, however, of the Bulgarian
king Bogoris had been baptized when a prisoner in Constantinople.
After her liberation, she sought, with the help of the Byzantine
monk =Methodius=, a brother of Cyril, to win her brother to
the Christian faith. A famine came to their aid, and a picture
painted by Methodius, representing the last judgment, made a
deep impression on Bogoris. In A.D. 861 he was baptized and
compelled his subjects to follow his example. But soon thereafter,
Methodius, along with his brother Cyril, was called to labour in
another field, in Moravia (§ 79, 2), and political considerations
led the Bulgarian prince in A.D. 866 to join the Western church.
At his request pope Nicholas I. sent bishops and clergy into
Bulgaria to organize the church there after the Roman model.
Byzantine diplomacy, however, succeeded in winning back the
Bulgarians, and at the œcumenical Council at Constantinople in
A.D. 869, their ambassadors admitted that the Bulgarian church
according to divine and human laws belonged to the diocese of the
Byzantine patriarch (§ 67, 1). Meantime the two Apostles of the
Slavs, Cyril and Methodius, by the invention of a Slavic alphabet
and a Slavic translation of the Bible, laid the foundation of a
Slavic ecclesiastical literature, which was specially fostered
in Bulgaria under the noble-minded prince Symeon, A.D. 888-927.
Basil II., the Slayer of the Bulgarians, conquered Bulgaria in
A.D. 1018. It gained its freedom again, together with Walachia,
in A.D. 1186; but fell a prey to the Tartars in A.D. 1285, and
became a Turkish province in A.D. 1391.
§ 73.4. =The Russian Church.=--Photius speaks in A.D. 866 of the
=Conversion of the Russians= as an accomplished fact. In the days
of the Grand Duke Igor, about A.D. 900, there was a cathedral at
Kiev. Olga, Igor’s widow, made a journey to Constantinople and
was there baptized in A.D. 955 under the name Helena. But her son
Swätoslaw could not be persuaded to follow her example. The aged
princess is said according to the report of German chroniclers
to have at last besought the emperor Otto I. to send German
missionaries, and that in response Adalbert of Treves, afterwards
archbishop of Magdeburg, undertook a missionary tour, from which,
however, he returned without having achieved his purpose, after
his companions had been slain. Olga’s grandson, Vladimir, “Equal
of the Apostles,” was the first to put an end to paganism in
the country. According to a legend adorned with many romantic
episodes he sent ten Boyars in order to see how the different
religions appeared as conducted in their chief seats. They were
peculiarly impressed with the beautiful service in the church of
Sophia. In A.D. 988, in the old Christian commercial town Cherson,
shortly before conquered by him, Vladimir was baptized with the
name Basil, and at the same time he received the hand of the
princess Anna. The idols were now everywhere broken up and burnt;
the image of Perun was dragged through the streets tied to the
tail of a horse, beaten with clubs and thrown into the Dnieper.
The inhabitants of Kiev were soon afterwards ordered to gather
at the Dnieper and be baptized. Vladimir knelt in prayer on the
banks and thanked God on his knees, while the clergy, standing
in the stream, baptized the people. On the further organization
of the Russian church Anna exercised a powerful and salutary
influence. Vladimir died in A.D. 1015. His son Jaroslaw I., the
Justinian of the Russians, attended to the religious needs of his
people by the erection of many churches, monasteries and schools,
improved the worship, enriched the psalmody, awakened a taste for
art and patronized learning. The monastery of Petchersk at Kiev
was the birthplace of Russian literature and a seminary for the
training of the clergy. Here, at the end of the 11th century, the
monk Nestor wrote his annals in the language of the country. The
metropolitan of Kiev was the spiritual head of the whole Russian
church under the suzerainty of the patriarch of Constantinople.
After the great fire of A.D. 1170, which laid the glory of Kiev
in ashes, the residency of the Grand Duke was transferred to
Vladimir. In A.D. 1299 the metropolitan also took up his abode
there, but only for a short time; for in A.D. 1328 the Grand Duke
Ivan Danilowitsch settled at Moscow and the metropolitan went
there along with him. The patriarch of Constantinople on his own
authority consecrated in A.D. 1353 a second Russian metropolitan
for the forsaken Kiev, to whom he assigned the Southern and
Western Russian provinces which since A.D. 1320 had been under
the rule of the pagan Lithuanians. This schism was overcome
in A.D. 1380 on the next occasion of a vacancy in the Moscow
chair by the appointment to Moscow of the Kiev metropolitan. But
the Lithuanian government, which had meanwhile become Catholic
(§ 93, 15), compelled the South Russian bishops in A.D. 1414 to
choose a metropolitan of their own independent of Moscow, who in
A.D. 1594 with his whole diocese at the Synod of Brest (§ 151, 3)
attached himself to Rome. The primate of Moscow continued under
the jurisdiction of Constantinople until, in A.D. 1589, the
patriarch Jeremiah II. (§ 139, 26), on the occasion of his being
personally present at Moscow voluntarily declared the Russian
church independent of him, and himself consecrated Job, the
metropolitan of that time, its first patriarch.[197]
§ 73.5. =Russian Sects.=--About A.D. 1150, the monk Martin, an
Armenian by birth, insisted upon a liturgical reform that seemed
to him most necessary. Among other things he declared that it was
sinful to lead the subject of baptism to the baptismal font from
right to left or from south to north; the direction should be
reversed following the course of the sun. But it seemed to him
most important that a reform should be made in the hitherto
prevalent mode of making the sign of the cross. Instead of
symbolizing, as up to this time had been done, the two natures in
Christ and the three persons in the Trinity by bending the little
finger and the thumb, and making the sign of the cross with other
three, they made this sign with the fore and middle fingers.
For nearly ten years this monk was allowed to disseminate his
errors unchecked, till a Council obliged him to retract. Two
hundred years later a certain Carp Strigolnik at Novgorod in
A.D. 1375 publicly accused the clergy of sinning, because,
in accordance with an old custom, they took fees in assisting
in the consecration of bishops, and demanded of all orthodox
Christians that they should separate from them as unworthy of
their office. But he, along with many of his followers, was
mobbed by the adherents of the opposite party and drowned in
the Volga. More dangerous than all the earlier sectaries was
the so-called Jewish sect at the end of the 15th century,
which sought to reduce orthodox Christianity to a rationalistic
cabbalistic Ebionitism. About A.D. 1470 the Jew Zachariah arrived
at Novgorod. He won two distinguished priests Alexis and Denis to
his views, that Christ was nothing more than an ordinary Jewish
prophet, that the Mosaic law is a divine institution and is of
perpetual obligation. By the advice of the Jew the two priests
continued to profess the greatest zeal for the ceremonial laws
of the Church, and by strict observance of the fasts obtained
a great reputation for piety, but secretly they wrought all the
more successfully for the dissemination of their sect among all
classes of the people. When the czar, Ivan III., in A.D. 1480,
came to Novgorod, they made so favourable an impression on
him that he took them with him to Moscow, where they reaped a
rich harvest for their secret doctrine. They succeeded through
their influence with the czar in placing at the head of the
whole Russian church a zealous proselyte for their sect in the
archimandrite Zosima. Meanwhile at Novgorod iconoclast excesses
were committed by the sectaries, which the archbishop of that
place, Gennadius, set himself to suppress by imposing generally
mild penalties. His successor Joseph Ssanin proceeded much more
energetically. He did not rest till the czar in A.D. 1504 called
a Church Synod at Novgorod which condemned the chiefs of the sect
to be burnt, and their followers to be shut up in monasteries.
Even the metropolitan Zosima as a favourer of the sect was sent
to a monastery; but Alexis managed so cleverly that he retained
his office and dignity to the end of his life. Secret remnants
of this sect, as well as of the two previously referred to,
continued to exist for a long time, even down to the 17th
century, when sectarianism in the Russian Church made again
a new departure (§ 163, 10).
§ 73.6. =Romish Efforts at Union.=--From a very early time Rome
cast a covetous glance at the young Russian church, and she
spared neither delicate hints nor attempts to subdue by force
by the aid of Danes, Swedes, Livonians and at a later time,
the Poles. In order to avert this danger and to obtain from
the West assistance against the oppressive yoke of the Mongols,
A.D. 1234-1480, the Grand Duke Jaroslav [Jaroslaw] II. of
Novgorod was not averse to a union. His son Alexander succeeded
him in A.D. 1247. By a glorious victory over the Swedes in
A.D. 1240, on the Neva, he won for himself the surname Newsky,
and in A.D. 1242 he defeated the Livonians on the ice of Lake
Peipus. Pope Innocent IV. who had already in A.D. 1246 nominated
Arch bishop Albert Suerbeer (§ 93, 12) a legate to Russia with the
power to erect bishoprics there, addressed an earnest exhortation
to the young prince in A.D. 1248 with promises of help against
the Mongols, urging him to go in the footsteps of his father and
to secure his own and his subjects’ salvation by doing what his
father had promised. The Grand Duke referred to the wisest men
of the land and answered the Pope: From Adam to the flood, from
that to the Confusion of languages, etc., down to Constantine and
the seventh œcumenical Council, we know the true history of the
Church, but yours we do not wish to acknowledge. Alexander Newsky
died in A.D. 1263, and has been ever since venerated by his
country as a national hero and by his Church as a national saint.
The prospects of the Roman Curia were more favourable during
the 14th century owing to the Lithuanian and Polish supremacy in
South and West Russia, and by the schism of the Russian Church
into Kiev and Moscow primacies. In those Southern and Western
provinces there was originally less disinclination to Rome than
in Moscow. Still even here we meet during the 15th century in the
metropolitan Isidore, born in Thessalonica, a prelate who made
everything work toward a union with Rome. When the Union Synod
of A.D. 1438 was to meet at Ferrara (§ 67, 6), he represented to
the Grand Duke Vassili that it was his duty to appear there. He
gave a hesitating and unwilling consent. At the Council Isidore
along with Bessarion showed himself a zealous promoter of the
union. He returned in A.D. 1441 as cardinal and papal legate.
But when at the first public service in Moscow he read aloud the
union documents, the Grand Duke had him imprisoned and banished
to a monastery. He escaped from his prison and died in Rome in
A.D. 1643.--Continuation, § 151, 3.
SECOND DIVISION.
THE HISTORICAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE GERMAN AND ROMAN CHURCH
DURING THE MIDDLE AGES.[198]
§ 74. CHARACTER AND DIVISIONS OF THIS PERIOD
OF THE DEVELOPMENT.
With the historically significant appearance of the Germanic peoples,
from whose blending with the old Celtic and Latin races of the conquered
countries the _Romance_ group of nationalities has its origin, there
begins a new phase in the historical development of the world and the
church. The so-called migration of the nations produced an upheaval
and revolution among the very foundations and springs of history such
as have never since been seen. For a similar significance cannot be
ascribed to the appearance at a somewhat later period of a motley crowd
of Slavic tribes and a detached contingent of the Turanian-Altaic race
(Finns, Magyars, etc.), because the stream of their development ran in
the same channel. Thus the appearance of the Germans forms the watershed
between the old world and the new. This dividing boundary, however,
is not a straight line; for the shoots of the old world run on for
centuries alongside of and among the young growths of the new world.
In so far as those remnants of the old have no relation to the new
and work out uninfluenced by their surroundings their own material
in their own way, the history of their developments has no place here;
but even these demand consideration at this point in so far as they
affect the development of the new world as a means of educating and
moulding, arresting and perverting. Just as the history of the church
and the world as a whole is distributed into ancient and modern,
so the special history of the Germano-Roman world can and must be
distributed into ancient and modern, the dividing boundary of which
is the Reformation of the 16th century. The earlier of these two phases
of history presents itself to us with a Janus-head, whose two faces are
directed the one to the ancient, the other to the modern world. This
follows from the fact that the groups of peoples referred to did not
require any longer to pursue the weary way of their development on
their own charges, but rather entered upon the spiritual heritage of
the defunct ancient world, and were able by means thereof more quickly
and surely to grow to the maturity of their own proper and independent
rank and culture. The Roman and, for some branches of the Slavic races,
also the Byzantine, church was the bearer and medium of this spiritual
heritage, and as such became teacher and disciplinarian of the young
world. The Reformation is the emancipation from the administrator of
discipline, whose leading strings were cast off by the youth when he
reached the maturity of man’s estate. It is the assertion of the German
nation that it had reached its intellectual majority.
§ 74.1. =The Character of Mediæval History.=--As its name implies
the mediæval period of church history is one of transition from
the old to the new. The old is the now completed development
of Christianity under the moulding influences of the ancient
Greek and Roman world; the new is the complete incorporation of
the special forms of life and culture that characterize the new
peoples, who are placed by means of the migration of the nations
in the foreground of history. But since the peculiar culture
of these nations was first present only potentially and as a
capacity, and was to realize itself first through the influence
of the early Christian culture, between the old and the new a
middle and intermediate age intervened, the extent of which was
just that influence of the old completed culture upon the new
developing culture. This conflict during the whole course of the
Middle Ages was carried on by those powerful waves of action and
reaction (formation, deformation, reformation), which, however,
amid the ferment of the times displayed an ever varying mixing
of the one with the other. The Middle Ages have brought forth
the most magnificent phenomena, the papacy, the monastic system,
scholasticism, etc., but characteristic of them all is that
crude blending of the three kinds of movement named above, which
hindered its effectiveness and led to its own deterioration.
First in the beginning of the 16th century did the reformatory
endeavours become so mature and strong that it could assume a
purer form and carry out its efforts with success. With this too
we reach the end of the Middle Ages and witness the birth of the
modern world.
§ 74.2. =Periods in the Church History of the German-Roman
Middle Ages.=--The first regular period is marked by the end of
the Carolingian age, which may be regarded as completed by the
dying out of the German Carolingians in A.D. 911. The movement
in all the chief departments of the church was hitherto regular
and unbroken: before Charlemagne an ascending one, during his
reign reaching the summit, and after his death declining. It is
the =universal German= period of history. The fundamental idea
of the Carolingian dynasty, which survived even its weakest
representatives, was no other than the combination of all
German, Roman and Slavic nationalities under the sceptre of
one German empire. The last German Carolingian carried this
idea with him to the grave. The powerful impulse present even in
the 9th century toward national separation and the dismemberment
of the Carolingian empire into independent Germanic, Romanic and
Slavic nations has since asserted its irresistible power. But
with the Carolingian empire the Carolingian epoch of civilization
also came to an end. And even the glory of the papacy, whose
intrigues had undermined the empire, because it had thus snapped
the branch on which it sat, now sank into the lowest depths of
weakness and corruption. When we take a general survey of the
beginning of the 10th century, we find on all sides, in church
and state, in secular and spiritual governments, in science,
culture and art, the creations of Charlemagne overthrown, and
a _seculum obscurum_ introduced from which amid great oppression
and savagery, emerge the conditions, earnests and germs of a new
golden age.--A second period is marked out, in quite a different
fashion, by the age of Pope Boniface VIII. or the beginning of
the 14th century. Up to this time =Germany= stood distinctly in
the foreground both of the history of the world and of the church;
but the unhappy conflict of Boniface with Philip the Fair of
France placed the papacy at the mercy of French policy, and so
henceforth in all the movements of Church history =France= stands
in the front. The pontificate of Boniface forms a turning point
also for the historical development within the church itself. The
most vast and influential products of mediæval ecclesiasticism
are the papacy, monasticism and scholasticism. The period before
Boniface is characterized by the growth and flourishing of these;
the period after Boniface by their decay and deterioration.
The reformatory current, too, which permeated the whole of
the Middle Ages, has in each of these two periods its own
distinctive character. Before Boniface those representatives of
the dominant ecclesiastical system were themselves inspired by a
powerful reformatory spirit working its way up from the great and
widespread depravation of the 10th century, accompanied, however,
by a hierarchical lust of power far beyond the limits justifiable
on evangelical principles. The evangelical reformatory endeavours
again directed against those representatives of ecclesiasticism
are still relatively few and isolated and find but a slight echo,
while as their caricature we see alongside of them heretical
extravagances which have scarcely ever had their like in history.
Toward the end of the first period, however, this relation
begins to be reversed. The papacy, monasticism and scholasticism
becoming more and more deteriorated are the patrons of every sort
of deterioration within the church. The revolutionary heretical
movement is indeed overcome, but all the more powerfully,
generally and variedly does the evangelical reformatory movement,
though still always burdened with much that was confused and
immature, assert itself independently of and over against those
ecclesiastical principalities, without being able, however,
to exert upon them any abiding influence.--Thus our phase of
development is divided into three periods: the period from the
4th to the 9th cent. (till A.D. 911); the period from the 10th
to the 13th cent. (A.D. 911-1294); and the period of the 14th
and 15th cent. (A.D. 1294-1517).
FIRST SECTION.
HISTORY OF THE GERMAN-ROMAN CHURCH FROM THE 4TH TO
THE 9TH CENTURY (DOWN TO A.D. 911).
I. Founding, Spread, and Limitation of the German Church.[199]
§ 75. CHRISTIANITY AND THE GERMANS.
In the pre-German age Europe was for the most part inhabited by
Celtic races. In Britain, Spain and Gaul, however, these were subjugated
by the Roman forces and Romanized, whereas in northern, eastern and
middle Europe they were oppressed, exterminated or Germanized by the
Germans. In its victorious march through Europe, Christianity met with
Celtic races of unmixed nationality only in Ireland and Scotland, for
even among the neighbouring Britons the Celtic nationality was already
blended with the Roman. Only in a very restricted field, therefore,
could the church first of all develop itself according to the Celtic
mode of culture. But here, with a wonderful measure of independence,
missionary operations were so energetically prosecuted that for a
long time it seemed as if the greater part of the opposite continent
with its German population was to be its prey, until at last the Romish
church would be driven out of its own home as well as out of its hopeful
mission fields (§ 77).--Even in pre-Christian times a second and more
powerful immigration from the East had begun to pour over Europe. The
various Germanic groups of tribes now presented themselves, followed
by other warlike races, Huns, Slavs, Magyars, etc., alternately driving
and being driven. The Germans first came into contact with Christian
elements in the second half of the 3rd century, and toward the end of
the 5th a whole series of powerful German peoples are found professing
the Christian faith, and each successive century far down into the
Middle Ages brings always new trophies from these nations into the
treasure-house of the church. It would certainly be wrong to ascribe
these results to a national predisposition of the German churches
and type of mind for Christianity. This cannot be altogether denied,
but it did not predispose the German peoples to Christianity as it
then was preached, but was first developed when this by other ways
and means had found an entrance and only at the Reformation of the
16th century did it get full expression. For that predisposition was
directed to the deepest and innermost sides of Christianity, for which
the ecclesiastical institution of the times in its externalism had
little appreciation; and the first task of the German spirit was to
secure recognition of this reformatory principle.
§ 75.1. =The Predisposition of the Germans for
Christianity.=--What we have been accustomed to hear about
this subject is in part greatly exaggerated, in part sought
for where its proper germ does not lie. The German mythology
may indeed conceal many deep thoughts under the garb of legendary
poetry which have some relation to Christian truth and afford
evidence of the religious needs, the speculative gifts and the
characteristic profundity of German thought, but this scarcely
in a larger measure than in the Greek myths, philosophemes and
mysteries.[200] Much more suggestive of a predisposition to
Christianity than such bright spots in the mythological system
of the Germans are the special and distinguishing characteristics
of the life of the German people. The fidelity of the vassal to
his lord, transferred to Christ the heavenly king, constitutes
the special core of Christianity. Besides, closely connected
therewith, the love of battle and faithfulness in battle for
and with the hereditary or elected chief found a parallel in
the struggles and victories of the Christian life. Further,
the Germans’ noble love of freedom, sanctified by the Gospel,
afforded form and expression for the glorious freedom of the
children of God. And finally, the spirituality of the Germans’
worship, praised even by Tacitus, who says that they _nec
cohibere parietibus Deos, neque in ullam humani oris speciem
adsimulare, ex magnitudine cœlestium arbitrantur_, predisposed
them in favour of the worshipping of God in spirit and in truth.
§ 75.2. What is of most significance, however, for understanding
the almost unopposed =Adoption of Christianity= by so many German
races is the slight hold that their heathen religion had upon
them at that time. It is essentially characteristic of heathenism
as the religion of nature that it can flourish only on its
native soil. German paganism, however, had been uprooted by its
transplantation to European soil and had, amid the movements of
peoples during the first centuries after their migration, never
quite struck root in the new ground. In the later centuries,
when it had long enough time for doing so, _e.g._ among the
Frisians, Saxons, Danes, it offered an incomparably more resolute
resistance. Again, rapid conversion will be furthered or hindered
according as the new home is one where already from Roman times
Christian institutions existed or even had existed, or is one
where the old primitive heathenism still prevailed. Only in
the latter case could German paganism develop its full power
and strike its roots deeply and feel at home upon the new soil;
whereas in the other case, the higher culture and spiritual
power of Christianity, even where it had been vanquished by
the barbarians, disturbed the even tenour and naïvete of the
genuinely pagan course of development. The circumstance also
deserves mention, that the marriage of heathen princes with
Christian princesses frequently secured their conversion along
with that of their subjects. In the narrower circles of the home,
the family, the tribe, innumerable instances of the same sort of
thing repeatedly occurred. There is something specially Germanic,
in the prominent position which German feeling had assigned to
the wife: _Inesse quin etiam_, says Tacitus, _sanctum aliquid
et providum putant; nec aut consilia earum adspernantur, aut
responsa negligunt_.[201]
§ 75.3. =Mode of Conversion in the Church of these Times.=--Apart
from the too frequent practice of Christian rulers to secure
conversions by the sword, baptism and conversion were commonly
regarded as an _opus operatum_, and whole crowds of heathens
without any knowledge of saving truth, with no real change of
heart and mind, were received into the church by baptism. No one
can approve this. But it must be admitted that only in this way
could striking and rapid results have been reached; that indeed
in the stage of childhood, in which the Germans then were, it
had a certain measure of justification. By the history even of
its attack upon German paganism an entirely different career of
conflict and victory was marked out to Christianity than that
through which it had to pass in its conquests of Græco-Roman
paganism. In this latter case it had to confront a high form of
civilization which had outlived its powers and had lost itself
in its own perplexities, which for a thousand years had proved
in its civilization and history a παιδαγωγὸς εἰς Χριστόν.
All this was wanting to the Germans. If the Roman world might
be compared to a proselyte who in ripe, well proved and much
experienced maturity receives baptism, the conversion of the
Germans may be compared to the baptism of children.--Gregory the
Great had at first directed the missionaries to the Anglo-Saxons
(§ 77, 4) to destroy the idol temples of converted heathens. But
further reflection convinced him that it was better to transform
them into Christian churches, and now he laid it down as a maxim
in Roman Catholic missions that pagan forms of worship and places
of worship which were capable of modification to Christian uses
should be carefully preserved and respected: “_Nam duris mentibus
simul omnia abscindere impossibile esse dubium non est, quia et
is qui summum locum ascendere nititur, gradibus vel passibus,
non autem saltibus, elevatur._” It was a fateful, two-edged word,
which led Catholic missions to a brilliant outward success, but
has saturated the Catholic worship and life with a pagan leaven,
which works in it powerfully down to the present day.
§ 76. THE VICTORY OF CATHOLICISM OVER ARIANISM.[202]
The first conversions of multitudes of the German races occurred
at the time when Arianism had reached its climax in the Roman empire.
Internal disturbances and external pressure compelled a portion of
the Goths in the second half of the fourth century to throw themselves
into the arms of the East Roman empire and to purchase its protection
by the adoption of Arian Christianity. The missionary zeal of the
national clergy, with bishop Ulfilas at their head, though we cannot
indicate particularly his methods, spread Arianism in a short time
over a multitude of the German nationalities. Down to the end of
the fifth century Arianism was professed by the larger portion of
the German world, by Visigoths and Ostrogoths, by Vandals, Suevi and
Burgundians, by the Rugians and Herulians, by the Longobards, etc. And
as the early friendly relations to the Roman empire had given Arianism
a foundation among those peoples, so the later hostile relations to the
Roman empire now turned Catholic made them cling tenaciously to their
Arian heresy. Arianism had more and more assumed the character of a
national German Christianity, and it almost seemed as if the whole
German world, and with it the universal history of the future, were
its secure prey. But a quick end was made of these expectations by
the conversion of one of its chief branches to Catholicism. The Franks
had from the first pursued a policy which was directed rather to
the strengthening of the future of its brother tribes, than to the
accelerating of the downfall of the Roman empire. This policy led them
to embrace Catholicism. Trusting to the protection of the Catholic
Christians’ God and the sympathies of the whole Catholic West, the
Frankish rulers took advantage of the call to suppress heresy and
conquer heretics’ lands. To renounce heresy so as to find occasion for
attacking the territories of heretics, was probably with them a matter
of political necessity.
§ 76.1. =The Goths in the lands of the Danube.=--From the middle
of the 3rd century Christianity had found an entrance among the
Goths through Roman prisoners of war. At the Council of Nicæa
in A.D. 325 there was present a Gothic bishop Theophilus. From
A.D. 348 the scion of an imprisoned Cappadocian Christian family,
=Ulfilas=[203] by name, wrought as bishop among the Visigoths,
already attached to the Arian confession, with so much zeal and
success for the spread of Christianity that the hatred of the
pagans was roused to such a pitch that in A.D. 355 they began
a bloody persecution of the Christians. With a great part of the
Gothic Christians Ulfilas fled over the Danube, and the emperor
Constantius, who honoured him as a second Moses, assigned him
a dwelling-place in Mount Hæmus. Ulfilas continued his work for
thirty-three years with many tokens of blessing. In order that
the Goths might have access to the original fount of saving
knowledge, he translated the Holy Scriptures into their language,
for which he invented a written character of his own. He died
in A.D. 381. A short biography of the Apostle of the Goths
was written by his disciple Auxentius, bishop of Dorostorus
in Silistria, which gives an account at first hand of his life
and doctrine. But not all Gothic Christians were expatriated
with Ulfilas. Those who remained behind were a leaven which
ever continued to expand and spread. So Athanaric, king of the
Thervingians, about A.D. 370, started a new and cruel persecution
against them. Soon afterwards a rebellion broke out among the
pagan Thervingians. At the head of the malcontents was Frithigern.
He was subdued, but got aid from the emperor Valens and in
gratitude for the help given adopted the Arian religion of
the emperor. This was the first conversion in multitude among
the Goths. A second followed not long after. The Huns had rushed
down like a whirlwind in A.D. 375 and destroyed the empire of the
Ostrogoths. A part of these were obliged to join the Huns; while
another fled into the country of the Thervingians. These last
again were driven before the conquerors and crossed the Danube
under Frithigern and Alaviv, where in A.D. 376 Valens gave
them a settlement on condition that they should profess Arian
Christianity. But this friendship did not last long, and Valens
fell in A.D. 378 fighting against them. Theodosius, the restorer
of the Catholic faith in the Roman empire, made peace with them.
They retained, however, their Arian Confession, which spread
from them in a way not yet explained to the Ostrogoths and other
related tribes. Chrysostom started a Catholic mission among them,
but it was stopped at his death.
§ 76.2. =The Visigoths in Gaul and Spain.=--The death of
Theodosius in A.D. 395 and the partition of his empire gave
the signal to the Visigoths to attempt securing for themselves
more room. Alaric devastated Greece, broke in upon Italy in
search of prey and plundered Rome in A.D. 410. His successor
Athaulf descended upon southern Gaul, and Wallia founded there
a Visigoth empire with Toulouse for its capital, which under
Euric, who died in A.D. 483, reached the summit of its glory.
Euric extended his kingdom in Gaul, and in A.D. 475, conquered
the most of Spain. He sought to strengthen his government by
having one system of law and one religion, but in his projected
conversion of his subjects to Arianism, he met with unexpected
opposition, which he sought in vain to put down by a severe
persecution of the Catholics. The Roman population and the
Catholic bishops longed for a Catholic government and placed
their hopes in the Frankish king Clovis who had been converted
in A.D. 496. As saviour and avenger of the Catholic faith Clovis
completely destroyed the Visigoth power on this side the Pyrenees
in a battle at Vouglé near Poitiers in A.D. 507. In Spain,
however, the Visigoths retained their power and persisted in
their efforts to convert all to the Arian faith. Under the
violent Leovigild these efforts culminated in A.D. 585 in a
cruel persecution. His son and successor Reccared, however,
saw the vanity and danger of this policy and took the opposite
course. At the third Synod of Toledo in A.D. 589 he adopted the
Catholic faith and with the co-operation of the able metropolitan
Leander of Seville secured complete ascendency for Catholicism
throughout the empire. Under the later kings the Visigoth power
sank lower and lower amid the treacheries, murders and revolts of
internal factions, and in A.D. 711 the last king of the Visigoths,
Roderick, after a bloody fight at Xeres de la Frontera yielded to
the Saracens who had rushed down from Africa upon Spain.
§ 76.3. =The Vandals in Africa.=--Early in the 5th century
the Vandals, who were even then Arian Christians, combining
with the Alani and Suevi, made a descent from Pannonia upon
Gaul in A.D. 406 and from thence upon Spain in A.D. 409, and
made dreadful havoc of these rich and fertile lands. In A.D. 428
the Roman proconsul of Africa, Boniface, unjustly accused of
treason by the Roman government, in his straits called in the
aid of the Vandals. Their king Genseric went in A.D. 429 with
50,000 men. Boniface, however, was meanwhile reconciled with
his government and did all in his power to get the barbarians
to retire. But all in vain. Genseric conquered Africa and founded
there a powerful Vandal empire. In A.D. 455 he even made an
attack upon Rome, which was plundered by his hordes for fourteen
days. In order to prevent any sympathy being shown by Africa
for Rome he determined to secure throughout his empire uniform
profession of the Arian creed, and in prosecuting this purpose
during his fifty years’ reign exercised continual cruelties.
He died in A.D. 477. But the African Catholics were faithful to
their creed unto death and went forth to martyrdom in a spirit
worthy of their ancestors of the 2nd or 3rd centuries. His
son Hunneric allowed them only a short respite and began again
in A.D. 483 the bloody work. He died in A.D. 484. Under his
successor Guntamund [Gunthamund], who died in A.D. 496, a stop
was put to the persecution; but Thrasamund [Thrasimund], who died
in A.D. 523, again adopted bloody measures. Hilderic, who died
in A.D. 530, a man of mild and generous temper, and the son of
a Catholic mother, openly favoured the Catholics. Gelimer, a
great-grandson of Genseric, put himself at the head of the Arians
whom Hilderic’s catholic sympathies had alienated, took Hilderic
prisoner and had him executed. But before he could carry out the
intended persecution, Justinian’s general Belisarius marched into
Africa, annihilated the Vandal army in a battle near Tricameron
in A.D. 533, and overthrew the Vandal empire.[204]
§ 76.4. =The Suevi= were still heathens when they entered Spain
with the Vandals in A.D. 409. Here under their king Rechiar they
adopted the Catholic faith. But Remismund to please the Visigoths
went over to Arianism in A.D. 465 with the whole people. Carraric,
who thought he owed the cure of his son to the relics of Martin
of Tours, passed over again to Catholicism in A.D. 550. With
the co-operation of Martin, metropolitan of Braga, he converted
his people, and a Provincial Synod at Braga in A.D. 563 under
Theodimir I. completed the work. The empire of the Suevi was
destroyed by Leovigild king of the Visigoths, in A.D. 585.
§ 76.5. =The Burgundians= carried on by the irresistible advance
of Vandals, Suevi and Alani from their home on the Main and the
Neckar, where they had adopted the Catholic faith, founded an
independent kingdom in the Jura district. Here they came into
contact with the Visigoths and for the most part fell away to
Arianism. Of Gundiac’s four sons, who divided the empire among
them, only Chilperic II., the father of Clotilda, remained
Catholic. By fratricide his brother Gundobald secured complete
sovereignty. The bishop Avitus of Vienne (§ 53, 5), however,
vigorously opposed Arianism, and to secure its suppression called
a Council at Epaon in A.D. 517, the decisions of which were
recognised by Sigismund, Gundobald’s son, and were made valid
throughout the empire. But even this did not satisfy Clotilda,
the wife of the Frankish king Clovis, as an atonement for her
father’s death. Her sons, urged by their mother to prove avengers
of her father’s blood, made an end of the Burgundian empire in
A.D. 534.
§ 76.6. =The Rugians=, in combination with the Herulians,
Scyrians and Turcellingians, had founded an independent kingdom
in the Old Roman Noricum, the Lower Austria of to-day. Arianism
had been introduced among them by the Goths but without the
complete expulsion of paganism. The Romans among them attached to
Catholicism were sorely oppressed. But from A.D. 454, =Severinus=
wrought among them like a messenger from heaven to bless, help
and comfort the heavily burdened. He died in A.D. 482. Even from
the barbarians he won the deepest reverence, and over heathens
and Arians he had an almost magical power. He prophesied to the
Scyrian Odoacer his future greatness. This prince in A.D. 476
put an end to the West Roman empire and ruled ably and wisely
as king of Italy for seventeen years. He put an end too to Arian
fanaticism in Rugiland in A.D. 487 by overthrowing the empire of
the Rugians. But in A.D. 489 the Ostrogoth Theodoric came down
upon Italy, conquered Ravenna after a three years’ siege, took
Odoacer prisoner and in a wild drunken revel had him put to death
in A.D. 493.
§ 76.7. =The Ostrogoths= when they conquered Italy had already
for a long time been Arians, but were free from that fanaticism
which so often characterized German Arianism. Theodoric granted
full liberty to Catholicism, spared, protected and prized Roman
culture, in all which certainly his famous minister Cassiodorus
(§ 47, 23) had no small share. This liberal-minded tolerance was
indeed made easy to the king by the thirty-five years’ schism of
that time (§ 52, 5), which prevented any suspicions of danger to
the state from the combination of Roman and Byzantine Catholics.
And in fact, when this schism was healed in A.D. 519, Theodoric
began to interest himself more in Arianism and to give way
to such suspicions. He died in A.D. 526. The confusions that
followed his death were taken advantage of by the emperor
Justinian for the reconquest of Italy. His general Narses
annihilated the last remnants of the Ostrogoth power in A.D. 554.
The Byzantine government again rose upon the ruins of the Goths,
and in A.D. 567 established the exarchate with Ravenna as its
capital. For the time being Arianism was completely destroyed
in Italy.[205]
§ 76.8. =The Longobards in Italy.=--In A.D. 569 the Longobards
under Alboin made a descent upon Italy from the lands of the
Danube, and conquered what has been called Lombardy after them,
with its capital Ticinum, now Pavia. His successors extended
their conquests farther south, till at last only the farthest
point of Italy, the duchies of Naples, Rome and Perugia, Ravenna
with its subject cities and Venice, acknowledged Byzantine rule.
Excited by desire of plunder and political jealousy, the Arian
Longobards warred incessantly for twenty years with Roman
culture and Roman Catholicism. But after this first outburst of
persecution had been stilled, religious indolence won the upper
hand and the Arian clergy were not roused from their indifference
to spiritual things by the growing zeal for conversions which
characterized the Catholic bishops. Pope Gregory the Great,
A.D. 590-604, devoted himself unweariedly to the task, and was
powerfully supported by a Bavarian princess, the zealous Catholic
queen Theodelinde. The Longobards were so enamoured of this
fair and amiable queen that, when her first husband Anthari was
murdered in A.D. 590, one year after their marriage, they allowed
her to choose for herself one of the dukes to be her husband and
their king. Her choice fell on Agilulf, who indeed himself still
continued an Arian, but did not prevent the spread of Catholicism
among his people. Their daughter Gundiberge, married successively
to two Longobard kings, Ariowald († A.D. 636) and Rothari
(† A.D. 652) was an equally zealous protectress of the Catholic
church; and with Rothari’s successor Aribert, brother’s son of
Theodelinde, who died in A.D. 663, begins the series of Catholic
rulers of the Longobards.--Continuation, § 82, 1.
§ 76.9. =The Franks in Gaul.=--When the West Roman empire was
overthrown by Odoacer in A.D. 476, the Roman authority was still
for a long time maintained in Gaul by the proconsul Syagrius.
But the Merovingian Clovis, A.D. 481-511, put an end to it by
the battle of Soissons in A.D. 486. In A.D. 493 he married the
Burgundian princess Clotilda, and she, a zealous Catholic, used
every effort to convert her pagan husband. The national pride
of the Frank resisted long, but she got permission to have her
firstborn son baptized. The boy, however, died in his baptismal
robes, and Clovis regarded this as a punishment from his gods.
Nevertheless on the birth of his second son he was unable to
resist the entreaties of his beloved wife. He too sickened after
his baptism; but when contrary to expectation he recovered amid
the fervent prayers of the mother, the heathen father confessed
that prayer to the Christian’s God is more powerful than Woden’s
vengeance. He remembered this when threatened in A.D. 496 at
Tolbiac with loss of the battle, of his life and of his empire
in the war with the Alemanni. Prayer to the national gods had
proved fruitless. He now turned in prayer to the God of the
Christians, promising to own allegiance to Him, if He should
get the victory. The fortune of battle soon turned. The army and
kingdom of the Alemanni were destroyed. At his baptism at Rheims
on Christmas Eve, A.D. 496, Archbishop Remigius addressed him
thus: “Bend thy neck, proud Sigamber; adore what thou hast burnt,
burn what thou hast adored!” The later tradition, first reported
by Hincmar of Rheims in the 9th century, relates that when the
church officer with the anointing oil could not get forward
because of the crowd, in answer to Remigius’ prayer a white dove
brought an oil flask from heaven, out of which all the kings of
the Franks from that day have been anointed. The conversion of
Clovis, soon followed by that of the nobles and the people, seems
really to have been a matter of conviction and genuine according
to the measure of his knowledge of God. He made a bargain with
the Christian’s God and fulfilled the obligations under which
he had placed himself. Of an inner change of heart we can indeed
find no trace. There was, however, no mention of that in his
bargain. Just after his conversion he commits the most atrocious
acts of faithlessness, treachery and secret murder. The Catholic
clergy of the whole West nevertheless celebrated in him a second
Constantine, called of God as avenger upon heathenism and Arian
heresy, and asked of him nothing more, seeing in this the task
which providence had assigned him. The conversion of Clovis was
indeed in every respect an occurrence of the greatest moment.
The rude Arianism of the Germans, incapable of culture, received
here its deathblow. The civilization and remnants of culture of
the ancient world found in the Catholic church its only suitable
vehicle for introduction into the German world; and now the
Franks were at the head of it and laid the foundation of a new
universal empire which would for centuries form the central
point of universal history. On the work of Friddin [Fridolin]
and Columbanus in the land of the Franks, see § 77, 7.
§ 77. VICTORY OF THE ROMISH OVER THE OLD BRITISH CHURCH.[206]
According to an ancient but more than doubtful tradition a British
king Lucius about the middle of the 2nd century is said to have asked
Christian missionaries of the Roman bishop Eleutherus and by them to
have been converted along with his people. This, however, is certain,
that at the end of the 3rd century (§ 22, 6) Christianity had taken
root in Roman Britain, probably through intercourse with the Romans.
Down to the Anglo-Saxon invasion in A.D. 449, the British church
certainly kept up regular communication with that of the continent,
especially with Gaul. From that time, being driven back into North
and South Wales, it was completely isolated from the continental church;
but all the more successfully it spread itself out among its neighbours
in the allied tribes of Ireland and Scotland, among the former through
Patrick, the Apostle of the Irish, among the latter by Columba, the
Apostle of the Scots, and followed a thoroughly independent course of
development. When one hundred and fifty years later, in A.D. 596 the
long interrupted intercourse with Rome was again renewed by a Romish
mission to the Anglo-Saxons, several divergences from Roman practice
were discovered among the Britons in respect of worship, constitution
and discipline. Rome insisted that these should be corrected, but
the Britons insisted on retaining them and repudiated the pretensions
of the Romish hierarchy. The keen struggle which therefore arose,
beginning amid circumstances that promised a brilliant success to
the British church, ended with complete submission to Rome. The
battle-field was then transferred to Germany, and there too in spite
of the resolute resistance of their apostles the contest concluded
with the same result (§ 78). The struggle was not merely one of highly
tragic interest but of incomparable importance for the history of
Europe. For had the result been, as for a time it seemed likely that
it would be, in favour of the old British church, not only England but
also all Germany would have taken up a decidedly anti-papal attitude,
and not only the ecclesiastical but also the political history of
the Middle Ages would have most likely been led into an altogether
different course.
§ 77.1. =The Conversion of the Irish.=--Among the Celtic
inhabitants of the island of Ireland there were some individual
Christians from the beginning of the 5th century. The mission
of a Roman deacon Palladius in A.D. 431 was without result. But
in the following year, A.D. 432, the true apostle of the Irish,
=Patrick=, with twenty-four companions, stept upon the shore of
the island. The only reliable source of information about his
life and work is an autobiography which he left behind him,
_Confessiones_. According to it he was grandson of a presbyter
and son of a deacon residing at Banava, probably in Britain, not
likely in Gaul. In his sixteenth year he was taken to Ireland by
Irish pirates and sold to an Irish chief whose flocks he tended
for six years. After his escape by flight the love of Christ
which glowed within his heart gave him no rest and his dreams
urged him to bring the glorious liberty of the children of God
to those who so long kept him bound under hard slavery. Familiar
with the language and the customs of the country, he gathered the
people by beat of drum into an open field and told them of the
sufferings of Christ for man’s salvation. The Druids, priests
of the Celts, withstood him vigorously, but his attractive and
awe-inspiring personality gained the victory over them. Without
a drop of martyr’s blood Ireland was converted in a few years,
and was thickly strewn with churches and monasteries. Patrick
himself had his residence at Macha, round which the town of
Armagh, afterwards the ecclesiastical metropolis, sprang up. He
died about A.D. 465, and left the island church in a flourishing
condition. The numerous monasteries, in which calm piety
flourished along with diligent study of Scripture and from which
many teachers and missionaries went forth, won for the land the
name of _Insula Sanctorum_. Only after the robber raids of the
Danes in the 9th century did the glory of the Irish monasteries
begin to fade.[207]
§ 77.2. =The Mission to Scotland.=--A Briton, Ninian, educated
at Rome, wrought, about A.D. 430, among the Celtic =Picts= and
=Scots= in Scotland or Caledonia. But those converted by him fell
back into paganism after his death. The true Apostle of Scotland
was the Irishman =Columba=. In A.D. 563 he settled with twelve
disciples on the small Hebridean island Hy. Its common name,
Iona, seems to have originated by a clerical error from Ioua,
and was then regarded as the Hebrew equivalent of Columba, a dove.
Icolmkill means Columba’s cell. Here he founded a monastery and
a church, and converted from this centre all Caledonia. Although
to the last only a presbyter and abbot of this monastery, he had
all the authority of an apostle over the Scottish church and its
bishops, a position that was maintained by successive abbots of
Iona. He died in A.D. 597. The numerous monasteries founded by
him vied with the Irish in learning, piety and missionary zeal.
The original monastery of Iona flourished in a superlative
degree.[208]
§ 77.3. =The Peculiarities of the Celtic Church.=--In the
Anglo-Saxon struggle the following were the main points at issue.
1. On the part of Rome it was demanded that they should submit
to the archiepiscopal jurisdiction instituted by the pope,
which the British refused as an unrighteous assumption.
2. The British had an =Easter Canon= different from that
of the Romish church. They were indeed nothing else than
Quartodecimans, although they like these in ignorance
referred to the Johannine tradition (§ 34, 2), but celebrated
their Easter always on a Sunday, the settling of which they
decided according to an 84 years’ cycle of the moon, after
Rome had adopted a cycle of 19 years (§ 56, 3).
3. The Celtic clergy had also a different =Tonsure= from the
Roman _Tonsura Petri_ which seems to have been the Greek
_Tonsura Pauli_ (§ 45, 1), although the zealous advocate of
the Roman customs, Ceolfrid, abbot of Jarrow, in a letter
to Naitan, king of the Picts, derives it from Simon Magus.
4. Besides this there was also the question of the Marriage
of Priests, which indeed the popish Anglo-Saxon Archbishop
Augustine declared himself at first willing to allow to the
British, which, however, was subsequently so passionately
denounced by Boniface as _fornicatio_ and _adulterium_.
5. If, further, according to Bede’s statement, besides their
divergent views about Easter, the British _et alia plurima
imitati ecclesiasticæ contraria faciebant_, this certainly
cannot be understood of doctrinal divergences, but
only of different forms of constitution and worship,
or ecclesiastical habits and customs, as might be well
expected in churches that had been completely separated
since A.D. 449. We need only think, _e.g._, of the progress
made by the idea of the papal primacy (§ 46, 7-10), the
consolidation and reconstruction of monasticism under
Benedict (§ 85), the codification of Roman canon law by
Dionysius Exiguus (§ 43, 3), the modification of the idea
of penance since Leo the Great (§ 61, 1) and the development
of the doctrine of the mass down to Gregory the Great
(§ 58, 3; 59, 6). The most considerable peculiarity of
constitution in the Celtic church seems to have been that
above referred to in placing the abbots of the principal
monasteries at the head of the hierarchy. Only in one
passage (Bede, III. 19) is there mention of ecclesiastical
doctrine: In A.D. 640 Pope John IV. addressed a conciliatory
letter to the Scots in which he warns them against the
Pelagian heresy, “_quam apud eos revivescere didicerat_.”
When then we turn our attention to the Celtic church planted on
the continent at a later period, it is specially Columbanus’ view
of Easter that is regarded in France as heretical. Often and loud
as Boniface lifted up his voice against the horrible heresies
of British, Irish and Scotch intruders, it is found at last that
these consist in the same or similar divergences as those of the
Anglo-Saxons. Not insisting upon the law of celibacy, opposition
to the Roman primacy, the Romish tradition and the Romish canon
law, especially the ever-increasing strictness of the Roman
marriage laws (§ 61, 2), more simple modes of administering the
sacraments and conducting public worship, even in unconsecrated
places in forests and fields,--these and such like were the
heresies complained of.--As concerns the _pro_ and _con._ of
the evangelical purity of the ancient British Christianity, so
highly praised by Ebrard, one occupying an impartial historical
standpoint is justified in expecting that as all the good
development so also all the bad development which had taken
firm root in the common thought and feeling of the church down
to the middle of the 5th century, would not have been uprooted
from the church of Patrick and Columba, so also in the 7th
century it would be still prevalent there. And this expectation
is in general confirmed, so far as our information goes about
all which was not expressly imported from Rome into the British
church. If we deduct the by no means insignificant amount of
unevangelical corruption which was first introduced into the
Romish church during the period between Leo the Great and Gregory
the Great, A.D. 440-604, partly by exaggerating and adorning
elements previously there, partly by bringing in wholly new
elements of ecclesiastical credulity, superstition and mistaken
faith, there still remains for the Celtic church standing outside
of this process of deterioration a relatively purer doctrine. Yet
the Christianity that remains is by no means free of mixture from
unevangelical elements as Jonas of Bobbio himself shows in his
biography of his teacher Columbanus. But the more embittered the
conflict between the British and the Romish churches became over
matters of constitution and worship, the more did differences
in faith and life, which had been overlooked at first, assume
serious proportions, and supported by a careful study of
Scripture, led to greater evangelical freedom and purity on
the side of the British. This is thoroughly confirmed by Ebrard’s
numerous quotations from the literature of that period.[209]
§ 77.4. =The Romish Mission to the Anglo-Saxons.=--To protect
himself against the robber raids of the Picts and Scots, the
British king Vortigern sought the aid of the Germans inhabiting
the opposite shores. Two princes of the Jutes, Hengist and Horsa,
driven from their home, led a horde of Angles and Saxons over
to Britain in A.D. 449. New hordes kept following those that had
gone before and after a hundred years the British were driven
back into the western parts of the island. The incomers founded
seven kingdoms; at the head of all stood the prince of one of
the divisions who was called principal king, the Bretwalda. The
Anglo-Saxons were heathens and the bitter feelings that prevailed
between them and the ancient Britons prevented the latter
from carrying on missionary operations among the former. The
opportunity which the British missed was seized upon by Rome.
The sight of Anglo-Saxon youths exposed as slaves in the Roman
market inspired a pious monk, afterwards Pope Gregory I., with
a desire to evangelize a people of such noble bodily appearance.
He wished himself to take the work in hand, but was hindered
by the call to the chair of Peter. He now bought Anglo-Saxon
youths in order to train them as missionaries to their
fellow-countrymen. But when soon thereafter the Bretwalda
Ethelbert of Kent married the Frankish princess Bertha, Gregory
sent the Roman abbot =Augustine= to England with forty monks in
A.D. 596. Ethelbert gave them a residence and support in his own
capital Dorovernum, now Canterbury. At Pentecost the following
year he received baptism and 10,000 of his subjects followed his
example. Augustine asked from Gregory further instructions about
relics, books, etc. The pope sent him what he sought and besides
the pallium with archiepiscopal rights over the whole Saxon and
British church. Augustine now demanded of the Britons submission
to his archiepiscopal authority and that they should work
together with him for the conversion of the Saxons. But the
British would do nothing of the sort. A personal interview with
their chiefs under Augustine’s oak in A.D. 603 was without result.
At a second conference everything was spoilt by Augustine’s
prelatic pride in refusing to stand up on the arrival of the
Britons. Inclined to compliance the Britons had just proposed
this at the suggestion of a member as a sign. Augustine died
in A.D. 605. The pope nominated as his successor his previous
assistant Laurentius. Ethelbert’s heathen son and successor,
Eadbald, oppressed the missionaries so much that they decided
to withdraw from the field, in A.D. 616. Only Laurentius delayed
his retreat in order to make a final attempt at the conversion of
Eadbald. He was successful. Eadbald was baptized; the fugitives
returned to their former posts. In the kingdom of Essex Augustine
had already established Christianity, but a change of government
had again restored paganism. The gospel, however, soon afterwards
got entrance into Northumbria, the most powerful of the seven
kingdoms. King Edwin, the founder of Edinburgh, won the hand of
the Kentish princess Ethelberga, daughter of Bertha. With her,
as spiritual adviser of the young queen, went the monk Paulinus,
A.D. 625. These two persuaded the king and he again persuaded
his nobles and the priests to embrace Christianity. At a popular
assembly Paulinus proved the truth of Christianity, and the
chief priest Coisi, setting at defiance the gods of his fathers,
flung with his own hand a spear into the nearest idol temple.
The people thought him mad and looked for Woden’s vengeance.
When it came not, they obeyed the command of Coisi and burnt
down the temple, A.D. 627. Paulinus was made bishop of Eboracum,
now York, which pope Honorius on sending a pallium raised to
a second metropolitanate. Edwin, however, fell in battle in
A.D. 633 fighting against Penda, the pagan king of Mercia;
Paulinus had to flee and the church of Northumbria was almost
entirely rooted up.[210]
§ 77.5. =Celtic Missions among the Anglo-Saxons.=--The saviour
of Northumbria was Oswald, A.D. 635-642, the son of a former
king who had been driven out by Edwin. He had found refuge as
a fugitive in the monastery of Hy and was there converted to
Christianity. To restore the church in Northumbria the monks
sent him one of their number, the amiable Aidan. Oswald acted as
his interpreter until he acquired the Saxon language. His success
was unexampled. Oswald founded a religious establishment for him
on the island of Lindisfarne, and supported by new missionaries
from Hy, Aidan converted the whole of the northern lands to
Christianity. Oswald fell in battle against Penda. He was
succeeded as king and also as Bretwalda by his brother Oswy.
Irish missionaries joined the missionary monks of Hy, rivalling
them in their exertions, and by A.D. 660 all the kingdoms of
the Heptarchy had been converted to Christianity, and down to
this date all, with the exception of Kent, which alone still
adhered to the Romish church, belonged to the ancient British
communion.[211]
§ 77.6. =The Celtic Element Driven out of the Anglo-Saxon
Church.=--Oswy perceived the political danger attending the
continuance of such ecclesiastical disputes. He succeeded in
convincing also his neighbour kings of the need of ecclesiastical
uniformity. The only question was as to which of the two should
be recognised. The choice fell upon the Romish. Oswy himself
most decidedly preferred it. His wife Eanfled, Edwin’s daughter,
was a zealous partisan of the Romish church, and on her side
stood a man of extraordinary power, prudence and persistence, the
abbot Wilfrid, a native Northumbrian, trained in the monastery of
Lindisfarne. He had, however, visited Rome, and since then used
all his eloquence and skill in intrigue in order to lay all
England at the feet of the pope. The queen and the abbot wrought
together upon the Bretwalda, and he in his turn upon the other
princes. To these personal influences were added others of a
more general kind: the preference for things foreign over those
of home growth, the brilliancy and preponderating weight of the
Romish church, and above all, the gulf, not yet by any means
bridged over, between the Saxons and the British. When secret
negociations toward the desired end had been carried out, Oswy
called a general Synod at the nunnery of Streoneshalch, now
Whitby, _Synodus Pharensis_, A.D. 664. Here all the civil and
ecclesiastical notabilities of the Heptarchy were assembled.
The chief speaker on the Roman side was Wilfrid, on the Celtic
side bishop Colman of Lindisfarne. The observance of Easter was
the first subject of discussion. Wilfrid referred to the Apostle
Peter, to whom the Lord said: Thou art Peter, etc. Then Oswy
asked Colman whether it was true that the Lord had said so to
Peter. Colman could not deny it, and Oswy declared that he would
follow him who had the power to open for them the gates of heaven.
And so the question was settled. Oswy as Bretwalda carried out
with energy the decisions of the Council, and within a few weeks
the scissors had completed the conversion of the whole Heptarchy
to the Roman tonsure and the Roman faith.[212]
§ 77.7. =Spread and Overthrow of the British Church on the
Continent.=--The first Celtic missionary who crossed the channel
was the Irishman =Fridolin=, about A.D. 500. With several
companions he settled near Poitiers in Aquitaine which was
then under the Visigoths, converted the Arian bishop of that
place together with his congregation to trinitarian orthodoxy,
and, under the protection of Clovis, who had meanwhile, A.D. 507,
overthrown the Visigoth power in Gaul, founded churches and
monasteries. Afterwards he wrought among the heathen Alemanni in
Switzerland (§ 78, 1). We have fuller and more reliable accounts
of Columba the younger, usually called =Columbanus=, an Irishman
by birth, who, in A.D. 590, with twelve zealous companions, went
forth from the British monastery of Bangor in Co. Down, Ireland,
and settled among the Vosges mountains. Here they founded the
monastery of Luxovium, now Luxeuil, as centre with many others
affiliated to it. They cultivated the wilderness and wrought
laboriously in restoring church discipline and order in a region
that had been long spiritually neglected. But their strict
adherence to the British mode of observing Easter caused offence.
The severe moral discipline which they enjoined was galling to
the careless Burgundian clergy, and the aged Brunehilda swore
to compass their death and destruction, because of the influence
adverse to her authority which they exercised upon her grandson,
the young king Theodoric II. Thus it happened that in A.D. 610,
after twenty years’ labours, they were driven away. They turned
then to Switzerland (§ 78, 1). But when persecuted here also,
Columbanus with his followers migrated to Italy, about A.D. 612,
where, under Agilulf’s protection (§ 76, 8), he founded the
celebrated monastery of Bobbio and contended against Arianism.
The _Regula Columbani_ extant in several MSS. constitutes a
written guide to Christian piety and breathes a free evangelical
spirit, while the annexed _Regula cœnobialis fratrum de Hibernia_,
also ascribed to him, bears a rigoristic ascetic character,
enjoining frequent flagellations. Columbanus died in A.D. 615.
The monks of his order joined the Benedictines in the 9th century.
On his personal relation to the Romish chair during his residence
in Gaul and Italy we get some information from three of his
epistles still extant. In the first he asks Gregory the Great
for an explanation of the Gallic observance of Easter, and in
the second he asks Boniface IV. to confirm his old British mode
of reckoning Easter. In both he recognises the pope as occupier
of the chair of Peter, and in the second greets him as head of
all the churches of Europe and describes the Roman church as the
chief seat of the orthodox faith. In the third, on the other hand,
he demands of the pope in firm terms an account of his own faith
and that of the Roman church. He did so in consequence of a
report having reached him, probably through the mention by the
5th œcum. Council (§ 52, 6) of a schism between Rome and Northern
Italy, that the Roman chair had fallen into the heresies of
Eutyches and Nestorius.--The ablest of Columbanus’ followers
was Gallus or St. Gall. He remained in Switzerland and had his
faithfulness rewarded by rich success. After Columbanus had been
expelled from France traces of Celtic ecclesiastical institutions
may indeed for a considerable time have lingered on among his
Frankish scholars and friends animated by the missionary zeal
of their master. For from their midst as it would seem proceeded
most of those Frankish missionaries who carried the gospel in the
7th century to the German lands (§ 78). But from the time of the
overthrow of the old Celtic ecclesiastical system at the Synod of
Streoneshalch in A.D. 664, whole troops of its adherents, British,
Irish, Scotch and Anglo-Saxons, crossed the channel to convert
Germany. With very few exceptions, only the names of these men,
and for the most part not even these, have come down to us. But
their zeal and success are witnessed to by the fact that even in
the beginning of the 8th century throughout all the district of
the Rhine, as well as Hesse, Thuringia, Bavaria and Alemannia
we find a network of flourishing churches bearing the impress
of Celtic institutions. And the overthrow of this great and
promising ecclesiastical system, partly by peaceful, partly by
violent transportation into the Romish church, was the work of
the Anglo-Saxon Winfrid, whom the Romanists, quite rightly from
their point of view, honour, under the name of Boniface, as the
Apostle of Germany (§ 78, 4-8).[213]
§ 77.8. =Overthrow of the Old British System in the Iro-Scottish
Church.=--After the British Church had lost, in A.D. 664, all
support in the Anglo-Saxon Heptarchy, it could not long maintain
itself in its own original Celtic home. The Scottish kings
on political grounds, in order to avoid giving their Saxon
neighbours an opportunity of gratifying the love of conquest
under the pretext of zeal for the faith, were obliged to
assimilate their church organization with that of the Southerns.
The learned Abbot Adamnan of Hy, when, in A.D. 684, by order
of his king, he visited the Northumbrian court, professed to
be there convinced of the correctness of the Romish observance
of Easter. But when his monks stoutly resisted, he left the
monastery and went on a missionary tour to Ireland where he
urged his views so successfully that in A.D. 701 the most of the
Irish adopted the Roman reckoning. Some years later, in A.D. 710,
Naitan II., the powerful king of the Picts, asked instructions
from Abbot Ceolfrid about the superiority of the Romish practice
regarding Easter and the tonsure, forced his whole people to
adopt the Romish doctrine and banished the obstinate priests.
Finally, the Anglo-Saxon Egbert, educated in Ireland, but
subsequently won over to the Romish church, induced by visions
and tempests to abandon his projected mission to the heathen
Frisians (§ 78, 3), and to devote himself to what was regarded
as the more arduous task of the conversion of the schismatical
monks of Hy, succeeded in A.D. 716 in so far overcoming their
obstinacy that they at least gave up their divergent tonsure and
Easter reckoning. Thereafter the Romanists were satisfied with
the gradual Romanizing of the whole Celtic regions in the west
and north. In worship, constitution and discipline all remained
for a long time as it had been of old. The Roman law of celibacy
could not win its way. Public worship was conducted and the
sacraments dispensed in the language of the people and in the
simple forms of primitive times. Canon law was almost everywhere
made subordinate to the customs of the national church. Indeed,
when in A.D. 843, the kingdom of the Picts, where the papacy
had made most progress, went by inheritance to the Scottish
king Kenneth, he restored even there the old ecclesiastical
institutions of their fathers. Malcolm III., who died in
A.D. 1093, was the first of the Scottish kings to begin the
complete, thorough and lasting Romanizing of the whole country.
His marriage with the English princess Margaret, a zealous
supporter of the papacy, marks the beginning of that policy
which was carried out and completed by their son David, who
died in A.D. 1152. In Ireland the English conquest of A.D. 1171
under Henry III. prepared the way for the complete Romanizing
of the island. Still in both Scotland and Ireland down to the
14th century many of the old Celtic priests survived. To them was
given the Celtic name Kele-de, _servus_ or _vir Dei_, Latinized
as Colidei, and in modern form, Culdees. They were secular
priests who, bound by a strict rule, in companies generally of
twelve with a prior over them, like a Catholic canon (§ 84, 1),
devoted themselves to a common spiritual life and activity,
maintaining an existence in many places down to the end of
the 8th century. The origin of the rule under which they lived
is still very obscure. It allowed them to marry but enforced
abstinence from marital intercourse during the period of their
service, and required of them, besides the charge of the public
services, special attention to the poor. In Scotland particularly
their societies soon became so numerous that almost the whole
secular clergy went over to them. By the forcible introduction
of regular canons they were crushed more and more down to the
11th century, or where they still existed, they were deprived
of the right of pastoral supervision and administration of the
sacraments and reduced to subordinate positions, such as that
of choir singers.--The usual application of the name of Culdees
to all, even earlier representatives of the Celtic church, is
quite unjustifiable.[214]
§ 78. THE CONVERSION AND ROMANIZING OF GERMANY.[215]
In the Roman period the regions of the Rhine and the Danube had
become Christian countries, but the rush of the migration of the
peoples had partly destroyed the Christian foundations, partly overlaid
them with heathen superstitions. By the end of the 6th century a great
part of Germany was already under the dominion of the Franks, and,
to distinguish it from the country of the West Franks or Neustria,
was called Austrasia or the land of the East Franks. South-western
and South-eastern Germany (Alemannia, Bavaria, Thuringia) was governed
by native dukes under the often disputed over-lordship of the Franks.
North-western Germany (embracing the Frisians and the Saxons) still
enjoyed undisputed national independence. The first serious attempt
to introduce or restore Christianity in Austrasia began about the end
of the 6th century. The missionaries who took the work in hand went,
partly from Neustria, partly from this side of the Channel. The Irish
and Scottish monasteries were overflowing. Those dwelling in them
had an unconquerable passion for travel and in their hearts an eager
longing to spread Christ’s kingdom by preaching the gospel. This
impulse was greatly strengthened by the overthrow of their national
prestige (§ 77, 6). They were thus out of sympathy with their native
land, and were encouraged to hope that they might win on the opposite
continent what they had lost at home. Crowds of monks from Iro-Scottish
monasteries crossed over into the heathen provinces of Germany. But
Romish Christian Anglo-Saxons, no less fond of travel, impelled by
the same missionary fervour and no slight zeal for their own communion,
followed in their steps. Thus in the 8th century on German soil the
struggle was renewed which at home had been already fought out, to
end again as before in the defeat of the Celtic claims. In almost all
German countries we find traces of Irish or Scottish missionaries and
married priests, reproachfully styled adulterers. What mainly secured
for the Anglo-Saxons the victory over them was the practical talent for
organization shown by the former, and their attachment to the imposing
spiritual power of the papal see. To them alone is Germany indebted
for her incorporation into the Roman ecclesiastical union; for even
the Frankish missionaries for the most part had no connection with
Rome.--Most rapid and successful progress was made by the mission
where there had previously been Christian institutions, _e.g._ in
the provinces of the Rhine and the Danube. The work was more difficult
on the east of the Scheldt in Friesland, Hesse, Thuringia and Saxony,
where paganism had reigned undisturbed. Mission work was at once
furthered and hindered by the selfish patronage of the Frankish rulers.
Paganism and national liberty, the yoke of Christ and the yoke of the
Franks, seemed inseparably conjoined. The one stood and fell with the
other. The sword of the Franks was to make the way for the cross of
Christ, and the result of preaching was to afford an introduction to
political subjection. The missionaries submitted regretfully to this
amalgamation of religious and political interests, but it was generally
unavoidable.
§ 78.1. =South-Western Germany.=--Here were located the
powerful race of the =Alemanni=. Of the Christian institutions
of the Roman period only some shadowy remnants were now to be
seen. The diet of Tolbiac in A.D. 496 which gave the Franks a
Christian king, first secured an entrance among the Alemanni
to Christianity. Yet progress was slow, for the Franks did
not resort to force. The revision of Alemannian jurisprudence,
concluded by Dagobert I. about A.D. 630, assumed indeed that the
country was wholly Christian, but it only anticipated what the
country was destined to become. =Fridolin= (§ 77, 7), founder
of the monastery of Seckingen on an island of the Rhine above
Basel, is called the first Apostle of the Alemanni, A.D. 510.
The reports that have reached us of his work are highly legendary
and unreliable. After =Columbanus= in A.D. 610 had been compelled
along with his companions to leave the Frankish territory
(§ 77, 7), he chose Alemannian Switzerland as the field of their
operations. They settled first of all at Tuggen on the Zurich
lake. The fiery zeal with which they destroyed heathen idols,
roused the wrath of the inhabitants, who maltreated them and
drove them away. They next wrought for three years at Bregentz
where they converted many pagans. The main instrument in this
work was =Gallus= who had gained thorough mastery of the language
of the people. Driven from this place also, Columbanus and
his followers settled in Italy. Only =Gallus=, who was ill at
the time, remained behind. He felt obliged, in spite of all
unfavourable circumstances, to carry on the work that had been
begun. In a wild forest dale by the stream Steinach, where he
was held firm by a thorn bush while on his knees praying, he
built a cell, from which arose in later times the famous abbey of
St. Gall. He died, after an eminently useful and successful life
in his 95th year in A.D. 646. He does not seem to have been so
persistent as Columbanus in maintaining the peculiarities of the
British church. His disciple =Magnoald= continued his work and
founded the monastery of Füssen on the Upper Lech in Swabia. At
the same time there wrought at Breisgau the hermit =Trudpert=, an
Irishman, who laid the foundation of the future abbey of Trudpert
at the foot of the Black Forest, and was murdered in A.D. 643
by a servant given up to him for forced labour. Somewhat later
we meet with =Pirminius=, a Frankish cleric, on the Lake of
Constance, where, under the protection of the Frankish ruler
Charles Martel, he founded the monastery of Reichenau in A.D. 724.
A national rising of the Alemanni against the Franks drove him
away after three years; but the monastery remained uninjured. He
then proceeded down the Rhine and founded several monasteries,
the last at Hornbach in the diocese of Metz, where he died in
A.D. 753.
§ 78.2. =South-Eastern Germany.=--After the successful labours
of Severinus (§ 76, 6) the history of the Danubian provinces
is shrouded in thick darkness. A hundred years later we find
there the powerful nation of the Boyars, now Bavarians, with
native dukes descended from Agilulf. Only scanty remnants of
Christianity were to be seen. In A.D. 615 the Frankish abbot
=Eustasius= of Luxeuil, the successor of Columbanus, appears
prosecuting the missionary labours, and struggling against the
so-called heresies of Bonosus and Photinus, remnants probably
of Gothic Arianism. About the middle of the 7th century, at the
court of the Duke of Bavaria, Theodo I., at Regensburg, =Emmeran=,
bishop of Poitiers, laboured for three years. Suddenly he
left the country and made a pilgrimage to Italy. Being charged
with the seduction of the Princess Ota, he was on his journey
in A.D. 652, according to others in A.D. 715, overtaken by her
brother and cruelly murdered. Ota is said at the advice of the
saint himself to have named him as her seducer, in order to
screen the actual seducer from vengeance. The true Apostle of
Bavaria was bishop =Rupert= of Worms. In A.D. 696 he baptized
the Duke Theodo II. with his household, founded many churches
and monasteries, and almost completed the Christianizing of
the country. The centre of his operations was the bishopric of
Salzburg, founded by him. About A.D. 716 he returned to Worms
and died there in A.D. 717. An old tradition describes him as
a Scot, whether in respect of his descent or of his undoubtedly
ecclesiastical tendencies, is uncertain. We find at least no
trace of his having had any connection with Rome. Soon after
him a Frankish itinerant bishop called =Corbinianus= made his
appearance in Bavaria, and was the founder of the episcopal see
at Freisingen, A.D. 724. He was a man of imperious temper and
unbending stubbornness, who exercised discipline with reckless
strictness, rooted out the remnants of pagan superstition, and
founded many churches and monasteries. He died in A.D. 730.--That
the Frankish missionaries were still more or less influenced by
the old British traditions is shown by the fact that Boniface
found the Bavarian church free from Rome. Duke Theodo II. soon
after Rupert’s departure on a pilgrimage to Rome had indeed
entered into relations with Gregory II., in consequence of which
three Roman clerics made their appearance in Bavaria. But the
organization of the Bavarian church committed to them by the
pope could not be carried out on account of political troubles.
Boniface was the first who succeeded in some measure in
doing this.--The Apostle of the neighbouring Thuringians was
an Irishman =Kilian= or Kyllena, who, toward the end of the
7th century, along with twelve companions, entered the province
of Würzburg. These faithful men found the reward of their labours
in the crown of martyrdom. But crowds of their zealous believing
fellow-countrymen followed them, and continued with rich success
the work which they had begun, until, after a hard struggle, they
were obliged to resign the field to Boniface.
§ 78.3. =North-Western Germany.=--In the Middle Rhine provinces
Christian episcopal dioceses had been maintained, but in a feeble
condition and overrun with crowds of heathen people. About the
middle of the 6th century a Frank called =Goar= settled as a
hermit within the bounds of the diocese of Treves, converted
many of the surrounding heathens and put to shame the envious
suspicions of the clergy of Treves, his holiness being attested
according to later legends by many extraordinary miracles. The
beautiful town of St. Goar has grown up round the spot where he
built his cell and church. After him in the same region wrought
a Longobard =Wulflaich= who as a stylite (§ 44, 6), in spite
of the northern climate, preached down to the heathens from
his pillar. But the neighbouring bishops disliked his senseless
asceticism and had the pillar thrown down.--After the Frankish
king Dagobert I. conquered the south of the Netherlands in
A.D. 630, an accomplished Frankish priest, =Amandus=, appeared
at Rome preaching the gospel among the Frisians settled there.
The command given by him for the compulsory baptism of all the
pagans only intensified the hatred against him and his sacred
message. Insulted, maltreated and repeatedly thrown into the
Scheld, he left the country to missionarize among the Basques
of the Pyrenees and then among the Slavs of the Danube. But at
a later period he returned to Ghent, and gained great influence
after having succeeded in converting a rich Frisian called
Bavo, with whose help he built two monasteries. In A.D. 647
he was chosen bishop of Maestricht, but retired in A.D. 649,
notwithstanding the dissuasion of Pope Martin I., on account of
the opposition of his clergy, and then founded the monastery of
Elno, afterwards called St. Amand, near Tournay, where he died
in A.D. 648. During the same period wrought =Eligius=, formerly a
skilful goldsmith at the court of Dagobert, from A.D. 641 bishop
of Noyon, where he died in A.D. 658. He took numerous missionary
journeys for the conversion of the Frisians extending as far
as the Scheld. From this side of the Channel too wistful eyes
had looked over to the Frisian coasts. A Briton said to have
been converted to Romanism by Augustine the Apostle of the
Anglo-Saxons, =Livinus=, appeared as a missionary on the Scheld
about A.D. 650, but was slain by the heathens soon after his
arrival. The celebrated supporter of Romish claims, =Wilfrid=
(§ 77, 6), first preached the gospel to the Frisians living
north of the Scheld. He had been elected archbishop of York, but,
expelled from his bishopric (§ 88, 3), he went to seek protection
at Rome and was cast by a storm on the Frisian shores, which was
fortunate for him as hired assassins waited for him in France.
He spent the winter of A.D. 677-678 in Friesland, preached daily,
baptized Duke Aldgild and “thousands” of the people. But in
the following spring he took his departure. Aldgild’s successor
Radbod († A.D. 719), who passed his whole life in war with Pippin
of Heristal († A.D. 714) and Charles Martel, hated and persecuted
Christianity as the religion of the Franks, and the seed sown
by Wilfrid perished. Pippin’s victory at Dorstadt in A.D. 689
compelled him for a time to show greater toleration. Then
immediately a Frankish mission was started under bishop =Wulfram=
of Sens, a pupil of the monastery of Fontanelle founded by
Columbanus. According to an interesting tradition, which, however,
does not stand the test of criticism, Radbod was himself just
about to receive baptism, but drew back from the baptismal font,
because he would rather go with his glorious forefathers to hell
than enter the Christian heaven with a crowd of miserable people.
It is probably only a legend designed in the interest of the
doctrine of predestination.--The true Apostle of the Frisians was
the Anglo-Saxon =Wilibrord= who, in company with twelve followers,
undertook the work in A.D. 690. Born in Northumbria about
A.D. 658, he received his first training under Wilfrid at the
monastery of Ripon and then in an Irish monastery under the
direction of Egbert, whose debt to the Frisians (§ 77, 8) he
now undertook to pay. Pippin gave protection and aid to the
missionaries, and Wilibrord travelled to Rome that he might get
there support for his life work. He returned armed with papal
approbation and supplied with relics. But meanwhile a party of
his followers, probably dissatisfied with his control, sent one
of their number called Suidbert to England, where he received
episcopal consecration. Wilibrord’s party, however, kept the
upper hand. Suidbert went to the Bructeri on the Upper Ems, and,
when driven thence by the Saxons, to the Rhine, where he built a
monastery on an island of the Rhine given him by Pippin, and died
there in A.D. 715.--After many years’ successful labour Wilibrord,
at Pippin’s command, went a second time to Rome in A.D. 696, to
be there consecrated a bishop. Sergius I. gave him consecration
under the name of Clement, distinguishing him in this way as
an eminent man, and Pippin gave him the castle of Utrecht as
an episcopal residence. From this centre his missionary labours
stretched out over Radbod’s realm and even across the Danish
frontier. During a visit to the island of Heligoland he ventured
to baptize three men in a holy well. Radbod would have the
blasphemers together to sacrifice to the gods; thrice he enquired
at the sacred lot, but it answered regularly in favour of the
missionaries. But, in consequence of the complete defeat which
Charles Martel suffered at the hands of Radbod at Cologne, in
A.D. 715, the Frisian mission was stopped and only after Radbod’s
death in A.D. 719 could Wilibrord commence operations again from
the monastery of Echternach, to which he had meanwhile withdrawn.
When he died at the age of eighty-one in A.D. 739, the conversion
at least of South Friesland was almost completed. We hear nothing
of conflicts and disputes with Celtic missionaries all through
his fifty years of missionary labour, in consequence, no doubt,
of his mild and peaceful temper, which led him to attend rather
to the Christianizing of the heathen than to the Romanizing
of those who were already Christian.--In consequence of
jurisdictional claims of the Cologne see, the episcopate of
Utrecht remained vacant for a long time after Wilibrord’s death.
The mission among the heathens was meanwhile conducted with zeal
and success by =Gregory=, a Frankish nobleman of the Merovingian
family and a favourite pupil of Boniface, who as abbot of the
monastery of Utrecht presided over its famous seminary. Willehad,
the Anglo-Saxon, was held in high repute by his scholars and
was made bishop of Bremen by Charlemagne. The conversion of the
northern Frisians was completed by =Liudger=, a native Frisian,
afterwards bishop of Münster.
§ 78.4. =The Missionary Work of Boniface.=--The Anglo-Saxon
=Winfrid= or =Boniface=,[216] born at Kirton in Wessex
about A.D. 680 had at an early age, on account of his piety,
ecclesiastical tastes and practical talent, gained an honourable
position in the church of his native land. But he was driven by
an irresistible impulse to devote himself to the heathen tribes
of Germany. In A.D. 716 he landed in Friesland. Although Radbod,
then at war with Charles Martel, considering that he had no
connection with the Franks, put no hindrances in his way, he
had not such success as encouraged him to continue, and so before
winter he returned home. But his missionary ardour gave him no
rest; even his election as abbot of his monastery of Nutscall was
not sufficient to hold him back. And so in the spring of A.D. 718
he crossed the Channel a second time, but went first of all to
Rome, where Gregory II., A.D. 715-731, supplied him with relics
and papal authority for the German mission. The task to which
he now applied himself was directed less to the uprooting of
paganism than to the overthrow of that Celtic heresy which had
on many sides struck its roots deeply in German soil. He next
attempted to gain a footing in Thuringia. But he could neither
induce the “adulterous” priests to submit to Rome, nor seduce
their people from allegiance to them. News of Radbod’s death
in A.D. 719 moved him to make a journey into Friesland, where
he aided Wilibrord for three years in converting the heathens.
Wilibrord wished him to remain in Friesland as his coadjutor,
and to be his future successor in the bishopric of Utrecht. But
this reminded him of his own special task. He tore himself away
and returned to Upper Hesse in A.D. 722. Here he won to Roman
Christianity two Christian chiefs Dettic and Deorulf, erected
with their help the monastery of Amanaburg (Arnöneburg, not
far from the Ohm or _Amana_), and baptized, as his biographer
Willibald assures us, in a short time “many thousands” of the
heathens. He reported his success to the pope who called him to
Rome in A.D. 723, where, after exacting of him a solemn vow of
fealty to the papal chair, he consecrated him Apostolic bishop
or Primate of all Germany, and gave him a _Codex canonum_ and
commendatory letters to Charles Martel and the German clergy,
as well as to the people and princes of Thuringia, Hesse, and
even heathen Saxony. He next secured at the court of Charles
Martel a letter of protection and introduction from that powerful
prince, and then again betook himself to Hesse. The cutting
down of the old sacred oak of Thor at Geismar near Fritzlar
in A.D. 724, against which he raised the axe with his own hand
amid the breathless horror of the heathen multitudes, building
a Christian chapel with its timber, marked the downfall of
heathenism in the heart of Germany. In the following year,
A.D. 725, he extended his operations into Thuringia, where
Celtic institutions were still more widely spread than in Hesse.
This extension of his field of labour required a corresponding
increase of his staff. He applied to his English friends, of whom
bishop Daniel of Winchester was the most distinguished. His call
was responded to year after year by Anglo-Saxon priests, monks
and nuns. All England was roused to enthusiasm for the work of
its apostle and supported him with advice and practical aid,
with prayers and intercessions, with gifts and presents for his
personal and ecclesiastical necessities. Thus there soon arose
two spiritual armies over against one another; both fought with
equal enthusiasm for what seemed to them most high and holy.
But the Anglo-Saxon invader gained ground always more and more,
though indeed amid much want, weariness and care, and the Celtic
church gradually disappeared before advancing Romanism. Meanwhile
Gregory II. had died. His successor Gregory III., A.D. 731-741,
to whom Boniface had immediately submitted a report, answered by
sending him the archiepiscopal pallium with a commission as papal
legate in the German lands to found bishoprics and consecrate
bishops. His work in Thuringia, after ten years’ struggles and
contests, was so far successful that he could look around for
other fields of labour. He chose now, however, not heathen Saxony
but the already Christianized Bavaria, which, as still free from
Rome and strongly infected with the British heresy, seemed to
afford a more attractive field for his missionary zeal. He made
a hasty tour of inspection through the country in A.D. 735-736.
The most important result of this journey was the accession
of a fiery young Bavarian named Sturm, supposed to be next in
succession to Odilo the heir of the throne, whom Boniface took
with him to educate at the seminary at Fritzlar. In the following
year he undertook a third journey to Rome, undoubtedly to consult
with the pope about the further organization of the German
church and the best mode of its accomplishment. He had the most
flattering reception and stayed almost a whole year in Rome.
The pope sent him away in A.D. 738 with apostolic letters to
the clergy, people and nobles of Middle Germany, and also to
some distinguished Bavarian and Alemannian bishops, in which
those addressed were urged to assist his legate by their ready
and hearty obedience in bringing about a much-needed organization
of the churches in their several provinces.[217]
§ 78.5. =The Organization Effected by Boniface.=--The attention
of Boniface was directed first of all to Bavaria, and duke Odilo
reigning there since A.D. 737 anticipated it by an invitation.
Arriving in Bavaria he divided the whole Bavarian church into
four dioceses. Bivilo of Passau had before this been consecrated
as bishop in Rome. Erembert of Freisingen received consecration
at the hand of the legate. The bishops of Regensburg and Salzburg,
however, down to the close of their lives, asserted themselves
as opposition bishops over against those appointed by Boniface.
Odilo, too, withdrew from him his favour, and entrusted not
to him but to Pirminian the Alemannian Apostle, who sided with
the Celtic church, the organization and oversight of several
newly-founded Bavarian monasteries. Thus the results of the papal
legate’s visit to Bavaria were of a very doubtful kind, and he
had not even made a beginning of Romanizing Alemannia. In the
meantime, however, an incident occurred which gave him in a short
time the highest measure of influence and success. Charles Martel
died in A.D. 741 and his sons succeeded him, Carloman in Austrasia
and Pepin the Short in Neustria. Charles Martel had indeed on
Gregory’s recommendation given Boniface a letter of protection
that he might carry on his work in Hesse and Thuringia, but
he had never gone further, so that Boniface often complained
bitterly to his English friends of the indolent, even hostile
attitude of the Frankish prince. But he could not wish a better
coadjutor than Carloman, who was really rather more a monk than
a prince. And so Boniface no longer delayed the organization of
the Hessian and Thuringian churches, for in the course of the
year 741 he founded four bishoprics there. It was a matter of
still greater consequence that Carloman and then also Pepin aided
him in the reorganization of the Frankish national church on
both sides of the Vosges mountains, where partly on account of
sympathy with the British church system, partly on account of the
wild spirit engendered by a life of war and the chase, the clergy
had not hitherto submitted to the influence of the papal emissary.
In order that the estates of the realm might be advised by “the
envoy of St. Peter” and the clergy of the empire about what was
necessary for the Austrasian church, Carloman, at the close of
an imperial diet, at a place unknown, called the first Austrasian
Synod, _Concilium Germanicum_, in A.D. 742, and gave to its
decrees the authority of imperial laws. Boniface was recognised
as Archbishop and Primate of the whole Austrasian church; it was
forbidden that the higher or lower clergy should have anything
to do with arms, hunting and war, that all “false and adulterous”
priests should be expelled; that the admission of “strange”
clerics should be dependent on examination before a Synod to
be held annually; that in all monasteries the Benedictine rule
(§ 85, 1) should be enforced; and that it be made the duty of
counts to support the bishops in maintaining church discipline
and stamping out all remnants of paganism. In the next year,
A.D. 743, Carloman summoned the Second Austrasian Synod at
Liptinä, now Lestines, near Cambray, which confirmed the decrees
of the first and enlarged their scope, especially in regard to
the rooting out of pagan superstition and enforcing strictly the
Romish prohibition of marriage between those naturally (§ 61, 2)
and spiritually (§ 58, 1) related. Thus upon the whole the
legal reorganization of the church of Austrasia might have
been regarded as complete, even though its actual enforcement
required yet many severe struggles. In A.D. 744 Boniface laid
the foundation of the famous monastery of Fulda which for
many centuries was a chief resort and principal school of
the Benedictine monks of Germany. Its first abbot was young
Sturm.--After the close of the Austrasian Synod Boniface began
to treat with Pepin about the reorganization of the church in
Neustria. Pepin called a Neustrian provincial Synod at Soissons
in A.D. 744. Its decrees in regard to discipline were in essential
agreement with those of the two Austrasian Synods. Besides it was
resolved to erect three metropolitan sees. Two of the prelates
designate, however, refused to accept the pallium offered by pope
Zacharias, A.D. 741-752, ostensibly on the plea that the payment
of the fee demanded would render them guilty of simony. Their
refusal, however, was perhaps mainly due to Pepin’s discovery
that the political unity of Neustria required a Primate at Rheims
rather than three metropolitans (§ 83). At a national Synod,
place of meeting unknown, held in A.D. 745, called by the two
princes acting together, at Boniface’s request the bishop Gewilib
of Mainz, a rude warrior guilty of secret murders, was deposed.
It was now the wish of Boniface that he should receive the vacant
episcopal chair of Cologne, which was destined to be raised
into a metropolitan see. Yet, through the machinations of his
opponents, the vacancy at Cologne was otherwise filled, and
Boniface was at last obliged to be satisfied with the less
important bishopric of Mainz. At a second national Council
of A.D. 748 held probably at Düren he succeeded in getting
a considerable number of Austrasian and Neustrian bishops to
subscribe a declaration of absolute submission to the pope
in which they fully acknowledged the papal supremacy over the
Frankish church. Pepin, who now, after the retirement of his
brother Carloman from the government in A.D. 747, in order to
spend the rest of his days in the monastery of Monte Cassino,
was sole ruler of both kingdoms, obtained the express approval
of pope Zacharias in A.D. 752 in making an end of the puppet
show of a sham Merovingian royalty (§ 82, 1). But it is quite
a mistake to say that Boniface was the intermediary in this
matter between the pope and the mayor of the palace. His letters
rather show, from the disfavour in which he at that time stood
at the court of Pepin, that the negociations were carried on
directly with the pope without his knowledge.[218]
§ 78.6. =Heresies Confronted by Boniface.=--Among the numerous
heresies with which Boniface had to deal the most important were
those of the Frankish Adalbert, the Scotchman Clement, and the
Irishman Virgilius. Adalbert wrought on the left bank of the
Rhine far into the interior of Neustria; Clement among the East
Franks. In the summer of A.D. 743 Carloman had at Boniface’s
urgent request cast both into prison, and at the Neustrian Synod
of Soissons in A.D. 744 Boniface secured Adalbert’s condemnation.
Yet soon after we find both at liberty. Boniface now accused them
before the pope Zacharias, and they were condemned unheard at
a Lateran Council in A.D. 745. The legate’s written accusation
charged the Frankish =Adalbert= with the vilest hypocrisy and
blasphemy: He boasted that an angel had brought him relics
of extraordinary miracle-working power, by which he could do
anything that God could; he placed himself on an equality with
the apostles; he introduced unlearned and uncanonically ordained
bishops; he forbade pilgrimages to Rome, and the consecration
of churches and chapels in the names of apostles and martyrs,
but had no objection to their consecration in his own name; he
neglected divine service in consecrated places and assembled the
people for worship in woods and fields and wheresoever it seemed
good to him; he let his own hair and nails be venerated as relics;
he absolved those who came to him in confession with the words:
I know all your sins, for nothing is hidden from me, confession
is unnecessary, go in peace, your sins are forgiven you, etc.;
in this way he won great influence especially over women and
peasants, who honoured him as a great apostle and miracle-worker.
Three documents supported the report of Boniface; viz., a
biography of Adalbert composed by one of his admirers, according
to which his mother in the “ever blessed” hour of his birth had
in vision seen an ox go forth out her right side; also, a letter
said to have fallen from heaven to Jerusalem which guaranteed his
divine mission; and finally, a prayer composed by him which while
generally breathing a spirit of deep humility and firm faith,
went on to invoke a rarely-named angel. If we strike out from
these charges those which evidently rest upon misunderstanding
and legendary or malevolent exaggeration, we have before us a
man who in opposition to the prevailing worship of saints and
relics maintained that the relics set up for veneration were no
more worthy of it than his own hair and nails would be, who also
disputed the advantage of pilgrimages, denied the necessity of
auricular confession, insisted upon the universal priesthood of
believers in opposition to Romish hierarchical claims, and the
evangelical worship of God in spirit and in truth in opposition
to the Romish overestimation of consecrated places; but in
doing so perhaps, more certainly in mystic-theosophic enthusiasm
than in conscious deceitfulness, he may have boasted of divine
revelations and the possession of miracle-working power.--The
figure of the Scotchman =Clement= comes out yet more distinctly
in the charge formulated against him. He is simply an adherent
of the pure and unadulterated ecclesiastical system of the old
British church. He treats with contempt the Canon law, and does
not regard himself as bound by the decrees of Synods or the
authority of the Latin Fathers; he claims to be a bishop and
still lives in “adulterous” wedlock; he affirms that a man
may marry the widow of his deceased brother; he teaches with
reference to Christ’s descent into hell that even those who
died in heathenism may yet be redeemed, and “_affirmat multa
alia horribilia de prædestinatione Dei contraria fidei cath_.”
The pope committed to his legate the execution of the Synod’s
condemnatory judgment. But still in A.D. 747 Boniface again
complains that the undiminished reputation of both heretics at
all points stands in his way. Soon after this, however, Carloman,
after Adalbert had submitted in a disputation with Boniface, sent
him into confinement in the monastery of Fulda, from which he
made his escape, and after long wanderings was at last killed
by the swineherds. No information has reached us as to the end
of Clement.--The Irishman =Virgilius= was from A.D. 744 bishop
of Salzburg, and, as before at the court of Pepin, so now at his
recommendation at the court of the Bavarian duke Odilo, he stood
in high favour. After a long and determined refusal he at last
agreed to submit to the Romish choice of bishops. A priest of
his diocese unskilled in Latin had baptized _in nomine patria
et filia et speritus sancti_, Boniface pronounced such baptism
invalid. Virgilius thought otherwise and appealed to the pope
who was obliged to admit that he was right. But now Boniface
complained of him as a heretic because he taught: _Quod alius
mundus et alii homines sub terra sint_, and this time the pope
took the side of his legate, because upon the accepted notion
of the orbicular form of the earth, the doctrine of antipodes
(already regarded by Lactantius and Augustine as of dangerous
tendency) amounted to a denial of the unity of the human
race and the universality of redemption, whereas the Irishman
belonging to a seafaring race probably considered the earth to
be globular. The pope, in A.D. 748, ordered his deposition and
removal from the clerical order, which Boniface, however, was
not able to accomplish.[219]
§ 78.7. =The End of Boniface.=--On the one hand, distrusted,
and set aside by Pepin and the new pope Stephen II., A.D. 752-757,
from his position as legate (§ 82, 1), and also, on the other
hand, feeling himself overborne in his old age by the burden of
his episcopal and archiepiscopal cares, sorrows and conflicts,
Boniface had his favourite pupil, the energetic Lullus, already
recognised by pope Zacharias, elected as his successor, and
with Pepin’s consent transferred to him at once the independent
administration of the episcopal diocese of Mainz. He now
determined to devote his last as he had his first energies
undividedly to his archiepiscopal diocese embracing the Frisian
church, which still needed firm episcopal control and was now
threatened with a pagan reaction. After Wilibrord’s death in
A.D. 739, Cologne, resting its pretensions on an ancient deed
of gift by Dagobert, claimed jurisdiction over the Frisian church.
Boniface indeed at Carloman’s orders had ordained a new bishop
to the Utrecht chair, in A.D. 741, probably the Anglo-Saxon
Eoban. Yet this new bishop never came into actual, at least not
into undisputed possession. In one of his last letters Boniface
earnestly but in vain implores pope Stephen II. to disallow the
unjust pretensions of Cologne. Charlemagne first settled the
dispute by requiring Alberich, Gregory’s successor in the Utrecht
see, to receive consecration at the hands of the Cologne prelate.
With a stately retinue of fifty-two followers clerical or lay,
and with a foreboding presentiment carrying with him a winding
sheet, Boniface sailed down the Rhine in the spring of A.D. 754.
Whether he had now in view a reorganization of the existing
Frisian church and how far he succeeded, we have no means of
knowing. On the other hand his biographers in their legendary
exaggeration cannot sufficiently extol the wonderful success
of his missionary preaching. Wherever he appeared throughout
the land he baptized thousands of heathens. At last he had
pitched his tent in the neighbourhood of what is now Dokkum,
and there, on June 5th, A.D. 755, a number of neophytes received
confirmation. But a wild troop of heathen apostates rushed down
on them before the break of day. The guard desired to offer armed
resistance, but Boniface refused to shed blood, and, according
to the report of an old woman, received his deathblow holding the
gospel over his head. His companions were also cut down around
him. Utrecht, Mainz and Fulda quarrelled over his bones. Signs
and wonders at last decided in favour of Fulda, which he had
himself fixed upon as their resting place.--By order of Lullus,
a priest of Mainz called Wilibald wrote his life about A.D. 760.
Another life by an anonymous author in Utrecht appeared about
A.D. 790; and yet another by the Regensburg monk Othlo about
A.D. 1060. His literary remains consist of Epistles, Sermons,
and Penitentials of doubtful authenticity.
§ 78.8. =An Estimate of Boniface.=--In opposition to the current
Roman Catholic apotheosis of Boniface which assigns to him as the
true Apostle of the Germans the highest place of honour in the
firmament of German saints and cannot find the least shadow or
defect in all his life, struggles and doings, ultra-protestant
estimates have run to the very contrary extreme. Ebrard has
carried this to the utmost length. He refuses to credit him with
zeal, any hearty regard, any real capacity for proper mission
work among the heathens. Alongside of Wilibrord he was only a
despicable Romish spy; in Hesse and Thuringia only the brutal
destroyer of the Culdee church that flourished there, and in the
Frankish empire only the inconscionable agent of Rome who allied
himself to the Rome-favouring dynasty of Pepin in order to secure
the overthrow of the Culdee-favouring Merovingians, purchasing
thus Frankish aid in subjecting the German and Frankish churches
to the hierarchical tyranny of Rome. He can find in him no
trace of intellectual or spiritual greatness. On the contrary
fanaticism, hatred and a persecuting spirit, intrigue and
dishonesty, servility, dissimulation, hypocrisy, lying and
double dealing are there in abundance. His world-wide fame
is accounted for by this, that he is the accursed founder of
all mischief which has arisen upon Germany from its connection
with the papal chair.--It is true that Boniface stopped the
course of the national and independent development of the German
church that had begun and put it on the track of Roman Catholic
development and mal-development. But even had Boniface never
crossed the Channel this fate could scarcely have been averted.
It is further true that Boniface was far more eager in uprooting
heretical “Celtism” and bringing Frankish and Bavarian Christians
under the Romish yoke than in converting heathen Saxons to
Christianity. But he was thus eager because that seemed to him
in the first instance more necessary and important than aiming
at new conversions. It is a crying injustice to deny that he
showed any zeal, any energy, or that he had any success in the
conversion of the heathen in Friesland, Hesse and Thuringia. All
his thoughts, labours and endeavours are dominated by a steadfast
conviction that the pope is the head and representative of
the church in which alone salvation can be found. But yet with
him the church laws which emanate from the Holy Spirit stand
superior to the pope. Hence the right of final decision on all
ecclesiastical questions belongs indeed to the pope, but only
_secundum canones_. The expression ascribed to Boniface in
Gratian’s Decretal: _Papa a nemine judicetur nisi devius a
fide_ is never met with in any of his extant writings, but
it thoroughly well characterizes his position. Thus alongside
of the most abject submission to the chair of Peter, we see
how firmly he speaks to pope Zacharias in connection with
the Neustrian pallium affair about the Simoniacal greed of
the officials, and on another occasion declares his profound
indignation at the immoral, superstitious and blasphemous
proceedings, fit to be compared to the old pagan Saturnalia,
which, went on in Rome openly before the eyes of the pope
unchecked and unpunished. He also showed brave resistance
when papal dispensations infringed his ordinances founded
upon the canon law, and protested vigorously, when Stephen II.,
in A.D. 754, disregarding the archiepiscopal authority gave
episcopal consecration to Chrodegang of Metz. But Boniface never
mixed himself up with the political intrigues of the popes, nor
did he ever intermeddle in the political manœuvres between Pepin
and the Merovingians, between the Frankish empire and its German
vassals. An inventive genius, great and profound thoughts, a
liberal and comprehensive view of matters, we certainly often
miss in him. All his thoughts, feelings and desires were bound
within the narrow limits of Romish ecclesiasticism. His piety
was deep, earnest and sincere, but is quite of the legalistic
and hard external kind that characterizes Roman Catholicism.
With the most painful conscientiousness he holds by Rome’s
ecclesiastical institutions; any resistance to these is abhorrent
to him and he persecutes heresies as cursed and soul-destroying.
He clearly understands the absurdity of prohibiting marriage
between those who are related only in baptism and at confirmation.
For he sees that on this principle all marriages between Christian
people as recipients of baptism must be forbidden since by
baptism they have all become sons and daughters of Christ and His
church, and so are spiritually brothers and sisters. But then he
willingly sacrifices his understanding, and continues to denounce
all marriages between those spiritually related as fearful sin
and horrible incest. Very characteristic too are many of his
questions to the popes as to what should be held on this point
and that, mostly about very trivial and indifferent matters of
common life. Thus he lets himself be informed that raw bacon
should only be eaten smoked, but that the eating of the flesh of
horses, hares, beavers, jackdaws, ravens and storks is absolutely
forbidden, “_immundum enim est et execrabile_.”[220]
§ 78.9. =The Conversion of the Saxons.=--The first missionary
attempts among the Saxons, who had forced their way from the
north-west of Germany down to the neighbourhood of the Rhine,
were made by two Anglo-Saxon monks, who were both called Ewald,
the black or the white Ewald. A Saxon peasant received them
hospitably, but so soon as he discovered their object, fell
upon them with his household servants and slew them, A.D. 691.
Boniface had many pious wishes about his heathen kinsfolk but
did nothing for their conversion. The most that he did was
to found the monastery of Fulda on the Saxon frontier as the
rallying point for a future clerical raid upon Saxon paganism.
For thirty years, however, this remained but a pious wish, till
at last the sword of the most powerful of the Frankish kings
took up the mission. The subjugation of the powerful as well as
hostile Saxon people was with Charlemagne a political necessity.
But lasting subjugation was impossible without conversion and
conversion was impossible without subjugation; for the Saxons
hated the religion of the Franks no less heartily than they did
the Franks themselves. Alcuin with true magnanimity exerted all
his influence with his royal friend against any use of force in
conversion, but political necessity overcame the counsel of the
much trusted friend. The Saxon war lasted for thirty-three years,
A.D. 772-804. In the very first campaign the strongest Saxon
fortress Eresburg was stormed and their most revered idol, the
Erminsul, was destroyed. Frankish priests followed the Frankish
arms and Christianized immediately the conquered districts. But
as soon as Charlemagne’s army was engaged elsewhere, the Saxons
proceeded to destroy again all Christian foundations. In the
imperial diet at Paderborn in A.D. 777 they were obliged to
swear that life and property would be forfeited by a new apostasy.
But the most powerful of the Saxon princes, Wittekind, who had
not appeared at the diet, organized a new revolt. The Frankish
army sustained a fearful defeat at Mount Sunthal, all Christian
priests were murdered, all churches were destroyed. Charlemagne
took a dreadful revenge. At Verden he beheaded in one day 4,500
Saxons. After a new rebellion, a second diet at Paderborn in
A.D. 785 prescribed for them horribly bloody laws. The least
resistance against the precepts of the church was punished with
death. Wittekind and Albion, the two most famous Saxon chiefs,
acknowledged the vanity of further resistance. They were baptized
in A.D. 785 and continued thenceforward faithful to the king
and the church. But the rebellions of the rest of the Saxons
were still continued. In A.D. 804 Charlemagne drove 10,000 Saxon
families from their homes on the Elbe, and gave the country to
the Obohites [Obotrites] that were subject to him. Now for the
first time was a lasting peace secured. Charlemagne had founded
eight bishoprics in Saxony, and under these bishops’ care
throughout this blood-deluged country, no longer disturbed,
a Christianity was developed as truly hearty and fresh as in
any other part of Germany. One witness to this among others is
afforded by the popular epic the Heliand (§ 89, 3).[221]
§ 79. THE SLAVS IN GERMAN COUNTRIES.[222]
The sudden rush of the wild hordes of the Huns in the 5th century
drove the Slavs to the south of the Danube and to the west of the
Vistula. Again in the 6th century Slavic tribes forced their way
westward under pressure from the Mongolian Avars who took possession
of Dacia, Pannonia and Dalmatia. For the conversion of the Slavs in
north-eastern Germany nothing was done; but much was attempted on
behalf of the conversion of the southern Slavs and the Avars, who were
specially under the care of the see of Salzburg.
§ 79.1. =The Carantanians and Avars.=--The Carantanian prince
Boruth, in what is now called Carinthia, in A.D. 748 asked the
help of the Bavarian duke Thassilo II. against the oppression
of the Avars. His nephew Chatimar, who had received a Christian
training in Bavaria, when in A.D. 753 he succeeded to the throne,
introduced Christianity into his country. After the overthrow
of Thassilo in A.D. 788, Carinthia came under Frankish rule, and
Charlemagne extended his conquests over the Avars and Moravians.
Bishop Arno of Salzburg, to whom metropolitan rights had been
accorded, conducted a regular mission by Charlemagne’s orders
for the conversion of these peoples. In A.D. 796, Tudun, the
prince of the Avars, with a great band of his followers, received
baptism, and vowed in A.D. 797 to turn the whole nation of the
Avars to Christianity, and asked for Christian teachers. In
the 9th century, however, the name of the Avars passed away
from history.
§ 79.2. =The Moravian Church.=--In A.D. 855 Rastislaw, Grand
Duke of Moravia, freed his country from the Frankish yoke and
deprived the German bishops of all their influence. He asked
Slavic missionaries from the Byzantine emperor. The brothers
=Cyril= and =Methodius= (§ 73, 2, 3) who had already approved
themselves as apostles of the Slavs, answered the call in
A.D. 863. They introduced a liturgy and public worship in the
language of the Slavs, and by preaching in the Slavic tongue
they won their way to the hearts of the heathen people. But in
spite of this encouraging success they found themselves, amid
the political convulsions of the age, in a difficult position.
Only by attachment to the pope could they reasonably expect
to hold their ground. They accepted therefore an invitation
of Nicholas I. in A.D. 867, but on their arrival in Rome they
found that Hadrian II. had succeeded to the papal chair. Cyril
remained in Rome and soon died, A.D. 869. =Methodius= swore
fealty to the pope and was sent away as archbishop of Moravia.
But now all the more were the German bishops hostile to him.
They suspected his fidelity to the pope, charged him with heresy
and inveighed against the Slavic liturgy which he had introduced.
John VIII., rendered suspicious of him by these means, called
upon him in strong terms in A.D. 879 to make answer for himself
at Rome. Methodius obeyed and succeeded in completely vindicating
himself. The pope confirmed him in his archiepiscopal rank and
expressly permitted him to use the Slavic liturgy, enjoining,
however, that by way of distinction the gospel should first be
read in Latin and then rendered in a Slavic translation. The
intrigues of the German clergy, however, continued and embittered
the last days of the good and brave apostle of the Slavs. He
died in A.D. 885. A general persecution now broke out against
the Slavic priests and the metropolitan chair of Moravia remained
vacant for fourteen years. John IX. restored it in A.D. 899. But
in A.D. 908 the Moravian kingdom was overthrown. The Bohemians
and Magyars shared the spoil between them.
§ 79.3. =The Beginnings of Christianity in Bohemia.=--On New
Year’s day of A.D. 845 fourteen Bohemian lords appeared at
Regensburg at the court of Louis of Germany and asked for
baptism along with their followers. Of the motives and of
the consequences of this step we know nothing. When Rastislaw
raised the Moravian empire to such a height of glory the
Bohemians connected themselves closely with Moravia. Rastislaw’s
successor Swatopluc married a daughter of the Bohemian
prince Borsivoi in A.D. 871. After that Methodius extended
his missionary labours into Bohemia. Borsivoi himself and his
wife, Ludmilla, were baptized by Methodius in A.D. 871. The sons
of Borsivoi, also, Spitihnew, who died in A.D. 912 and Wratislaw,
who died in A.D. 926, with the active support of their mother
furthered the interests of the church in Bohemia.
§ 80. THE SCANDINAVIAN NATIONS.[223]
The mission to the Frisians and Saxons called the attention of
missionaries to the neighbouring Jutes and Danes. Wilibrord (§ 78, 3)
in A.D. 696 carried the gospel across the Eider, and Charlemagne felt
it necessary in order to maintain his authority over the Frisians and
Saxons to extend his conquest and that of the church over the peninsula
of Jutland to the sea coast. He could not, however, accomplish his
design. Better prospects opened up before Louis the Pious. Threatened
with expulsion through disputes about the succession, Harald the king
of the Jutes sought the protection of the Franks. Consequently Ebo,
archbishop of Rheims, crossed the Eider in A.D. 823 at the head of an
imperial embassy and clothed with full authority from pope Paschalis I.
He baptized also a number of Danes, and when, after a year’s absence,
he returned home, he took with him several young Jutes to educate as
teachers for their countrymen. But Harald was again hard pressed and
concluded to break entirely with the national paganism. In A.D. 826 he
took ship, with wife and child, accompanied by a stately retinue, and
at Mainz, where Louis then held his court, received baptism with great
pomp and ceremony. Soon after his return a young monk followed him
from the monastery of Corbei on the Weser. =Ansgar=, the apostle of
the north, had committed to him by Louis the hard and dangerous task
of winning the Scandinavian nations for the church. Ansgar devoted his
whole life to the accomplishment of this task, and in an incomparable
manner fulfilled it, so far as indomitable perseverance, devotion and
self-denial amid endless difficulties and perverse opposition could
do it.
§ 80.1. =Ansgar= or Anschar, the son of a Frankish nobleman, born
A.D. 801, was educated in the monastery of Old Corbie in Picardy,
and on the founding of New Corbie in A.D. 822 was made Superior
of it. Even in very early youth he had dreams and visions which
led him to look forward to the mission field and the crown of
martyrdom. Accompanied by his noble-minded brother monk Autbert,
who would not let his beloved friend go alone, Ansgar started in
A.D. 826 on his first missionary journey. Harald had established
his authority in the maritime provinces of Jutland, but he
ventured not to push on into the interior. In this way the
missionary efforts of the two friends were restricted. On the
frontier of Schleswig, however, they founded a school, bought
and educated Danish slave youths, redeemed Christian prisoners
of war and preached throughout the country. But in the year
following Harald was driven out and fled to the province of
Rüstringen on the Weser, which Louis assigned to him for life.
Also the two missionaries were obliged to follow him. Autbert
died in the monastery of Corbie in A.D. 829, having retired
again to it when seized with illness. Soon afterwards the emperor
obtained information through ambassadors sent by the Swedish
king Bjorn, that there were many isolated Christians in their
land, some of them merchants, others prisoners of war, who had
a great desire to be visited by Christian priests. Ansgar, with
several companions, undertook this mission in A.D. 830. On the
way they were plundered by Norse pirates. His companions spoke
of returning home, but Ansgar would not be discouraged. King
Bjorn received them in a very kindly manner. A little group
of Christian prisoners gathered round them and heartily joined
in worship. A school was erected, boys were bought and adults
preached to. Several Swedes sought baptism, among them the
governor of Birka, Herigar, who built at his own cost the first
Christian church. After eighteen months Ansgar returned to the
Frankish court in order to secure a solid basis for his mission.
Louis thus perceived an opportunity of founding a bishopric for
the Scandinavian Norsemen at Hamburg on the borders of Denmark.
He appointed Ansgar bishop in A.D. 834, and assigned to him and
the mission the revenues of the rich abbey of Turholt in Flanders.
Ansgar obtained in Rome from Gregory IV. the support of a bull
which recognised him as exclusively vicar apostolic over all the
Norse. Then he built a cathedral at Hamburg, besides a monastery,
bought again Danish boys to educate for the priesthood and sent
new labourers among the Swedes, at whose head was the Frankish
monk Gauzbert. But soon misfortunes from all sides showered down
upon the poor bishop. His patron Louis died in A.D. 840, Harald
apostatized from the faith, the Swedish missionaries were driven
out by the pagans, the Norse rushed down on Hamburg and utterly
destroyed city, church, monastery, and library. Moreover Charles
the Bald took possession of the abbey of Turholt which according
to the Treaty of Verdun in A.D. 843 had fallen to Flanders, in
order to bestow it upon a favourite. Ansgar was now a homeless
beggar. His clergy, when he had no longer support for them, left
him. His mission school was broken up. His neighbour, bishop
Leuterich of Bremen, with whom he sought shelter, inspired by
despicable jealousy, turned him from his door. At last he got
shelter from a nobleman’s widow who provided for him at her
own expense a lodging at Ramslo, a country house near Hamburg.
In A.D. 846 Leuterich died. Louis of Germany now gave to the
homeless Apostle of the North a fixed habitation by appointing
Ansgar to the vacant bishopric. The bishops of Cologne and Verden
had divided between them the shattered fragments of the Hamburg
bishopric. But at last pope Nicholas I. in A.D. 834 put an end
to their selfish pretensions by uniting the two dioceses of
Hamburg and Bremen into one, and conferring upon it metropolitan
rights for the North. But meanwhile Ansgar notwithstanding all
the neediness in which he himself lived had been working away
uninterruptedly on behalf the Scandinavian mission. In =Denmark=
the king was Eric whose court Ansgar repeatedly visited as
ambassador of the German king. By Eric’s favour he had been
enabled to found a church in Schleswig and to organize a mission
stretching over the whole country. Eric did not venture himself
to pass over to Christianity, and when pagan fanaticism broke out
in open rebellion in A.D. 854, he fell in a battle against his
nephew who headed the revolt. A boy, Eric II., perhaps grandson
of the fallen Eric, mounted the throne. But the chief Jovi
reigned in his name, a bitter foe of the Christians, who drove
away all Christian priests and threatened every Christian in the
land with death. Yet in A.D. 855 Eric II. emancipated himself
from the regency of Jovi and granted toleration to the Christians.
The work of conversion was now again carried on with new zeal and
success.--All attempts, by means of new missionaries, to gather
again the fragments of the mission in =Sweden=, broken up by
Gauzbert’s expulsion, had hitherto proved vain. At last Ansgar
himself started on his journey thitherward about A.D. 850. By
rich presents and a splendid entertainment he won king Olaf’s
favour. A popular assembly determined to abide by the decision
of the sacred lot and this decided in favour of the adoption
of Christianity. From that time the Swedish mission was carried
on without check or hindrance under the direction of Erimbert,
whom Ansgar left there. Ansgar died in A.D. 865. The most dearly
cherished hope of his life, that he should be honoured with the
crown of martyrdom, was not realized; but a life so full of toil,
privation and trouble, sacrifice, patience and self-denial, was
surely nobler than a martyr’s crown.[224]
§ 80.2. =Ansgar’s Successor= in the see of Hamburg-Bremen was
=Rimbert=, his favourite scholar, his companion in almost all
his journeys, who wrote an account of his master’s life and
pronounced him a saint. He laboured according to his ability
to follow in the steps of his teacher, especially in his care
for the Scandinavian mission. But he was greatly hindered by
the wild doings of the Danish and Norse pirates. This trouble
reached its height after Rimbert’s death, and went so far
that the archbishop of Cologne on the pretext that the Hamburg
see had been extinguished was able to renew his claims upon
Bremen.--Continuation, § 93.
§ 81. CHRISTIANITY AND ISLAM.[225]
From A.D. 665 the Byzantine rule in =North Africa= (§ 76, 3) was
for a time narrowed and at last utterly overthrown by the Saracens
from Egypt, with whom were joined the Berbers or Moors who had been
converted to Islam. In A.D. 711, called in by a rebel, they also
overthrew the Visigoth power in =Spain= (§ 76, 2). In less than
five years the whole peninsula, as far as the mountain boundaries
of the north, was in the hands of the Moors. Then they cast a covetous
glance upon the fertile plains beyond the Pyrenees, but Charles Martel
drove them back with fearful loss in the bloody battle of Poitiers
in A.D. 732. The Franks were in this the saviours of Europe and of
Christianity. In A.D. 750 the Ommaiadean dynasty at Damascus, whose
lordship embraced also the Moors, were displaced by the Abbassidean,
but a scion of the displaced family, Abderrhaman I., appeared in Spain
and founded there an independent khalifate at Cordova in A.D. 756,
which soon rose to an unexampled splendour. Also in =Sicily= the Moslem
power obtained an entrance and endeavoured from that centre to maintain
itself by constant raids upon the courts of Italy and Provence. The
expulsion of the Moors from Spain and Sicily was first completely
accomplished during the next period (§ 95).
§ 81.1. =Islam in Spain.=--The Spanish Christians under the
Ommaiade rule were called Mozarabians, _Arabi Mustaraba_, _i.e._
Arabianized Arabs as distinguished from Arabs proper or _Arabi
Araba_. They were in many places under less severe restrictions
than the Oriental Christians under Saracen rule. Many Christian
youths from the best families attended the flourishing Moorish
schools, entered enthusiastically upon the study of the Arabic
language and literature, pressed eagerly on to the service of the
Court and Government, etc. But in opposition to such abandonment
of the Christian and national conscience there was developed
the contrary extreme of extravagant rigorism in obtrusive
confessional courage and uncalled-for denunciation of the prophet.
Christian fanaticism awakened Moslem fanaticism, which vented
itself in a bloody persecution of the Christians in A.D. 850-859.
The first martyr was a monk Perfectus. When asked his opinion
about Mohammed he had pronounced him a false prophet, and was
executed. The khalif of that period, Abderrhaman II., was no
fanatic. He wished to stop the extravagant zeal of the Christians
at its source, and made the metropolitan Recafrid of Seville
issue an ecclesiastical prohibition of all blasphemy of the
prophet. But this enactment only increased the fanaticism of
the rigorists, at whose head stood the presbyter, subsequently
archbishop, Eulogius of Cordova and his friend Paulus
Alvarus (§ 90, 6). Eulogius himself, who kept hidden from
her parents a converted Moorish maiden, and was on this account
beheaded along with her in A.D. 859, was the last victim of
the persecution.--The rule of the Arabs in Spain, however, was
threatened from two sides. When Roderick’s government (§ 76, 2)
had fallen before the arms of the Saracens in A.D. 711, Pelayo,
a relation of his, with a small band of heroic followers,
maintained Christian national independence in the inaccessible
mountains of Asturia, and his son-in-law Alphonso the Catholic
in the Cantabrian mountains on the Bay of Biscay. Alphonso
subsequently united both parties, conquered Galicia and the
Castilian mountain land, erecting on all sides the standard
of the cross. His successors in innumerable battles against
the infidels enlarged their territory till it reached the
Douro. Of these Alphonso II., the Chaste, who died in A.D. 850,
specially distinguished himself by his heroic courage and his
patronage of learning. Oviedo was his capital. On the east
too the Christian rule now again made advance.--Charlemagne
in A.D. 778 conquered the country down to the Ebro. But a
rebellion of the Saxons prevented him advancing further, and
the freebooting Basques of the Pyrenees cut down his noblest
heroes. Two subsequent campaigns in A.D. 800, 801, reduced all
the country as far as the Ebro, henceforth called the Spanish
March, under the power of the Franks.[226]
§ 81.2. =Islam in Sicily.=--A Byzantine military officer
fled from punishment to Africa in A.D. 827 and returned with
10,000 Saracen troops which terribly devastated Sicily. Further
migrations followed and in a few years all Sicily was under the
rule of the Arabs, who made yearly devastating raids from thence
upon the Italian coasts, venturing even to the very gates of Rome.
In A.D. 880 they settled on the banks of the Garigliano, and put
all central Italy under tribute, until at last in A.D. 916 the
efforts of pope John X. were successful in driving them out.
Spanish-Moorish pirates landed in A.D. 889 on the coasts of
Provence, besieged the fortress of Fraxinetum, and plundered
from this centre for a hundred years the Alpine districts and
northern Italy. Their robber career in south Italy was most
serious of all. It lasted for three centuries and was first
brought to an end by the Norman invasion.--Continuation, § 95, 1.
II. THE HIERARCHY, THE CLERGY AND THE MONKS.
§ 82. THE PAPACY AND THE CAROLINGIANS.
The Christianizing of the German world was in great part accomplished
without the help of Rome. Hence the German churches, even those that
were Catholic, troubled themselves little at first about the papal
chair. The Visigoth church in Spain was most completely estranged
from it. The Saracen invasion of A.D. 711 cut off all possibility
of intercourse with Rome. Even the free Christian states in Spain
down to the 11th century had no connection with Rome. The Frankish
churches, too, in Gaul as well as in Austrasia, throve and ran wild
in their independence during the Merovingian age. On the other hand,
the relation of the English Church to Rome was and continued to be
very intimate. Numerous pilgrimages of Anglo-Saxons of higher and lower
ranks were undertaken to the grave of the chief of the Apostles, and
increased the dependence of the nation on the chair of St. Peter. For
the support of these pilgrims and as a training school for English
clergy, the _Schola Saxonica_ was founded in the 8th century, and for
its maintenance and that of the holy places in the city, on Peter’s day
the 29th June was collected the so-called Peter’s pence, a penny for
every house. Out of this sprang a standing impost on all the English
people for the papal chair, which in the 13th century became a money
tax upon the kings of England which Henry VIII. was the first to
repudiate in A.D. 1532. The credit belongs to the Anglo-Saxons and
especially to Boniface of not only delivering the rich sheaves of their
missionary harvest into the granaries of Rome, but also of organizing
the previously existing churches of the Frankish territories after
the Romish method and rendering them obedient to the Roman see. Since
then there has been such a regular intercourse between the pope and
the Carolingian rulers that it absorbed almost completely the whole
diplomatic activity of the Romish curia.
§ 82.1. =The Period of the Founding of the States of the
Church.=--From bequests and presents of ancient times the
Roman chair succeeded to an immense landed property, _Patrimonium
S. Petri_, which afforded it the means of greatly assuaging the
distress of the inhabitants of Italy during the disturbances
of the migrations of the peoples. There was naturally then no
word of the exercise of sovereign rights. From the time of the
restoration of the Byzantine exarchate in A.D. 567 (§ 76, 7) the
political importance of the pope grew immensely; its continued
existence was often dependent on the good will of the pope for
whom generally indeed the idea of becoming the court patriarch
of a Longobard-Roman emperor was not an enticing one. But the
pope could not prevent the Longobard power (§ 76, 8) from gaining
ground in the north as well as in the south of the peninsula. An
important increase of influence, power and prestige was brought
to the papal chair under =Gregory II.=, A.D. 715-731, through
the rebellions in northern and central Italy occasioned by the
Byzantine iconoclastic disputes. Rome was in this way raised
to a kind of political suzerainty not only over the Roman duchy
but also over the rest of the exarchate in the north--Ravenna
and the neighbouring cities together with Venice (§ 66, 1).
=Gregory III.=, A.D. 731-741, hard pressed by Luitprand the
Longobard, thrice (A.D. 739, 740) applied for help to the Frank
=Charles Martel=, who, closely bound in friendship with Luitprand,
his ally against the Saracens, sent some clerics to Italy to
secure a peaceful arrangement. Gregory’s successor =Zacharias=,
A.D. 741-752, sanctioned by his apostolic judgment the setting
aside of the Merovingian sham king Childeric III., whereupon
=Pepin the Short=, in A.D. 752, assumed the royal title with
the royal power which he had long possessed. The next elected
pope called Stephen died before consecration, consequently his
successor of the same name is usually designated =Stephen II.=,
A.D. 752-757. The Longobard Aistulf had in A.D. 751 conquered
Ravenna and the cities connected with it. Pope Stephen II. sought
help anew of the Frankish king and supported his petition by
forwarding an autograph letter of the Apostle Peter, in which
he exhorted the king of the Franks as his adopted son under
peril of all the pains of hell to save Rome and the Roman church.
He himself at Pepin’s invitation went to France. At Ponthion,
where, in A.D. 754, the king greeted him, Pepin promised the
pope to restore to Rome her former possessions and to give
protection against further inroads of the Longobards; while the
pope imparted to the king and his two sons Charles and Carloman
the kingly anointing in the church of St. Dionysius or Denis
in Paris. At Quiersy then Pepin took counsel with his sons and
the nobles of his kingdom about the fulfilling of his promise,
bound the Longobard king by oath in the year following after
a successful campaign to surrender the cities, properties and
privileges claimed by the pope, and assigned these in A.D. 755
as a present to St. Peter as their possessor from that time forth.
But scarcely had he retired with his army when Aistulf not only
refused all and any surrender, but broke in anew upon Roman
territory, robbing and laying waste on every side. By a second
campaign, however, in A.D. 756, Pepin compelled him actually
to deliver over the required cities in the provinces of Rome
and Ravenna the key of which he deposited with a deed of gift,
no longer extant, on the grave of St. Peter; while the pope,
transferring to Pepin the honorary title of Exarch of Ravenna,
decorated him with the insignia of a Roman patrician. When the
Byzantine envoys claimed Ravenna as their own property, Pepin
answered that the Franks had not shed their blood for the Greeks
but for St. Peter.--Aistulf’s death followed soon after this
and amid the struggles for the succession to the throne one of
the candidates, duke Desiderius of Tuscany, sought the powerful
support of the pope and promised him in return the surrender
of those cities of the eastern province of Ravenna which still
remained in the hands of the Longobards. The pope obtained
Pepin’s consent to this transaction, and Desiderius was
made king. But neither Stephen nor his successor Paul I.,
A.D. 757-767, could get him completely to fulfil his promise,
and new encroachments of the Longobards as well as new claims
of the pope intensified the bad feeling between them, which the
conciliation of Pepin, who died in A.D. 768 had not by any means
overcome.[227]
§ 82.2. After the death of Paul I. the nobles forced one of
their own order upon the Romans as pope under the name of
Constantine II. Another party with Longobard help appointed
a presbyter, Philip. The former maintained his ground for
thirteen months, but was then overthrown by a clerical party
and, with his eyes put out, was cast into the street. They now
united in the choice of =Stephen III.=, A.D. 768-772.--Desiderius
wished greatly to form a marriage connection with the Frankish
court, and found a zealous friend in Bertrada, the widow of Pepin.
When Stephen heard of it his wrath was unbounded, and he gave
unbridled expression to it in a letter which he sent to her sons
Charlemagne and Carloman. Referring to the fact that the devil
had already in Paradise by the persuasion of a woman overthrown
the first man and with him the whole race, he characterized this
plan as _propria diabolica immissio_, declared that any idea
of a connection by marriage of the illustrious reigning family
of the Franks with the _fœtentissima Longobardorum gens_, from
which all vile infections proceed, was nothing short of madness,
etc. Not peace and friendship, but only war and enmity with this
robber of the patrimony of Peter would be becoming in the pious
kings of the Franks. He laid down this his exhortation at the
grave of Peter and performed over it a Mass. Whoever sets himself
to act contrary to it, on him will fall the anathema and with the
devil and all godless men he shall burn in everlasting flames;
but whosoever is obedient to it, shall be partaker of eternal
salvation and glory. Nevertheless Charles married Desiderata the
daughter of Desiderius, and Gisela, Charles’ sister, married the
son of Desiderius. But before a year had passed, in A.D. 771,
he wearied of the Longobard wife and sent her home. Soon after
this Carloman died. Charles seized upon the inheritance of his
youthful nephews, who together with their mother found shelter
with Desiderius. When =Hadrian I.=, A.D. 772-795, refused to give
the royal anointing to Carloman’s sons, Desiderius took from him
a great part of the States of the Church and threatened Rome. But
Charles hastened at the pope’s call to give him help, conquered
Pavia, shut up king Desiderius in the monastery of Corbei, and
joined Lombardy to the Frankish empire. Further information
as to what passed between him and Hadrian at Rome in A.D. 774
is only to be got from the _Vita Hadriani_ (§ 90, 6) written
during the reign of Louis of France. It relates as follows: At
the grave of Peter the pope earnestly exhorted him to fulfil
at last completely the promise which his father Pepin I. with
his own consent and that of the Frankish nobles gave to pope
Stephen II. at Quiersy in A.D. 754. Charles after reading over
the document referred to agreed to everything promised therein,
and produced a new deed of gift after the style (_ad instar_)
of the old, undertaking to transfer to the Roman church
a territorial possession which, together with the assumed
_Promissio_ of Pepin described with geographical precision,
embraced almost all Italy, excepting Lombardy but including
Corsica, Venice and Istria. It is now quite inconceivable that
Charles, let alone Pepin, should have given the pope such an
immense territory which Pepin for a simple footing in A.D. 754,
and Charles for at least three-fourths of it, must have first
themselves conquered. Moreover this account of the matter is
directly contradicted by the statement of all the witnesses of
Pepin’s own times. On the part of the Franks the continuator of
the Chronicler Fredégar, on the part of the Romans the biographer
of Stephen II. in the _Liber pontificalis_ and that pope himself
in his letters to Pepin, all speak of the negociations between
the king and the pope as having reference simply to Rome and
Ravenna. And since all attempts to reconcile these contradictions
by exegetical devices have failed, we can only regard this
as a fiction designed to palm off upon Louis of France Rome’s
own ambitious territorial scheme. All that Charlemagne did was
to confirm and renew his father’s gifts, as Hadrian himself
distinctly states: _Amplius_ (=further, _i.e._ for time to
come) _confirmavit_.--Moreover Pepin, and still more Charlemagne,
would hardly have granted to the holy father by his gift
absolute sovereignty over the States of the Church thus founded.
By conferring the patriciate upon the two Frankish princes,
the pope, indeed, himself acknowledged that the suzerainty
now belonged to them which formerly the Byzantine emperor
had exercised by his viceroy, the exarch of Ravenna. A more
exact definition of these rights, however, may have been first
given when Charles was crowned emperor, his imperial authority
undoubtedly extending over the Papal States. The pope as a
temporal prince was his vassal and must himself, like all
citizens of Rome, take the oath of allegiance to the emperor.
Judicial authority and the appointment of government officials
belonged to him; but they were supervised and controlled by
the Frankish ambassadors, _Missi dominici_, who heard appeals
and complaints of all kinds and were authorized to give a final
judgment.
§ 82.3. =Charlemagne and Leo III.=--Hadrian I. was succeeded by
=Leo III.=, A.D. 795-816. During a solemn procession in A.D. 799
he was murderously attacked by the nephews of his predecessor
and severely beaten. Some of the bystanders declared that they
had seen the bandits tear out his tongue and eyes. The legend
vouched for by the pope himself was added that Peter by a miracle
restored him both the next night. Leo meanwhile escaped from
his tormentors and fled to Charlemagne. His opponents accused
him before the king of perjury and adultery, and the hearing of
witnesses seems to have confirmed the serious charges, for Alcuin
hastened to burn the report which was given in to him on the
subject. But the pope was honourably discharged and assumed again
the chair of Peter under the protection of a Frankish guard.
Next year Charles crossed the Alps with his army for a campaign
against Benevento. He convened a Synod at Rome; but the bishops
maintained that the pope, the head of all, can be judged of none;
yet the pope with twelve sponsors swore an oath of purgation and
prayed for his accusers. At the Christmas festival Charles went
to the church of St. Peter. At the close of Mass the pope amid
the applause of the people placed a beautiful golden crown upon
his head (A.D. 800). The world is asked to believe that he did
it by the immediate impulse of a divine inspiration; but it was
the result of the negociations of years and the fulfilment of
a promise by which the pope had purchased the king’s protection
against his enemies. With the idea of the imperial power
Charlemagne connected the idea of a theocratic Christian
universal monarchy in the sense of Daniel’s prophecy. The
Greeks had proved themselves unworthy of this position and
so God had transferred it to the king of the Franks. As emperor,
Charles stands at the head of all Christendom, and has only
God and His law over him. He is the most obedient son, the most
devoted servant of the church, so far as it is the vehicle and
dispenser of salvation; but he is its supreme lord and ruler so
far as it needs to adopt earthly forms and an earthly government.
Church and state are two separate domains, which, however, on all
sides limit and condition one another. Their uniting head they
have in the person of the emperor. Hence on every hand Charles’
legislation enters the domain of the church, in respect of her
constitution, worship and doctrine. On these matters he consults
the bishops and synods, but he confirms, enlarges and modifies
their decisions according to his own way of thinking, because for
this he is personally answerable to God. In the pope he honours
the successor of Peter and the spiritual head of the church;
but, because the emperor stands over church and state, he is also
ruler of the pope. The pope who gave him imperial consecration
did it not by any power of his own immanent in the papacy, but
by special divine impulse and authority. Hence the crowning
of the emperor is only to be once received at the pope’s hand.
This rank is henceforth hereditary in the house of Charles, and
only the emperor can beget and nominate the new emperor. The
unity of the empire is to be maintained under all circumstances,
and hence, contrary to the Frankish custom of dividing the
inheritance, younger sons are to receive only the subordinate
rank of ruling princes.[228]
§ 82.4. =Louis the Pious and the Popes of his
Time.=--Charlemagne’s weaker son Louis the Pious, A.D. 814-840,
was not in a position to carry out the work his father had begun.
But pious as Louis was, he was yet as little inclined as his
immediate successor to give up the imperial suzerainty over
the city and chair of St. Peter. The popes were most expressly
required before receiving papal consecration to obtain imperial
confirmation of their election. Leo’s successor =Stephen IV.=,
A.D. 816-817, seems indeed to have evaded it, yet still he let
the Romans take the oath of fealty to the emperor, and unasked
submitted to make a journey over the Alps in order to get over
the anomaly of an emperor without the consecration of Peter’s
hand. An agreement come to on that occasion, A.D. 816, between
emperor and pope has not been preserved. A few days after
his return the pope died. The newly-elected =Paschalis I.=,
A.D. 817-824, also indeed mounted the papal chair without
imperial confirmation, but apologized by an embassy on the ground
that he had been unwillingly obliged to act so, and praying for a
continuation of the agreement made with his predecessor, to which
the emperor consented. Indeed, according to a diploma of A.D. 817,
extant only in a transcript, bearing the name of Louis, the
king was to bestow upon the papal chair, besides what Pepin and
Charlemagne had given, Corsica, Sardinia and Sicily, and many
estates in Calabria and Naples. There was also an undertaking
that only after having been consecrated should any newly-elected
pope interchange friendly greetings with the emperor. All copies
of this document can be traced back to a collection of imperial
grants to the Romish church of the 11th century. At its basis
there lay probably a genuine document, but it has been variously
altered in the interests of the high church party.--Some years
later, after he had decoyed to France and blinded his illegitimate
nephew Bernard, who had as reigning prince in Italy rebelled
against the law of succession passed in A.D. 817, Louis sent his
son Lothair into Italy to quiet the tumults there, and the pope
availed himself of this opportunity to crown the prince already
crowned by his father as co-emperor. But scarcely had Lothair
got over the Alps again when two of the most distinguished and
zealous of the Frankish partisans were in A.D. 823 blinded and
beheaded in the papal palace. Before the imperial commission
the pope took an oath of purgation, to which 34 bishops and
5 presbyters joined with him in swearing, but bluntly refused
to deliver up the perpetrator of the deed. As the pope died soon
afterwards, Lothair was sent a second time to Rome, in order
to enforce once and for all upon his successor =Eugenius II.=,
A.D. 824-827, the observance of imperial rights. The result of
their conference was the so-called _Constitutio Romano_, by which
the election of the pope (§ 46, 11) was taken from the common
people and given to the clergy and nobles, but the consecration
was made dependent on the emperor’s confirmation and an oath
of homage from the newly-elected pope (A.D. 824). Nevertheless
his successor Valentine was elected and consecrated without any
reference to the constitution. He died, however, after six months,
and now the Frankish party came forward so energetically that
the new pope =Gregory IV.=, A.D. 827-844, was obliged to submit
in all particulars to the requirements of the law. But soon
after political troubles arose in the Frankish kingdom which
could not fail to contribute to the endeavours of the papacy
after emancipation. From his weak preference for his younger
son, Charles the Bald, born of a second marriage, Louis was
led in A.D. 829 to set aside the law of succession he himself
had issued in A.D. 817. The sons thus disinherited rebelled with
the assistance of the most distinguished Frankish prelates, at
whose head was Wala, abbot of Old Corbie, cousin of Charlemagne,
and the bishops Agobard of Lyons, Ebo of Rheims, etc., as
assertors of the unity of the empire. Also pope Gregory IV.,
whose predecessors had sanctioned the law of succession now set
aside, was won over and was taken across the Alps by Lothair to
strengthen his cause by the weight of his apostolic authority.
The pope threatened with the ban those bishops who remained true
to the old emperor and had obeyed his summons to attend the diet.
But they answered the pope that he had no authority in the empire
of the Franks, and that if he did not quietly take himself over
the Alps again they would excommunicate him. He was inclined to
yield, but Wala’s counsel restrained him. He answered the bishops
earnestly and moderately, and, as a last attempt at conciliation,
went himself personally to the camp of the emperor, but was
unable to effect anything. But next morning Louis had no army;
during the night most of his soldiers had passed over to the camp
of his enemy. The emperor now had to surrender himself prisoner
to his son Lothair, then at a diet at Compiègne in A.D. 833,
to do humble penance in church and to resign the government. His
penitent son, Louis the German, however, set him free in A.D. 834.
A severe judgment was now passed upon the confederate prelates at
the Diedenhosen in A.D. 835. But the brothers continued constantly
at war with one another, and Louis the Pious did not live to see
the end of it.
§ 82.5. =The Sons of Louis the Pious and the Popes of their
Days.=--The Treaty of Verdun, A.D. 843, put an end to the bitter
war between the sons of Louis the Pious, and made of the western
empire three independent groups of states under Lothair, Louis
the German and Charles the Bald. Lothair I., who got the title
of Emperor with Italy and a strip of land between Neustria and
Austrasia, died in A.D. 855. Of his sons, Louis II. inherited
Italy with title of Emperor, Lothair II. the province called
after him Lotharingia, _Lotharii regnum_, and Charles Burgundy
and Provence. Lothair and Charles died in A.D. 869 soon after one
another without heirs, and before the emperor Louis II. could lay
his hands upon their territories they were seized by the uncle.
By the treaty of Mersen, A.D. 870, Charles took the Romanic, and
Louis the German took the German portions. Thus was completed
the partition of the Carolingian empire into three parts
distinguished as homogeneous groups of states by language
and nationality: Germany, France and Italy.--Gregory IV. had
survived the overthrow of the universal monarchy of Charlemagne.
His successor, =Sergius II.=, A.D. 844-847, did not observe
the obligations devolving on him by the _Constitutio Romana_.
But Lothair I. was not inclined to let pass this slight to
his imperial authority. His son Louis was sent into Italy with
a powerful army, and obliged the pope and the Romans to take
the oaths of fealty to his father with the promise not again to
consecrate a pope before they had the emperor’s consent. But the
next pope =Leo IV.=, A.D. 847-855, was also consecrated without
it, but excused himself from the circumstances of the age,
the pressure of the Saracens, while making humble professions
of most dutiful obedience. His successor =Benedict III.=,
A.D. 855-858, did not regard the imperial consent as necessary,
and the anti-pope set up by the French party could not maintain
his position.
§ 82.6. =The Legend of the Female Pope Joanna.=--Between Leo IV.
and Benedict III. is inserted an old legend of the pontificate
of a woman, the so-called female pope Joanna: A maiden from Mainz
went in man’s clothes with her lover to Athens, obtained there
great learning, then appeared at Rome as Joannes Anglicus,
was elected pope, but having become pregnant by one of her
chamberlains, was seized with labour pains in the midst of a
solemn procession and died soon after, having been pope under
the name of John VIII. for two years, five months and four days.
This story was widely credited from the 13th to the 17th century,
but its want of historical foundation is proved by the following
facts:
1. The immediate succession of Benedict III. to Leo. IV. has
contemporary testimony from the _Annales Bertiniani_ of
A.D. 855, also from a letter of Hincmar to Nicholas I.,
Benedict’s successor, as well as the inscription “Benedict”
and “Lothair,” on a Roman denarius of the same year.
2. Neither Photius nor Michael Cærularius, who certainly would
not have failed to make a handle of such a papal scandal
(§ 67), know anything of the matter.
3. The first certain trace of the existence of such a legend
is found about A.D. 1230 in Stephen of Bourbon, yet there
indeed the words are added: _Ut dicitur in chronicis_; but
he makes the female pope mount St. Peter’s chair only about
A.D. 1100, knows neither her name nor her native country,
and describes the catastrophe of her overthrow differently
from the legend current in later times.
4. On the other hand, the existence of her biography in the
_Liber pontificalis_ between that of Leo IV. and that of
Benedict III., was regarded down to the 17th century as
the oldest and indeed almost contemporary witness to the
historicity of the female pope. It is wanting, however, in
the oldest and best MSS. and must therefore be considered
a later interpolation. This also applies to the reference
made thereto by Marianus Sectus (d. A.D. 1086), Sigbert of
Semblours (d. A.D. 1113), Otto of Friesingen (d. A.D. 1158),
and Godfrey of Viterbo (about A.D. 1190). Even in the oldest
MSS. of the Chronicle of the Roman penitentiary Martinus
Polonus (d. A.D. 1278) we read nothing of the female pope;
yet the story must soon have been inserted there, for
Tolomeo of Lucca about A.D. 1312 affirms in his Church
History, that all writers whom he had read, with the single
exception of Martin, made Benedict III. follow immediately
after Leo IV. Perhaps Martin himself in a second enlarged
edition of his chronicle had inserted a biography of the
female pope, which he might do with the less hesitation
if it was true that the pope of his own time John XX.,
A.D. 1276-1277, thought it wrong not to count the female
pope and so styled himself John XXI. From that time all
chroniclers of the Middle Ages without the slightest
expression of doubt repeated the legend in essentially the
same way as Martin’s chronicle and the _Liber pontificalis_
report it. The Reformed theologian, David Blondel, in
A.D. 1649, performed a service to the Catholic church
by his elaborate critical treatment of the legend which
destroyed all belief in its historicity. After this, however,
it was again vindicated by Spanheim (_Opp._ ii. 577) and
Kist; and even Hase regards it as still conceivable that
the church which has affirmed the existence of things that
never were, may have denied the existence of things that
were, if the knowledge of it might prove hazardous to the
interests of the papacy.
The origin and gradual development of the legend, about the
middle of the 12th century and certainly in Rome, may be most
simply explained with Döllinger from a combination of the
following data.
1. From the time of Paschalis II. in A.D. 1099 it was customary
for the new pope in the solemn Lateran procession when
having his entrance on office attested to sit upon two
old chairs standing in the Lateran with pierced seats,
which probably came from an old Roman bath. But the popular
wit of the Romans suggested another reason for the pierced
seats. The chairs were thus pierced in order that before the
consecration a deacon might satisfy himself of the manhood
of the new pope; for, it would be added by and by, a woman
in disguise was once made pope, etc.
2. In a street of Rome was found a statue in white robes with
a child and an enigmatical inscription, the letter P six
times repeated which some read: _Parce pater patrum papissæ
prodere partum_, others: _Papa pater patrum peperit papissa
papellum_; so that this statue was supposed to represent the
female pope with her child.
3. Further the papal processions between the Lateran and the
Vatican at a point where the direct way was too narrow were
wont to diverge into another wider street; this was done, it
was now said, because at this place the catastrophe referred
to had befallen the female pope.
4. That the name Joannes was given to the female pope is easily
explained from the frequency of this name among the popes.
In A.D. 1024 it had been already held by nineteen. And that
she who had brought such a disgrace upon the papacy should
have been described as a native of the German city of Mainz,
is explained from national antipathy entertained by the
Italians for everything German.
5. Finally, the most difficult part of the problem, why this
episode should have been inserted just between Leo IV. and
Benedict III., may perhaps find satisfactory solution in the
supposition that the legend may have been first introduced
as an appendix to a codex of the _Liber ponficalis_ which
closed with the biography of Leo IV.[229]
§ 82.7. =Nicholas I. and Hadrian II.=--The successor of
Benedict III., =Nicholas I.=, A.D. 858-867, was chosen with
the personal concurrence of the emperor Louis II. then in
Rome. This pope was undoubtedly the greatest of all the popes
between Gregory I. and Gregory VII. He was a man of inflexible
determination, clear insight and subtle intellect, who, favoured
by the political movement of the age, supported by public opinion
which regarded him as a second Elijah, and finally backed up in
his endeavours after papal supremacy by the Isidorian collection
of decretals just now brought forward (§ 87, 2), could give
prestige and glory to the struggle for law, truth and discipline.
Among the many battles of his life none brought him more credit
and renown than that with Lothair II. of Lothringia. That
he might marry his mistress Waldrade, Lothair accused his
wife Thielberga of committing incest before her marriage with
her brother, abbot Hucbert, and of having obtained abortion
to conceal her wickedness. Before a civil tribunal she was in
A.D. 858 acquitted by submitting to a divine ordeal, the boiling
caldron ordeal which a servant undertook for her. But Lothair
treated her so badly that at last, in order simply to be rid of
her tormentors, she confessed herself guilty of the crime charged
against her before a Synod at Aachen in A.D. 859 attended by the
two Lothringian metropolitans Günther of Cologne and Thietgaut
of Treves, and expressed the wish that she should atone for
her sins in a cloister. But soon she regretted this step and
fled to Charles the Bald in Neustria. A second Synod at Aachen
in A.D. 860 now declared the marriage with Thielberga null,
and Lothair formally married Waldrade. Meanwhile the Neustria
metropolitan Hincmar of Rheims had published an opinion in
respect of civil and ecclesiastical law (_De divortio Lotharii_)
wholly favourable to the ill-used queen, and she herself had
referred the matter to the pope. Nicholas sent two Italian
bishops, one of whom was Rhodoald of Porto (§ 67, 1), to
Lothringia to investigate the affair. These took bribes and
decided at the Synod of Metz in A.D. 863 in favour of the
king. But Nicholas annulled the decisions of the Council,
excommunicated his legates and deposed the two Lothringian
metropolitans who had vainly trusted to the omnipotence of
Lothringian gold in Rome. Thirsting for revenge they incited
the emperor Louis II., Lothair’s brother, against the pope.
He besieged Rome, but came to an understanding with the pope
through his wife’s mediation. Lothair, detested by his subjects,
threatened with war by his uncles Louis of Germany and Charles
the Bald as champions of the childless Thielberga, repented and
besought the pope for grace and protection from the ambitious
designs of his uncles. Nicholas now sent a legate, Arsenius,
across the Alps, who acting as plenipotentiary in all three
kingdoms, obliged Lothair to take back Thielberga and put away
Waldrade. But she flung herself upon him and in her arms Lothair
soon forgot the promise to which he had sworn. At the same time
he reconciled himself to his uncles whose zeal had somewhat
cooled in presence of the lordly conduct of the papal legate.
Thielberga now herself sought divorce from the pope. But Nicholas
continued firmly to insist upon his demands. His successor
=Hadrian II.=, A.D. 867-872, an old man of seventy-five years,
could only gradually emancipate himself from the imperial party
which had elected him and taken him under its protection. He
received back again the two excommunicated metropolitans, without,
however, restoring them to their offices, released Waldrade
from church discipline, and always put off granting Thielberga’s
reiterated request for divorce. Lothair now went himself to
Rome, took a solemn oath that he had no carnal intercourse with
Waldrade since the restoration of his wife, and received the
sacrament from the pope’s hand. Full of hope that he would get
success in his object he started for home, but died at Piacenza
of a violent fever in A.D. 869. When dead the uncles pounced
upon the kingdom. Hadrian used all his influence in favour of
the emperor, the legitimate heir, and threatened his opponents
with excommunication. But Hincmar of Rheims composed a state
paper by order of his king, in which he told the pope that the
opinion of France was that he should not interfere with things
about which he knew nothing. The pope was obliged to let this
insult pass unrevenged. In a dispute of his own Hincmar succeeded
in giving the pope a second rebuff (§ 83, 2).[230]
§ 82.8. =John VIII. and his Successors.=--His successor
=John VIII.=, A.D. 872-882, was more successful than Hadrian
in bringing the Carolingian king to kneel at his footstool.
In the art of intrigue and in the perfidy, hypocrisy and
unconscionableness required therefor, he was, however, greatly
superior. He succeeded almost completely in freeing the papal
chair from the imperial authority. But he did so only to make it
a playball of the wildest party interests around his own hearth.
To his account mainly must be laid the unfathomable degradation
and debasement of the papacy during the 10th century. When the
emperor Louis II. died in A.D. 875, Louis the German, as elder
and full brother of his father, ought to have been his heir.
But the pope wished to show the world that the papal favour
could make a gift of the imperial crown to whomsoever it chose.
Accepting his invitation, Charles the Bald appeared in Rome and
was crowned by the pope on Christmas Day, A.D. 875. But he had
to pay dearly for the papal favour, by formally renouncing all
claims to the rights of superior over the States of the Church,
allow for the future absolute freedom in the election of popes,
and accept a papal representative and clerical primate for all
France and Germany. But not altogether satisfied with this,
the pope made the new emperor submit himself to a formal act
of election by the Lombards of Pavia, and in order to secure
the approval of his own nobles to his proceedings he even agreed
to give them the right of election. The Neustrian clergy, however,
with Hincmar at their head, offered a vigorous resistance and
at the first Synod at Pontion in A.D. 876 there were violent
altercations. The shameful compromise satisfied neither pope
nor emperor. In Rome a wild party faction gained ground against
the pope, and the Saracens pressed further and further into Italy.
From the emperor, who knew not how to keep back the advances of
the Normans in his own country, no help could be expected. Yet
he made hasty preparations, purchased a dishonourable peace
from the Normans, and crossed the Alps. But new troubles at
home imperiously called him back, and at the foot of Mount Cenis
in A.D. 877, he died in a miserable hut of poison administered
by his physician, a Jew. The pope got into yet greater straits
and made his position worse by further intrigues. Also his
negotiations with Byzantium in A.D. 879 involved him in yet
more serious troubles (§ 67, 1). He died in A.D. 882, apparently
by the hand of an assassin. A year before his death Charles
the Fat, the youngest son of Louis the German, had been crowned
emperor, and he, the least capable of all the Carolingian line,
by the choice of the Neustrian nobles, united once more all the
Frankish empire under his weak sceptre. Marinus, the successor
of John VIII., died after a single year’s pontificate. So
was it, too, with Hadrian III. And now the Romans, without
paying any heed to the impotent wrath of the emperor, elected
and consecrated =Stephen V.=, A.D. 885-891, as their pope. In
A.D. 857 the German nobles at last put an end to the despicable
rule of the fat Charles by passing an act of formal deposition.
They chose in his place Arnulf of Carinthia, a natural son of
Charles’ brother Carloman. Pope =Formosus=, A.D. 891-896, called
him to his assistance in A.D. 894, and crowned him emperor. But
he could not hold his ground in Italy and the opposition emperor
Lambert, a Longobard, had possession of the field. Formosus died
soon after Arnulf’s withdrawal. Boniface VI., who died after
fifteen days, was succeeded by =Stephen VI.= in A.D. 896. This
man, infected by Italian fanaticism, had the body of Formosus,
who had favoured the Germans, lifted from the grave, shamefully
abused and then thrown into the Tiber. The three following popes
reigned only a few weeks or months, and were either murdered
or driven away. John IX., A.D. 898-900, in order to pacify the
German party, honoured again the memory of Formosus.--Arnulf’s
tenure of the empire, however, had only been a short vain dream;
but in Germany during a trying period he wielded the sceptre
with power and dignity. When he died in A.D. 899, the German
nobles elected his seven-year-old son, Louis the Child. He
died in A.D. 911, and with him the dynasty of the Carolingians
in Germany became extinct. In France this line continued to
exist in pitiable impotence down to the death of Louis V. in
A.D. 987.--Continuation, § 96.
§ 82.9. =The Papacy and the Nationalities.=[231]--From the
time of Charlemagne the policy of the French kings was to
establish bishoprics on the frontiers of their territories
for Christianizing the neighbouring heathen countries, and
thereby securing their conquest, or, if this had been already
won, confirming it. The first part of this purpose the popes
could only approve and further, but just as decidedly they
opposed the second. There must be a reference to the chair
of Peter, that the pope may maintain and preserve as head of
the universal church the rights of nationalities. Each country
won to Christianity should be received into the organism of the
church with its national position unimpaired, and so under the
spiritual fatherhood of the pope there would be established
a Christian family of states, of which each member occupies
a position of perfect equality with the others. In this way
the interests of humanity, and at the same time, the selfish
interests of papal policy, were secured. This policy was
therefore directed to the emancipating as soon as possible
the newly founded national churches from the supremacy of the
German clergy and giving them an independent national church
organization under bishops and archbishops of their own.
§ 83. THE RANK OF METROPOLITAN.[232]
The position of metropolitan was not regarded with equal favour in
the German church and in the German state. Amid the variety of races
the metropolitans represented the unity of the national church, as
the pope did that of the universal church, while at the same time
as an estate of the empire they exercised great influence on civil
administration and foreign policy. The reigning princes recognised
in the unity of the ecclesiastical administration of the country a
support and security for the political unity and therefore opposed
the partition of the national church into several metropolitanates,
or, where the larger extension of the empire required several
archbishoprics, wished rather to give the ablest of these the rank
and authority of a primate. The popes on the other hand endeavoured to
give each of the larger countries at least two or three metropolitans,
and to prevent as far as possible the appointment of a national church
primate; for in the unity of the national church they perceived the
danger of such a prelate sooner or later giving way to the desire to
emancipate himself from Rome and secure for himself the position of an
independent patriarch.
§ 83.1. =The Position of Metropolitans in General.=--As
representing the unity of the national churches the interests
of the metropolitans were bound up with those of the ruling
princes. They were the most vigorous supporters of their policy,
and generally got in return the prince’s hearty support. This
coalition of the metropolitans and the civil power, however,
threatened the subordinate clergy with abject servitude, and
drove them to champion the interests of the pope. Through
pressure of circumstances, a widespread conspiracy of bishops
and abbots was formed during the last years of Louis the Pious
to emancipate the clergy and especially the episcopate from
the dominion of the state and the metropolitans and to place
them immediately under the papal jurisdiction. They founded upon
the Isidorian decretals as showing their rights in the earliest
times (§ 87, 2). Their endeavour met indeed powerful opposition,
but the statements of the Pseudo-Isidore had now obtained the
validity of canon law.
§ 83.2. =Hincmar of Rheims.=--Among the =French= prelates
after the restoration of the order of metropolitans by Boniface
the first place was held by the occupant of the see of Rheims.
It reached the summit of its glory under Hincmar of Rheims,
A.D. 845-882, the ablest of all the ecclesiastical leaders of
France. His life consists of an uninterrupted series of battles
of the most varied kind. The first fight in which he engaged was
the predestination controversy of Gottschalk (§ 91, 5). But his
strength did not lie in dogmatics but in church government. And
here, every inch a metropolitan, he has fought the most glorious
battles of his life and affirmed, against the assumptions of
popes and emancipation efforts of bishops, the autonomy of
reigning princes, the freedom and independence of national
churches, and the jurisdiction of metropolitans. Of this sort
was his contest with bishop Rothad of Soissons. Hincmar had
deposed him in A.D. 861 for insubordination. Rothad appealed to
pope Nicholas I. on the ground of the Sardican Canon (§ 46, 3),
which, however, had never been accepted in the Frankish Empire.
He had at the same time referred the pope to the Isidorian
decretals. Thus supported, Nicholas after a hard struggle had
Rothad reinstated in A.D. 865. The insolent defiance of his
own nephew, Hincmar, bishop of Laon, led the archbishop into
another obstinate fight. Here too the Isidorian decretals played
a prominent part. Hadrian II. in A.D. 869 took the side of the
nephew, but the metropolitan gained the victory, and the nephew,
who defied the king as well as the metropolitan and moreover had
entered into treasonable communication with the German court,
ended his course by being deprived of his eyes by the king. Down
to A.D. 875 Hincmar was inflexibly true to the king as a pillar
of his policy and his throne. But when Charles the Bald in
that year paid down as purchase price for the imperial throne,
not only the autonomy of the empire but also the freedom of the
French church and the rights of the metropolitans, he was obliged
now to turn his weapons against him. Hincmar died in A.D. 882
in flight before the Normans. With him the glory of the French
archbishopric sank into its grave. The pseudo-Isidorian party
had triumphed, the bishops were emancipated from the government
of the princes of their country, but instead of this were often
surrendered to the rude caprice of secular nobles.
§ 83.3. =Metropolitans in other lands.=--The =English= princes
in the interests of the political unity of the Heptarchy for
a long time withstood the endeavours of the popes to place a
rival alongside of the archbishop of Canterbury. The action and
reaction of these opposing interests were particularly strong
in the time of Wilfrid (§ 78, 3), whom the Roman party had
appointed archbishop of York. Wilfrid was driven away and died
in A.D. 709 after an eventful life, without succeeding in taking
possession of the place to which he had been appointed. At last,
however, the pope reached his end. In A.D. 735 a Northumbrian
prince obtained a pallium, and after that the see of York got
an undisputed place alongside that of Canterbury.--In =Northern
Italy= there were metropolitan sees at Ravenna, Milan and
Aquileia which still made their old claims to self-government
(§ 46, 1). Sergius, the prelate of Ravenna, about A.D. 760,
thought it would be well out of the ruins of the exarchate to
found an ecclesiastical state after the model of that of Rome.
There was often opposition there to the Roman supremacy. On
this account the violent archbishop John of Ravenna, who was
also a defrauder of the church, suffered the most complete
humiliation from Nicholas I. in A.D. 861, in spite of the
emperor’s protection. The force of public opinion compelled
the emperor to abandon his protégé when excommunicated by the
pope. But during the pontificate of John VIII., Ausbert, prelate
of Milan (died A.D. 882), who kept true to the German party,
could defy papal anathema and deposition. His successor, however,
again acknowledged the papal supremacy.--In =Germany=, since
the time of Charlemagne, new metropolitan sees had been created
at Salzburg, Cologne, Treves and Hamburg-Bremen. Mainz, however,
still claimed the primacy and represented the unity of the German
church. The Isidorian forgery availed not here as in the land of
its birth to stop the contention of the archbishop. The German
metropolitanate to the advantage of the empire maintained its
rights untouched for centuries. Among the primates of Mainz
the most important by far was =Hatto I.=, A.D. 891-913. Even
under Arnulf (died A.D. 899), whose most trusted adviser he
was, he exercised a wide as well as wholesome influence on the
administration of the empire. It was still greater under Louis
the Child (died A.D. 911) whom he raised to the throne and for
whom he acted as regent. Conrad I. (§ 96, 1) also owed to him
his election as king of the Germans. In the internal affairs
of the German church, he directed and adjusted, organized and
ruled in this time of general upheaval with wonderful insight,
wisdom and energy, most conspicuously, and that too against
papal assumptions, at the great national synod of Tribur in
A.D. 895. The primate regarded it as a political axiom, that,
in order to conserve and advance the unity of the empire, the
particularism of the several races and the struggles of their
chiefs and princes for independence should be crushed. Owing to
the consistency and energy with which he carried out his idea,
he did indeed make many enemies. The stories of insidious perfidy
and bloody violence which have attached themselves to his memory
are to all appearance due to their calumnious hatred. His sudden
death probably gave rise to the legend that the devil fetched
him away and cast him into the mouth of Etna. To him, and not
to the much less important Hatto II., who died in A.D. 970, is
the other equally baseless legend of the Mäusethurm near Bingen
to be referred.--Continuation, § 97, 2.
§ 84. THE CLERGY IN GENERAL.[233]
The bishops subject to the archbishop were called diocesan bishops,
or, as voting members of the Provincial Synod, suffragan bishops. The
canonical election of bishops by the people and clergy was completely
done away with in the German national church. Kings without opposition
filled vacant bishoprics according to their own choice. Louis the
Pious at the Synod of Aachen, in A.D. 817, restored canonical election
by people and clergy, subject to the emperor’s confirmation, but
his successors paid no attention to the law. Deposition was usually
carried out by the Provincial and National Synods. The investiture of
bishops with pastoral staff and marriage ring by the reigning prince
is occasionally met with even in the Merovingian age and became general
after the development of the benefice system in the 9th century. Out
of the institution of bishops without dioceses, _Episcopi regionarii_,
originally intended for missionary service, arose in all probability
the institution of _Chorepiscopi_ which flourished especially in
France during the 8th and 9th centuries. With the old _Chorepiscopi_
(§ 34, 2; § 45) they have nothing in common beyond the name. They
were subordinate assistants of the diocesan bishops, whose convenience,
unspirituality and often absence on state affairs demanded such
substitutes. But by their arbitrary conduct and refractoriness they
often gave great trouble to those bishops who had any care for their
flock. A Synod at Paris, therefore, in A.D. 849, withdrew all authority
from them. From that time they gradually sank out of view. The inferior
clergy, taken generally from the serfs, stood mostly in slavish
dependence on the bishop and often had not the barest necessaries
of culture. Their appointment lay with the bishop, yet the founder of
a church and his successors frequently retained the right of patronage
in choosing their own officiating clergymen.[234] Especially in the
later Merovingian and earlier Carolingian periods, the Frankish clergy,
superior and inferior, had become terribly corrupt. Boniface was the
first to reintroduce some sort of discipline (§ 78, 5) and Charlemagne’s
powerful government contributed in an extraordinary measure to the
ennobling of the clergy. Yet the corruption was too general and too
great to be altogether eradicated. Louis the Pious, therefore, in
A.D. 816, extended to the whole kingdom a reformation which Chrodegang
of Metz had introduced fifty years previously among his own clergy, by
which means discipline and order were again improved for some decades.
But in the troublous times of the last Carolingians everything went
again into confusion and decay. Exemption from civil jurisdiction
was accorded the clergy during this period only to this extent, that
the secular courts could not proceed against a clergyman without the
advice of the bishop, and the bishop himself was subject only to the
jurisdiction of the king and the Provincial Synod.
§ 84.1. =The Superior Clergy.=--In the German states from
the earliest times the superior clergy constituted a spiritual
aristocracy which by means of their higher culture won a more
influential position in civil life than the secular nobles. In
all important affairs of state the bishops were the advisers of
the king; they were almost exclusively employed on embassies; on
all commissions there were clerical members and always one half
of the _Missi dominici_ were clerics. This nearness to the person
of the king and their importance in civil life made them rank as
one of the estates of the realm. The Frankish idea of immunity,
in consequence of which by royal gift along with the rights of
territorial lords there were handed over to the new proprietors
also the princely right of levying taxes and administering
justice, brought to them secular as well as spiritual jurisdiction
over a great part of the land. As the court of the Frankish
king was moved from place to place, he required a special court,
chapel, with a numerous court-clergy, at the head of which was
an Arch-chaplain, usually the most distinguished prelate in
the land. The names _Capella_ and _Capellani_ were originally
applied only to court chapels and court chaplains, and were
derived from the fact that in the chapel was kept the _Cappa_
or coat of Martin of Tours as a precious relic and the national
palladium of France. The court clergy formed the nursery for
future bishops of the realm. In addition to the ring and staff
as episcopal insignia we find in the Carolingian age the bishop’s
cap, consisting of two long sheets of tin or pasteboard running
up to a peak, covered with silk of the same colour as the dress
used in celebrating mass, generally richly ornamented with gold
and precious stones, called by the old pagan name _Infula_ or
_Mitra_.[235]
§ 84.2. =The Inferior Clergy.=--The enormous expansion of
episcopal dioceses rendered a new arrangement of the =inferior
clergy= indispensable. The extension churches in towns and the
country churches which previously had been served by the clergy
of the cathedral church, obtained a regular clergy of their
own. As these churches were always dedicated to a saint they
were called _Tituli_, and the clergy appointed to officiate in
them, _Intitulati_, _Incardinati_, _Cardinales_. Thus originated
the idea of _Parochia_, παροικία and of _Parochus_ or parish
priest,[236] who, because the _cura animarum_ was committed to
him was also called Curate, as in the French curé. Over about
ten parishes was placed an _Archipresbyter ruralis_ who was
called _Decanus_, Dean. As the right of administering baptism
belonged originally to him exclusively, his church was called
_Ecclesia baptisimalis_; his diocese, _Christianitas_ or _Plebs_;
he himself also, _Plebanus_. A further arrangement was first
introduced in the 8th century by Heddo of Strasburg [Strassburg],
who gave to each of the deans in his diocese seven archdeacons,
_præpositi_, provosts. Besides the parish churches there were
many chapels or oratories where divine service was conducted
only at certain times by the neighbouring parish clergy or
chaplains appointed for that purpose. To this class also belong
the domestic chapels in episcopal residences or on the estates
of noblemen which were served by special domestic or castle
chaplains. The latter indeed had in addition the duty of feeding
the dogs, waiting at table and taking charge of the lady’s pony.
Notwithstanding repeated reinforcement of the old law: _Ne quis
vage ordinetur_, there was still a great number of so-called
_Clericis vagis_, mostly vagabonds and idlers, who, ordained by
unprincipled bishops for a reward, roamed over the country like
clerical pedlars.
§ 84.3. =Compulsory Celibacy= was stoutly resisted by the German
clergy. The inferior clergy were mostly married. At ordination
they were ordered indeed to separate from their wives and to
abstain from marital intercourse, but the promise was rarely
fulfilled. Among the unmarried clergy, fornication, adultery
and unnatural lust were prevalent. A bishop, Ulrich of Augsburg,
addressed to Nicholas I. a philippic against the law of celibacy
with fearless exposures of its evil consequences. The =moral
condition= of the clergy was generally speaking shockingly low.
Legacy hunting, forging of documents, simony and chaffering for
benefices were carried on in a shameless way. The lordly habits
of the bishops consisted in hunting, going about with dogs and
falcons, and in wild drunken revels. In the 7th century it was
the peculiar pleasure of the Frankish bishops in wild scenes
of blood that induced them to take part in the wars, and led
to their being afterwards obliged to fit out contingents for
the field at the cost of their ecclesiastical revenues. Pepin,
Charlemagne and Louis the Pious passed stringent laws against
these warlike habits of churchmen; but the later Carolingians
not only tolerated but actually encouraged them.
§ 84.4. =Canonical life.=--Augustine’s institution of a
_monasterii Clericorum_ (§ 45, 1) was often imitated in later
times. But bishop =Chrodegang of Metz=, who died in A.D. 766,
gave it for the first time, about A.D. 760, a fixed and permanent
form. His rule or _Canon_ is closely connected with the monastic
rule of St. Benedict (§ 85), with the omission of the vow of
poverty. He built a commodious residence Domus, _monasterium_
(comp. Germ. words Dom and Münster), in which all the clergy of
his cathedral church were obliged to live, pray, work, eat and
sleep under the constant and strict supervision of the bishop
or his archdeacon. This was the _Vita canonica_. After morning
devotions all the members of the establishment gathered together
in the hall where the bishop or provost read to them a chapter
from the Bible, most frequently from Leviticus, from the rule or
from the fathers, and added thereto the necessary explanations
and exhortations. The hall was therefore called the Chapter House;
then the name =Chapter=[237] was given to the whole body gathered
together there. The =Colleges=[238] were a subsequent development
of the chapter in non-episcopal city churches, with a provost
or deacon at their head. Louis the Pious allowed Chrodegang’s
rule to be revived and generalized by the deacon Amalarius of
Metz, and at the National Assembly at Aachen in A.D. 817 enforced
it for the whole kingdom. It is known as _Regula Aquisgranensis_.
But soon after the Canons endeavoured to emancipate themselves
more and more from the burdensome yoke of episcopal control.
Gunther of Cologne (§ 82, 7) who, though deposed by the pope,
retained his official position, was obliged to purchase the
support of his chapter by a bargain in accordance with which
a great part of the ecclesiastical revenues of the chapter were
placed at their own full disposal as Prebends or Benefices. And
what this one chapter gained for itself was afterwards contended
for by others.[239]--Continuation, § 97, 3.
§ 85. MONASTICISM.[240]
While from the 5th century one rush of migrating peoples was rapidly
followed by another, the monkish orders fell into decay, barbarism and
corruption. They would scarcely have survived this period of commotion,
at least would not have proved the great blessing that they have
been to the German west, had not the spirit of ancient Rome with its
practical turn, its appreciation of law and order and its organizing
talent, given them at the right time, what they hitherto wanted, a
rule answering to the requirements and circumstances of the age, and
by means of it firm footing, unity, order and legal form. This task was
accomplished by =Benedict of Nursia= (d. A.D. 543), the patriarch of
Western Monasticism. The rule, which he prescribed in A.D. 529 to the
monks of the monastery of Monte Cassino in Campania founded by him, was
not unduly ascetic, combined strict discipline with a certain degree
of mildness and indulgence, estimated the needs of human nature as well
as the circumstances of the times, and was, in short, adaptable and
practical. From the rule of Cassiodorus (§ 47, 23) Benedict’s disciples
borrowed that zeal for scholarly studies about which their master had
given no directions, and Gregory the Great inspired the order with
enthusiasm for missionary labours. Thus the Benedictine order obtained
its full consecration to its calling of worldwide significance. Soon
spreading over all the West, being introduced into France by Maurus in
A.D. 543, it nobly fulfilled its vocation by cultivating the soil and
the mind, by clearing the forests, bringing in waste lands, zealously
preaching the gospel, rooting out superstition and paganism, educating
the young, fostering and restoring literature, science and art. The
barbarous age, however, which saw the overthrow of the Merovingians
and the rise of the Carolingians, exerted a deteriorating influence
also on the Benedictines. But Charlemagne restored strict discipline,
and assigned to the monasteries the task of erecting schools and
prosecuting scholarly studies. By authority of Louis the Pious and
by order of the National Assembly at Aachen in A.D. 817, =Benedict of
Aniane= undertook a reformation and re-organization of all the monkish
systems throughout the empire. At the head of a commission appointed
for that purpose he visited all the Frankish monasteries, and compelled
them to organize themselves after his improved Benedictine Rule.
§ 85.1. The one source of information regarding the life
of =Benedict of Nursia= is the miracle-laden record of the
miracle-loving pope Gregory the Great in the second book of
his Dialogues. Benedict’s =Rule= comprises 73 chapters. The
first principle of the monastic life is obedience to the Abbot,
as representative of Christ. The choice of abbot lies with the
brothers. Of serving brothers the rule knows nothing. The chief
occupation is agriculture. Idleness is strictly forbidden. Charge
of the kitchen and reading at table are duties performed by all
the monks in turn week about. Divine service begins at 3 a.m. and
is rendered regularly through all the seven hours (§ 56, 2). Two
meals a day are partaken of and each monk has daily half a bottle
of wine. Flesh meat is given only to the sick and weak. At table
and after the _Completorium_ or last hour of prayer, no word
was allowed to be spoken. All the brothers slept in a common
dormitory, each in a separate bed, but completely dressed and
girded, so as to be ready at call for matins. The discipline was
strict and reasonable; first private, then public rebuke, then
penal fasting, corporal punishment, and finally excommunication.
Hospitality and attention to the poor were enjoined on all
monasteries. Reception was preceded by a year’s novitiate.
The vow included _Stabilitas loci_, _Conversio morum_ (poverty
and chastity) and _Obedientia_. The _Oblati_ were a special kind
of novices, _i.e._ children who in their early youth were placed
in the monastery by their parents. They were educated in the
monastic schools and were not allowed to go back to the world.
§ 85.2. =Benedict of Aniane= (A.D. 821) was originally called
Witiza and was the son of a Visigoth count. He had served as
a soldier under Charlemagne. In attempting to save his brother
he was himself almost drowned. His ambition was now directed
to an ascetic life, in which his personal performances were
most remarkable. On the river Anianus in Languedoc he founded
in A.D. 779 the monastery of Aniane. He was the indispensable
and all-powerful counsellor of Louis the Pious. In order to have
him always near him, Louis founded for him the monastery of Inda
or the Cornelius-Münster near Aachen. In the interests of his
cloister reform he published in A.D. 817 a _Codex regulorum_ in
which he collected all the monastic rules previously known.
§ 85.3. The rule of the elder Benedict made no reference to
=Nunneries=; but his sister Scholastica is regarded as the
founder of the order of female Benedictines. Another form of
female asceticism was developed after the model of the canonical
life of the secular clergy in the institution of canonesses. The
rule, which Louis the Pious at Aachen in A.D. 816 allowed them
to draw up for themselves, is distinctly milder than that of
the nuns. The ladies’ orders gradually became places of resort
for the unmarried daughters of the nobles. The canonical age for
taking the nun’s vows was twenty-five. The novitiate lasted three
years. Besides the _propria professio_ the _paterna devotio_ was
also regarded as binding. In regard to dress the adoption of the
veil was the main thing; but in addition they wore the wreath as
a symbol of virginity and the ring as token of spiritual marriage.
At this time the cutting of the hair was only a punishment for
unchaste nuns. The honourable position of the wife among the
Germans secured special respect for the abbess, and obtained
for the most famous nunneries exemption, civil prerogatives and
proprietary, even princely rights. The frequent appearance of
=Double-Cloisters= where monks and nuns, naturally in separate
dwellings, under a common rule either of an abbess as often in
England, or of an abbot, was also peculiarly German.
§ 85.4. =The Greater Monasteries=, formed as they were of a vast
number of separate buildings for agriculture, cattle rearing,
handicraft and arts of all kinds, for elementary teaching, for
higher education, for hospitable entertainment, caring for the
sick, etc., came by and by to attain the proportions of little
towns. Frequently they were the centre around which cities were
raised. The monastery of Vivarium in Calabria, Cassiodorus’
foundation, inspired Western monasticism with an enthusiasm
for scholarly studies. The regulations of Monte Cassino were
extended to all monasteries of the West. Columbanus’ monastery
of Bobbio rooted out paganism and Arianism in northern Italy. The
monasteries of Iona in Scotland and Bangor in Ireland gained high
repute in the struggle of the Celtic church against the Roman.
The English monastery of Wearmouth was a famous school of science.
In France St. Denys near Paris and Old Corbei in Picardy gained
a high reputation. In South Germany St. Gall, Reichenau, Lorsch
and Hirschau, in Central Germany Fulda, Hersfeld and Fritzlar,
and in North Germany New Corbei, a branch from Old Corbei, were
main centres of Christian culture.
§ 85.5. In its new Western form also monasticism was still
without the clerical character. But there was an ever-increasing
tendency to draw the monastic and the clerical institutions
more and more closely together. By means of celibacy and
the introduction of the canonical life (§ 84, 4) the clergy
came to have the monkish character, and on the other hand,
most of the monks, in the first instance for monastic and
mission services, took clerical orders. By and by monks sought
appointments as curates (§ 84, 2), and thus rivalries arose
between them and the clergy. The monasteries were wholly under
the jurisdiction of the bishops in whose diocese they lay. The
exemptions of this period were limited to security for the free
election of the abbot, independent administration of property
and gratuitous performance of consecrations by the bishop. In
the Frankish empire, however, abbots were ordinarily appointed
to vacancies by the court, and rich abbeys were also often
bestowed upon distinguished noblemen _in commendam_, _i.e._,
for temporary administration with the enjoyment of their revenues,
or even to court and military officers as a reward for special
services. Such lay abbots or _abbacomites_ often stayed in the
monasteries for months with their families, their huntsmen and
their soldiers, and made them the scene of their drinking bouts,
their field sports and their military exercises. The kings
retained the richest abbacies to themselves or gave them to
their sons and daughters, wives and concubines.
§ 85.6. =The Stylites= (§ 44, 6) on account of the climate,
could gain no footing, though attempts were indeed made, _e.g._
by Wulflaich (§ 78, 3). In place of them we find male and female
recluses, =Reclusi= (_Inclusi_) and _Reclusæ_, who shut themselves
up in cells which they never quitted. =Hermits of the Woods=,
unfettered by any rules, found great favour among the Germans.
Their national melancholic temperament inclining them to solitude,
their strong love of nature, their passionate delight in roaming
unchecked through woods and mountains, contributed to make such a
mode of life attractive. It was during the 6th century that this
craze for hermit life reached its height in Germany, and its main
seat was in Auvergne with its wild mountains, glens and gorges.
But as the cell of the saint was often in later times developed
into a monastery on account of the crowds of disciples that
gathered round, the hermit life gradually passed over into a
regulated cœnobite life. In Switzerland Meinard, son of a count
of Zollern, was a hermit of this sort. In A.D. 861 he had been
murdered by two robbers, and this was afterwards discovered, the
legend says, by means of two ravens feeding upon the body of the
murdered man. His cell in later times grew into the beautiful
Benedictine abbey of Maria-Einsiedeln with its miracle-working
image of the mother of God, which at this day is visited by more
than a hundred thousand pilgrims yearly.
§ 86: THE PROPERTY OF CHURCHES AND MONASTERIES.
The inalienableness of church property being regarded as the first
principle of its administration, it grew by enormous strides from year
to year through donations and legacies, At the end of the 7th century
there was in Gaul fully a third of the whole territory in the possession
of the churches and monasteries, while the national exchequer was
quite exhausted. In this emergency Charles Martel founded the benefice
system, for which he also converted into money the abundant possessions
of the church. His sons, however, Carloman and Pepin the Short, in
consideration of the reorganization of the Frankish church effected by
Boniface (§ 78, 5), sought to avert the impoverishment of many churches
and cloisters by a partial restitution so far as the neediness of the
times would allow. Charlemagne and Louis the Pious did still more in
this direction, so that partly by these means, partly by the continued
donations of rich people, church property soon acquired its earlier
proportions. Thus, _e.g._, the monastery of Luxeuil had in the 9th
century an estate with 15,000 farm-houses upon it.--The administration
of the property of churches and monasteries lay in the hands of the
bishops and abbots. For defending and maintaining secular and legal
rights there were ecclesiastical and monastic advocates, _Advocati
ecclesiæ_. This institution, however, often degenerated into an
agency for oppressing the peasants and plundering the property of
their clients; for many advocates assumed arbitrary powers and dealt
with the property of the church and its proceeds just as they chose.
§ 86.1. =The Revenues of Churches and Monasteries.=--The main
sources of their growing wealth were donations and legacies.
Princes often made bequests of enormous magnitude and rich people
in private life vied with them. Occasions were never wanting;
restoration from sickness, escape from danger, the birth of
a child, etc., regularly won for the church whose patron saint
had been helpful, some valuable present. The clergy also used
all means in their power to encourage this prevailing readiness
to bestow presents; and to this must in great measure be traced
the beginnings of the forging of deeds. A peculiar form for
bequeathing a gift was that of the _Precaria_, according to
which the giver retained to himself for his lifetime the use
of the goods which he gifted. Church property was farther greatly
increased by the personal possessions of the clergy and the
monks, which at the death of the former and at the _conversio_
of the latter usually became part of the revenue of the church
or cloister to which their owners belonged. Besides the proceeds
of its own estates the church drew the tithes of all property
and incomes of parishioners, the claim being enforced as a _jus
divinum_ by a reference to the Mosaic legislation and made a
law of the empire by the injunction of Charlemagne. On the other
hand the clergy were forbidden to exact payment for discharge
of official duties, so called stole-dues, because they were
performed by the priest dressed in the _stola_. The cathedral
church was entitled to an annual tax, _Honor cathedræ_, levied
upon all the churches of the diocese. The inferior clergy, on the
other hand, often arrogated to themselves the right in accordance
with a bad custom of grasping by violent plunder the possessions
of their deceased bishop, _Spolium_.[241]
§ 86.2. =The Benefice System.=--In consequence of the vast
gifts of the Merovingians to the churches and their ministrants,
when Charles Martel assumed the government, the sources of crown
revenue that hitherto seemed inexhaustible were almost completely
dried up, while this prince, in order to deliver the country from
the Saracens and in order to maintain his rule over against the
innumerable petty tyrants who threatened to dismember the empire,
required a yet fuller treasury than any of his predecessors. Out
of these circumstances grew the =Benefice System=. The soldiers
who had served the nation and princes had been as before rewarded
by grants of lands. These, however, were no longer given as
hereditary possessions but only for the lifetime of the receiver
(_Beneficium_), and for this he was under obligation to supply
a proportionate contingent for military service. When the crown
lands had been well nigh exhausted, Charles Martel did not
hesitate to lay claim to the church property. His son Carloman
at the first Austrasian national Synod in A.D. 742 (§ 78, 5)
promised to restore the church property that had thus been
alienated, but had soon to confess his inability to perform his
promise. At the second Austrasian Synod at Lestines in A.D. 743
he therefore limited the immediate restitution to the most
pressing cases of notoriously poor and needy churches and
monasteries. He was driven to this by the absolutely needful
claims of the civil and military departments. But the claim
of the church to get back the property was secured by the
beneficiary giving a _Precarial_ letter and by the payment of
an annual tax of a solidus for every farm house on the estate.
The king also promised the full restoration on the death of
the beneficiary, with express retention, however, of the right,
if the needs of the times required it, to lease out again the
vacant _precariæ_. Even Pepin at the Neustrian national Synod
at Soissons in A.D. 744 granted similar concessions, but yet
in the execution of them did not go so far as his brother. In
A.D. 751 he caused a _descriptio et divisio_, _i.e._ an inventory
of church property with an exact fixing of the limits of its
various titles to be made.[242]--The annual tax referred to was
transformed by Charlemagne into a second tithe, the so-called
_Nonæ_. But even after the partial restitution effected by the
descendants of Pepin there still remained upon the restored
property the beneficial burdens that had been laid upon it,
especially the obligation to supply and equip a certain number
of soldiers, and this was thence transferred to the whole
property of the church.--The benefice system, originating
in the pressure of circumstances, continued to spread more
and more, and formed the foundation of the entire social and
civil organization of the Middle Ages.[243]
§ 87. ECCLESIASTICAL LEGISLATION.
The construction of ecclesiastical legislation for the German
empire was at first wholly the work of the Synods. The popes exerted
scarcely any influence upon it, but all the more powerfully was
felt the influence of the kings. They summoned the Synods, laid
down to them the subjects to be discussed, and confirmed according
to their own judgment their decisions. From the time that the Frankish
bishoprics were filled by native Franks the independent life of
the Synods was quenched, and ecclesiastical affairs were arranged
at the national assemblies in which the bishops also took part as
territorial nobles. The great national Synods, too, at which Boniface’s
reorganization of the church in accordance with Roman ecclesiastical
law as carried (§ 78, 5) were _Concilia mixta_ of this kind; and
even under Charlemagne and Louis of France these were still prevalent.
Charles, however, made their proceedings more orderly by grouping the
nobles into three ranks as bishops, abbots and counts. Under the Pepin
dynasty alongside of the synodal we have the royal decrees, arranged
in separate chapters, and hence the ordinances are called _Capitularia_.
Purely ecclesiastical Synods in later times again gained a footing and
were particularly numerous in the times of Hincmar.
§ 87.1. =Older Collections of Ecclesiastical Law.=--Gregory II.
furnished Boniface with a _Codex canonum_, undoubtedly the
_Dionysiaca_ (§ 43, 3), and Hadrian II. presented Charlemagne
with one which was solemnly received at the National Synod of
Aachen in A.D. 802. There was in Spain a new collection which
was erroneously attributed to bishop Isidore of Seville, who to
distinguish him from the Frankish Pseudo-Isidore is designated
the genuine Isidore, or more correctly as _Hispana_. This
collection in form attaches itself to _Dionysiaca_. In the
9th century it was introduced among the Franks, and here gave
contents and name to the Pseudo-Isidorian collection. In close
connection with this masterpiece of forgery stands the collection
of laws by Benedictus Levita of Mainz, which was indeed called
a collection of capitularies, but was gathered mainly from
documents of ecclesiastical legislation, genuine and spurious. A
collection of true and genuine capitularies was made in A.D. 827
by Ansegis, Abbot of Fontenelles. Benedict’s collection was
included in it as 5th, 6th, and 7th books. Besides these large
collections many bishops prepared epitomized collections for
the use of their own dioceses, of which several are extant under
the name of _Capitula Episcoporum_. Decidedly in the interest
of the Pseudo-Isidore are the _Capitula Angilramni_, composed
and subscribed by bishop Angilramnus of Metz (d. A.D. 791). The
dates and contents of the three first-named collections were
determined in the interest of the Pseudo-Isidorian, and are still
a matter of controversy. Benedict, according to his own credible
statement, undertook his work at the command of the archbishop
Otgar, of Mainz, for the archives of Mainz, but completed and
published it probably in France only after Otgar’s death, which
occurred in A.D. 847. But while in earlier times it was generally
believed that Benedict had used the Pseudo-Isidore, Hinschius
has become convinced that the author of the capitula is identical
with the Pseudo-Isidore, and from Benedict’s capitularies has
unravelled first the composition of the capitula and then that
of the decretals.[244]
§ 87.2. =The Collection of Decretals of the Pseudo-Isidore.=--In
the fiftieth year of the 9th century there appeared in France
under the name of Isidorus Mercator a collection of canons and
decretals, which indeed completely embraced the older so-called
_Isidoriana_, but was enlarged by the addition of a multitude
of forged decretals. The surname Mercator, otherwise Peccator,
is probably derived from the well known Marius Mercator
(§ 47, 20), who had also occupied himself with the translation
of ecclesiastical documents, which the Pseudo-Isidore used
for his work. It begins with the fifty _Canones Apostt._, then
follow fifty-nine forged decretals which are assigned to the
thirty oldest popes from Clement to Melchiades (d. A.D. 314).
The second part embraces, besides the original document of
the Donation of Constantine, genuine synodal decrees falsified
apparently only in one passage. The third part, again, contains
decretals of Sylvester, the successor of Melchiades, down to
Gregory II. (d. A.D. 731), of which thirty-five are not genuine.
The non-genuine decretals are for the most part not altogether
forgeries, but are rather based upon the literature of theology
and canon law then existing, amplified or altered, and wrought
up to serve the purposes of the compiler. The system of the
Pseudo-Isidore is characterized by the following peculiarities:
Over the _Imperium_ is raised the _Sacerdotium_, ordained of
Christ to be governor and judge of the world. The unity and
head of the _Sacerdotium_ is represented by the pope. Bishops
are related to the pope as the other apostles were to Peter.
The metropolitan is only _primus inter pares_. Between the pope
and the bishops as an intermediate rank we have the primates or
patriarchs. This rank, however, belongs only to such metropolitan
sees as either were ordained to it by the apostles and their
successors, or to such sees in more recently converted lands
as were elevated to this position in consequence of the multitude
of bishops belonging to them. Provincial Synods should be held
only with the consent of the pope, their decrees become valid
only after receiving his confirmation, and all _causæ majores_,
especially all complaints against bishops, belong solely to
his own judicature. Priests are the _Familiares Dei_, the
_Spirituales_; the laity, on the other hand, are the _Carnales_.
No clergyman, least of all a bishop, may be taken before a
secular tribunal. A layman may not appear as an accuser against
a clergyman, and the Synods are enjoined to render charges
against a bishop as difficult as possible. An expelled bishop,
before the charges against him can be examined, must have been
fully restored (_Exceptio Spolii_). If the accused regards his
judges as _inimici_ or _suspecti_, he may appeal to be examined
before the pope. For the establishing of a charge at least
seventy-two witnesses are necessary, etc.
§ 87.3. The forgery originated in France, where it had been in
existence for some years before it was known in Rome, as appears
from the process against Rothad of Soissons (§ 83, 2). Rothad
first brought it to Rome in A.D. 864. Blondel and Kunst regard
Benedict Levita as its author. He first gave currency to the
forgery in his Collection of Capitularies. and so arouses
the suspicion that he is himself the forger. Philipps fathers
it upon Rothad of Soissons; Wasserschleben ascribes it to
archbishop Otgar of Mainz, who, as a prominent head of the
clerical conspiracy against Louis the Pious (§ 82, 4), would
have reason to defend himself against the judgment which would
befall conspirators. But this doom did not in any very special
manner threaten Otgar. On Louis’ restoration he was not sentenced
or deposed by any synod, but was without more ado received into
favour by the emperor. The Pseudo-Isidore’s hostile attitude
toward the chorepiscopi (§ 84), while gaining no footing in
Germany, certainly prevailed in France; and France, not Germany,
was the place where this collection first appeared between
A.D. 853 and 864. Since now, moreover, the prominence given
by the Pseudo-Isidore to the rank of primate may be regarded
as equally favourable to the see of Rheims as to that of Mainz,
Weizsäcker and v. Noorden have sought the original home of the
forgery in the diocese of Rheims, and point to Ebo, archbishop of
Rheims, Hincmar’s predecessor, as the forger. And Ebo certainly
stood in the front rank of the revolt referred to. Before him
Louis had specially to humble himself. He was therefore taken
prisoner immediately upon the emperor’s restoration, and deprived
of his office at the Synod of Didenhofen in A.D. 835 (§ 82, 4).
The emperor Lothair, indeed, restored him in A.D. 840, but
his position was still very insecure, as he had before a year
passed to save himself by flight on the approach of Charles
the Bald, and never again saw Rheims, which till Hincmar’s
elevation remained in the hands of chorepiscopi. The composition
of the collection, according to v. Noorden, belongs to the
period immediately preceding and lasting through his restitution.
Finally Hinschius regards Rheims as undoubtedly the scene
of the composition of these forgeries, but he cannot ascribe
them to Ebo because, according to his demonstration, Benedict’s
Pseudo-Isidore used as his authority only a collection completed
after A.D. 847, and by that time Ebo could not have the shadow
of a hope of restoration. But he also advances other weighty
considerations. Ebo himself had never attempted to make good
the claims which the Pseudo-Isidorian decretals would have
afforded him. If his own affairs had first led him to think
of forging decretals he must have foreseen that the extensive
studies necessary for such a work would have demanded many years
of laborious effort, and would be concluded much too late to
serve his purpose. It would, therefore, seem to him safer to
confine himself to what his immediately present circumstances
urgently required; whereas the actual Pseudo-Isidore, on the
contrary, puts in the mouths of the early popes, with no little
zeal and emphasis, a vast array of other exhortations and decrees
that seemed to him useful amid the troubles of that age for the
well being of the church and its ministers. Thus the whole work
assumes more of the character of a _pia fraus_ of a somewhat
high church cleric of that time than of a forgery devised in
the selfish interests of an individual. This much, however,
must be admitted, that the directions quoted about judicial
procedure against accused bishops exactly fit the case of Ebo.
As the first attempt to use the non-genuine decretals only found
in Pseudo-Isidore was made at the Synod of Soissons in A.D. 853,
by those clerics who had been ordained by Ebo after his deposition
but rejected by Hincmar, the final redaction and publication must
fall between A.D. 847 and 853. Langen fixes the date at A.D. 850,
and refers its authorship to Servatus Lupus (§ 90, 5). Nobody
then doubted their genuineness. Even Hincmar seems for a long
time to have had no doubts. But he decidedly repudiated their
legal authority in the Frankish church, and energetically opposed
them when they were sought to be enforced against the independence
of the church. Thus he could always refer to them where their
contentions agreed with his own, or, as in the case against his
nephew, where they supported his rights as primate, in order to
defeat his opponents with their own weapons. Subsequently however,
in A.D. 872, in a letter written in the name of his king to pope
Hadrian, he characterized them in contrast with the genuine and
valid decretals as _secus a quoquam compilata sive conficta_.
The Magdeburg Centuriators were the first conclusively to prove
them spurious. The Jesuit Turrianus, however, entered the lists
once more on their behalf. But the reformed theologian, David
Blondel, castigated so sharply and thoroughly this theological
unprincipledness, that even in the Roman Catholic church their
non-genuineness has been now since admitted.[245]
§ 87.4. Among the many spurious documents which the
Pseudo-Isidore included in his collection of ecclesiastical
laws, we find an =Edictum Constantini Imperatoris=. In the
first part of it, the so-called _Confessio_, Constantine makes
a confession of his faith, and relates in detail in what a
wonderful way he was converted to Christianity by pope Sylvester,
and cured of leprosy (§ 42, 1). Then in the second part, the
so-called _Donatio_, he confers upon the chair of Peter, with
recognition of its absolute primacy over all patriarchates of
the empire, imperial power, rank, honour, and insignia, as all
privileges and claims of imperial senators upon its clergy. In
order that the possessor of this gift may be able to all time to
maintain the dignity of his position, he gives him the Lateran
palace, transfers to him independent dominion over “_Romanam
urbem et omnes Italiæ seu_ (in Frankish Latin of the 8th and
9th centuries this means ‘as well as’) _occidentalium regionum
provincias, loca et civitates_” (therefore not merely Italy
but the whole West Roman empire); he removes his own imperial
residence to Byzantium, “_quoniam ubi principates Sacerdotum et
Christ. religionis Caput ab Imperatore cœlesti constitutum est,
justum non est, ut illic Imperator terrerum habeat potestatem_.”
In a letter of Hadrian I. to Charlemagne in A.D. 788, in which he
salutes the emperor as a second Constantine who is called upon by
God not only to restore to the apostolic chair the “_potestas in
his Hesperiæ partibus_,” which had been already assigned it by
the first Constantine, but also all later legacies and donations
“of various patricians and other God-fearing men,” which the
godless race of the Longobards in course of time tore from it,
we have the first hint at the idea of a _Donatio Constantini_.
The same pope, too, according to the _Vita Hadriani_ in the
Romish Pontifical, on the occasion of Charles’ visit to Rome
in A.D. 774 is said to have reclaimed from him an enormous grant
of land (§ 82, 2). It seemed therefore an extremely probable
supposition that assigned Rome as the place where this document
originated, and the period of the overthrow of the Longobard
empire, whether actually accomplished or on the eve of taking
place, as the date of its fabrication (§ 82, 1, 2). Against
this view, almost universally prevalent, quite recently Grauert
has advanced a vast array of powerful arguments, _e.g._, the
limitation of the _Donatio_ of Constantine to Italy which
is here suggested contradicts its own express statement. The
words of the letter of Hadrian referred to speak not of a
dominion =over= Italy, and which they could have read, “_in
has H. partes_,” but of a dominion in Italy which was founded
upon Constantine’s munificence and enlarged by many subsequent
presents. They do not, therefore, refer like the words of
the _Donatio_ to sovereign territorial authority, but to the
exceedingly wide-spread and rich property included in the
_Patrimonium Petri_ (§ 46, 10). The “potestas,” said to have
been assigned by Constantine to the Roman see, does not exceed
the authority which even according to the _Vita Sylvestri_ of
the Pontifical had been given by Constantine to that pope.--Thus
the donation document is met with first in the Pseudo-Isidore.
It was often afterwards referred to by the Frankish government.
By Rome, on the other hand, although even Nicholas I. was made
acquainted with the Pseudo-Isidorian decretals by Rothad, and
referred to them in A.D. 865, they are never used, either against
the Franks or against the Byzantines until, in A.D. 1053, we meet
an allusion to them in a letter from Leo IX. to the patriarch
Michael Cærularius (§ 67, 3). Grauert accounts for this by saying
that there were two recensions of Pseudo-Isidore, a shorter,
which had only the first part of the document, the so-called
_Confessio_; and a longer, which had also the _Donatio_, and
that Rothad took probably only the shorter one to Rome. From
these and other data adduced by Grauert it seems more than
probable that the foundry in which the document was forged
was not in Rome, but rather in France among the high church
party there, from which also the full-fledged forgery
proceeded. It would also seem that a double purpose was
served by its composition. On the one hand, over against the
Greeks it represented the chair of Peter as raised above all
the patriarchates of the empire, and the Western empire as a
thoroughly legitimate one transferred by Constantine the Great
to the pope, and then by him to the kings of the Franks. And,
on the other hand, it also made it clear to the Frankish princes
that all temporal power in the West essentially, and from of old,
belonged to the pope, and is bestowed upon them by means of their
coronation by the pope’s hands.--That from the time when they met
with the document unto the 11th century the Byzantines did not
contest its genuineness, need not surprise us when we consider
the uncritical character of the age. They would also be the less
disposed to do so as they could only thereby hope to win that
perfect equality in spiritual authority as well as in secular
rank with the Roman bishop which the fourth œcumenical council
had assigned to their patriarchal see. But while the Byzantines
may be regarded as inconsiderately incorporating this donation
of Constantine into their historical and legal books, blotting
out indeed the passages which seemed to them to favour the
pretensions of the pope to universal sovereignty, it is a
more difficult task to secure for it acceptance among Western
diplomatists. Even in A.D. 999 a state paper of Otto III.
describes it as a pure fiction. High church tendencies, however,
raised their standard also in the West during the 11th century
(§ 96, 4, 5). Indeed, even in A.D. 1152, an Arnoldist (§ 108, 7),
named Wetzel, wrote to the Emperor Frederick I.: “Their lies
and heretical fables are now so completely exploded that even
day-labourers and cow-men could prove to scholars their emptiness,
and the pope with his cardinals ventures not for shame to show
himself in the city of Rome.” The victory, however, of the papacy
over the Hohenstaufen gained currency for it again, and it was
the treatise of Laurentius Valla, “De falso credita et ementita
Constantini donatione declamatio,” which Ulrich von Hutten issued
in multitude from the press, gave it the death blow (§ 120, 1).
When, thereafter, even Baronius admitted the spuriousness of the
document, though assigning its fabrication to the Greeks, who
wished by it to prove that the Roman primacy was not of Christ
but from Constantine, it found no longer a vindicator even in the
Roman Catholic church.
III. THE CHURCH AND THE PEOPLE.
§ 88. PUBLIC WORSHIP AND ART.
The German Arians undoubtedly used the language of the people
in their services. The adoption of Catholicism, however, led to the
introduction of the Latin tongue. The last trace of acquaintance with
Ulfilas’ translation of the Bible is found in the 9th century. The
nations converted directly to Catholicism had from the first the Latin
language in public worship. Only the Slavs still retained the use of
their mother tongue (§ 79, 2). The Roman liturgy, as well as the Roman
language, was adopted in all churches with the exception of those of
Milan and Spain. After Pepin had entered into closer relations with
the popes, he endeavoured, in A.D. 754, at their desire, to bring about
a uniformity between the Frankish ritual and the Roman pattern; and
Charlemagne, whom Hadrian I. presented with a Roman Sacramentarium,
carried it out with relentless energy. The slightness of the liturgical
contributions of the Germans is to be accounted for partly by the
fact that the Roman liturgy was already presented to them in a
richly developed and essentially complete form, but also partly
by the exclusion of the national languages and the refusal to give
the people a share in the liturgical services. Under the constraint
of a foreign tongue the Germans could not put the impress of their
national character on a department in which language plays so important
a part.
§ 88.1. =Liturgy and Preaching.=--Alongside of the Roman or
Gregorian =Liturgy= many others also were in use. The people
and clergy of Milan so determinedly adhered to their old
Ambrosian liturgy, that even Charlemagne could not dislodge
it, and down to the present day Milan has preserved this
treasure. No less energetically did the Spaniards hold by
their national liturgy, the so-called Mozarabic (§ 81, 1).
It has a strong resemblance to the oriental liturgies, but
was further elaborated by bishops Leander and Isidore of Seville
(§ 80, 2), and was recognised by the National Synod of Toledo in
A.D. 633 as valid for the whole of Spain. The Gallican liturgies
too of the Carolingian times betrayed a certain dependence upon
the oriental rituals. =Preaching=, in the services of the Western
churches was always subordinate to the liturgy, and the relapse
into savagery occasioned by the migrations of the peoples drove
it almost completely out of the field. The missionary fervour in
the Western church during the 7th century was the first thing to
re-awaken a sense of its importance. But then very few priests
could compose a sermon. Charlemagne, therefore, about A.D. 780,
had a Latin Homiliarium compiled by Paulus Diaconus [Paul
Warnefrid] (§ 90, 3) from the fathers for all the Sundays and
Festivals of the year, as a model for their own composition,
or, where that was too much to be expected, for reading in
the original or in a translation. During the whole Middle
Ages and beyond the Reformation it continued to be one of the
most read and most diligently used books in the Roman Catholic
church. Missionaries naturally preached themselves or through
interpreters in the language of the people; even in constituted
churches preaching was generally conducted in the speech of
the country. Charlemagne and the Synods of his time insisted
at least upon German or Romanic preaching.
§ 88.2. =Church Music= (§ 59, 4, 5).--After Gregory’s ordinance
church music continued to be restricted to the clergy. Charlemagne
indeed insisted, but unsuccessfully, that all the people should
take part in singing the _Gloria_ and the _Sanctus_. In the
7th-9th cent. a number of Latin hymn-writers flourished, of
whom the most distinguished were Bede, Paul Warnefrid, Theodulf
of Orleans, Alcuin, Rabanus Maurus, and Walafrid Strabo. The
beautiful Pentecost hymn _Veni creator Spiritus_ is ascribed
to Charlemagne. The old classical form and colouring were
more and more lost, but all the more the essentially Christian
and Germanic character of simplicity and spirituality became
prominent. Toward the end of our period the composition of Latin
hymns obtained a new and fruitful impetus from the adoption
of the so-called =Sequences= or =Proses= in the Mass. Under
the long series of notes, hitherto without words attached,
which were appended to the Alleluia to express inarticulate
jubilation, hence called _jubilationes_, were now placed
appropriate rhythmical words in Latin prose, which, however,
soon assumed the form of metre, rhyme and strophes. The first
famous writer of Sequences was the monk Notker Balbulus of
St. Gall, who died in A.D. 912. Connected in form with the
Latin Sequences were the more recently introduced Old Frankish
_Lais_ (Celtic=verse, song) and the Old German _Leiche_ (=melody,
song), to simple airs that had been used for popular songs. The
only one which the church allowed to the people, and that only
in services outside of the church, in processions, rogations and
pilgrimages, in going to the church, at translations of relics,
funerals, consecrations of churches, popular religious festivals,
etc., was the singing or rather reciting of the _Kyrie eleison_
from the great Litany. The fondness of the Germans for singing
and composing hymns led, in the second half of the 9th century,
to the attaching to these words short rhyming sacred verses in
their mother tongue, and this in such a manner that the _Kyrie
eleison_ always formed the refrain of a strophe, so that they
were called =Leisons=. This was the beginning of German church
music. Of the Leisons only one hymn to St. Peter in the Old
High-German dialect has come down to our day.--=The Gregorian
Music=, _Cantus firmus_ or _choralis_, won a most complete
victory over the Ambrosian (§ 59, 5). In A.D. 754 Pepin at
the request of Stephen II. ordered that in France only the
Roman singing should be allowed, and Charlemagne secured for
it complete and exclusive ascendency in all the West by violently
extirpating the already very degenerate Ambrosian music, by
establishing the celebrated singing schools of Metz, Soissons,
Orleans, Paris, Lyons, etc., at the head of which he placed
teachers brought from Rome, and by introducing instruction in
singing in all the higher and lower schools. The first =Organ=
came to France in A.D. 757 as a present to Pepin the Short from
the Greek emperor Constantinus Copronymus; the second to Aachen
with an embassy from the emperor Michael I. in Charlemagne’s
time. From that time they became more common. They were still
as instruments very imperfect. They had only from 9 to 12 notes,
and the keys were so stiff that they had to be beaten down with
the fist.[246]--Continuation, § 104, 10, 11.
§ 88.3. =The Sacrifice of the Mass.=--As the idea of sacrifice
gained place there sprang up in addition to the masses for the
souls of the departed (§ 58, 3) private masses for various other
purposes, for the success of some undertaking, for the recovery
of a sick person, for good weather and a good harvest, etc.
To some extent the multiplication of masses was limited by the
ordinance that celebration should be made at the same altar
and by the same priest only once in the day. From the wish to
secure that as many masses as possible should be said for their
souls after death, churches and monasteries were formed into
fraternities with a stipulated obligation to celebrate a certain
number of masses for each deceased member of the fraternity in
all the churches and monasteries belonging thereto. Fraternities
of this kind, into which as a special favour princes and nobles
were received, were called =Confederacies for the Dead=.
§ 88.4. =The Worship of Saints= (§ 57).--This practice
found a very ready response from the Germans. It afforded
some compensation for the abandoned worship of their ancestors.
But over all other saints towered the mother of God, the meek
and gentle queen of heaven. In her the old German reverence
for woman found its ideal and full satisfaction. In respect of
=Image Worship= (§ 57, 4) the Germans lagged behind, partly from
the scarcity of images, partly from national aversion to them.
The Frankish church of the Carolingian age protested formally
against them (§ 92, 1). But all the greater was the zeal shown
in the =Worship of Relics= (§ 57, 5) in which the worshipper
had the saint concretely and bodily. The relics of the West were
innumerable. Rome was an inexhaustible storehouse; and from the
successive missionaries, from the deserts and solitudes, from the
monasteries and bishops’ seats, there went forth crowds of new
saints whose bones were venerated with enthusiasm. The gaining
of a new relic for a church or monastery was regarded as a piece
of good fortune for the whole land, and amid thousands assembled
from far and near the translation was carried out, accompanied
with liberal gifts of money. The Frankish monastery of Centula
could show in the 9th century an immensely long list of the
relics which it possessed, from the grave of the Innocents,
the milk of the Holy Virgin, the beard of Peter, his cloak,
the _Oratorium_ of Paul, and even from the wood of the three
tabernacles that Peter wished to build on Tabor. The custom of
making =Pilgrimages= (§ 57, 6) also found great favour among the
travel-loving Germans, especially among the Anglo-Saxons. The
places most frequented by pilgrims were the tomb of the chief
Apostles at Rome, then the tomb of Martin of Tours, and, toward
the end of our period, that of St. James of Compostella, _Jacobus
Apostolus_ the elder, the supposed founder of the Spanish church,
whose bones were discovered there by Alfonso the Chaste. The
immoralities consequent upon pilgrimages, about which even
the ancient church complained, were also only too apparent
in this later age. On account of them Boniface urges that his
countrywomen should be forbidden to go on pilgrimages, since
this only served to supply the cities of Gaul and Italy with
prostitutes. The idea of =Guardian Angels= (§ 57, 3) was eagerly
adopted by the Germans. They were specially drawn to the warlike
Archangel Michael, the conqueror of the great dragon (Dan. xii. 1;
Jude 9; Rev. xii. 7 ff.).--Continuation, § 104, 8.
§ 88.5. =Times and Places for Public Worship.=--The beginning
of the church year was changed from Easter to Christmas. All
Saints’ Day (§ 57, 1), originally a Roman local festival, was
made a universal ordinance by Gregory IV. who, in A.D. 835, fixed
its date at 1st Nov. The abundance of relics and the multitude
of masses that were said made it necessary to increase the number
of altars in the churches beyond what Charlemagne had enjoined.
Afterwards they were usually limited to three. The high altar
stood out by itself in the middle of the choir recess. The side
altars leant on pillars or on the chief altar. A relic shrine
generally from the 8th century formed the back of the altar. No
trace of a chancel is found, not even of a confessional chair. In
churches which had the right of baptizing (§ 84, 2) there were as
a rule separate baptistries. In place of these, after the right
of baptizing was conferred on all churches, the baptismal font
was introduced, either on the left side of the main entrance or
at the point where the transepts crossed the nave. This change
required the substitution of sprinkling for immersion. Clocks and
towers became always more common. The latter, at first separate
from the buildings, were from Charlemagne’s time attached to the
church edifice. The baptism of bells, their consecration with
water, oil and chrism, with the bestowing on them of some saint’s
name, was forbidden by Charlemagne, but it was nevertheless
continued, and is common to this day in the Roman Catholic church.
§ 88.6. Most attention was paid to ecclesiastical architecture
and painting, south of the Alps during the Ostro-gothic period,
north of the Alps during the Carolingian period. The Anglo-Saxons,
however, in their island home also developed a taste for art.
During the 9th century it received special attention in the
German monasteries of St. Gall and Fulda. The monk Tutilo of
St. Gall, d. A.D. 912, was pre-eminently distinguished both as
a master in architecture, painting and sculpture, and in poetry
and scholarship. The old Roman basilica style still maintained
the front rank in church building. Yet at Ravenna, the Byzantium
of Italy, during the Gothic domination there were several
beautiful churches in the Byzantine cupola style. Einhard
received from Charlemagne the rank of a court architect. Of
all the churches built in Charlemagne’s time the most important
was the cathedral of Aachen. It was built in the cupola style
after the pattern of the cathedral church of Ravenna. Intended
as a royal chapel, it was connected by a pillared passage with
the palace. It was therefore also of only moderate dimensions.
Its being appropriated as the coronation church led subsequently
to its enlargement by the addition to it in A.D. 1355 of a
large choir in the Gothic style. The church afforded abundant
scope for the use of the art of the statuary. Costly shrines
for relics were required, crucifixes, lamps, _ciboria_, incense
vessels, etc., on which might be lavished all the refinements
of artistic skill. The church books had artistically carved
covers. Church doors, episcopal thrones, reading desks,
baptismal fonts, afforded room for practice in _relievo_
work. Among the various kinds of pictorial representations
miniature painting was most diligently practised upon copies
of the church books.--Continuation, § 104, 12, 14.
§ 89. NATIONAL CUSTOMS, SOCIAL LIFE AND CHURCH DISCIPLINE.
The remains of Christian popular poetry of this period afford a
convincing proof of the powerful and profound manner in which the
truths of Christianity (§ 75, 1) had been grasped by the German races.
The great mass of the people indeed had adopted the new faith in a
purely historical fashion. Only gradually did it make its way into
the inner spiritual life, and meanwhile out of the not fully conquered
paganism there grew up a rich crop of superstitions in connection
with the Christian life. It must be confessed that the state of
morality among the Germans had fallen very low as compared with
that which prevailed before Germany’s conversion to Christianity.
A sadder contrast is scarcely conceivable than that presented by a
comparison of the description in Tacitus of the old German customs
and discipline and the account of Gregory of Tours of colossal
criminality and brutish sensuality in the Merovingian Age. But
never more than here does the fallacy: _Post hoc ergo propter hoc_,
require to be guarded against. The moral deterioration of the German
peoples was carried out independently of their contemporaneous, merely
external, Christianization. The cause of it lies only in the overturning
of the foundations of German life by the migration of the peoples.
Severed from their original home, the most powerful guardian of
ancestral customs, and set down as conquerors in the midst of rich
countries with morally base surroundings, which had a poisonous effect
upon them, with that eagerness and tenacity which characterize children
of nature, they seized upon the seductive treasures and enjoyments,
and their unfettered passion broke through all restraints of discipline
and morality. The clearest proof of this view lies in the fact that the
moral decay appeared in so remarkable a degree only among such peoples
as settled in the corrupt Roman world and became amalgamated with it,
most conspicuously among the Franks in Gaul and the Longobards in Italy,
whereas among the Anglo-Saxons and the inhabitants of Germany the moral
development was more normal.
§ 89.1. =Superstition.=--A powerful impulse was given to
superstition on the one hand by the church, according to the
educational method recommended by Gregory the Great (§ 75, 3),
refusing recklessly to root out every element of paganism and
rather endeavouring to give Christian applications to heathen
institutions and views and to fill pagan forms with Christian
contents, and on the other hand, by the representatives of the
church not regarding belief in the existence of heathen deities
as a delusion but counting the gods and goddesses as demons.
The popular belief therefore saw in them a set of dethroned
deities who in certain realms of nature maintain their ancient
sway, whom therefore they dare not venture altogether to
disoblige. The fanciful poetic view of nature prevailing
among the Germans contributed also to this result, with its
love of the mysterious and supernatural, its fondness for
subtle enquiries and intellectual investigations. Thus, in
the worship of the saints as well as in the church’s belief in
angels and devils, new rich worlds opened themselves up before
the Christianized Germans, which the popular belief soon improved
upon. The pious man is exposed on all sides to the vexations of
demons, but he is also on all sides surrounded by the protecting
care of saints and angels. The popular belief made a great deal
of the devil, but the relation of men to the prince of darkness
and his attendant spirits seemed much too earnest and real to be
as yet the subject of the humour which characterized the devil
legends of the later Middle Ages, in which the cheated, “stupid”
devil is represented as at last possessed only of impotent rage
and sneaking off in disgrace.
§ 89.2. =Popular Education.=--The idea of a general system
of education for the people was already present to the mind
of Charlemagne. Yet as we may suppose only beginnings were made
toward its realization. Bishop Theodulf of Orleans was specially
active in founding schools for the people in all the villages
and country towns of his diocese. The religious instruction of
the youth was restricted as a rule to the teaching of the Lord’s
Prayer and the Apostles’ Creed. Whatever grown up man or woman
did not know these two was at Charles’ command to be subjected
to flogging and fasting and to be made to learn them besides.
As evidence of the extent of a religious consciousness among
the people may be adduced the German forms of adjuration,
belief, confession and prayer, of the 8th and 9th centuries
which are still preserved. Further means of advancing the
religious education of the people were afforded by the attempts
to make the biblical and patristic books accessible to the people
by translations in their own language. Among the Germans the
monastery of St. Gall was famous for its zeal in originating
a national literature. Among the Anglo-Saxons this effort was
made and carried out by Alfred the Great, who died in A.D. 901
(§ 90, 10).
§ 89.3. =Christian Popular Poetry.=--It makes its first
appearance at the end of the 7th century and continued far
down into the 9th century. It flourished chiefly in England
and Germany. Under the name of the Northumbrian =Cædmon=, who
died in A.D. 680, there has been preserved a whole series of
biblical poems of no small poetic merit, which range over the
whole of the Old and New Testament history. The most important
Anglo-Saxon poet after him was his countryman =Cynewulf= living
about a century later. His poems are less homely and simple,
but more elaborate than those of Cædmon, and as full of poetic
enthusiasm as these. He too paints for us in his “Christ” the
picture of the Redeemer as that of a manly victorious prince
among his true “champions and earls” with such clear-cut features
that “whoever once beholds them will never again forget them.”
His poetically wrought up legends bear more of the Romish stamp
with traces of saint worship and the doctrine of merit.[247]
Still higher than these two Anglo-Saxon productions stands
the German-Saxon epic the =Heliand=, of the time of Louis of
France, a song of the Messiah worthy of its august subject,
truly national, perfect in form, simple, lively and majestic
in style, transposing into German blood and life a genuine deep
Christianity. In poetic value scarcely less significant is the
“Krist” of Otfried, a monk of Weissenberg about A.D. 860. Near
to his heart as well as to that of the Anglo-Saxon singers lay
the thought: _thaz wir Kriste sungun in unsere Zungun_. It is,
however, no longer popular but artistic poetry, in which the old
German letter rhyme or alliteration gives place to the softer
and more delicate final rhyme. To this class belongs also the
so-called =Wessobrunner Prayer=, of which the first poetical
half is probably a fragment of a larger hymn of the creation,
and a poem in High German on the end of the world and the last
judgment, known by the name of =Muspilli=, extant only as a
fragment which is, however, almost unsurpassable in dignity
and grandeur of description.
§ 89.4. =Social Condition.=--From the point of view of German
law the contract of betrothal had the validity of =marriage=
and the subsequent nuptial ceremony or surrender of the bride
to the bridegroom in a public legal manner by her father or legal
guardian was held to be only the carrying out of that contract.
The bridal ceremony with the ecclesiastical benediction of the
marriage bond already legally tied, was frequently celebrated
only on the day following the marriage, therefore after its
consummation. The Capitulary of Charlemagne of A.D. 802 came
to the support of the claims of the church (§ 61, 2), ordaining
that without previous careful enquiry as to the relationship of
the parties by the priest, and the elders of the people, and also
without the priestly benediction, no marriage could be concluded.
The Pseudo-Isidorian decretals ascribed this demand to the popes
of the 4th and 5th centuries. But the right to perform marriages
was not thereby committed to the church; it was only that the
religious consecration of the civil ordinance of marriage was
now made obligatory. It seemed best of all when sooner or later
the spouses voluntarily renounced marital intercourse; but this
was strictly forbidden during Lent (§ 56, 4, 5), on all festivals
and on the station days of the week (Wednesday, Friday, Saturday
and Sunday). Second marriages were branded with the reproach of
incontinence and called forth a lengthened penance. There was on
the other hand as yet no prohibition of divorce, and the marrying
again of those separated was only unconditionally forbidden in
particular cases. The church was not willing to tolerate mixed
marriages with heathens, Jews and Arians. The Germans found it
most difficult to reconcile themselves to the strict requirements
of the church in regard to the prohibited degrees of relationship.
National customs had regarded many such marriages, especially
with a brother’s widow, as even a pious duty.[248]--Continuation,
§ 104, 6.--=Slavery= or Serfdom was an institution so closely
connected among the Germans with their notions of property that
the church could not think of its entire abolition; indeed the
church itself, with its large landed possessions, owned quite
a multitude of slaves. Yet it earnestly maintained the religious
and moral equality of masters and servants, assigned to the
manumission of slaves one of the first places among good works,
and was always ready to give protection to bondmen against cruel
masters.[249]--The church with special energy entered upon the
task of =Caring for the Poor=; even proud and heartless bishops
could not overlook it. Every well appointed church had several
buildings in which the poor, the sick, widows and orphans were
maintained at the church’s cost.[250]
§ 89.5. =Practice of Pubic Law.=--The custom of =Blood Revenge=
was also a thoroughly German institution. It had, however,
been fairly restricted by the custom of =Composition= or the
payment of satisfaction in the form of a pecuniary fine. The
church from its dislike of capital punishment decidedly favoured
this system. As a means of securing judicial evidence oaths
and ordeals were administered. Only the freeman, who was quite
capable of acting in accordance with his own judgment, was
allowed to take an =Oath=; the husband took the oath for his
wife, the father for the children, the master for the slave.
Relatives, friends and equals in rank swore along with him as
sharers of his oath, _Conjuratores_. Although they repeated with
him the oath formula, the meaning of their action simply was
that they were fully satisfied as to the honour and truthfulness
of him who took the oath. Where the oath of purgation was not
allowed, _conjuratores_ were not forthcoming and the other means
of proof awanting, the =Ordeal= (_Ordale_ from _Ordâl_=judgment)
was introduced. Under this may be included:
1. The Duel, derived from the old popular belief: _Deum adesse
bellantitus_. Only a freeman was allowed to enter the lists.
Old men, women, children and priests were allowed to put in
their place another of the same rank by birth.
2. Various fire tests; holding the bare hand a length of time
in the fire; in a simple shirt walking over burning logs of
wood; carrying glowing iron in the bare hand for nine paces;
walking barefoot over nine or twelve glowing ploughshares.
3. Two water tests: the accused was obliged to pick up with
his naked hand a ring or stone out of a kettle filled with
boiling water, or with a cord round his naked body he was
cast into deep water, his sinking was the proof of his
innocence.
4. The cross test: he whose arms first sank with weariness from
the cruciform position, was regarded as defeated.
5. The Eucharist test, applied especially to priests: it was
expected that the criminal should soon die under the stroke
of God’s wrath. As a substitute for this among the laity
we find the test of the consecrated morsel, _Judicium offæ_
which the accused was required to swallow during mass.
6. The bier test, _Judicium feretri_: if when the accused
touched the wound of the murdered man blood flowed from
the wound or forth from the mouth, it was regarded as proof
of his guilt.
The church with its belief in miracles occupied the same
ground as that on which the ordeal practice was rooted. It
could therefore only combat the heathen conception of the
ordeal and not the thing itself. But the church took charge of
the whole procedure, and certainly did much to reduce the danger
to a minimum. It was Agobard of Lyons, who died in A.D. 840, who
first contended against the superstition as worthy of reprobation.
Subsequently the Roman chair, first by Nicholas I., forbade
ordeals of all kinds.--Among the various kinds of privileges
involving the inviolability of person and goods, profession and
business, the privileges of the church were regarded as next
highest to those of the king. Any injury done to ecclesiastical
persons or properties and any crime committed in a sacred place,
required a threefold greater composition than _ceteris paribus_
would have otherwise been required. The bishop ranked with the
duke, the priest with the count.
§ 89.6. =Church Discipline and Penitential Exercises=
(§ 61, 1).--=The German= State allowed the church a share in
the administration of punishments, and regarded an evildoer’s
atonement as complete only when he had submitted to the
ecclesiastical as well as the secular judgment. Out of this grew
the institution of Episcopal =Synodal Judicatures=, _Synodus_,
under Charlemagne. Once a year the bishop accompanied by a royal
_Missus_ was to travel over the whole diocese, and, of every
parish priest assisted by assessors sworn for the purpose, should
inquire minutely into the moral and ecclesiastical condition
of each of the congregations under him and punish the sins and
shortcomings discovered. Directions for the conducting of Synodal
judicatures were written by Regino of Prüm and Hincmar of Rheims
(§ 90, 5). The state also gave authority to =Ecclesiastical
Excommunication= by putting its civil forces at the disposal
of the church. Pepin ordained that no excommunicated person
should enter a church, no Christian should eat or drink with
him, none should even greet him. Directions for the practice of
=Penitential Discipline= are given in the various =Penitentials=
or Confessional-books, which, after the pattern of forensic
productions, settle the amount of penal exactions for all
conceivable sins in proportion to their enormity. The Penitential
erroneously ascribed to Theodore archbishop of Canterbury
(§ 90, 8) is the model upon which most of these are constructed.
The Confessional-books that go under the names of the Venerable
Bede and Egbert of York obtained particularly high favour. All
these books, even in their earliest form extremely perverse and
in their later much altered forms full of contradictions, errors
and arbitrary positions, reduced the whole penitential practice
to the utmost depths of externalization and corruption. How
confused and warped the church idea of penitence had become is
seen by the rendering of the word _pœnitentia_ by penance, _i.e._
satisfaction, atonement. In the Penitentials _pœnitere_ is quite
identical with _jejunare_. The idea of _pœnitentia_ having been
once associated with external performances, there could be no
objection to substitute the customary penitential act of fasting
(§ 56, 7) for other spiritual exercises, or by adoption of
the German legal practice of receiving composition to accept
a money tax for ecclesiastical or benevolent purposes. In this
way the first traces made their appearance of the Indulgences
of the later Roman Catholic church. It therefore followed from
this, that, as satisfaction could be rendered for all sins by
corresponding acts of penance, so these works might also be
performed vicariously by others. Thus in the Penitentials there
grew up a system of =Penitential Redemptions= which formed the
most despicable mockery of all earnest penitence. For example,
a direction is given as to how a rich man may be absolved from
a penance of seven years in three days, without inconveniencing
himself, if he produces the number of men needed to fast for
him. Such deep corruption of the penitential discipline, however,
aroused, in the 8th and 9th centuries, a powerful reaction
against the Confessional-books and their corrupt principles.
It was first brought forward at the English Synod at Clovesho
in A.D. 747; in its footsteps followed the French Synods of
Chalons in A.D. 813, of Paris A.D. 829, of Mainz, A.D. 847.
The Council of Paris ordered that all Confessional-books should
be seized and burnt. They nevertheless still continued to be
used.--There did not as yet exist any universal and unconditional
compulsion to make confession. The custom, however, of a yearly
confession in the Easter forty days’ season was even during the
9th century so prevalent, that the omission of it was followed by
a severe censure by the synodal court. The formulæ of absolution
were only deprecative, not judicative.[251]
IV. THEOLOGY AND ITS BATTLES.
§ 90. SCHOLARSHIP AND THEOLOGICAL SCIENCE.[252]
With the exception of Ulfilas’ famous efforts, the Arian period of
German church history is quite barren in scientific performances. Yet
those few who preserved and fostered the scientific gains of earlier
times were honoured and made use of by the noble-minded Ostrogoth king
Theodoric, and under him Boethius [Boëthius] and Cassiodorus (§ 47, 23)
performed the praiseworthy task of saving the remnants of classical
and patristic learning. For Spain the same office was performed by
Isidore of Seville, who died in A.D. 636, whose text-books continued
for centuries, even on this side the Pyrenees, to supply the groundwork
of scholarly studies. The numerous Scottish and Irish monasteries
maintained their reputation down to the 9th century for eminent piety
and distinguished scholarship. Among the Anglo-Saxons the learned Greek
monk Theodore of Tarsus, who died in A.D. 690, and his companion Hadrian,
enkindled an enthusiasm for classical studies, and the venerable Bede,
who died in A.D. 735, though he never quitted his monastery, became
the most famous teacher in all the West, The Danish pirates did indeed
crush almost to extinction the seeds of Anglo-Saxon culture, but Alfred
the Great sowed them anew, though this revival was only for a little
while. In Gaul Gregory of Tours, who died in A.D. 595, was the last
representative of Roman ecclesiastical learning. After him we enter
upon a chaos without form and void, from which the creative spirit of
Charlemagne first called a new day which spread over the whole West its
enlightening beams. This light, however, was put out even by the time of
the great emperor’s grandson, and then we suddenly pass into the night
of the _Sæculum Obscurum_ (§ 100).
§ 90.1. =Rulers of the Carolingian Line.=--=Charlemagne=,
A.D. 768-814, may be regarded as beginning his scientific
undertakings on his first entrance into Italy in A.D. 774.
On this occasion he came to know the scholars Peter of Pisa,
Paul Warnefrid, Paulinus of Aquileia, and Theodulf of Orleans,
and brought them to his palace. From A.D. 782, however, the
particularly brilliant star of his court was the Anglo-Saxon
scholar Alcuin, whom Charles had met in Italy in the previous
year. Scientific studies were now carried on in an exceedingly
vigorous manner in the palace. The royal family, the whole court
and its surroundings engaged upon them, but of them all Charles
himself was the most diligent and successful of Alcuin’s students.
In the royal school, _Schola palatina_, which was ambulatory
like the royal residence itself, the sons and daughters of the
king with the children of the most distinguished families of
the land received a high-class education. The teaching staff
was constantly recruited from England, Ireland and Italy. After
such preparations Charles issued in A.D. 787 a circular to all
the bishops and abbots of his kingdom which enjoined under threat
of his severe royal displeasure that schools should be erected in
all monasteries and cathedral churches. Meanwhile his endeavours
were most successful, but were rather one-sided in the preference
given to classical and patristic literature, without a proper
national foundation. Charles’s great and generous nature indeed
had a warm interest in national culture, but those around him,
with the single exception of Paul Warnefrid, had in consequence
of their Latin monkish training lost all taste for German thought,
language and nationality, and fearing lest such studies might
endanger Christianity and cause a relapse into paganism, they
did not help but rather hindered the king’s effort to promote
a national literature.--=Louis the Pious=, A.D. 814-840, had his
weak government disturbed by the strifes of parties and of the
citizens. This period, therefore, was not specially favourable
to the development of scientific studies, but the seed sown by
his father still bore noble fruit. His son Lothair issued an
ordinance which gave a new organization to the educational system
of Italy, indeed created it anew. But Italy restless and full of
factions was the land where least of all such institutions could
be successfully conducted. A new golden age, however, dawned
for France under =Charles the Bald=, A.D. 840-877. His court
resembled that of his great grandfather in having gathered to
it the élite of scholars from all the West. The royal school
gained new renown under the direction of _Joannes Scotus Erigena_.
The cathedral and monastic schools of France vied with the most
famous institutions of Germany (St. Gall, Fulda, Reichenau, etc.),
and over the French episcopal sees men presided who had the most
distinguished reputation for scholarship. But after Charles’s
death the bloom of the Carolingian period passed away with almost
inconceivable rapidity amid the commotions of the time into thick
darkness, chaos and barbarism.
§ 90.2. =The most distinguished Theologians of the
Pre-Carolingian Age.=
1. In Merovingian France flourished =Gregory of Tours=,
sprung of a good Roman family. When in A.D. 573, in
order to get cured of an illness, he made a pilgrimage
to the tomb of St. Martin (§ 47, 14), he had the bishopric
of Tours conferred upon him, where he continued till his
death in A.D. 595. His _Historia Ecclesiastica Francorum_
in ten Bks. affords us the only exact and trustworthy
information we possess of the Merovingian age. The
_Ll. VII. Miraculorum_ are a collection of several
hagiographic writings, four of them recounting some
of the innumerable miracles of St. Martin.
2. Scientific studies were prosecuted more vigorously on the
other side of the Pyrenees than on this. In the empire of
the Suevi (§ 76, 4) archbishop =Martin of Braccara=, now
Braga, distinguished himself in the work of Catholicising
the Arian population. He was previously abbot of the
monastery of Dumio, and died about A.D. 580. He was a
voluminous writer on church law and also in the departments
of moral and ascetical theology. His writings in the latter
section have so much in common with those of Seneca that
they were at one time ascribed to the Roman moralist. The
treatise _De Correctione Rusticorum_ is very important for
the history of the morals, legal institutions and culture
of that period.--The great star of the Spanish Visigothic
kingdom was =Isidorus [Isidore] Hispalensis=, who died
in A.D. 636. He was descended from a distinguished Gothic
family, and, as successor of his brother Leander, rose to
the archbishopric of Seville (Hispalis). His writings are
diligent compilations, which have preserved to us many
fragments and items of information otherwise unknown.
Incomparably greater, however, was the service they rendered
in conveying classical and patristic learning to the German
world of that age. His most comprehensive work consists
of xx. Bks. _Originum s. Etymologiarum_, an encyclopædic
exhibition of the whole field of knowledge of the day. He
also wrote a _Chronicon_ reaching down to A.D. 627, and
_Hist. de regibus Gotorum_, a shorter _Hist. Vandalorum
et Suevorum_, and a continuation of Jerome’s _Catalogus
de viris illustr_. Of more importance than his numerous
compilations of mystico-allegorical expositions of Scripture
are the iii. Bks. _Sententiarum_, a well-arranged system of
doctrine and morals from patristic passages, especially from
Augustine and Gregory the Great, and the _Lb. II. de ecclest.
officiis_. The two last-named works were highly prized
as text-books throughout the Middle Ages. The two books
_Contra Judæos_ belong to the department of apologetics.
He also composed a monastic rule (comp. further § 87, 1
and 88, 1).--Isidore’s elder brother =Leander of Seville=,
who died in A.D. 590, had a good reputation as a church
leader (§ 76, 2; 88, 1), and had no insignificant rank
as a theological writer. The same may be said of the two
bishops of Toledo, =Ildefonsus=, who died in A.D. 669, and
=Julianus=, who died in A.D. 690.
3. England’s greatest and most famous teacher was the
Anglo-Saxon, the =Venerable Bede=. Trained in the monastery
of Wearmouth, he subsequently took up his residence in
the monastery of Jarrow, where he died in A.D. 735. He
was a proficient in all the sciences of his time and
withal a model of humility, piety and amiability. While
his numerous pupils reached the highest places in the
service of the church, their famous teacher continued
in quiet retirement as a simple monk. He himself wished
nothing else. Even on his deathbed he continued unweariedly
to teach and write. Immediately before his death he
dictated the last chapter of an Anglo-Saxon translation
of the Gospel of John. By far his most important work
for us is the _Hist. ecclest. gentis Anglorum_ in 5 Bks.
reaching down to A.D. 731 (Engl. Transl. by Giles, Lond.,
1840; and by Gidley, Lond., 1871). Connected with this are
his biographies of several saints of his native land, also
a history of the monastery of Wearmouth, and a _Chronicon
de sex ætatibus mundi_ reaching down to A.D. 729. His
commentaries ranging over almost all the books of the Old
and New Testament give evidence of a wonderful knowledge
of the fathers. His numerous sermons are mostly exegetical
and practical, rarely doctrinal. He was distinguished too
as a poet in Latin as well as in his mother tongue.
§ 90.3. =The most distinguished Theologians of the Age of
Charlemagne.=
1. The brightest star in the theological firmament of this
period was the Anglo-Saxon =Alcuin= (Albinus) with the
Horatian surname of Flaccus, which he got for his poetical
productions. He was educated in the famous school of York
under Egbert and Elbert. When the latter was made archbishop
in A.D. 766, Alcuin undertook the presidency of the schools.
While on a visit to Rome in A.D. 781 he met Charlemagne who
took him to his court, where he became the emperor’s teacher,
friend and most trusted counsellor. Down to his death in
A.D. 804 he was the king’s right hand in all religious
ecclesiastical and educational matters. In order to allay
a feeling of home-sickness, he undertook a journey in
A.D. 789 to his native country as ambassador of Charlemagne,
returned in A.D. 793, and did not again quit France. In
A.D. 796 Charles gave him the abbacy of Tours. He soon
raised its monastic school to the highest rank as a seminary
of learning. His exegetical works are mere compilations. The
_Ll. II. de fide s. et Individuæ Trinitatis_ may be regarded
as his dogmatic masterpiece; a compendium of dogmatics based
upon Augustine’s writings. The _Quæstiones de Trin._ treat
of the same matter in the catechetical form of question and
answer. He contributed to the doctrinal controversies of his
time the _Libellus de processione Spiritus S._ (§ 91, 2) and
by several learned controversial tracts against the leaders
of the Adoptionists (§ 91, 1). It is doubtful whether at all,
and if so to what extent, he had to do with the composition
of the _Libri Carolini_ (§ 94, 1) which appeared during his
stay in England. His numerous epistles, about 300 in number,
are very important for the history of his times. In his
Latin poems he sometimes very happily imitates his classical
models.[253]
2. =Paulus Diaconus= or Paul (the son of) Warnefrid, of
an honourable Longobard family, was next to Alcuin the
most distinguished scholar of his age. Probably sorrow
at the overthrow of his people (§ 82, 2) drove him into
the monastery of Monte Cassino; but Charlemagne took
him to his court in A.D. 782, where he was an object
of admiration as a Homer among the Grecians, a Virgil,
Horace, Tibullus, among the Latinists, and a Philo (!)
among the Hebraists. Love of his native land, however,
led him back to his monastery in A.D. 786, where he died
at a very advanced age in A.D. 795. What was specially
praiseworthy in this learned and amiable man, all the more
that few then took interest in those matters, was love and
enthusiasm for the language, the national legends and heroic
tales, the old laws and customs of his fellow-countrymen.
His most important work is the _Historia s. de Gestis
Langobardorum_ in 6 bks., reaching down to A.D. 774. The
earlier _Hist. Romana_, composed at the wish of a daughter
of king Desiderius, is, so far as its earlier periods are
concerned, compiled from the classical historians, but for
the later periods down to the overthrow of the Gothic rule
is more independent. At the Frankish court he composed the
_Hist. Episcoporum Mettensium_. He was also distinguished
as a poet. On his _Homiliarius_ comp. § 88, 1.[254]
3. =Theodulf, bishop of Orleans=, distinguished as a Christian
poet and learned theologian, and especially as a promoter
of popular education, stood in high repute with Charlemagne,
but under Louis the Pious, being suspected of treasonable
correspondence with Bernard of Italy, was deposed and
banished in A.D. 818. Subsequently, however, he was
pardoned and recalled, but died in A.D. 821 before he
reached his diocese. His book _De Spiritu S._ was a
contribution to the controversy about the procession
of the Holy Spirit (§ 91, 2). At Charlemagne’s request
he described and explained the baptismal ceremony in the
book _De ordine baptismi_. His numerous poems have been
published in 6 bks.
4. =Paulinus=, patriarch of Aquileia, who died in A.D. 804,
and bishop =Leidrad of Lyons=, who died in A.D. 813, took
part in Alcuin’s controversy against the Adoptionists by
the publication of able treatises.
5. Of the works of =Hatto=, abbot of Reichenau, subsequently
bishop of Basel, who died in A.D. 836, we still have
the so-called _Capitulare Hattonis_, with prefatory
directions for the official guidance of the Basel clergy,
and the _Visio Wettini_, describing the vision of a monk
of Reichenau called Wettin, who in A.D. 824 three days
before his death was conducted by an angel through hell,
purgatory and paradise. Hatto wrote it in prose and Walafrid
Strabo rendered it into verse. It made a great impression
on his contemporaries and was probably not without influence
upon Dante’s _Divina Comediá_.
§ 90.4. =The most distinguished Theologians of the Age of Louis
the Pious.=
1. =Agobard of Lyons=, a Spaniard by birth, died as
archbishop of Lyons in A.D. 840. As the resolute defender
of the integrity of the empire and the head of the national
church party among the Frankish clergy, he was drawn into
a conspiracy against Louis the Pious in A.D. 833 (§ 82, 4),
which led to his deposition and banishment in A.D. 835.
After two years, however, he was pardoned. He was a man
of remarkable culture and extraordinary force of character,
and withal a vigorous opponent of all ecclesiastical and
extra-ecclesiastical superstition. On his writings referring
to these matters see § 92, 2. In the book _Adv. dogma
Felicis_ he contended against Adoptionism (§ 91, 1). In
connection with his battle against the insolence and pride
of the numerous and wealthy Jews in his diocese he wrote and
dedicated to the emperor the accusatory tract _De insolentia
Judæorum_, followed by several similar addresses to the
most influential councillors of the crown. Another series
of writings from his pen was devoted to the vindication
of the attitude which he had assumed in the struggle
between Louis the Pious and his sons. Several treatises
on the position and task, the rights and duties of the
ministerial office show a reformatory tendency. He engaged
in a passionate controversy with Amalarius of Metz about
the necessity of a liturgical reform. Against Fredigis of
Tours, Alcuin’s successor, he maintained the view regarding
the prophets and apostles that the Holy Spirit _non solum
sensum prædicationis et modos vel argumenta dictionum
inspiraverit, sed etiam ipsa corporalia verba extrinsecus
in ora illorum ipse formaverit_.
2. =Claudius, bishop of Turin=, who died in A.D. 839, was
also a Spaniard by birth and a scholar of Felix of Urgel
(§ 91, 1), without, however, imbibing his heretical views.
He was throughout his whole career a zealous and determined
reformer. His reformatory notions were set forth first
of all in his exegetical works that covered almost the
whole range of Scripture. Of these only the commentary
on Galatians is now extant. He also vindicated his position
against the attacks of his old friend the abbot Theodemir
in his _Apologeticus_ (§ 92, 2).
3. =Jonas of Orleans=, the successor of Theodulf, was one of
the most distinguished prelates of his age, who wrought
earnestly and successfully for the restoring of discipline
and order in his diocese. In the struggle between Louis the
Pious and his sons he resolutely took the side of the old
king. He died in A.D. 844. His three books, _De institutione
laicali_ constitute a handbook of morals for married
persons, which also, because it deals with the sins and
vices that were then rampant, is of value as a picture of
the moral condition of his age. The book _De institutione
regia_, addressed to Louis’ son Pepin, may be regarded
as an appendix to the former treatise. In opposition to
the iconoclastic opinions of Claudius (§ 92, 2) he wrote
_Ll. III. De cultu imaginum_.
4. The principal work of the priest =Amalarius of Metz= is
his _De ecclesiasticis officiis_ in 4 bks., a detailed
description of all the ceremonies of public worship and
the ecclesiastical furniture and vestments, with many
arbitrary mystico-allegorical explanations, which called
forth a crushing rejoinder from Agobard. On his revision
of the rule of Chrodegang, see § 84, 4.
5. From the pen of the German monk =Christian Druthmar= of Old
Corbei we have a commentary on Matthew, which is remarkable
for the doctrine of the Lord’s Supper which it sets forth
(§ 91, 3), as well as for the hermeneutical principle there
laid down, that first and foremost the exegete must secure
a thorough understanding of the historical literal sense,
before he may think of developing the spiritual sense, which
must have the former as its basis.
6. =Rabănus [Rabanus] Magnentius Maurus=, the most
distinguished scholar of his age, was descended from an
old Roman family but one that had long been Germanized at
Mainz. His earliest education was received at the monastery
of Fulda. He then became a pupil of Alcuin at Tours. In
A.D. 803 he became himself a teacher at Tours, and in
A.D. 822 was made abbot of Fulda. After the death of Louis
the Pious he took the side of Lothair against Louis the
German, and was consequently obliged to resign his position
as abbot and to quit Fulda in A.D. 842. Subsequently,
however, he obtained Louis’ favour, and upon Otgar’s
death in A.D. 847 (§ 87, 3) was appointed his successor
in the archiepiscopal see of Mainz. He died in A.D. 856.
The monastic school at Fulda was raised by him to the
highest eminence. His commentaries extending over almost
all the Old and New Testaments are mainly occupied with
the development of the so-called spiritual sense, manifest
wonderful familiarity with the writings of the Latin fathers
from Ambrose to Bede, and were held in the highest esteem
throughout the Middle Ages. The same may be said of his
numerous homilies. The encyclopædic work _De universo_
in 22 bks., is a continuation of Isidore’s _Origines_.
His book _De institutione clericorum_ in 3 bks. affords
a summary of all that was then to be learnt by the clergy
for the practical work of the ministry. The _Tractatus de
diversis quæstionibus ex V. et N. T. contra Judæos_ is an
apologetic treatise. He wrote against Gottschalk’s doctrine
of predestination in a letter to bishop Noting of Verona
(§ 91, 5), and another to the abbot Eigil of Prüm against
Radbert’s doctrine of the Lord’s Supper (§ 91, 3). Of his
many other works we may mention a _Martyrologium_ based
upon ancient authorities.
7. =Walafrid Strabo= received his early training in the
monastery of Reichenau. He studied subsequently under
Rabanus at Fulda, in which institution he became a teacher.
About A.D. 842 he was made abbot of Reichenau; the seminary
here he raised to high repute, although he died in his
early prime in A.D. 849. Among his evangelical writings
his so-called _Glossæ ordinariæ_, _i.e._ short explanations
of the Latin text of the Bible, mostly culled from the
commentaries of Rabanus, were extremely popular, and
continued in use throughout the Middle Ages as an exegetical
handbook. In the liturgical department we have his treatise
_De exordiis et incrementis rerum ecclesiasticarum_, in
which he expresses himself on the image controversy in
the spirit of the old Frankish church (§ 92, 1). Walafrid
was also famous as a writer of sacred and secular poems.
§ 90.5. =The Most Distinguished Theologians of the Age of Charles
the Bald.=
1. The powerful metropolitan =Hincmar of Rheims=, who died
in A.D. 882 (§ 82, 7; 83, 2), was not indeed strong in
dogmatics, but in his writings just as well as in his life
and struggle he was heart and soul a church leader and
statesman. His most important work from a theological point
of view is the _Capitula Synodica ad presbyteros parochiæ
suæ_ on various points of worship and discipline, a notable
witness to the zeal and care which this man, so much taken
up with affairs of state and ecclesiastical controversies,
showed in the discharge of his ministerial duties. Of his
writings in connection with the Gottschalk controversy
(§ 91, 5, 6) only the prolix work _De predest. Dei et libero
arbitrio_ vindicating the decrees of Quiersy of A.D. 853 are
now extant.
2. =Paschasius Radbertus=, who died about A.D. 865, was
monk, and, from A.D. 844-851, also abbot of the monastery
of Corbei in Picardy. But among the monks of that place
there was a cotery which occasioned the most profound grief
to the pious-minded abbot; especially the learned monk
Ratramnus under the protection of court favour took delight
in contesting the somewhat ultra-pietistic views of his
abbot. Probably it was this that led Radbertus to resign his
office in A.D. 851. Besides the two treatises controverted
by Ratramnus he composed biblical commentaries, which are
more independent and contain more of his own than was common
at that time. He also wrote 3 bks. on faith, love and hope;
besides several Hagiographies.
3. =Ratramnus=, the antagonist of the former, takes a very
prominent place among the clear and subtle thinkers of that
age. Besides his controversial treatises against Radbertus
(§ 91, 3, 4) and against Hincmar (§ 91, 5, 6), he took part
in the burning controversy between the Greeks and Latins
(§ 67, 1) and wrote, _Contra Græcorum opposita Romanam eccl.
infamantium_.
4. =Florus Magister= was a cleric of the diocese of Lyons
distinguished no less for great learning than for poetic
gifts. His principal work _De actione Missarum, s. expositio
in Canonem Missæ_ is, notwithstanding its title, not so
much a liturgical treatise as a controversial tract against
Radbertus’ doctrine of the Eucharist (§ 91, 3). In the
liturgical controversy between Agobard and Amalarius,
he took the side of Agobard and argued against Amalarius
in several epistles. In the predestinarian controversy
he published the work _Contra J. Scoti Erigenæ erroneas
definitiones_ (§ 91, 5). He also composed a _Martyrologium_.
5. =Haymo, bishop of Halberstadt=, who died in A.D. 853, won
great reputation not only by his compiled exegetical works
and his _Homiliarium_ for the festival part of the year,
but also as author of a Church History, which, however, is
nothing more than a working up of extracts from Rufinus.
6. =Servatus Lupus=, scholar of Rabanus, was from A.D. 842
abbot of Ferrières. His 130 epistles are important for the
history of his time, as he was in constant correspondence
with the most famous men of his day. On the side of
Gottschalk in the predestinarian controversy he wrote
his treatise _De tribus quæstionibus_.
7. =Remigius of Auxerre=, who died about A.D. 908, was
teacher of the monastic school at Rheims, and subsequently
at Paris. Besides numerous commentaries on the books of
the Old and New Testaments in the usual compilatory and
allegorical style, he has left in his _Expositio Missæ_
a mystico-allegorical explanation of the ceremonies of
the mass.
8. =Regius of Prüm=, abbot of the monastery there,
subsequently resigned his rank and retired into the
monastery of Treves. He died in A.D. 915. His _Chronicon_
reaching down to A.D. 906 is of great value for his own
times. His 2 bks. _De cantis synodalibus et disciplinis
ecclesiasticis_ are a directory for the visitation of
churches to be carried out by means of synodical judicatures.
§ 90.6.
9. =Anastasius Bibliothecarius= was abbot of a Roman monastery
and librarian under popes Nicholas I., Hadrian II. and
John VIII., and visited the Byzantine court in A.D. 869
as member of an embassy of Emperor Louis II., and was also
present at the 8th œcumenical Council at Constantinople
(§ 67, 1). He translated the acts of this synod into Latin,
wrote the lives of several saints, and composed a _Hist.
ecclest. s. Chronographia tripartita_ drawn from three
Byzantine historical works of that period. To the _Liber
Pontificalis s. de vitio Roman. pontificum_, reaching down
to the death of Stephen V. in A.D. 891, which has been
ascribed to him, he can only have contributed the _Vita_
of pope Nicholas I., and perhaps also the _Vitæ_ of his
four immediate predecessors. It is a history of the popes
gathered together from various sources that had their
origin at different times, the earliest of which goes back
to A.D. 354. The oldest extant recension of it reaches
down to Pope Conon in A.D. 687, and forms an important
link in the chain of Romish fabrications and interpolations,
by means of which the numerous fabricated acts of Romish
martyrs, as well as already existing fables referring
to particular popes and emperors (comp. _e.g._ § 42, 1),
gained credence, more recently introduced liturgical
practices had assigned to them a more remote antiquity,
and the popes were represented as legislators for the
whole church. The complete biographies often written by
contemporaries preserved in this collection are of great
historical value.
10. =Eulogius of Cordova= was chosen archbishop in A.D. 858,
but was not received by the Moorish government, and suffered
martyrdom in A.D. 859 (§ 81, 1). The most important of his
writings is the historical _Memoriale Sanctorum s. Ll. III.
de Martyrib. Cordubens_. The _Apologeticus Sanctorum_ is a
continuation of the former with violent invectives against
Islam and its false prophet. =Paulas [Paul] Alvarus= of
Cordova, from his youth closely associated with Eulogius,
wrote his life and vindicated in a _Judiculus luminosus_
the tendency to court martyrdom then frequently shown by
Christians but often objected to.
§ 90.7.
11. =Joannes Scotus Erigena=, the miracle as well as the
enigma of his age, by birth probably an Irishman, who
flashed out as a brilliant meteor in the court of Charles
the Bald and passed away from view, without its being known
whence he came or whither he went, was the greatest scholar,
the most profound, subtle and liberal thinker of his times,
with a speculative power the like of which was not seen
for centuries before and after. He died after A.D. 877.
His extant works embrace fragments of his commentary
on the Areopagite (§ 47, 11), and a Latin faithful,
literal and therefore hard to understand translation
of the Areopagite’s writings, also a translation of a
work of Maximus Confessor on difficult passages from
the writings of Gregory Nazianzen (_Loca ambigua_), his
controversial treatise _De prædestinatione_ (§ 91, 5),
a homily on the prologue of John’s gospel, a fragment of
a speculative-mystical treatise _De egressu et regressu
animæ ad Deum_, and the _Opus palmare_ of the author, by
far the most comprehensive of his writings, the 5 bks. _De
divisione naturæ_. Based upon the gnosis of the school of
Origen, but resting mainly on the theosophical mysticism of
the Areopagite and the dialectic of Maximus Confessor, he
produced in this treatise a system of speculative theology
of magnificent dimensions which, in spite of every effort
to hold by the doctrinal position of the church, is but
one piece of heterodoxy from beginning to end. He starts
from the principle that true theology and true philosophy
are only formally different, but essentially identical.
The _Fides_ have to express the truth as _Theologia
affirmativa_ (καταφατική) in the biblically revealed and
ecclesiastically communicated shell, accommodating itself
to the finite understanding by figurative and metaphorical
expressions. But the task of the _Ratio_ is to strip off
this shell (_Theologia negativa_, ἀποφατική), and by means
of speculation raise the faith to knowledge. The title of
this book is to be explained from its fundamental thought
that nature, _i.e._ the sum of all being and non-being, by
which he understands everything the existence of which is
yet unknown, or merely potential, or necessarily belonging
to things past, comprises four forms of existence:--_Natura
creatrix non creata_, _i.e._ God as the potential sum of
all being, _Natura creatrix creata_, _i.e._ the eternal
thoughts of God regarding the world as the eternal primal
types of all creation, _Natura creata non creans_, _i.e._
the world in time as the visible product and sensible
realization of the eternal invisible world of ideas,
and _Natura nee creata nee creans_, _i.e._ God as the
final end of all created being, to whom all creation
when all contradictions have been overcome returns in
the ἀποκατάστασις τῶν πάντων. The Aristotelian threefold
division into the unmoved and moving, the moved and moving,
and the moved and not moving, seems to have afforded
him the starting-point for his fourfold division; while
the divergent conception of them, their enlargement and
development may be traced to Platonic and Neo-Platonic
influences.--That such a system must essentially tend
to pantheism soon became evident, but on the other hand
Erigena’s own Christian consciousness strongly reacted
against the pantheistic current of his thought, and he was
anxiously concerned to preserve the fundamental truths of
Christian Theism. By the fundamental fourfold division of
his system he could not give to the doctrine of the Trinity
a necessary and controlling but only an accidental and
occasional position. Only the presence of this doctrine
in Scripture and tradition obliged him to maintain it.
He speaks indeed of three persons in God, but he uses the
expression only in an improper sense, and has no intention
of explaining Father, Son and Spirit as mere names of
divine relations (_habitudines_, _relationes_): _Pater
vult, Filius facit, Spir. S. perficit_. In the Son as
the creative Word of God are all original causes of
things, undistinguished, unordered; by the Spirit are
they differentiated into the various phenomena and
effects in the kingdom of nature as well as of grace.
On his doctrine of evil, comp. § 91, 5. As Origen has
in himself the germs of all orthodoxy and heterodoxy of
the ancient church undeveloped and uncontrasted, so also
in Erigena are there the germs of the contradictions
of later scholasticism and mysticism. Had he lived
three centuries later he would probably have set the
whole learned world astir, but now he passed unhonoured,
misunderstood, scarcely regarded worth dealing with for
heresy (§ 91, 5), and apparently leaving little trace
behind him. His great work _De divisione naturæ_ was
first condemned by a provincial Council at Sens, and
this judgment was confirmed by Honorius III. in A.D. 1225.
The book was characterized as _Scatens vermibus hæreticæ
pravitatis_; orders were given that it should be sought out
everywhere and burnt.[255]
§ 90.8. =The Monastic and Cathedral Schools= had as their
main task the training of capable servants for the church. The
handbooks mainly in use were those of Cassiodorus, Isidore, Bede,
Alcuin and Rabanus. Great diligence was shown, especially in the
monasteries, in founding libraries and multiplying books by means
of good copies. Alcuin made a threefold division of all sciences;
ethics, physics and theology. Ethics corresponded to what was
afterwards called the Trivium (Grammar, Rhetoric and Dialectic);
Physics to the Quadrivium (Arithmetic, Geometry, Music and
Astronomy). These two together comprehended the whole range
of the seven _free_ arts, _i.e._ worthy of the study of a free
man, liberal studies. Latin was the language of intercourse
and instruction. Greek, which was spread by Theodore of Tarsus,
a Greek monk, who, after being long a teacher in Rome, was in
A.D. 669 made archbishop of Canterbury, and by his pupils was
also taught in the more important schools. Acquaintance with
Hebrew was much more rare, and was often obtained by means
of intercourse with learned Jews. Boethius [Boëthius] was the
vehicle of instruction in philosophy. In the 9th century the works
ascribed to Dionysius the Areopagite (§ 47, 11) were sent to
France as a present from the Byzantine emperor Michael to Louis
of France. He was identified with the founder of the church of
Paris of the same name, and patriotic feeling gave an immense
impulse to the study of his writings. The abbot Hildmin of
St. Denys, and subsequently Joannes Erigena, translated them
into Latin. Encyclopædic works, giving compendiums of the whole
range of the sciences then known, were produced by Isidore and
Rabanus.[256]--Continuation, § 99, 3.
§ 90.9. =Various Branches of Theological Science.=--The labours
of the German church in the department of scientific theology was
directed to the church’s immediate needs, and hence the character
of its theology was biblical and practical, and the reputation of
the fathers so extravagantly high, that wherever it was possible,
teaching, preaching, proving and refuting were all carried on in
their very words. Charlemagne’s powerful efforts in the direction
of reform gave even in the department of theology abundant
occasion and encouragement to scholars round about him to a
more independent procedure, and the theological controversies
of the 9th century afforded sufficient scope to independent
thinking.
1. =Exegesis= on the basis of the Vulgate was most diligently
prosecuted. Charlemagne set Alcuin to produce a critical
revision of its very corrupt text. Agobard combated the
mechanical theory of inspiration by the assertion that the
holy prophets were something better than Balaam’s ass. Only
one out of the very numerous exegetes, Christian Druthmar,
recognised it as a first principle, most essential and
necessary, if not the only task of the exegete, to bring
out the grammatical and historical sense of the words
of Scripture. The literal sense was and continued to
be regarded as the scullion of interpretation, while it
was thought that the most precious treasures of Divine
wisdom were to be found in the _allegorical_ sense,
_i.e._ with application to the mysteries of the faith,
the _tropological_ or moral, and the _anagogical_, which
aimed at the elevation of the mind.
2. In =Systematic Theology= Apologetics was most feebly
represented. The humble form of the paganism to be
controverted did not require elaborate defences of the
Christian faith, but the advance of Mohammedanism and the
great number of Jews established in France, especially
under Louis of France, by means of their wealth and bribes,
developed an incredible arrogance. While Jewish and pagan
slaves were not allowed to have baptism, Christian slaves
on the other hand were compelled to observe the Sabbath,
to work on Sunday, to eat flesh on fast days; they openly
blasphemed Christ, insulted the church and sold Christian
slaves to the Saracens. Agobard fought against them
energetically by word, Scripture and action, but the
needy court protected them. Isidore and Rabanus in their
apologetical writings proved the nullity of the Jewish
beliefs. From the time of Charlemagne theologians were
much more eagerly engaged in polemics (§§ 91, 92). Isidore
in his _Ll. III. Sententiarum_ collected from patristic
passages a system of doctrine and morals, which continued
a favourite text-book for centuries. Alcuin’s _Ll. III.
De fide Trinitatis_ form a compendium of dogmatics. The
introduction of the Pseudo-Areopagita into the West prepared
the way for speculative mysticism, which had its first
representative in Joannes Scotus Erigena.
3. In =Practical Theology= homiletical literature was but
poorly represented. Besides the Homiliarius of Paul
Warnefrid (§ 88, 1), we meet with Bede, Walafrid, Rabanus
and Haymo as authors of sermons. On the other hand great
and constant interest was shown in developing a theory of
worship, in describing it and giving a mystical explanation
of it. Isidore with _De officiis ecclesiasticis_ was
the first in this department. Charlemagne set to all his
theologians the task of explaining the baptismal ceremony.
In the time of Louis the Pious, Agobard appears as a
reformer of the liturgy, in connection with which he
passionately contended against Amalarius, against whom
also Florus Magister entered the lists. Important works
in this department were also written by Rabanus, Walafrid
and Remigius. On works treating of church law and church
discipline, see § 87 and § 89, 5.
4. Finally, as to the department of =Historical Theology= all
knowledge of earlier church history was derived from Rufinus
and Cassiodorus. Even Haymo’s Church History is made up
simply of extracts from Rufinus. All the greater diligence
was shown throughout the Middle Ages in chronicling the
ecclesiastical and political events of the immediate
present and also keeping the past in memory. This endeavour
shows itself in a threefold direction. (a) The writing of
=National Chronicles=. The Visigoths had their Isidore, the
Ostrogoths their Cassiodorus,[257] the Longobards their Paul
Warnefrid, the Franks their Gregory of Tours, the Britons
their Gildas[258] and Nennius,[259] the Anglo-Saxons
their Bede.--(b) Then we have the clumsy compilations of
=Annals= and =Chronicles= which most monasteries produced,
and which were continued from year to year.--(c) And
further, =Biographies=, both of distinguished statesmen
and distinguished churchmen. The _Vitæ Sanctorum_ are
innumerable, mostly quite uncritical, composed purely for
the glorification of some local saint. To this category
belong the numerous _Martyrologies_, arranged in the
order of the Calendar. Among the most famous were those
prepared by Bede, Ado of Vienne, Usuardus, Rabanus, Notker
Balbulus, Wandelbert, etc. In the department of historical
biography proper may be included the portion of the
_Liber pontificalis_ belonging to this period, the _Hist.
Mettensium Episcoporum_ of Paul Warnefrid, and Isidore’s
continuation of Jerome’s _Catalogus_, which was further
continued by Ildefonsus of Toledo.
§ 90.10. =Anglo-Saxon Culture under Alfred the Great=,
A.D. 871-901.--Alfred the Great, the greatest and noblest of
all the kings that England has ever had, was the grandson of
Egbert who had united in A.D. 827 the seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.
When five years old he received papal anointing at Rome and two
years later in company with his pious father he travelled thence,
made a considerable stay at the brilliant court of Charlemagne
where he received the impress of its superior culture, and
began his reign in A.D. 871 in his 22nd year when the kingdom
was sorely oppressed by Danish invasions. He applied all the
energy of his mind to the difficult problems of government, to
the emancipation and civilization of his country and people by
driving out the Danish robbers, and then improving the internal
condition of the land by attention to agriculture, industry and
trade, by a wise organization, legislation and administration,
by the founding of churches, monasteries and schools, and
by furthering every scientific endeavour from a thoroughly
national point of view. When already thirty-six years of age
he learnt the Latin language and used this acquirement for the
enriching of Anglo-Saxon literature by translations from his
own hand, with many important additions of his own, of Boëthius’
_Consolatio philosophiæ_, the Universal History of Orosius, Bede’s
History of the Church of England and the _Regula pastoralis_ of
Gregory the Great. He also began a translation of the Psalms.
He stimulated his learned friends to a like activity, among whom
bishop Asser of Sherborne in his _Vita Alfredi_ (Engl. transl.
in “Six Old English Chronicles”) has reared a worthy memorial
of his master.[260]--Continuation, § 100, 1.
§ 91. DOCTRINAL CONTROVERSIES.
The first important heresy that grew up independently on German
soil was Adoptionism. This heresy took its rise at that point in the
development of Christology that was reached by the 6th œcumenical
Council of Constantinople in A.D. 680 (§ 52, 8), for it recognises
the double nature and the double will while denying the double sonship.
Frankish orthodoxy, however, saw in it not a further development of
doctrine, but a relapse into Nestorianism, and so condemned the new
doctrine. During the same period the dogma of the procession of the
Holy Spirit was the subject of lively controversy, and the Frankish
church came forward as defender of Western orthodoxy against the Greeks.
In the Eucharistic controversy the most eminent Frankish theologians
opposed the Transubstantiation doctrine of Balbutus [Balbulus].
A further controversy as to the conception of the Blessed Virgin
was closely connected with the one just referred to. Neither of
them was made the subject of any synodal decision. On the other
hand very definite synodal decisions were passed in reference to the
predestination controversy, without, however, bringing that controversy
by any means to a conclusion. Of subordinate importance was the dispute
over the expression _Trina Deitas_.
§ 91.1. =The Adoptionist Controversy, A.D. 782-799.=--Of all
Christian dogmas none were so offensive to the Moslems as that
of the Trinity which to their barren monotheism necessarily
appeared as Tritheism, and none were the subject of so much scorn
as the idea that God should have a son. It need not, therefore,
surprise us to find that Spanish theologians endeavoured to
put this doctrine in a form as little offensive as possible
to the Moslems. One =Migetius= went so far as to adopt a very
crude form of Sabellianism, for he, undoubtedly approaching
the Mohammedan view of the prophetic order, represented the
Trinitarian development of the one Divine Being as a threefold
historical manipulation of God: in David the person of the
Father is revealed, in Christ as son of David that of the Son,
and finally, in the Apostle Paul that of the Holy Spirit. At
a Spanish synod of A.D. 782 he was successfully opposed by the
archbishop =Elipandus of Toledo=, who took the opportunity of
attempting a further development of the Christological dogma.
This also was more fully elaborated by =Felix of Urgel= in
the Spanish Mark. Both taught: That Christ is properly Son of
God only according to His divine nature (_Filius Dei Naturâ_);
according to His human nature He is properly, like all of us,
a servant of God, and only by the decision of the Divine will
is He adopted as the Son of God (_Filius Dei Adoptivus_), just
as all of us may by Him and after His example be raised from the
condition of servant into the family of God. According to His
Divine nature therefore He is the =Only Begotten=, according to
His human nature the =First Begotten= Son of God. The adoption
of the human nature into Divine Sonship began with its conception
by the Holy Ghost, but was more definitely determined in His
baptism, and perfected in His resurrection. The first scene of
the controversy called forth by this doctrine was enacted on
Spanish soil. Two representatives of the Asturian clergy, the
presbyter Beatus of Libana and bishop Etherius of Osma, contended
by word and writing against the heresy of Elipandus (A.D. 785).
This was done perhaps with the view of emancipating the Asturian
church from the see of Toledo then under Saracen domination. The
Asturians applied to Hadrian I., who in an epistle to the bishops
of Spain in A.D. 786 condemned Adoptionism as a heresy. The
controversy entered upon a second stage through the interference
of Charlemagne. The absence of Adoptionism in Frankish Spain
afforded him an excuse for interfering, and he readily seized
upon this, because it gave him an opportunity of posing as the
defender of orthodoxy in the West, _i.e._ as Emperor _in esse_.
Before a Synod at Regensburg in A.D. 792, Felix was compelled
to renounce this heresy, and was sent to Rome to pope Hadrian I.
There he had to make a second recantation, but escaped from
prison and fled to Saracenic territory. In the meantime Alcuin
had returned from his travels in England, and immediately engaged
in controversy by addressing an affectionate exhortation to
Felix. The Spaniards gave a very firm reply and Charlemagne
then convened the famous œcumenical German Synod of Frankfort
in A.D. 794. After further investigation Adoptionism was again
condemned, and the judgment of the synod, in order that it might
have an œcumenical character, was sent to Spain accompanied
by four complete reports as representing the various national
churches and authorities. But on the Spaniards this made little
impression. Just as little effect had a learned controversial
tract of Alcuin’s, to which Felix made a smart rejoinder.
Meanwhile Charlemagne sent a clerical commission under Leidrad
of Lyons and Benedict of Aniane (§ 85, 2) into the Spanish
Mark, in order to root out the weeds of heresy that were growing
there. Felix declared himself ready for further enquiry. At the
national Synod of Aachen in A.D. 792 he disputed for six days
with Alcuin, and declared himself at last thoroughly convinced.
Alcuin and Paulinus of Aquileia published new controversial
tracts, and Leidrad went a second time into the Spanish Mark
where he succeeded in rooting out the heresy. But all the more
determined were the bishops of Saracenic Spain in maintaining
their doctrine, and Elipandus answered a conciliatory letter of
Alcuin in a passionate and angry tone. Felix remained until the
end of his life in A.D. 818 under the guardianship of the bishop
of Lyons. Leidrad’s successor, Agobard, found among his papers
undoubted evidence that to the end he was at heart an Adoptionist,
and from this took occasion to publish another controversial
tract. This was the very last of these productions. But in Spain
Adoptionism seems to have maintained its hold down to the second
half of the 9th century. At last about that time Paulus Alvarus
of Cordova (§ 90, 6) contended with a certain Joannes Spalensis
on account of his Adoptionist views. In the 12th century the
controversy again broke out on German soil (§ 102, 6).[261]
§ 91.2. =Controversy about the Procession of the Holy
Spirit.=--At a Synod at Gentiliacum in A.D. 767, held for
the purpose of meeting a Byzantine embassy about the iconoclast
controversy, the addition to the creed of the _Filioque_ was
spoken about (§ 67, 1). The result of the discussion is unknown.
In Charlemagne’s time Alcuin and Theodulf defended the Latin
doctrine in special treatises, and at a Synod at Friaul in
A.D. 791 Paulinus of Aquileia justified its adoption into
the creed and the Carolingian books (§ 92, 1). The discussion
was renewed when the Latin monks of Mount Olivet, blamed by
the Greeks because of the addition, appealed to the usage of
the Frankish church. Pope Leo III. communicated in regard to
this with Charlemagne, and a Council at Aachen in A.D. 809
defended the addition. But the pope, although not contesting
the correctness of the doctrine, disallowed the change in the
creed, and had two silver tablets erected in St. Peter’s in Rome
with the creed wanting the addition. This was evidently a damper
upon the ecclesiastico-political movements of the emperor.
§ 91.3. =The Eucharistic Controversy, A.D. 844.=--Vacillations
about the doctrine of the Supper (§ 58, 2) lasted down to the
9th century. Paschasius Radbertus, monk at Corbie, undertook
in A.D. 831, in his treatise _De Sanguine et corpore Domini_,
theologically to justify, and on all sides to develop the
doctrine of the Supper, which had long ago struck its roots
in the practice of the church and the faith of the people.
The air of genuine piety which meets us in this work impresses
us favourably, and it cannot be denied that he had a profound
perception of fulness, power, and depth of the Sacrament. It
was, therefore, quite in accordance with popular belief. He
could, also, refer to facts from the _Vitæ Sanctorum_, where
the inner _Veritas_ had come to outer manifestation. He thinks
that the fact that this did not always happen is to be accounted
for partly by this, that the Supper in its very nature is
a _Mysterium_ for faith and not a _Miraculum_ for unbelief,
partly by the divine condescendence which takes into account the
natural horror at flesh and blood, and would take away from the
heathen all occasion for blasphemy. At this time, A.D. 831, the
Scriptures were not appealed to. Meantime Radbertus was made
abbot of Corbie, and in this important position he revised his
work, and presented it to Charles the Bald in A.D. 844. The king
called upon the learned monk, =Ratramnus= of Corbie, to express
his opinion on the subject, and he was only too ready to do
an injury to his abbot. Without naming him, he contested his
doctrine in his treatise, _De corp. et sang. Domini ad Carolum
Calvum_, with bitter criticism, and subtly developed his own
view, according to which the body and blood of Christ are enjoyed
only _spiritualiter et secundum potentiam_. Rabanus Maurus,
Scotus Erigena, and Florus of Lyons also opposed the magical
transformation doctrine of Radbertus in favour of a merely
spiritual enjoyment. Hincmar and Haymo, on the other hand,
took the side of Radbertus, while Walafrid Strabo, and the able,
energetic Christian Druthmar, found in the idea of impanation
and consubstantiation a more fitting expression for the solemn
mystery. But Radbertus had spoken the word which gave clear
utterance to the ecclesiastical feeling of the age; the protest
of so many great authorities might delay, but could not destroy
its effects. Continuation, § 101, 2.
§ 91.4. =Controversy about the Conception of the Virgin.=--This
notion of the magical operation of the Divine prevailed with
Radbertus when soon afterwards he undertook in his own way,
and also in accordance with Ps. xxii. 10 and Jer. xxxi. 22,
in the tract, _De partu virginali_, to establish the opinion
already expressed by Ambrose and Jerome (§ 57, 2), that Mary
brought forth _utero clauso_, and without pain. Ratramnus also
has left a treatise on this theme: _De eo quod Christus ex
Virigine natus est_. He maintains equally with Radbertus that
during conception as well as in bearing, the Virgin did not
lose her virginity. But while Radbertus contended against those
who taught less than this, _i.e._, that though Mary conceived
as a virgin, she bore after the manner of all women, Ratramnus
directed his attack against those who affirmed more than that,
_i.e._, that Christ at His birth did not leave His mother’s womb
in the usual, natural manner, by His mother bearing Him. Further,
while the former was angry at the profaning of the mystery of
the birth of Christ, by ranking it under the laws of nature, the
latter emphasized the fact that in no case should it be regarded
as in itself ignominious to be placed under the laws of nature.
Finally, while Radbertus unconditionally repudiated the position,
_Vulvam aperuit_, Ratramnus felt compelled by Luke ii. 23 to
admit it in a certain sense. C. v. “_Utique vulvam aperuit,
non et clausam corrumperet, sed et per eam suæ nativitatis
ostium aperiret, sicut et in Ezech. xliv. 3 porta et clausa
describitur et tamen narratur Domino aperta; non quod liminis
sui fores dimoverit ad ejus egressum, sed quod sic clausa
patuerit dominanti_,” and c. viii. “_Exivit clauso sepulchro
(?) et ingressus foribus obseratis (Jo. xx. 9) ... ut et clausam
relinqueret et per eam transiret ... nec haureundo patefecit_.”
The polemic, therefore, was most probably occasioned not by
anything in the writings, but rather in their oral utterances.
Neither understood the other’s view, and the one drew consequences
from the other’s statements that were not warrantable. But when
Ratramnus pretends to be debating, not with his abbot but with an
unnamed German opponent, this can only be regarded as a literary
artifice.
§ 91.5. =The Predestinarian Controversy A.D. 847-868.=--The
earlier predestinarian controversy (§ 53, 5), was, so far
from being brought to a conclusion, that all the gradations
of doctrinal views, from that of Semi-Pelagianism to a doctrine
of predestination to condemnation that went far beyond Augustine,
could find representatives among the teachers of the church. In
the 9th century the controversy broke out in a passionate form.
=Gottschalk=, the son of Berno, a Saxon count, had been placed
by his parents when a child in the monastery of Fulda. A Synod
at Mainz in A.D. 829 allowed him to go forth, but the abbot of
Fulda at that time, Rabanus Maurus, got Louis the Pious to annul
this dispensation. Transferred to the monastery of Orbais, in
the diocese of Soissons, Gottschalk sought comfort in the study
of the writings of Augustine, and was an enthusiastic defender
of the doctrine of absolute predestination. In one point he
even went beyond Augustine himself, for he taught a two-fold
predestination (_Gemina prædestinatio_), a predestination to
salvation and a predestination to condemnation, while Augustine
had spoken of the latter mostly as a giving over to deserved
condemnation. He took advantage of two journeys into Italy in
A.D. 840 and A.D. 847 for spreading his doctrine. Impelled with
a vehement desire to make converts, he made an attempt upon
bishop Noting of Verona. Through him Rabanus, from A.D. 847
archbishop of Mainz, obtained information thereof, and issued
to Noting, as well as to Count Eberhard of Friaul, with whom
Gottschalk was living, threatening letters which distorted
Gottschalk’s doctrine in many particulars, and drew from it
unfair consequences, making the _Prædestinatio ad damnationem_
a _Prædestinatio ad peccatum_. Rabanus’s own doctrine
distinguished prescience and predestination, and placed the
condemnation of the wicked under the former point of view. At
the same time, in A.D. 848, he convened a Synod at Mainz, before
which Gottschalk stated his doctrine without reserve, in the
joyous conviction that it was in accordance with the doctrine
of the church. But the Council excommunicated him, and assigned
him for punishment to his metropolitan Hincmar of Rheims. Hincmar
had him anew condemned at the Synod of Quiersy in A.D. 849,
then, because he steadily refused to recant, had him savagely
scourged and consigned to imprisonment for life in the monastery
of Hautvilliers. Gottschalk offered to prove the justice of
his cause by submitting to an ordeal; but Hincmar, though in
other instances a defender of the ordeal, denounced this as the
proposal of a second Simon Magus. The inhuman treatment of the
poor monk, and the rejection of the doctrine of Augustine by two
church leaders, occasioned a mighty commotion in the Frankish
church, which was mainly directed against Hincmar. At first,
bishop Prudentius of Troyes took the condemned monk’s part. Then
Charles the Bald asked the opinions of Ratramnus of Corbie and
the abbot Servatus Lupus of Ferrières. Both of these took the
side of Gottschalk. Hincmar’s position threatened to become very
serious. He looked out for supporters, and succeeded in finding
champions in the deacon Florus of Lyons, the priest Amalarius of
Metz, and the learned Joannes Scotus Erigena. But the latter’s
advocacy was almost more dangerous to the metropolitan than the
charges of his accusers. For the speculative Irishman founded
his objections to the doctrine of predestination on the position,
unheard of before in the West, that evil is only a μὴ ὄν, and
condemnation therefore not a positive punishment of God, but
consisting only in the consciousness of a defect. Hincmar’s
position was now worse than ever, for his opponents made him
responsible for the heresies of Scotus. And not only an old
objector, Prudentius of Troyes in his _De prædest. c. Joh.
Scotu_, but even archbishop Wessilo of Sens and the deacon
Florus of Lyons, who had hitherto supported him, now put on
their armour against him. But Charles the Bald took the part
of the sorely-beset metropolitan, and summoned the national
Synod of Quiersy of A.D. 853, where in four articles (_Capitula
Carisiaca_), a modified Augustinianism, rejecting the _gemina
prædestinatio_, was set forth as the orthodox faith. The
Neustrian objectors were now compelled to keep silence, but
archbishop Remigius of Lyons set a Lothringian national Synod
of Valence of A.D. 855 over against the Neustrian Synod. This
Synod expressly condemned the decisions of the Synod of Quiersy,
together with the Scottish mixture (_pultus Scotorum_), and
laid down six conflicting articles as the standard of orthodoxy.
Finally the rulers of the West Franks combined their forces and
called an Imperial Synod at Savonnières, a suburb of Toul, in
A.D. 859. But harmony was not yet secured, and they were likely
to part with bitter feelings, when Remigius made the proposal to
reserve decision for a subsequent assembly to be convened in a
less agitated time, and meanwhile to maintain the peace. This
was agreed upon, and so the controversy put out of view, for
the proposed assembly was never brought about. Gottschalk, left
in the lurch by his former friends, now turned for help to the
powerful pope Nicholas I. The pope ordered Hincmar to answer
before the papal plenipotentiaries for his proceedings against
the monk at the Synod of Metz in A.D. 863 (§ 82, 7). Hincmar
preferred not to comply to this demand, and to his delight the
pope himself annulled the decisions of the Synod because his
legates had been bribed. Moreover the metropolitan succeeded by
intercession and well-planned letters in winning over the pope.
Thus then Gottschalk was cheated out of his last hope. For twenty
years he languished in prison, but with his latest breath he
rejected every proposal of recantation. He died in A.D. 868,
and by Hincmar’s orders was buried in unconsecrated earth.
§ 91.6. =The Trinitarian Controversy, A.D. 857.=--From his
prison Gottschalk had accused his metropolitan of a second
heresy. Hincmar had removed from a church hymn, _Te trina Deitas
unaque poscimus_, the expression, =trina Deltas=, as favouring
Arianism, and substituted the words, _sancta Deitas_. His
opponents therefore charged him with Sabellianism, and Ratramnus
made this accusation in a controversial tract no longer extant.
Ratramnus, on the other hand, to whom Hincmar applied, supported
the change, but would not commit himself to a written approval
of it, whereupon Hincmar himself undertook a defence of the
expression substituted in his treatise, _De una et non trini
Deitate_.[262]
§ 92. ENDEAVOURS AFTER REFORMATION.
The independence which Charlemagne gave to the German church first
awakened in it the consciousness of its vocation as a reformer.
This consciousness was maintained throughout the Middle Ages,
though hampered indeed by much narrowness, one-sidedness, and error.
Charlemagne himself stood first in the series of reformers with his
energetic protest against image worship. Louis the Pious too persevered
in this same direction, and encouraged Agobard of Lyons and Claudius of
Turin when they contested similar forms of ecclesiastical superstition.
§ 92.1. =The Carolingian Opposition to Image Worship,
A.D. 790-825.=--On the occasion of an embassy of the emperor
Constantinus Copronymus (§ 66, 2) Pepin the Short convened a
Synod at Gentiliacum in A.D. 767 (§ 91, 2) where the question
of image worship was dealt with. We have no further information,
as the acts of this Synod have been lost. Then in A.D. 790
Hadrian I. sent to Charlemagne the acts of the 7th occasional
Synod of Nicæa (§ 66, 3). Charles, as emperor-elect, regarded
himself as grievously wronged by the assumption of the Greeks,
who, without consulting the German court, sought to enact
laws that were wholly antagonistic to the Frankish practice.
He published under his own name a state paper in 4 bks., the
so-called _Libri Carolini_, in which the Byzantine proceedings
were censured in strong terms, the synodal acts refuted one by
one, every form of image worship denounced as idolatry, while at
the same time the position of the iconoclasts was repudiated and,
with reference to Gregory the Great (§ 57, 4), the usefulness
of images in quickening devotion, instructing the people and
providing suitable decoration for sacred places was admitted.
Veneration of saints, relics, and the cross is, on the other
hand, permitted. Charlemagne sent this writing to the pope,
who in the most courteous language wrote a refutation, which,
however, made no impression upon Charlemagne. On the contrary he
now hastened preparations for calling a great œcumenical Synod of
all German churches that would outdo the Synod of the Byzantine
court. Alcuin utilized his visit to England for securing a
representation at this Synod of the Anglo-Saxon church. The
Synod met at Frankfort in A.D. 794 and confirmed the positions
of the Caroline books. The pope found it prudent to yield to
the times and the people. Under Louis the Pious the matter was
brought forward anew on the occasion of an embassy from the
iconoclast emperor Michael Balbus. A national Synod at Paris
in A.D. 825 condemned image worship sharply, in opposition to
Hadrian I., and affirmed the positions of the Caroline books.
Pope Eugenius II. kept silent on this subject. In the Frankish
empire down to the 10th century no recognition was given to the
2nd Nicene Council, and official opposition was continued against
image worship.
§ 92.2. Soon after the Parisian council of A.D. 825, =Agobard
of Lyons= made his appearance with a powerful polemic: _Contra
superstitionem eorum, qui picturis et imaginibus sanctorum
adorationis obsequiem deferendum putant_. He goes much further
than the Caroline books, for not only does he regard it as
advisable, on account of the inevitable misuse on the part of
the people, to banish images entirely, but with image worship
he also rejects all adoration of saints, relics, and angels. Man
should put his trust in the omnipotent God alone, and worship
and reverence only the one Mediator, Christ. He comes forward
also as a reformer of the liturgy. He finds fault with all
sensuous additions to Divine service, would banish from it all
non-Biblical hymns, urges to earnest study of Scripture, contends
against the folly of the ordeal (_De Divinis Sententiis_), the
popular superstitions about witchcraft and weather omens (_Contra
insulsam vulgi opinionem de grandine et tonitruis_), and the
idea that by presents to churches a stop can be put to epidemics
and pestilences. Also on inspiration he entertained very liberal
opinions (§ 90, 9). No one thought on account of these views to
charge him with heresy. =Claudius of Turin= went still further
than Agobard. By the help of Augustine he was able to grasp more
profoundly than any of his contemporaries the essential core of
saving truth, that man without any merit of works is justified
and saved by the grace of God in Christ alone. Louis the
Pious appointed him to the bishopric of Turin with the express
injunction that he should contend against image worship in his
Italian diocese. He found there image worship along with an
extravagant devotion to relics, crosses and pilgrimages carried
on to such a degree that he felt himself constrained reluctantly
because of the condition of affairs to cast images and crosses
out of the churches altogether. The popular excitement over this
proceeding rose to the utmost pitch, and his life was saved and
his office retained only through dread of the Frankish arms. When
pope Paschalis intimated to him his displeasure, he said the pope
is only to be honoured as apostolic, when he does the works of
an apostle, otherwise Matt. xxiii. 2-4 applies to him. Against
the views of his early scholar and friend the abbot Theodemir,
regarding monastic psalmody, he vindicated himself in A.D. 825
in his controversial tract _Apologeticus_, which is now known
only from the replies of his opponents. A Scotchman, Dungal,
teacher at Pavia, entered the lists against him and accused him
before the emperor, who, however, contented himself with calling
upon bishop Jonas of Orleans to refute the apologetical treatise.
This refutation appeared only after the death of Claudius. It
assumed the position of the Frankish church on the question of
image worship, as also Dungal had done.
Butler & Tanner, The Selwood Printing Works, Frome, and London.
FOOTNOTES.
[1] Dowling, “Introduction to Study of Eccl. Hist.; its
Progress and Sources.” Lond., 1838.
Smedt, “Introd. generalis ad Hist. Eccl. critice
tractandam.” Gandavi, 1876.
[2] See Sermon on The Pharisees in Mozley’s “Univ. Sermons.”
Lond., 1876; also
Schürer, Div. II., vol. ii., pp. 1-43, “Pharisees and
Sadducees.”
[3] See Lightfoot, _Ep. to the Col._, 5th ed., Lond., 1880,
Diss. on “Essenes, their Name, Origin, and Relation to
Christianity.” pp. 349-419; also
Schürer, Div. II., vol. ii., pp. 188-218, “The Essenes.”
[4] Nutt, _Sketch of Samaritan History, Dogma, and
Literature_. Lond., 1874.
[5] On Philo, see Schürer, Div. II., vol. iii., pp. 321-381.
[6] J. Bannerman, “The Church of Christ.” 2 vols.,
Edin., 1868.
Jacob, “Ecclesiastical Polity of the New Testament.”
Lond., 1871.
Hatch, “The Organization of the Early Chr. Churches.”
Lond., 1881; 2nd ed., 1883.
D. D. Bannerman, “The Doctrine of the Church.”
Edin., 1887.
Hodge, “The Church and its Polity.” Edin., 1879.
Binnie, “The Church.” Edin., 1882.
Pressensé, “Life and Pract. of Early Church.” Lond., 1879.
Lightfoot, “Comm. on Philip.” “Essay on Christian
Ministry.” 6th ed., Lond., 1881, pp. 181-269.
[7] Mommsen, “De collegiis et sodaliciis Rom.” Kiel, 1843.
Foucart, “Les associat. relig. chez les Grecs.”
Paris, 1873.
Hatch, “Organization of Early Chr. Churches.” pp. 26-39.
[8] Lightfoot, “Epistle to Phil.” 6th ed., Lond., 1881,
p. 95. Detached notes on the synonyms “bishop” and
“presbyter.” “Diss. on Christian Ministry.”
pp. 187-200.
[9] Blondel, “Apologia pro sententia Hieron. de episcop. et
presbyt.” Amst., 1646.
[10] The φίλημα ἅγιον of Rom. xvi. 16; 1 Cor. xvi. 20.
[11] Of these we probably find fragments in Eph. ii. 14;
1 Tim. iii. 16; 2 Tim. ii. 11-13; and perhaps also in
1 Tim. iii. 1, 16; Jas. i. 17; Rev. i. 4; iv. 11; v. 9;
xi. 15; xv. 3; xxi. 1; xxii. 10.
[12] Acts ii. 4, 6; xx. 7.
[13] John xx. 26; Acts xx. 7; 1 Cor. xvi. 2; Rev. i. 10.
[14] Acts ii. 39; xvi. 33; 1 Cor. vii. 14.
[15] Acts viii. 17; vi. 6; xiii. 3; 1 Tim. iv. 14.
[16] On the subject of this section consult:
Pressensé, “Early Years of Christianity.” Vol. 2,
“Apostolic Age.” Lond., 1879, pp. 361-381.
Lechler, “Apostolic and Post Apostolic Times.” 2 vols.,
Edin., 1886; Vol. i., pp. 37-67, 130-144.
[17] Burton, “Heresies of the Apostolic Age.” Oxford, 1829.
[18] As authorities for this period consult:
Moshemii, “Commentarii de reb. Christianor. ante
Constant.” Helmst., 1753.
Baur, “First Three Centuries of the Christian Church.”
Lond., 1877.
Milman, “Hist. of Chr. to Abol. of Pag. in Rom. Emp.”
3 vols., Lond., 1840.
Pressensé, “Early Years of Christianity.” 4 vols.,
Lond., 1879.
[19] Consult:
Killen, “The Ancient Church.” Edin., 1859; “The Old
Catholic Church.” Edin., 1871.
Lechler, “Apost. and Post-Apost. Times.” 2 vols.,
Edin., 1886; Vol. ii., pp. 260-379.
Robertson, “Hist. of Chr. Church.” Vol. i., (A.D. 64-590),
Lond., 1858.
[20] Although the Post-Apostolic and Old Catholic Ages are
sharply enough distinguished from one another in point
of time and of contents along many lines of historical
development, and are rightly partitioned off from each
other, so that they might seem to require treatment as
independent periods; yet, on the one hand, passing over
from the one to the other is so frequent and is for the
most part of so liquid and incontrollable a nature, while
on the other hand, the opposition of and the distinction
between these two periods and the œcumenical Catholic
Imperial Church that succeeds are so thorough-going,
that we prefer to embrace the two under one period and
to point out the boundary lines between the two wherever
these are clearly discernible.
[21] Inge, “Society in Rome under the Cæsars.” Lond., 1887.
[22] Uhlhorn, “Conflict of Christianity with Heathenism.”
Steere, “Account of the Persecutions of the Church under
the Roman Emperors.”
[23] Renan, “Antichrist.” Lond., 1874.
Merivale, “Hist. of Rom. Emp.” Vols. v. vi.,
Lond., 1856, 1858.
Farrar’s “Early Days of Christianity.” Lond., 1884;
Bk. I., pp. 1-44.
Mommsen, “Hist. of Rome.” 6 vols., Lond., 1875 ff.
[24] Renan, “Marcus Aurelius.” Lond., 1883.
Lightfoot, “Ignatius and Polycarp.” 3 vols., Lond., 1885.
[25] Lightfoot, “Ignatius.” Vol. i., pp. 469-476.
[26] “Kirchengesch. v. Dtschl.” I. 94.
[27] Mason, “The Persecution of Diocletian.” Cambridge, 1876.
[28] Cotterill, “Peregrinus Proteus.” Edin., 1879; Engl.
Transl. of Lucian’s works, by Dr. Francklin, 4 vols.,
Lond., 1781.
[29] Baur, “Christian Church in First Three Centuries.”
Lond., 1877.
“Celsus and Origen.” in vol. iv. of Froude’s “Short
Studies.”
[30] Philostratus, “Life of Apollonius of Tyana.” First 2 bks.,
Transl. by Blount, Lond., 1680.
Newman, “Hist. Sketches.” Vol. i., chap. ii., “Apollonius
of Tyana.”
[31] The works of Plotinus consist of 54 treatises arranged
in 6 Enneads, “Opera Omnia.” ed. Creuzer, 3 vols.,
Oxon., 1835. Several of the treatises transl. into
English by H. Taylor, Lond., 1794 and 1817.
[32] Zeller, “History of Eclecticism in Greek Philosophy.”
Lond., 1831.
Ueberweg, “Hist. of Phil.” Lond., 1872; Vol. i.,
pp. 240-252.
[33] “Narratio orig. rituum et error. Christianor. S. Joannis.”
Rom., 1652.
[34] Ewald, “Hist. of Israel.” Lond., 1886; Vol. viii., p. 120.
[35] In de Sacy’s “Chrestom. Arabe.” 2 ed., I. 333.
[36] 1 Cor. xvi. 3; 2 Cor. viii. 19; Gal. ii. 9.
[37] Burton, “Heresies of the Apostolic Age.” Oxford, 1829.
Zeller, “Acts of the Apostles.” 2 vols., London,
1875, 1876.
Pressensé, “Apostolic Age.” London, 1879, pp. 66-73;
318-330.
[38] Neander’s “First Planting of Christianity and
Antignostikus.” (Bohn), 2 vols., Lond., 1851.
Mansel, “Gnostic Heresies of First and Second Centuries.”
Ed. by Bishop Lightfoot, Lond., 1875.
King, “Remains of the Gnostics.” Lond., 1864;
new ed., 1887.
Ueberweg, “Hist. of Phil.” 2 vols., Lond., 1872, Vol. i.,
pp. 280-290.
[39] These are published among the works of Origen. Recently
Caspari discovered an admirable Latin translation of them
made by Rufinus, and published it in his “Kirchenhist.
Anecdota.” I., (Christ., 1883).
[40] Lipsius, “Valentinus and his School.” in Smith’s “Dict.
of Biography.” Vol. iv., Lond., 1887.
[41] In Cureton’s “Spicil. Syr.” Lond., 1855.
[42] In its extant Coptic form, ed. by Petermann, Brl., 1851.
In a Latin transl. by Schwartze, Brl., 1853.
In English transl. in King’s “Remains of the Gnostics.”
Lond., 1887.
[43] Yet the school of Baur regard this Gospel of Marcion as
the original of Luke. Hilgenfeld thinks that both our
Luke and Marcion drew from one earlier source. Hahn
has sought to restore the Marcionite Gospel in Thilo’s
“Cod. Apoc. N.T.” I. 401.
Sanday, “Gospels in the Second Century.” London, 1876.
[44] Salmon, “Introd. to the N.T.” London, 1885, pp. 242-248.
Reuss, “Hist. of N.T.” Edin., 1884, §§ 291, 246, 362, 508.
[45] Lightfoot, “Comm. on Galatians.” Camb., 1865; Diss.
“St. Paul and the Three.”
[46] Lechler, “Apost. and Post-Apostol. Times.” Vol. ii.,
p. 263 ff.
Ewald, “Hist. of Israel.” Lond., 1886, Vol. viii.,
p. 152.
[47] Ewald, “Hist. of Israel.” Vol. viii., p. 122.
[48] We possess this work in the original Greek. The first
complete edition was that of Cotelerius in his “Pp.
Apost.” The latest and most careful separate ed., is by
Lagarde, Lps., 1865; Eng. transl. in Ante Nicene Lib.,
Edin., 1871.
[49] Existing only in the Latin transl. of Rufinus. Published
in Cotelerius, “Pp. Apost.”
Separate ed. by Gersdorf, Lps., 1838; Eng. transl.
Ante-Nicene Lib., Edin., 1867.
[50] See de Sacy, “Mem. sur diverses antiqu. de la Perse.”
Par., 1794.
The most important of these Arabic works are the Literary
History of An-Naddim, Kitab al Fihrist, ed. Flügel and
Roediger, Lps., 1871; then
Al-Shurstani’s “Hist. of relig. and phil. sects.” ed.
Cureton, Lond., 1842; and
Al-Biruni’s “Chron. d. Orient Völker.” ed. Sachau,
Lps., 1878.
[51] Among the Mandeans _mana rabba_ means one of the highest
æons, and is thus perhaps identical with the name
Paraclete borrowed from the Christian terminology,
which Manes assumed.
[52] Ueberweg, “Hist. of Phil.” 2 vols., Lond., 1872, Vol. i.,
pp. 290-325. Patristic. Phil. down to Council of Nicæa.
[53] Donaldson, “Apostolic Fathers.” Lond., 1874.
Lightfoot, “Clement of Rome.” 2 vols., Lond., 1869, 1877;
Ignatius and Polycarp, 3 vols., Lond., 1885.
Sanday, “The Gospels in the Second Century.” Lond., 1876.
[54] Luke i. 1; § 32, 4; 36, 7; 59, 1.
[55] “Patrum Apost. Opera.” Ed. Gebhardt, Harnack and Zahn,
3 vols., Lps., 1876 ff.
“Apostolic Fathers.” Engl. transl. in Ante-Nicene Library,
Edin., 1867.
Donaldson, “Apostolic Fathers.” Edin., 1874.
[56] At Constantinople, 1875.
[57] Comp. Lightfoot, “St. Clement of Rome, An Appendix.” etc.,
Lond., 1877.
[58] Donaldson, “History of Christian Literature.” Vol. i.,
Lond., 1864.
Cunningham, “Dissertation on Epistle of St. Barnabas.”
Lond., 1877.
[59] “Hermæ Pastor.” ed. Hilgenfeld, 2 ed., Lps., 1881. Down
to the middle of the 19th century it was known only in
a Latin translation, but since then the Greek original
has been accessible in two recensions, as well as
in an ancient Ethiopic translation (ed. d’Abbadie,
Lps., 1860). One of the Greek recensions almost complete
was found in the monastery of Athos; and an older, but
less perfect one, was found in the _Codex Sinaiticus_.
Schodde, “Hermâ Nabî; The Ethiopic version of Pastor
Hermæ examined.” Lps., 1876.
[60] Comp.
Harnack in _Expositor_ for March, 1886, pp. 185-192.
Lightfoot, “Ignatius and Polycarp.” Lond., 1885, vol. ii.,
pp. 433-470.
[61] Cureton, “Corpus Ignatianum.” (Rom., Eph., and Ep. to
Polyc.), Lond., 1819.
[62] Against their genuineness:
Dallæus, “De scrr. quæ sub Dionysii et Ignatii nom.
circumfer.” Gen., 1666.
Killen, “Ignatian Epistles entirely Spurious.”
Edin., 1886.
In favour:
Pearson, “Vindiciæ St. Ignat.” Cantab., 1672.
Lightfoot, “Ignatius and Polycarp.” 3 vols., Lond., 1885.
[63] Salmon, “Introd. to the New Testament.” Lond., 1885,
pp. 104-126.
Sanday, “Gospels in Second Century.” Lond., 1876.
[64] Schaff, “The Oldest Church Manual.” Edin., 1886.
Hitchcock and Brown, “Teaching of the Twelve Apostles.”
New York, 1884.
Taylor, “The Teaching of the Twelve Apostles with Illus.
from the Talmud.” Cambr., 1886.
_Expositor_, April and June, 1886, pp. 319 f. and
401 ff.; Nov., 1887, pp. 359-371.
[65] Donaldson, “Hist. of Chr. Lit. from death of App. to Nic.
Council.” 3 vols., Lond., 1864, Vols. ii. and iii.,
“The Apologists.”
[66] The Syriac translation of a treatise of Melito’s given
in Cureton’s “Spicileg. Syr.” Lond., 1853, which gives
itself out as an address delivered before Antoninus
Cæsar, is not identical with his Apology to Antoninus
Pius, of which Eusebius has preserved three fragments,
as these passages are not found in it.
[67] The fragments of Melito’s works are collected by Routh,
“Reliquiæ Sacr.” L., Oxon., 1814.
[68] “Opera.” ed. Otto, 3 vols., Jena, 1876; Engl. transl. in
Ante-Nicene Library, Edin., 1867.
Semisch, “Just. Mart.” 2 vols., Edin., 1843.
Kaye, “Writings and Opin. of Just. Mart.” Lond., 1853.
[69] Salmon, “Introd. to New Test.” On Tatian, pp. 96-104.
Wace on “Zahn’s Tatian’s Diatessaron.” in _Expositor_
for Sept. and Oct., 1882.
[70] Bigg, “The Christian Platonists of Alexandria.” Bampton
Lect. for 1886, Oxf., 1886.
Kingsley, “Alexandria and her Schools.” Camb., 1854.
[71] “Opera.” ed. Harvey, Cantab., 1857; Introd. II.
“Life and Wr. of Irenæus.” Engl. transl. in Ante-Nicene
Lib., 2 vols., Edin., 1868, 1869.
Lightfoot, “Churches of Gaul.” in _Contemp. Review_,
Aug. 1876.
Lipsius, “Irenæus.” in Smith’s “Dict. of Chr. Biog.”
III., pp. 253-279.
[72] Many works ascribed to him have been lost; whatever fragments
of these exist have been collected by Fabricius and Lagarde.
These were:
_Exeget._, a Com. on Daniel;
_Apolog._, Πρὸς Ἰουδαίους;
_Polem._,
against Gnostics and Monarchians,
against the Asiatic Observance of Easter (§ 37, 2);
_Dogmat._,
Περὶ τῆς τοῦ πάντος οὐσίας,
Περὶ τοῦ Ἀντιχρίστου,
Περὶ τῆς ἀναστάσεως (§ 22, 4),
Περὶ χαρισμάτων;
Hist.-chron.,
Chronicle, and Easter-Canon.
On Philosophoumena:
Döllinger, “Hippolytus and Callistus.” Edin., 1876.
[73] “Opera.” ed. Dindorf, 4 vols., Oxon., 1868.
“Supplementum Clementinum, in Zahn’s Forsch.” Vol. iii.,
Engl. transl. in Ante-Nicene Lib., 2 vols., Edin., 1867.
Bigg, “Chr. Plat. of Alex.” Lectt. II. III., Oxf., 1886.
Kaye, “Clement of Alexandria.” London, 1855.
Reuss, “Hist of Canon.” Edin., 1884, pp. 112-116.
[74] Jerome reckons them at 2,000; Epiphanius at 6,000; these
must include the thousands of separate epistles and
homilies.
Bigg, “Chr. Platonists of Alex.” Lectt. IV.-VI.,
Oxf., 1886.
[75] _Hexaplorum quæ supersunt._ Ed. Field, Oxon., 1871.
[76] Ed. Selwyn, Cantab., 1876; Engl. transl. of C. Celsum
and De Principiis, in Ante-Nicene Library, 2 vols.,
Edin., 1869-1872.
[77] “Gregory Thaumaturgus, Dionysius of Alex. and Archelaus.”
transl. by Prof. Salmond, Edin., 1871.
[78] Neander, “Antignosticus, or the Spirit of Tertull.”
appended to “Hist. of Planting of Chr. Church.”
2 vols., Lond., 1851.
Kaye, “Eccles. Hist. of 2nd and 3rd Cents. illustr. from
Wr. of Tertull.” 2 ed., Camb., 1829.
Tertullian, “Works.” 3 vols., Ante-Nicene Lib.,
Edin., 1869.
[79] “Cyprian’s Treatises and Epistles.” Lib. of Fathers,
2 vols., Oxf., 1839, 1844.
“Writings of Cyprian.” Ante-Nicene Lib., 2 vols.,
Edin., 1868.
Poole, “Life and Times of C.” Oxf., 1840.
Pressensé, “Martyrs and Apologists.” Lond., 1879,
pp. 414-438.
[80] Dillmann, “Pseudepigraph. des A. Ts.” Herzog, xii. 341.
Reuss, “Hist. of the N. T.” Edin., 1884.
Salmon, “Introd. to N. T.” 2nd ed., Lond., 1886.
[81] “Fabricius, Codex pseudepigr. V.T.” Ed. 2., Hamb., 1722.
[82] Drummond, “Jewish Messiah.” Lond., 1877.
Lawrence, “Book of Enoch.” Oxf., 1821.
Schodde, “Bk. of Enoch.” Andover, 1882.
Schurer, “Hist. of Jew. Peo. in Times of J. Chr.”
Div. II., Vol. 3., pp. 59 ff., 73 ff., 93 ff., 134 ff.;
(Enoch, Assumptio, Ezra, Bk. of Jub.).
Bensly, “Missing Fragment of Lat. Transl. of 4th Bk. of
Ezra.” Cambr., 1875.
[83] Sinker, “Test. XII. Patriarchum.” Cambr., 1869;
Appendix, 1879.
Malan, “Book of Adam and Eve.” Lond., 1882.
Hort on Bks. of Adam, in Smith’s “Dict. of Chr. Biog.”
Lond., 1877.
[84] Salmon, “Introd. to N.T.” Lond., 1885; Lect. XII.,
“Apoc. and Her. Gospels.” pp. 226-248.
[85] Nicholson, “The Gosp. acc. to the Hebrews.” Lond., 1879.
[86] Giles, “Cod. Apoc. N. T.” 2 vols., Lond., 1852.
Tischendorf, “Evv. Apocr.” Ed. 2, Lps., 1876.
[87] Wright, “Apocryphal Acts of the Apostles.” Syriac and
English, 2 vols., Lond., 1871.
Malan, “The Conflicts of the Holy Apostles.” Lond., 1871.
Tischendorf, “Acta app. Apocr.” Lps., 1851.
[88] Phillips, “Addai the Apostle.” Syriac and English,
Lond., 1876.
[89] Lightfoot, “Comm. on Phil.” 6th ed., Lond., 1881; “Diss.
on Paul and Seneca.” pp. 270-328; “Letters of Paul
and Seneca.” pp. 329-333.
Lightfoot, “Comm. on Col.” 5 ed., Lond., 1880;
pp. 274-300, “The Epistle from Laodicea.”
[90] Dorner, “Hist. of Dev. of Doctr. of Person of Chr.”
5 vols., Edin., 1862.
Pressensé, “Heresy and Christian Doctrine.” Lond., 1879.
[91] Deut. xviii. 15; Isa. liii. 3; Matt. xii. 32; Luke i. 35;
John viii. 40; Acts ii. 22; 1 Tim. ii. 5.
[92] Tertullian says: _Ita duo negotia diaboli Praxeas Romæ
procuravit, prophetiam expulit et hæresim intulit,
paracletum fugavit et patrem crucifixit._--Ps.-Tertull.:
_Hæresim introduxit, quam Victorinus corroborare
curavit._
[93] Dorner, “Person of Christ.” Vol. ii.
[94] Pressensé, “Life and Practice in the Early Church.”
Lond., 1872.
[95] Hatch, “The Organization of the Early Christian
Churches.” Lond., 1881; “The Growth of Church
Institutions.” Lond., 1887.
Bannerman, “Doctr. of the Church.” 2 vols., Edin., 1858;
espec. vol. i., pp. 277-480.
Lightfoot, “Comm. on Phil.” 6th ed., Lond., 1881:
“Dissertat. on Chr. Ministry.”
Papers in _Expositor_, 1887, on “Origin of Chr. Ministry.”
by Sanday, Harnack and others.
[96] We are not carried further than this by Irenæus, iii. 3.
Similarly, too, Cyprian, _De Unitate Ecclesiæ_, iv.
Tertullian also does not accept the Roman tradition
as of supreme authority, but prefers that of Asia
Minor in regard to the Easter Controversy, and, in the
_De Pudicitia_, he opposes with bitter invective the
penitential discipline of the Roman bishop Zephyrinus or
Callistus. So, too, Cyprian repudiates the Roman practice
in regard to heretics’ baptism (§ 35, 5); and on the same
subject Firmilian of Cæsarea in Cappadocia hesitates not
to write: _Non pudet Stephanum, Cyprianum pseudo-christum
et pseudo-apostolum et dolosum operarium dicere:
qui omnia in se esse conscius prævenit, ut alteri
per mendacium objiceret, quæ ipse ex merito audire
deberet._--Consult:
Blondel, “Traité hist. de la primauté.” Gen., 1641.
Salacious, “De Primatu Papæ.” Lugd. Bat., 1645.
Kenrick, “The Primacy of the Apostolic See Vindicated.”
New York, 1848.
“The Pope and the Council.” by Janus, Lond., 1869.
[97] Wall, “Hist. of Infant Baptism.” with Gale’s Reflections,
and Wall’s Defence, 4 vols., Oxf., 1836.
Wilberforce, “Doctr. of Holy Baptism.” Lond., 1849.
[98] Funk’s assertion that the ἀκροᾶσθαι and the γονυκλίνειν
were not stages in the Catechumenate, but penal ranks
in which offending Catechumens were placed, and that
there was only one order of Catechumens is untenable
for these reasons:
1. Because the penitential institution presupposes a
falling away from the grace of baptism;
2. Because the Canon of Neo-Cæsarea with its
κατηχούμενος ἁμαρτάνων, ἐὰν μὲν γονυκλίνων, ἀκροάσθω,
necessarily implies that γονυκλίνειν is a stage in
the Catechumenate;
3. Because this Canon provides that after the first
penal procedure, not after passing through two
penitential orders, the sinner will be expelled;
4. Finally, because the γονυκλίνειν of the Catechumens,
just like that of the congregation in prayer, is
even in expression something quite different from
the ὑπόπτωσις of the penitents.--Consult:
Pressensé, “Life and Practice in the Early Church.”
Lond., 1879, pp. 5-36, 333.
[99] Pressensé, “Life and Practice in the Early Church.”
pp. 201-216, 263-286.
Lechler, “Apostolic and Post-Apost. Times.” 2 vols.,
Edin., 1886; Vol. ii. 298.
Jacob, “Ecclest. Polity of N. T.” Lond., 1871,
pp. 187-319.
[100] Jacob, “Ecclest. Polit. of N.T.” Lond., 1871, Lect. vii.,
“The Lord’s Supper.”
Waterland, “Review of the Doctrine of the Eucharist.”
Lond., 1737.
[101] See, _De Doctr. Christiana._ II. ii. 15.--“Old Latin
Biblical Texts.” Edited by John Wordsworth, Bp. of
Salisbury, Oxford, 1885, etc.
[102] Lechler, “Apostolic and Post-Apostolic Times.”
Edin., 1886, Vol. ii., pp. 301-310.
[103] Bosio, “Roma Sotteranea.” Rom., 1632.
De Rossi, “Roma sott. crist.” 3 vols., Rome, 1864-1877.
Northcote and Brownlow, “Roma Sotteranea.” Lond., 1869.
Withrow, “The Catacombs of Rome.” Lond., 1876.
[104] Marriott, “Testimony of the Catacombs.” Lond., 1877.
[105] Zöckler, “The Cross of Christ.” Lond., 1877.
Allen, “Early Christian Symbolism.” Lond., 1887.
Didson, “Chr. Iconography.” 2 vols., Lond., 1886.
[106] Schmidt, “The Social Results of Early Christianity.”
Lond., 1886.
Brace, “Gesta Christi.” Lond., 1883.
Uhlhorn, “Chr. Charity in the Ancient Church.”
Edin., 1883.
Pressensé, “Life and Practice in Early Church.”
Lond., 1879, pp. 345-477.
Ryan, “Hist. of the Effects of Relig. upon Mankind.”
Dublin, 1820.
[107] Morinus, “De discipl. in administr. s. pœnitentiæ.”
Par., 1651.
Marshall, “Penitential Discipline of the Prim. Church for
the First Four Centuries.” Lond., 1844 (1st ed., 1718).
Tertullian, “De Pœnitentia.” See Transl. in Library of
Fathers, Tertullian, vol. i., “Apologetic and Practical
Treatises.” Oxf., 1843; XI. Of Repentance, with long
and valuable notes by Dr. Pusey, pp. 349-408.
[108] J. de Soyres, “Montanism and the Primitive Church.”
Cambr., 1878.
Cunningham, “The Churches of Asia.” Lond., 1880,
p. 159 ff.
[109] Bunsen, “Hippolytus and his Age.” Lond., 1854.
Wordsworth, “St. Hippolytus and the Church of Rome.”
Lond., 1852.
Döllinger, “Hippolytus and Callistus.” Edin., 1876
(orig. publ. 1853).
[110] “Library of Fathers.” Oxf., 1843, Cyprian’s Treatises:
v.“On Unity of the Church.” vi. “On the Lapsed.” with
prefaces.
Also, “Epp. of S. Cyprian.” (1844) xli.-xlv., lii.
and lix.
[111] “Library of Fathers.” Oxf., 1844; “Epp. of S. Cyprian.”
Ep. lii., also Ep. lv.
[112] Merivale, “Conversion of the Roman Empire.” Lond., 1864.
Milman, “Hist. of Christianity to Abol. of Pag. in Rom.
Emp.” 3 vols., Lond.
Lecky, “Hist. of Eur. Morals.” Vol. ii., “From Constantine
to Charlemagne.”
[113] Döllinger, “Fables respecting the Popes of the Middle
Ages.” Lond., 1871.
[114] Original source is Eusebius, “Life of Constantine.”
Trans. Lond., 1842.
See interesting lect. on Constantine in Stanley’s “Hist.
of Eastern Church.” Lond., 1861.
Madden, “Christian Emblems on Coins of Constantine I.”
Lond., 1878.
[115] Neander, “The Emperor Julian and his Generation.”
Lond., 1850.
G. H. Rendall, “The Emperor Julian.” Lond., 1879.
Newman, “Miracles in Eccl. Hist.” Oxf., 1842.
Bp. Wordsworth, “Julian.” in Smith’s Dict. of Biog.,
vol. iii., pp. 484-523.
[116] On this whole period consult: Histories of Theodoret,
Sozomen, Socrates, and Evagrius (containing much
fabulous matter, but useful as contemporary records
extending down to A.D. 594). Transl. in 4 vols.,
Lond., 1812-1846.
For Theodosius I. see Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.”
vol. ii., p. 341 ff., Edin., 1876.
[117] A careful reconstruction of the whole as far as
possible has been attempted by Neumann (Leipz., 1880),
accompanied by prolegomena and a German translation.
[118] Hefele, “Hist. of Church Councils.” Edin., 1872, Vol. i.,
pp. 1-48.
Pusey, “Councils of Ch. from A.D. 51 to A.D. 381: their
constit., obj., and history.” Oxf., 1857.
[119] Its original form is probably preserved in a Syriac
translation; see Bunsen’s “Analecta Antenicæna.”
ii. 45-338, Lond., 1854.
[120] First published in the Greek original by Bickell under
the title, inapplicable to the first part: Αἱ διαταγαὶ
αἱ διὰ Κλήμεντος καὶ κανόνες ἐκκλησιαστικοὶ τῶν ἁγίων
ἀποστόλων.
[121] Maitland, “The Dark Ages.” Lond., 1844.
Ozanam, “Hist. of Civilization in 5th Cent.” Transl.
by Glyn, 2 vols.
Montalembert, “Monks of the West, from Benedict to
Bernard.” 7 vols., Edin., 1861 ff.
[122] Stephens, “Chrysostom: his Life and Times.” 3rd ed.,
London, 1883, pp. 59 ff., 294 ff.
[123] Hatch, “Organization of the Early Christian Churches.”
London, 1881, pp. 124-139.
Hatch, “Ordination.” in Smith’s “Dict. of Bibl. Antiq.”
Vol. ii.
[124] Hatch, “Organization of Chr. Ch.” p. 161.
Bede, “Eccles. Hist.” iv. 1.
[125] Dale, “Synod of Elvira, and Christ. Life in the 4th cent.”
London, 1882.
Lea, “Hist. of Sacerdotal Celibacy.” Philad., 1867.
Lecky, “Hist. of Europ. Morals.” London, 1877, Vol. ii.,
pp. 328 ff.
Hefele, “Hist. of Christ. Councils.” Edin., 1872, Vol. i.,
pp. 150, 380, 435.
[126] Neale, “Hist. of the Holy Eastern Church.” 5 vols.,
London, 1847-1873.
Stanley, “Lect. on the Eastern Church.” London, 1861.
[127] Greenwood, “Cathedra Petri: Pol. Hist. of Great Latin
Patriarchate from 1st to 16th cent.” 6 vols., London,
1856 ff.
[128] Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” Vol. ii., Edin., 1876,
pp. 231 ff., 483 ff.
[129] Comp. Döllinger, “Fables Respecting the Popes of the
Middle Ages.” Lond., 1871.
[130] Milman, “Latin Christianity.” Vol. i.
[131] Bright, “Hist. of Church from A.D. 313-451.” 2 ed.,
Cambr., 1869.
Milman, “Latin Christianity.” Vol. i.
[132] Kellett, “Pope Gregory the Great and his Relations with
Gaul.” (Cambridge Essays, No. ii.), Cambridge, 1889.
[133] Engl. Transl.:
“Eccles. Hist. with Life of Euseb. by Valesius.”
Lond., 1843.
“Theophania, or Div. Manifest. of the Lord.” from Syr.
by Dr. Sam. Lee, Lond., 1843.
“Life of Constantine.” Lond., 1844.
“Life of Eusebius.” by Bright, prefixed to Oxf. ed.
of Eccl. Hist. of 1872.
[134] “Festal Epp. of Athanasius.” (transl. from Syriac
discovered in 1842 by Tattam, and first edited by
Cureton in 1848), Oxf., 1854.
[135] “Treatises against Arians.” 2 vols., Oxf., 1842 (new ed.,
1 vol., 1877).
“Historical Tracts.” Oxf., 1843; “Select Tracts,” with
Newman’s Notes, 2 vols., Lond., 1881.
[136] Newman’s, “Hist. Sketches.” Vol. ii., chap. v; Sketches
of Basil, Gregory, etc. Originally publ. under title
“Church of the Fathers.” Lond., 1842.
[137] Ullmann, “Gregory Nazianzen.” Oxford, 1855; and Newman
“Church of the Fathers.”
[138] Cyril’s Comm. on Luke is transl. from the Syriac by
Dr. Payne Smith, Oxf., 1859.
[139] A very full and admirable account of Synesius and his
writings is given by Rev. T. R. Halcomb in Smith’s
“Dict. of Chr. Biog.” Vol. iii., pp. 756-780.
[140] Neander, “Life of Chrysostom.” Lond., 1845.
Stephens, “Life of Chrysostom.” 3rd ed., Lond., 1883.
Chase, “Chrysostom: a Study.” Cambr., 1887.
His Homilies and Addresses are transl. in 15 vols. in
the “Lib. of the Fathers.” Oxf., 1839-1851.
Various Eng. translations of the tract “On the
Priesthood.”
[141] Newman’s “Historical Sketches.” Vol. ii., chap. i.,
“Theodoret.”
[142] Translated by Dean Church in “Lib. of the Fathers.”
Oxf., 1838; with interesting and instructive Preface
by Newman.
[143] Ueberweg, “Hist. of Philosophy.” Lond., 1872, Vol. i.,
pp. 349-352.
Colet, “On the Hierarchies of Dionysius.” ed. by
Lupton, Lond., 1869.
Wescott, “Dionysius the Areopagite.” in _Contemp.
Review_ for May, 1867.
[144] Etheridge, “The Syrian Churches: their Early Hist.,
Liturg. and Lit.” Lond., 1846.
[145] Morris, “Select Writings of Ephraim the Syrian.”
Oxford, 1817.
Burgess, “Repentance of Nineveh, Metrical Homily by
Ephraem.” Lond., 1853.
“Select Metrical Hymns and Homilies of Eph. Syr.”
Lond., 1853.
[146] Newman, “Church of the Fathers.” 2nd ed., London, 1842.
Reprinted in Hist. Sketches, vol. ii.
Gilly, “Vigilantius and his Times.” London, 1844.
[147] “Lib. of Fathers.” in vol. of Cyprian’s Epps., Oxf., 1844,
pp. 318-384. For phrase quoted, see p. 322.
[148] A good account of the writings of Jerome is given by the
late Prof. William Ramsay in Smith’s “Dict. of Grk. and
Rom. Biogr.” Vol. ii., p. 460.
Milman, “Hist. of Chr.” Vol. iii., ch. xi.
Cutts, “St. Jerome.” Lond., 1877.
Gilly, “Vigilantius and his Times.” Lond., 1844.
[149] Gilly, “Vigilantius and his Times.” London, 1844.
[150] Newman’s “Arians of the 4th Century.” London, 1838.
Gwatkin, “Studies of Arianism.” Camb., 1882.
Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” Vols. i. ii., Edin.,
1872, 1876.
Newman’s “Tracts Theolog. and Eccles.” Chap. ii.; Doctrinal
Causes of Arianism.
“Select Treatises of Athanasius.” Ed. by Newman, 2 vols.,
London, 1881, Vol. 2 containing notes on Arius,
Athanasius, etc.
[151] Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” I., pp. 231-447.
Kaye, “Hist. of Council of Nicæa.” London, 1853.
Tillemont, “Hist. of Arians and Council of Nice.”
London, 1721.
[152] Newman’s “Select Treat. of Athanasius.” Vol. ii., p. 196 f.
Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” Vol. ii., Edin., 1876, p. 193.
[153] Newman’s “Select Treat. of Athanasius.” Vol. ii., p. 282 ff.
Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” ii., p. 217.
[154] Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” ii., pp. 340-373.
Hort, “Two Dissertations.” ii., On the Constantinople Creed
and other Eastern Creeds of the 4th cent., Camb., 1874.
[155] Swete, “The Hist. of the Doctr. of the Procession of the
Holy Spirit from Apost. Age to Death of Charlemagne.”
Cambr., 1876.
Pusey, “On the clause ‘And the Son.’” Oxf., 1876.
[156] Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” ii., p. 348 ff., § 97, The
Tome and the Creed.
[157] Stephens, “Chrysostom.” pp. 287-305.
Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” ii., p. 430 ff.
[158] The most useful and complete account of Chrysostom is
that of Stephens. Consult also Milman, “Hist. of Chr.”
Vol. iii., pp. 206 ff.
[159] Dorner, “Hist. of the Development of the Doctr. of the
Person of Christ.” 5 vols., Edin., 1861.
[160] Newman, “Tracts Theological and Ecclesiastical.”
Chap. iii., Apollinarianism.
[161] Hefele, “Hist. of Councils.” Vol. iii., pp. 1-156.
[162] Most informing about all these transactions is Hefele, “Hist.
of Councils.” iii., Edin., 1883; (Robber Synod, p. 241 ff.;
Chalcedon, p. 451 ff.).
Perry, “Second Council of Ephesus.” London, 1877.
Bright, “Hist. of Church from A.D. 313-451.” Cambr., 1869.
[163] Butler, “Ancient Coptic Churches.” 2 vols., London, 1884.
[164] Döllinger, “Fables respecting the Popes of the Middle
Ages.” Lond., 1871.
Willis, “Pope Honorius and the New Roman Dogma.” Lond., 1879.
Bottalla, “Pope Honorius before the Tribunal of Reason and
History.” London, 1868.
[165] Wiggers, “Augustinianism and Pelagianism.” Andover, 1840.
Müller, “Chr. Doctrine of Sin.” 2 vols., Edin., 1868.
Ritschl, “Hist. of Chr. Doctr. of Justific. and
Reconciliation.” Edin., 1872.
[166] Laidlaw, “The Bible Doctrine of Man.” Edin., 1879.
Heard, “Tripartite Nat. of Man.” 3rd ed., Edin., 1870,
pp. 189-200.
Delitzsch, “Biblical Psychology.” 2nd ed., Edin., 1869,
pp. 128-142.
Beck, “Outlines of Biblical Psychology.” Edin., 1877, p. 10.
[167] For an entirely different representation of the Augustinian
system see Cunningham, “S. Austin and his Place in Hist.
of Chr. Thought.” Lond., 1886; esp. chaps. ii. and iii.,
pp. 45-107.
A good outline and defence in Hodge’s “System. Theol.”
Edin., 1874, Vol. ii., pp. 333-353.
Mosheim, “Eccl. Hist.” ed. by Dr. J. S. Reid, Lond., 1880,
p. 210, notes 3 and 4; (pt. II., chap. v., § 25.)
Mozley, “Augustinian Doctrine of Predestination.”
Lond., 1855.
[168] Hodge, “Systematic Theology.” Vol. ii., pp. 166-168.
[169] Lardner, “Credibility of the Gospel Hist.” Vol. iv.,
London, 1743.
[170] Butcher, “The Ecclesiastical Calendar.” London.
Hampson, “Medii Ævi Kalend.”
[171] Gieseler, “Ecclesiastical History.” Edinburgh, 1848,
Vol. ii., pp. 141-145.
[172] Tyler, “Image Worship of Ch. of Rome contrary to Scripture
and the Prim. Ch.” London, 1847.
[173] Tyler, “Worship of Virgin Mary contrary to Script. and
Faith of Ch. of first 5 Cents.” London, 1851.
Clagett, “Prerogatives of Anna the Mother of God.”
London, 1688. Also by same: “Discourse on Worship of
Virgin and Saints.” London, 1686.
[174] Cosin, “Scholastic History of Popish Transubstantiation.”
Lond., 1676.
[175] Reuss, “History of the N.T. Scriptures.” Edin., 1884,
§ 377.
Keil, “Introduction to the O.T.” Edin., 1870, Vol. ii.,
pp. 201-203.
[176] Swainson, “The Nicene and Apostles’ Creeds.” Camb., 1875.
Westcott, “The Historic Faith.” Lond., 1883, note iii.,
the Creeds.
Harvey, “Hist. and Theology of the three Creeds.”
Camb., 1854.
Hort, Two Dissertations: II. “The Constantinopolitan Creed
and the Eastern Creeds of 4th cent.” Camb., 1876.
Schaff, “Creeds of Christendom.” Edin., 1877, vol. i.
Lumby, “History of the Creeds.” Camb., 1873.
Waterland, “Crit. Hist. of Athanasian Creed.” Camb., 1724.
Heurtley, “The Athanasian Creed.” Oxf., 1872.
Ommaney, “Ath. Creed: an Exam. of Recent Theories
respecting its Date and Origin.” Lond., 1875.
[177] Neale, “Hymns of the Eastern Church.” Lond., 1863.
“Mediæval Hymns and Sequences.” Lond., 1863.
Gieseler, “Ecclesiastical History.” Vol. iii., p. 353.
[178] Hawkins, “History of Music.” Lond., 1853.
[179] Hammond, “Ancient Liturgies.” Oxf., 1878.
Neale and Littledale, “Translations of Primitive Liturgies.”
Lond., 1869.
Neale, “Essays on Liturgiology.” Lond., 1867.
[180] Marriott, “Vestiarium Christianum: Origin and gradual
development of Dress of Holy Ministry of Church.”
Lond., 1868.
[181] Woltmann and Woermann, “History of Painting.” 2 vols.,
Lond., 1886; vol. i., “Anc., Early Chr. and Mediæval
Painting.” ed. by Prof. Sidney Colvin.
“Handbook of Painting: Italian Schools. Based on Kügler’s
Handbook.” by Eastlake; new ed. by Layard, 2 vols.,
Lond., 1886.
[182] Ozanam, “Hist. of Civilization during the 5th Century.”
2 vols.
Lecky, “Hist. of European Morals.” Vol. ii.
[183] Smith’s “Dictionary of Christian Biography.” vol. iii.,
p. 367.
[184] Gilly, “Vigilantius and his Times.” Lond., 1840.
[185] Gieseler, “Eccl. Hist.” ii. 148.
[186] Ludolphus, “History of Ethiopia.” London, 1684.
[187] Malan, “Gregory the Illuminator: his Life and Times.”
London, 1868.
Article by Lipsius on Eznik in Smith’s “Dictionary of Chr.
Biography.” Vol. ii., p. 439.
[188] Muir, “Life of Mohammed and Hist. of Islam.” 4 vols., Lond.
Bosworth Smith, “Mohammed and Mohammedanism.” Lond., 1874.
Mühleisen-Arnold, “Islam, its Hist., Chr. and Rel. to
Christianity.” 3rd ed., Lond., 1874.
Deutsch, “Literary Remains: Islam.” Lond., 1874.
Stephens, “Christianity and Islam.” Lond., 1877.
Mills, “Hist. of Mohammedanism.” Lond., 1817.
[189] Muir, “Annals of the Earlier Khalifate.”
[190] Finlay, “Hist. of Greece from Rom. Conquest.” 7 vols.,
Lond., 1864, new ed., 1877; vols. ii. and iii.
Bower’s “Lives of Popes.” Vols. iii. and iv., Lond., 1754.
Comber, “Disc. on 2nd Council of Nicæa.” Reprinted in
Gibson’s “Preserv. from Popery.” Lond., 1848.
Didron, “Christian Iconography.” 2 vols., Lond., 1886.
[191] Mendham, “The Seventh General Council, the Second of
Nicæa.” in which the worship of images was established.
[192] Allatius, “De eccl. occid. et orient. perpetua
consensione.” Colon., 1669.
Swete, “Hist. of the Procession of the Holy Spirit.”
Camb., 1876.
Ffoulkes, “Christendom’s Divisions.” London.
Neale, “Holy Eastern Church.” 5 vols., London, 1847.
[193] Popoff, “Hist. of Council of Florence.” Transl. from
Russian by Neale, London, 1861.
[194] Lupton, “St. John of Damascus.” London, 1882.
[195] Badger, “The Nestorians and their Rituals.” 2 vols.,
London, 1852.
[196] Baring-Gould, “Curious Myths of the Middle Ages.”
Lond., 1881.
[197] Murawieff, “Hist. of the Church of Russia.” Trans. from
the Russ., Lond., 1842.
Romanoff, “Sketches of the Rites and Customs of the
Græco-Russian Church.” Lond., 1869.
[198] Potthast, “Biblioth. Hist. Modii Ævi.” Berol., 1862, with
suppl. in 1868.
D’Achery, “Vett. Script. Spicilegium.” (1655), 3 vols.,
Par., 1783.
Eccard, “Corpus Hist. Medii Ævi.” 2 vols., Lps., 1723.
Du Chesne, “Hist. Francorum Serr.” 5 vols., Par., 1636.
Parker, “Rer. Brit. Serr. Vetust.” Lugd. B., 1587.
Gale, “Hist. Brit., Saxon., Anglo-Dan. Scrr.” 2 vols.,
Oxf., 1691.
Wharton, “Anglia Sacra.” 2 vols., Lond., 1691.
Wilkins, “Conc. Brit. et Hib.” 4 vols., Lond., 1737.
Haddan and Stubbs, “Councils and Eccles. Documents.”
(Revision of Wilkins), Lond., 1879 ff.
Maitland, “The Dark Ages: Essays on the State of Relig. and
Lit. in 9th, 10th, 11th, and 12th Centuries.” Lond., 1844.
[199] Bryce, “The Holy Roman Empire.” Lond., 1866.
Ranke, “History of the Latin and Teutonic Nations.”
Lond., 1886.
[200] Ebrard, “Christian Apologetics.” 3 vols., Edin., 1886-1887,
Vol. ii., p. 407; “The Religion of the Germans and that
of the Slavs.”
[201] Mallet, “Northern Antiquities.” London, 1848.
Hallam, “Europe during the Middle Ages.”
Guizot, “Hist. of Civiliz. in Europe.”
[202] Hodgkin, “Italy and her Invaders: A.D. 376-476.” 2 vols.,
London, 1880.
[203] Scott, “Ulfilas, the Apostle of the Goths.” Cambr., 1885.
Douse, “Introduction to the Gothic of Ulfilas.” London, 1886.
Bosworth’s “Gothic and Anglo-Saxon Gospels.” Oxf., 1874.
[204] Gibbon, “Decline and Fall of Roman Empire.” Chaps. xxxiii.,
xxxvi., xxxvii.
[205] Freeman, “Historical Essays.” 3rd series, Lond.; “The Goths
at Ravenna.”
[206] Ussher, “Brit. Eccl. Antiqu.” Lond., 1639.
Perry, “Hist. of English Church.” i., Lond., 1882.
Lanigan, “Eccl. Hist. of Ireland.” 4 vols., 2nd ed.,
Dublin, 1829.
Stokes, “Ireland and the Celtic Ch.” Lond., 1886.
Lingard, “Hist. and Antiqu. of Anglo-Sax. Ch.” 2 vols.,
Lond., 1845.
Maclauchlan, “Early Scottish Church.” Edinb., 1865.
Reeves, “The Culdees of the British Islands.” Dublin, 1864.
Skene, “Celtic Scotland.” 3 vols., Edin., 1876; 2 ed., 1886.
Bright, “Chapters of Early Eng. Ch. Hist.” Oxf., 1878.
Pryce, “Ancient British Church.” Lond., 1886.
[207] Todd, “Life of St. Patrick.” Dublin, 1864.
Cusack, “Life of St. Patrick.” Lond., 1871.
O’Curry, “Lects. on Anc. Irish History.” Dublin, 1861.
Writings of St. Patrick. Transl. and ed. by Stokes and
Wright, Lond., 1887.
[208] Maclauchlan, “Early Scottish Church.” Pp. 145-205.
Adamnan, “Life of Columba.” Ed. by Dr. Reeves, Dublin, 1857.
Smith, “Life of Columba.” Edin., 1798.
Forbes, “Lives of Ninian, Columba, Kentigern.” in series of
Historians of Scotland.
[209] Ussher, “Discourse of the Religion anciently Professed by
the Irish and British.” Lond., 1631.
Maclauchlan, “Early Scottish Church.” Pp. 239-250.
Warren, “Ritual and Liturgy of the Celtic Church.”
Oxf., 1881.
[210] Soames, “The Anglo-Saxon Church.” 4th ed., Lond., 1856.
Stanley, “Historical Memorials of Canterbury.” Lond., 1855.
Hook, “Lives of Archbishops of Canterbury.” Vol. i.
Sharon Turner, “Hist. of Anglo-Saxons to the Roman
Conquest.” 6 ed., 3 vols., Lond., 1836.
[211] Lappenburg, “Anglo-Saxon Kings.” Lond., 1845.
Bede, “Eccles. History.” Book III.
Maclauchlan, “Early Scottish Church.” Pp. 217-238.
[212] Gildas († A.D. 570), “De excidio Britanniæ.” Engl. transl.
by Giles, London, 1841.
Bede († A.D. 735), “Eccles. Hist. of Engl.” Transl. by
Giles, London, 1840.
[213] Lanigan, “Eccl. Hist. of Ireland.” iii., ch. 13.
Innes, “Ancient Inhab. of Scotland.” in the Series of
Historians of Scotland.
[214] Maclauchlan, “Early Scottish Church.” p. 435.
Reeves, “The Culdees of the British Islands.” Dublin, 1864.
Robertson, “Scotland under her Early Kings.” Edin.,
2 vols., 1862.
[215] Merivale, “Conversion of the Northern Nations.”
London, 1866.
Maclear, “Apostles of Mediæval Europe.”
[216] That he first received the Latin name after his consecration
as bishop in A.D. 723 is rendered more than doubtful by
the fact that it is found in letters of earlier date. It
is probably only a Latinizing of the Anglo-Saxon Winfrid
or Wynfrith (from Vyn=fortune, luck, health; frid or
frith=peace; therefore: peaceful, wholesome fortune)
into the name, widely spread in Christian antiquity, of
_Bonifatius_ (from _bonumfatum_, Greek: Eutyches, good
luck). But the transposition into the form Bonifacius
which might seem the equivalent of the Anglo-Saxon word
“Benefactor” of the German people, is first met with,
although even then only occasionally, in the 8th century,
but afterwards always more and more frequently, and then
is given to the popes and other earlier bearers of the name.
By the 15th century the original and etymological style of
writing the name and that used in early documents had been
completely discarded and forgotten, till modern philology,
diplomatics and epigraphies have again clearly vindicated
the earlier form.
[217] Wright, “Biog. Britannica Literaria.” Lond., 1842.
Cox, “Life of Boniface.” Lond., 1853.
Hope, “Boniface.” London, 1872.
Maclear, “Apostles of Mediæval Europe.”
[218] Trench, “Lectures on Mediæval Church History.” Lond., 1877.
Hardwick, “History of Christian Church during Middle Ages.”
[219] Mosheim, “Eccl. Hist.” Ed. by Reid, London, 1880, p. 285,
Cent. viii., pt. ii., ch. 5.
Wright, “Biographia Brit. Literaria.” London, 1842.
[220] Milman, “Hist. of Latin Christianity.” Vol. ii., Trench’s
“Lectures on Mediæval Church History.”
[221] “William of Malmesbury’s Chronicle of Kings of England.”
Bk. I., ch. 4.
[222] Freeman, “Historical Essays.” 2nd series: “The Southern
Slavs.”
[223] Adam of Bremen, “Gesta Hammaburgensia.” A.D. 788-1072.
Pontoppidan, “Annales Eccles. Danicæ.” Copenhag., 1741.
Merivale, “Conversion of the Northern Nations.”
London, 1865.
[224] Geijer, “History of the Swedes.” Transl. by Turner,
Lond., 1847.
[225] Muir, “Annals of Early Khalifate.”
Ockley, “Hist. of Saracens and their Conquests in Syria,
Persia and Egypt.”
[226] Condé, “History of Dominion of Arabs in Spain.” 3 vols.
Freeman, “Hist. and Conquests of the Saracens.” 2nd ed.,
Lond., 1876.
Abd-el-Hakem, “History of the Conquest of Spain.” Tr. from
Arabic by Jones, Gött., 1858.
[227] Kingsley, “Roman and Teuton.” Lectures in Univ. of Cambr.:
“The Popes and the Lombards.”
[228] Crakenthorp, “The Defence of Constantine, with a Treatise
on the Pope’s Temporal Monarchy.” Lond., 1621.
[229] Platina, “Lives of Popes.” Under John VII.
Bower, “Lives of Popes.” Vol. iv.
Blondel, “Joanna Papissa.” Amst., 1657.
Hase, “Church History.” New York, 1855, p. 186.
[230] Cunningham, “Discussions on Church Principles.”
Edin., 1863, pp. 101-163; “Temporal Supremacy of the Pope
and Gallican Liberties.”
Barrow, “Pope’s Supremacy.” London, 1683.
[231] Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” ch. viii., National
Churches, pp. 139-154.
[232] Hefele, “History of Councils.” iii. 69, 131, 149.
Field, “Of the Church.” Reprint by Eccl. Hist. Society,
5 vols., London, 1847; vol. iii., pp. 7, 245 ff.
Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” ch. vii., The
Metropolitan, pp. 128-135.
[233] Lea, “Studies in Church History.” Philad., 1869.
Lecky, “History of European Morals.” 3rd ed., 2 vols.,
London, 1877.
[234] Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” London, 1887,
p. 43.
[235] Marriott, “Vestiarium Christianum.” P. 187 ff.,
London, 1868.
[236] Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” Ch. v., The Parish,
pp. 89-97.
[237] Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” Ch. ix., The
Canonical Rule, pp. 157-172; Ch. x., The Cathedral
Chapter, pp. 175-190.
[238] Hatch, “Growth of Ch. Instit.” Ch. xi., The Chapter of the
Diocese, pp. 193-208.
Stubbs, “Constit. Hist. of England.” Vol. iii.
[239] Walcott, “Cathedralia.”
_Ibid._, “Sacred Archæology.”
Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” Ch. iii., Fixed
Tenure of Parish Priest; Ch. iv., The Benefice.
[240] Lecky, “Hist. of Europ. Morals.” ii., 183-248.
Montalembert, “Monks of West from Benedict to Bernard.”
7 vols., Edin., 1861 ff.
[241] Hatch, “Growth of Church Institutions.” Ch. vi., Tithes and
their Distribution, pp. 101-117.
[242] Roth, however, regards this _divisio_ as putting a complete
stop to the secularization of church property.
[243] Hatch, “Growth of Ch. Institutions.” Ch. iv., The Benefice,
pp. 61-77.
Art. “Benefice.” in Smith’s “Dict. of Chr. Antiquities.”
[244] Ayliffe, “Parergon Juris Canonici.” Lond., 1726.
Guizot, “Hist. of Civilization.” Transl. by Hazlitt,
Lond., 1846.
Walcott, “Sacred Archæology.”
[245] Blondel, “Pseudo-Isid. et Turrianus vapulantes.”
Genev., 1628.
[246] Hopkins, “The Organ, its hist. and construct.” Lond., 1855.
[247] Guest, “History of English Rhythms.” Vol. ii.,
London, 1838.
Wright, “Biogr. Brit. Lit. Anglo-Saxon Period.”
London, 1842.
Thorpe, “Cædmon’s Paraphrase in Anglo-Saxon with Engl.
Transl.” London, 1832.
Conybeare, “Illustr. of Anglo-Saxon Poetry.” London, 1827.
[248] Evans, “Treatise on Chr. Doct. of Marriage.” New
York, 1870.
Hammond, “On Divorces.” In his Works, vol. i.,
London, 1674.
Cosin, “Argument on the Dissolution of Marriage.” Works,
vol. iv., Oxf., 1854.
Tertullian, Treatise in “Lib. of Fath.” Oxf., 1854, with
two Essays by Pusey, “On Second Marriages of the Clergy.”
and “On Early Views as to Marriage after Divorce.”
[249] Babington, “Influence of Chr. in promoting the Abolition
of Slavery in Europe.” London, 1864.
Edwards, “Inquiry into the State of Slavery in the Early
and Middle Ages of the Christian Era.” Edin., 1836.
[250] Smith’s “Dict. of Chr. Antiq.” Vol. i., pp. 785-792; Arts.:
“Hospitality, Hospitals, Hospitium.”
[251] Haddan and Stubbs, “Councils and Eccl. Documents.”
Vol. iii., Oxf., 1871.
[252] Barington, “Lit. Hist. of the Middle Ages.” Lond., 1846.
Hallam, “Europe in Middle Ages.” 2 vols., Lond., 1818.
Trench, “Lect. on Med. Ch. Hist.” Lond., 1877.
[253] Lorentz, “Life of Alcuin.” Transl. by Slee, Lond., 1837.
[254] Kingsley, “Roman and Teuton: Paulus Diaconus.”
[255] Hampden, “The Scholastic Philosophy in its rel. to Chr.
Theology.” Oxf., 1833.
Ueberweg, “Hist. of Philosophy.” Vol. i., pp. 358-365.
[256] Mullinger, “Schools of Charles the Great and Restoration
of Education in the 9th cent.” Cambr., 1877.
[257] Cassiodorus’ work in 12 bks., _De rebus gestes Gotorum_,
has indeed been lost, but about A.D. 550 Jornandes, who
also used other documents, embodied this work in his
_De Getarum orig. et reb. gestis_.
[258] Gildas wrote about A.D. 560 his: _Liber querulis de
excidio Britanniæ_ (Eng. transl. in “Six Old English
Chronicles.” London, Bohn).
[259] Nennius wrote about A.D. 850 his: _Eulogium Britanniæ s.
Hist. Britonum_ (Engl. transl. in “Six Old Engl. Chron.”).
[260] Collected Ed. of Alfred’s works, by Bosworth, 2 vols.,
Lond., 1858.
Fox, “Whole Wks. of Alfred the Great, with Essays on Hist.,
Arts and Manners of 9th cent.” 3 vols., Oxf., 1852.
Spelman, “Life of Alfred the Great.” Oxf., 1709.
Pauli, “Life of Alfred the Gt.” transl. with Alfred’s
Orosius, Lond., 1853.
Hughes, “Alfred the Great.”
Giles, “Life and Times of King Alfred the Great.”
Lond., 1848.
[261] Robertson, “Hist. of Chr. Church.” Vol. ii., London, 1856;
pp. 154 ff.
Dorner, “Hist. Development of Person of Chr.” Div. II.,
vol. i.
[262] Ussher, “Gotteschalci et controv. ab eo motæ hist.”
Dubl., 1631.
TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES.
The following corrections have been made in the text:
§ 7, 1.
Sentence starting: There are mysterious phenomena....
- added omitted Word ‘to’
(which seemed to establish)
§ 14.
Sentence starting: The Levite Barnabas,...
- ‘ministery’ replaced with ‘ministry’
(and strengthened his own ministry)
§ 16, 1.
Sentence starting: That Babylon is mentioned....
- ‘23’ replaced with ‘13’
(1 Pet. v. 13)
§ 20.
Sentence starting: As the history of....
- ‘beginings’ replaced with ‘beginnings’
(the beginnings of the church)
§ 25, 2b.
Sentence starting: The school of Baur....
- ‘§ 183, 9’ replaced with ‘§ 182, 7’
(school of Baur (§ 182, 7))
§ 26, 4.
Sentence starting: The most important of extant....
- ‘Hippolylus’ replaced with ‘Hippolytus’
(and of Hippolytus Ἔλεγχος)
§ 27, 2.
Sentence starting: After him there arose...
- ‘Hebdomes’ replaced with ‘Hebdomas’
(the so-called Hebdomas)
§ 27, 11.
Sentence starting: He consequently developed...
- ‘irreconcileable’ replaced with ‘irreconcilable’
(the irreconcilable opposition of righteousness)
§ 31, 1.
Sentence starting: The latter especially gave....
- ‘gramatico’ replaced with ‘grammatico’
(grammatico-historical examination of scripture.)
§ 31, 8.
Sentence starting: Sextus Julius Africanus,...
- ‘Septimus’ replaced with ‘Septimius’
(campaign of Septimius Severus)
§ 32, 6 f.
Sentence starting: It assigns the founding....
- ‘§ 12, 2’ replaced with ‘§ 13, 2’
(Christ’s promise (§ 13, 2).)
§ 35, 2.
Sentence starting: Only a few unimportant....
- ‘immobolis’ replaced with ‘immobilis’
(immobilis et irreformabilis)
§ 38, 1.
Sentence starting: Thereafter they were used....
- ‘were’ replaced with ‘where’
(and spots where martyr’s relics)
§ 40, 1.
Sentence starting: Themison, Alcibiades’ successor,...
- ‘ἐπστολή’ replaced with ‘ἐπιστολή’
(a Καθολικὴ ἐπιστολή,)
§ 40, 4.
Sentence starting: The following are some of....
- ‘§ 57, 3’ replaced with ‘§ 37, 3’
(On _dies stationum_ (§ 37, 3) nothing)
§ 44, 4.
Sentence starting: But twenty years later....
- ‘portea’ replaced with ‘postea’
(esset postea gloriæ)
Sentence starting: Martin of Tours....
- ‘§ 47, 15’ replaced with ‘§ 47, 14’
(Martin of Tours (§ 47, 14) established)
§ 45, 4.
Sentence starting: But the Council at Macon....
- ‘§ 85, 1’ replaced with ‘§ 86, 1’
(Carolingian legislation (§ 86, 1).)
§ 46, 3.
Sentence starting: In this year, however,...
- ‘§ 53, 2’ replaced with ‘§ 50, 2’
(the Council of Sardica (§ 50, 2),)
§ 46, 6.
Sentence starting: To his legates at the Council....
- ‘Ephesns’ replaced with ‘Ephesus’
(at the Council of Ephesus)
§ 47, 15.
Sentence starting: He deserves special credit for....
- ‘§ 69, 4-6’ replaced with ‘§ 59, 4-6’
(Hymn Composition, § 59, 4-6)
§ 47, 22c.
Sentence starting: Ordained deacon against his....
- ‘apocrisarius’ replaced with ‘apocrisiarius’
(a papal _apocrisiarius_ in Constantinople)
§ 48, 2.
Sentence starting: For the history of heresies....
- ‘§ 57, 21h’ replaced with ‘§ 47, 21f’
(the author of _Prædestinatus_ (§ 47, 21f).)
§ 48, 7.
Sentence starting: This cannot, however, be said....
- ‘Eutchyes’ replaced with ‘Eutyches’
(against Nestorius and Eutyches)
§ 50, 4.
Sentence starting: For the restoration of church....
- ‘followship’ replaced with ‘fellowship’
(received back into church fellowship)
§ 50, 6.
Sentence starting: Basil the Great wrote 4 bks....
- ‘Eunonius’ replaced with ‘Eunomius’
(4 bks. against Eunomius)
- ‘Amphilochum’ replaced with ‘Amphilochium’
(Ad Amphilochium, against the)
§ 52, 4.
Sentence starting: He appealed to an œcumenical....
- ‘§ 467’ replaced with ‘§ 46, 7’
(to =Leo the Great= (§ 46, 7) at Rome)
§ 52, 5.
Sentence starting: The strict Monophysites of....
- ‘Diophysites’ replaced with ‘Dyophysites’
(at the head of the Dyophysites)
§ 56, 4.
Sentence starting: The pre-eminence of the Christian....
- ‘Quadrigesma’ replaced with ‘Quadragesima’
(the whole Quadragesima season)
§ 59 1,
Sentence starting: This view prevailed....
- ‘§ 160, 8’ replaced with ‘§ 161, 8’
(referred to by the Protestants (§ 161, 8))
§ 59, 4.
Sentence starting: Under the name of Troparies,...
- ‘§ 71, 2’ replaced with ‘§ 70, 2’
(church service of Psalms (§ 70, 2).)
§ 63.
Sentence starting: Owing to various diversities....
- ‘§ 61, 7’ replaced with ‘§ 61, 1’
(and discipline (§ 61, 1),)
§ 67, 7.
Sentence starting: For the executing of his spiritual....
- ‘divisons’ replaced with ‘divisions’
(holders of the four divisions)
§ 71, 1.
Sentence starting: The Catholic polemists of the....
- ‘Manichiæan’ replaced with ‘Manichæan’
(to a Manichæan family)
§ 73, 5.
Sentence starting: Secret remnants of this sect,...
- ‘§ 162, 10’ replaced with ‘§ 163, 10’
(a new departure (§ 163, 10))
§ 76, 8.
Sentence starting: Pope Gregory the Great,...
- ‘694’ replaced with ‘604’
(Gregory the Great, A.D. 590-604)
§ 77.
Sentence starting: This, however, is certain,...
- ‘§ 23, 6’ replaced with ‘§ 22, 6’
(end of the 3rd century (§ 22, 6))
§ 77, 4.
Sentence starting: Two princes of the Jutes....
- removed duplicate ‘of’
(led a horde of Angles and Saxons)
§ 77, 6.
Sentence starting: His wife Eanfled, Edwin’s daughter....
- ‘decidly’ replaced with ‘decidedly’
(most decidedly preferred it)
§ 78, 8.
Sentence starting: Thus he lets himself be informed....
- ‘forbiden’ replaced with ‘forbidden’
(and storks is absolutely forbidden)
§ 86.
Sentence starting: This institution, however,...
- ‘ust’ replaced with ‘just’
(just as they chose)
§ 87, 3.
sentence starting: Langen fixes the date....
- ‘§ 290, 5’ replaced with ‘§ 90, 5’
(to Servatus Lupus (§ 90, 5))
§ 91, 2.
Sentence starting: At a Synod at Gentiliacum....
- ‘Gentiliscum’ replaced with ‘Gentiliacum’
(At a Synod at Gentiliacum)
Footnote 82.
- ‘Assumtio’ replaced with ‘Assumptio’
(Enoch, Assumptio, Ezra, Bk. of Jub.)
Footnote 251.
- ‘Hadden’ replaced with ‘Haddan’
(Haddan and Stubbs)
End of Project Gutenberg's Church History, Volume 1 (of 3), by J. H. Kurtz
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Church History, Volume 1 (of 3)
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EDITED BY THE REV. W. ROBERTSON NICOLL, M.A., LL.D.
_12 Volumes. Large crown 8vo. Price 7s. 6d. each._
I. =Still Hours.=
By RICHARD ROTHE. Translated by JANE T. STODDART. With an
Introductory Essay by the Rev. JOHN MACPHERSON, M.A.
II. =Biblical Commentary on the Book of Psalms.=
By Professor FRANZ DELITZSCH, of Leipzig. From the latest
edition specially revised by the Author. Translated by the
Rev. DAVID EATON, M.A. In three Volumes.
III. =A...
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— End of Church History, Volume 1 (of 3) —
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- Title
- Church History, Volume 1 (of 3)
- Author(s)
- Kurtz, J. H. (Johann Heinrich)
- Language
- English
- Type
- Text
- Release Date
- March 17, 2016
- Word Count
- 251,859 words
- Library of Congress Classification
- BR
- Bookshelves
- Browsing: History - Religious, Browsing: Religion/Spirituality/Paranormal
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