The newly-found work, like other productions of the same period, can have only a disturbing interest for the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Protestant. For, in conjunction with previous evidence, it shows that the unbroken unity of teaching is altogether a fiction; that what afterwards became heresy was, in the latter part of the second century, held in the church of the primacy itself, and by successors of St. Peter; that the clergy of Rome, so far from owning the apostolic authority of their chief, could resist him as heterodox; and that the contents of the Catholic system, far from appearing as an invariable whole from the first, were a gradual synthesis of elements flowing in from new channels of influence brought into connection with the faith; and as against the approved type of Protestant, it shows that his favorite scheme of dogma was still in a very unripe state, and that further back it had been still more so; so that if he binds himself to the earliest creed, he may probably have to accept a profession which he hardly regards as Christian at all. But from the third point of view, which a.s.sumes that development is an inherent necessity in a revelation, and may add to its truth, instead of subtracting from it, the monuments of Christian literature from the secondary period have a positive interest, free from all uneasiness and alarm. They arrest for us, in the midst, the advance of theological belief towards the form ultimately recognized in the Church, and expressed in the established creeds; they render visible the beautiful features and expanded look of the faith, when its Judaic blood had been cooled by the waters of an h.e.l.lenic baptism; and though they leave many undetermined problems as to the successive steps by which the original Hebrew type of the Gospel in Jerusalem was metamorphosed into the Nicene and hierarchical Christianity, they fix some intermediate points, and make us profoundly conscious of the greatness of the change.
The author of the "Philosophumena," for instance, would be stopped at the threshold of every sect in our own country, and excluded as heterodox. He crosses the lines of our theological definitions, and trespa.s.ses on forbidden ground, in every possible doctrinal direction.
Cardinal Wiseman would have nothing to say to him; for he is insubordinate to the "Vicar of Christ," and profanely insists that a pope may be deposed by his own council of presbyters. The Bishop of Exeter would refuse him inst.i.tution; for his Trinity is imperfect, and he allows no Personality to the Holy Ghost. The Archbishop of Dublin might probably think him a little hard upon Sabellius; but, if he would quietly sign the Articles, (which, however, he could by no means do,) might abstain from retaliation, and let him pa.s.s. At Manchester, Canon Stowell would keep him in hot water for his respectable opinion of human nature, and his lofty doctrine of free-will. In Edinburgh, Dr. Candlish would not listen to a man who had nothing to say of reliance on the imputed merits of Christ. The sapient board at New College, St. John"s Wood, would expel him for his loose notions of Inspiration. And the Unitarians would find him too transcendental, make no common sense out of his notions of Incarnation, and recommend him to try Germany. This fact, that a bishop of the second and third centuries would be ecclesiastically not a stranger only, but an outcast among us, is most startling; and ought surely to open the eyes of modern Christians to the false and dangerous position into which their churches have been brought by narrow-heartedness and insincerity. It will not be M. Bunsen"s fault if our Churchmen remain insensible to the national peril and disgrace of maintaining unreformed a system long known to have no heart of modern reality, and now seen to have as little ground of ancient authority. Again and again he raises his voice of earnest and affectionate warning. As a foreigner domesticated among us, as a scholar of wide historical view, as a philosophical statesman who, amid the diplomacy of the hour, descends to the springs of perennial life in nations, as a Christian who profoundly trusts the reality of religion, and cannot be dazzled by the pretence, he sees, with a rare clearness and breadth, both the capabilities and the dangers of our social and spiritual condition. He sees that G.o.d has given to the English people a moral ma.s.siveness and veracity of character which presents the grandest basis of n.o.ble faith; while learned selfishness and aristocratic apathy uphold in the Church creeds which only stupidity can sign without mental reservations,--a Liturgy that catches the scruple of the intellectual without touching the enthusiasm of the popular heart,--a laity without function,--a clergy without unity,--and a hierarchy without power. He sees that our insular position has imparted to us a distinctive nationality of feeling, supplying copious elements for coalescence in a common religion; while obstinate conservatism has permitted our Christianity to become our great divisive power, and to disintegrate us through and through. He respects our free inst.i.tutions, which sustain the health of our political life; but beside them he finds an ecclesiastical system either imposed by a dead and inflexible necessity, or left unguided to a whimsical voluntaryism, which separates the combinations of faith from the relations of neighborhood, of munic.i.p.ality, of country. With n.o.ble and richly-endowed universities at the exclusive disposal of the Church, he finds the theological and philosophical sciences so shamefully neglected, that Christian faith notoriously does not hold its intellectual ground, and in its retreat does nothing to reach a firmer position; but only protests its resolution to stand still, and raise a din against the critic or metaphysic host that drives it back.
Is there no one in this great and honest country that has trust enough in G.o.d and truth, foresight enough of ruin from falsehood and pretence, to lay the first hand to the work of renovation? Is statesmanship so infected with negligent contempt of mankind, that no high-minded politician can be found to care for the highest discipline of the people, and reorganize the inst.i.tutions in which their conscience, their reason, their upward aspirations, should find life?
Has the Church no prophet with faith enough to fling aside creed and college, and fire within him to burn away mediaeval pedantries, and demand an altar of veracity, that may bring us together for common work and "common prayer"? Or is it to be left to the _strong men_, exulting in their strength, and storming with the furor of honest discontent, to settle these matters with the sledge-hammer of their indignation? Miserable hypocrisy! to open the lips and lift the eyes to heaven, while beckoning with the finger of apathy to these pioneers of Necessity! Would that some might be found to lay to heart our author"s warning and counsel in the following sentences:--
"While we exclude all suggestions of despair, as being equally unworthy of a man and of a Christian, we establish two safe principles. The first is, that, in all congregational and ecclesiastical inst.i.tutions, Christian freedom, within limits conformable to Scripture, const.i.tutes the first requisite for a vital restoration. The second fundamental principle is, that every Church must hold fast what she already possesses, in so far as it presents itself to her consciousness as true and efficacious. In virtue of the first condition, she will combine Reason and Scripture in due proportions; by virtue of the second, she will distinguish between Spirit and Letter, between Idea and Form. No external clerical forms and mediaeval reflexes of bygone social and intellectual conditions can save us, nor can sectarian schisms and isolation from national life.
Neither can learned speculations, and still less the incomparably more arrogant dreams of the unlearned. Scientific consciousness must dive into real life, and refresh itself in the feelings of the people, and that no one will be able to do without having made himself thoroughly conversant with the sufferings and the sorrows of the lowest cla.s.ses of society. For out of the feeling of these sufferings and sorrows, as being to a great degree the most extensive and most deep-seated product of evil,--that is, of selfishness,--arose, eighteen hundred years ago, the divine birth of Christianity. The new birth, however, requires new pangs of labor, and not only on the part of individuals, but of the whole nation, in so far as she bears within her the germs of future life, and possesses the strength to bring forth. Every nation must set about the work herself, not, indeed, as her own especial exclusive concern, but as the interest of all mankind. Every people has the vocation to coin for itself the divine form of Humanity, in the Church as well as in the State; its life depends on this being done, not its reputation merely; it is the condition of existence, not merely of prosperity.
"Is it not time, in truth, to withdraw the veil from our misery? to point to the clouds which rise from all quarters, to the noxious vapors which have already well-nigh suffocated us? to tear off the mask from hypocrisy, and destroy that sham which is undermining all real ground beneath our feet? to point out the dangers which surround, nay, threaten already to engulf us? Is the state of things satisfactory in a Christian sense, where so much that is unchristian predominates, and where Christianity has scarcely begun here and there to penetrate the surface of the common life? Shall we be satisfied with the increased outward respect paid to Christianity and the Church? Shall we take it as a sign of renewed life, that the names of G.o.d and Christ have become the fashion, and are used as a party badge? Can a society be said to be in a healthy condition, in which material and selfish interests in individuals, as well as in the ma.s.ses, gain every day more and more the upper hand? in which so many thinking and educated men are attached to Christianity only by outward forms, maintained either by despotic power, or by a not less despotic, half-superst.i.tious, half-hypocritical custom? when so many churches are empty, and satisfy but few, or display more and more outward ceremonials and vicarious rites? when a G.o.dless schism has sprung up between spirit and form, or has even been preached up as a means of rescue? when gross ignorance or confused knowledge, cold indifference or the fanaticism of superst.i.tion, prevails as to the understanding of Holy Scripture, as to the history, nay, the fundamental ideas of Christianity? when force invokes religion in order to command, and demagogues appeal to the religious element in order to destroy?
when, after all their severe chastis.e.m.e.nts and b.l.o.o.d.y lessons, most statesmen base their wisdom only on the contempt of mankind? and when the prophets of the people preach a liberty, the basis of which is selfishness, the object libertinism, and the wages are vice? And this in an age the events of which show more and more fatal symptoms, and in which a cry of ardent longing pervades the people, re-echoed by a thousand voices!"--III. XV.
Sorry, however, as we should be to see our Roman presbyter disconsolately wandering from fold to fold in modern England, and dismissed as a black sheep from all, we should not like to find him metamorphosed into chief shepherd either, and invested with the guidance of our ecclesiastical affairs. Though he is above imitating the feeble railing of Irenaeus at the heresies, he deals with them in the true clerical style; often missing their real meaning, he does not spare them his bad word; and fancies he has killed them before he has even caught them. He has an evident relish also for a tale of scandal, as a make-weight against a theological opponent. In the "Little Labyrinth," he had told us a story about a Unitarian minister, who, for accepting his schismatical office, had been horsewhipped by angels all night; so that he crawled in the morning to the metropolitan, and gave in his penitential recantation. And now, in the larger work, the author flies at higher game, and makes out that Pope Callistus was an incorrigible scamp; originally a slave in the household of a wealthy Christian master, Carpophorus, whose confidence he abused in every possible way. First, having been intrusted with the management of a bank in the _Piscina publica_, he swindled and ruined the depositors, and decamped, with the intention of sailing from Portus, but was found on board ship; and, though he jumped into the sea to avoid capture, was picked up, and condemned by his master to the hand-mill. Next, being allowed to go out, on the plea of collecting some debts which would enable him to pay a dividend to the depositors, he created a riot in a Jews" synagogue, and, being brought before the prefect, was sentenced to be flogged and transported to Sardinia. Thence he escaped by pa.s.sing himself off among a number of Christians, released from their exile through the influence of the Emperor"s concubine, Marcia, and on the recommendation of Victor, the Pope. As he was not included in the list of pardons, he no sooner made his appearance in Rome than his master sent him off to live on a monthly allowance at Antium. On the death of Carpophorus, he seems to have attained his freedom by bequest; and his fertility of resource having made him useful to the new Pope Zephyrinus, he acquired influence enough to succeed him in the Primacy. We must confess that the evident _gusto_ with which our presbyter tells this scandal, the _animus_ with which he accuses Zephyrinus also of stupidity and venality, and the predominance in his narrative of theological antipathy over moral disgust, leave a painful impression on the reader respecting the spirit then at work in the Apostolic See. And though his scheme of belief, especially in relation to the person of Christ, was more rational than the definitions of more modern creeds, yet we fear that he would be not less nice about its shape, and intolerant of those who move about in freer folds of thought, than a divine of the Canterbury cloisters or the Edinburgh platform. His quarrel with the two popes whom he abuses shows pretty clearly the stage of development which the Christian theology had then reached. On this matter we must say a few words.
Whatever may have been the precise order of combination which brought the Hebrew and h.e.l.lenic ideas of G.o.d into union, there can be no doubt about the two _termini_ of the process. It started from the monarchical conception of Jehovah, as a Unity without plurality; and it issued in the Athanasian Trinity, with its three hypostases in one essence. Of these, the Father expressed the Absolute existence, the Son the Objective manifestation, the Holy Spirit the Subjective revelation of G.o.d. In the presbyter"s creed, the third term was not yet incorporated, but still floated freely, diffused and impersonal.
Leaving this out of view, we may observe, in the remaining part of the doctrine, two princ.i.p.al difficulties to be surmounted, arising from the double medium of divine objective manifestation,--Nature, always proceeding,--and Christ, historically transient. The first problem is, How to pa.s.s at all out of the Infinite existence into Finite phenomena, and conceive the relation between the Father and the Son; the second, How to pa.s.s from Eternal manifestation through all phenomena into temporary appearance in an Individual, so as to conceive the relation between the Son and the Galilean Christ. Thus, excluding all reference to the Holy Spirit, there were, in fact, _four_ objects of thought, whose relations to one another were to be adjusted; viz. the Father, the Son evolving all things, the Christ or divine individualization in the Gospel, and Jesus of Nazareth, the human being with whose life this individualization concurred. Among all these there were, so to speak, two clearly distinct Wills to dispose of; that of the man Jesus at the lowest extremity, and that of the Supreme G.o.d, which the Jew, at least, would fix at the upper.
These two Wills act, in the whole development of doctrine on this subject, as the secret centres of Personality; and the remaining elements obtain or miss a hypostatic character according as they are drawn or not into coalescence with the one or the other. The volitional point of the Divine Agency being once determined, it may be regarded as enclosed between the _Thought_, or intellectual essence out of which it comes, and the _Execution_ by which it is realized; or it may be left undistinguished from these, and may be made to coincide with either. According to these variable conditions arise the several modes of doctrine in reference to the Divine element in G.o.d"s Objective manifestation. The differences, for instance, between our presbyter"s doctrine and Origen"s, will be found to depend on the different points which they seize as the seat of divine volition, and the germ of their logical development. Our author, exemplifying the Hebrew tendency, seeks his initiative up at the fountain-head, and puts himself back before the first act of creation; he starts from the One G.o.d, with whom nothing was co-present, and fixes in Him the seat of the primeval Will. There, however, it would remain, a mere potentiality, did not the Eternal Mind, by reflection in itself, pa.s.s into self-consciousness, and give objectivity to its own thought. This primary expression of his essence, in which it enters into relation, but relation only to itself, is the _Logos_, or _Son_ of G.o.d, the agent in the production of all things. The potentiality is thus reserved to the Father; the effectuation is given to the Son; who, coming in at a point lower down than the seat of Will, and simply bridging over the interval that leads to accomplishment, is felt without the essential condition of a numerically distinct subsistence; and has either the instrumental and subordinate personality of a dependent being, or is imperfectly hypostatized.[41] In this impersonal character does the Logos manifest the Divine thought in the visible universe; in the minds of G.o.dly men, which are the source of law; in the glance of prophets, which catches and interprets the divine significance of all times; and first a.s.sumes a full personality in the Incarnation. Having left the primary Will behind in the Father"s essence, the Logos remains but an inchoate hypostasis, till alighting, in the human nature, on another centre of volition. As if our author were half conscious, in reaching this point, of relief from an antecedent uneasiness, he now holds fast to the personality which has been realized, represents it as not dissolved by the death on the cross, but taken up into heaven, and abiding for ever. It is, in this view, the two extreme terms that supply the hypostatizing power; of the others, the Logos has no personality but by looking back to the Father; nor the Christ, but by going forward to the Son of Mary. This shows the yet powerful influence of the Judaic Monarchianism, and the embarra.s.sment of a mind, setting out from that type of faith, to provide any plurality within the essence of G.o.d. Origen, on the other hand, yielded to the h.e.l.lenic feeling, and, instead of going back to any absolute commencement, looked for his Divine centre and starting-point further down; and took thence whatever upward glance was needful to complete his view. As the Greek reverence was not touched but by the Divine embodied in concrete life and form, so the Alexandrine catechist instinctively fixed upon the SON, the objective Thought of G.o.d, proceeding, not once upon a time or ever _first_, but _eternally_, from Him, as the initiative position for his doctrine.
Here was placed the clearest and intensest focus of Will; and only in this ever-evolving efficient were the full conditions of personality realized. The Father was conceived more pantheistically, as the universal ????, the intellectual background, whence issued the acting nature of the Son. In meditating on them in their conjunction, Origen would think of the relation between _thought_ and _volition_; our author, of that between _volition_ and _execution_. Both doctrines show the imperfect fusion of Hebrew and h.e.l.lenic elements, and ill.u.s.trate the characteristic effect of an excessive proportion of each. Where the Hebrew element prevails, the personality of the Son is endangered; where the h.e.l.lenic, the personality of the Father. Even our presbyter"s doctrine of the Son, however, gave too strong an impersonation to Him for the party in Rome who sided with Zephyrinus and Callistus. These popes accused him, it seems, of being a _Ditheist_; and themselves maintained that the terms Father and Son denoted only different sides and relations of one and the same Being,--nay, not only of the same Being, but of the same p??s?p??; and that the spirit that dwelt in Christ was the Father, of whom all things are full. For this opinion the two popes are angrily dealt with by our author, and charged with being half Sabellian, half humanitarian. His rancor justifies the suspicion, that, though he represents the party which triumphed at Rome, his opponents had been numerous and powerful, as, indeed, their election to the primacy would of itself show, and that even his own imperfect dogma was superinduced, not without a protracted struggle, upon an earlier faith yet remote from the Nicene standard.
And this brings us at once to a question of historical research, which, though far too intricate and extensive to be discussed here, we feel bound to notice, as far as it is affected by the newly discovered work. How long did it take for the Christian faith to a.s.sume the leading features of its orthodox and catholic form, and especially to work itself clear of Judaism? It is an acknowledged fact, that the earliest disciples, including at the lowest estimate all the converts of the first seven years from the ascension, not only were born Hebrews, but did not regard their baptism as in any way withdrawing them from the pale of their national religion; that, on the contrary, they claimed to be the only true Jews, differing from others simply by their belief in a personally appointed, instead of a vaguely promised Messiah; that they aimed at no more than to bring over their own race to this conviction, and persuade them that the national destinies were about to be consummated, and, so far from relaxing the obligations of their Law, adhered with peculiar rigor to its ritual and its exclusiveness. So long as none but the twelve Apostles had charge of its diffusion, Christianity was only a particular mode of Judaism, and its whole discussion a ??t?s?? t?? ???da???. It is further admitted, that the first inroad upon this narrowness was made by St. Paul, who insisted on the universality of Christ"s function, and the abrogation of the Mosaic Law in favor of inward faith, as the condition of union with G.o.d. Nor, again, is it denied that this freer view met with great resistance, and that its conflict with the other, apparent throughout the Pauline Epistles, formed the most animating feature of the Apostolic age. During that period, two distinct parties, and two separate lines of development and growth, may be traced; one following out in morals the _legal_ idea into asceticism, voluntary poverty, and physical purity, and in faith the _monarchian_ idea into theocratic and millenarian expectations; the other, proceeding from the notion of _faith_ to subst.i.tute an ideal Christ for the historical, a new religion for an old law, the free embrace of divine reconciliation for the anxious strain of self-mortifying obedience. But how long did this struggle and separation continue? According to the prevalent belief, it was all over in a few years; and, by the happy harmony and concurrence of the Apostles, was determined in favor of the generous Pauline doctrine; so that St. John lived to see the Hebrew Christians sink into a mere Ebionitish sect outside the pale, and their stiff Unitarian theology disowned in favor of the higher teachings of his Gospel. Against this a.s.sumption of so easy a victory over the Jewish tendency, several striking testimonies have often been urged.
Tertullian, in a well-known pa.s.sage of his treatise against Praxeas, describes the dislike with which the unlearned majority of believers regard the Trinitarian distinctions in the G.o.dhead, and the zeal with which they cry out for holding to "the Monarchy."[42] In the time of Pope Zephyrinus, as we learn from Eusebius, a body of Unitarians in Rome, followers of Artemon, defended their doctrine by the conservative plea of antiquity and general consent; affirming that it was no other than the uninterrupted creed of the Roman Church down to the time of Victor, the preceding pope; and that the higher doctrine of the Person of Christ was quite a recent innovation.[43] Nor are we without ecclesiastical literature, of even a later date, that by its theological tone gives witness to the same effect. The "Clementine Recognitions," written somewhere between 212 and 230, occupy a dogmatic position, higher indeed than the disciples of Artemon, but only in the direction of Arius, and, to save the Unity of G.o.d, deny the Deity of Christ.[44] Relying on such evidence as this, Priestley, in his "History of Early Opinions," and his controversy with Bishop Horsley, maintained that the creed of the Church for the first two centuries was Unitarian. But this position was attended with many difficulties, so long as the present canonical Scriptures were allowed to have been in the hands of the Christians of that period, and recognized as authorities; for the narratives of the miraculous conception, the writings of Paul, and the Gospel of John, are irreconcilable with the schemes of belief attributed to the early Unitarians. Moreover, if for two centuries the Church had interpreted its authoritative doc.u.ments in one way, and formed on this its services and expositions, it is not easy to conceive the rapid revolution into another. During a period of free and floating tradition, there is manifest room for the growth of essentially different modes of faith; but after the reception of a definite set of sacred books, the scope for change is much contracted. To treat the doctrine of the Logos as an innovation, yet ascribe the fourth Gospel to the beloved disciple; to suppose that justification by works was the generally received notion among people who guided themselves by the authority of Paul,--involves us in irremediable contradictions.
Avoiding these at least, possibly not without the risk of others, the celebrated theologians of Tubingen have maintained a bolder thesis than that of Priestley, including it indeed, but with it also a vast deal more. Their theory runs as follows. The opposition which St.
Paul"s teaching excited, and of which his letters preserve so many traces, was neither so insignificant nor so short-lived as is commonly supposed; but was encouraged and led by the other Apostles, especially James and John and Peter, who never heartily recognized the volunteer Apostle; and was so completely successful, that he died without having made any considerable impression on the Judaic Christianity sanctioned from Jerusalem. Accordingly, the earliest Christian literature was Ebionitish; and no production was in higher esteem than the "Gospel of the Hebrews," which, after being long current, with several variations of form, at last settled down into our Gospel of Matthew.
In almost all the writings known to us, even in Roman circles of the second century,--the Shepherd of Hermas, the Memorials of Hegesippus, the works of Justin,--some character or other of Ebionitism is present,--millenarian doctrine, admiration of celibacy and of abstinence from meat and wine, denunciation of riches, emphatic a.s.sertion of the _Messiahship_ of Jesus, and treatment of the miraculous conception as at least an open question. The labors of Paul, however, had left a seed which had been buried, but not killed; and from the first, a small party had cherished his freer principles, and sought to win acceptance for them; and as the progress of time increased the proportion of provincial and Gentile converts, and the Jewish wars of t.i.tus and Hadrian destroyed the possibility of Mosaic obedience and the reasonableness of Hebrew hopes, the Pauline element rose in magnitude and importance. Thus the two courses of opposite development ran parallel with each other, and gradually found their interest in mutual recognition and concession. Hence, a series of writings proceeding from either side, first of conciliatory approximation only, next of complete neutrality and equipoise, in which sometimes the figures of Peter and Paul themselves are presented with studiously balanced honor, at others their characteristic ideas are adjusted by compromise. The Clementine Homilies, the Apostolic Const.i.tutions, the Epistle of James, the Second Epistle of Clement, the Gospel of Mark, the Recognitions, the Second Epistle of Peter, const.i.tute the series proceeding from the Ebionitish side; while from the Pauline came the First Epistle of Peter, the Preaching of Peter, the writings of Luke, the First Epistle of Clement, the Epistle to the Philippians, the Pastoral Epistles, Polycarp"s, and the Ignatians.
These productions, however, springing from the practical instinct of the West, deal with the ecclesiastical more than with the doctrinal phase of antagonism between the two directions; and end with establishing in Rome a Catholic Church, founded on the united sepulchres of Peter and Paul, and combining the sacerdotalism of the Old Testament with the universality of the New Gentile Gospel.
Meanwhile, a similar course, with local modifications, was run by the Church of Asia Minor. Rome, with its political apt.i.tude, having taken in hand the questions of discipline and organization, the speculative genius of the Asiatic Greek addressed itself simultaneously to the development and determination of doctrine. Here the Epistle to the Galatians marks, as a starting-point, the same original struggle between the contrasted elements which the Epistle to the Romans betrays in Italy; while the Gospel of John closes the dogmatic strife of development with an accepted Trinity for faith, just as the Ignatian Epistles wind up the contests of the West with a recognized hierarchy for government. And between these extremes the East presents to us, first, the intensely Judaical Apocalypse; next, with increasing reaction in the Pauline direction, the rudiments of the Logos idea in the Epistles to the Hebrews, Colossians, and Ephesians; and as Montanism, in the midst of which these arose, had already made familiar the conception of the Paraclete, all the conditions were present for combination into the Johannine doctrine of the Trinity; and then it was, in the second quarter of the second century, that the fourth Gospel appeared. The speculative theology thus native to Lesser Asia was adopted for shelter and growth by the kindred h.e.l.lenism of Egypt, and gave rise to the school of Alexandria. In the whole of this theory great use is made of Montanism: it spans, as it were, the interval between the parallel movements of Italy and Asia; and is the common medium of thought in which they both take place. Singularly uniting in itself the rigor, the narrowness, the ascetic superst.i.tions of its Hebrew basis, with a Phrygian prophetic enthusiasm and an h.e.l.lenic theosophy, it imported the latter into the doctrine, the former into the discipline, of the Church. The Roman Catholic system betrays its Jewish or Montanist origin in its legalism, its penances, its celibacy, its monachism, its ecstatic phenomena, its physical supernaturalism, its exaggerated appreciation of martyrdom.
Such, in barest outline, is the theory which M. Bunsen characterizes as the "Tubingen romance." Its leading principle is, that the antagonism between the Petrine and Pauline, the Hebrew and the h.e.l.lenic Gospel, which has its origin and authentic expression in the Epistles to the Galatians, Romans, and Corinthians, continued into the second century; determined the evolution of doctrine and usage; stamped itself upon the ecclesiastical literature; and ended in the compromise and reconciliation of the Catholic Church. It is evident that, in the working out of this principle, the New Testament canon is made to give way. With the exception of the greater Pauline Epistles and the Apocalypse, both of which are held fast as genuine productions of the Apostles whose names they bear, and the first Gospel, which is allowed to have at least the groundwork in the primitive tradition, the received books are all set loose from the dates and names usually a.s.signed to them, and arranged, in common with other products of the time, according to the relation they bear to the Ebionitish or to the Pauline school, and the particular stage they seem to mark in the history of either.
This proceeding, however, is not an original violence resorted to for the exigencies of the theory; but, for the most part, a mere appropriation to its use of conclusions reached by antecedent theologians on independent grounds. The Epistle to the Philippians is the only work, if we mistake not, on the authenticity of which doubt has been thrown for the first time,--in our opinion, on very inadequate grounds. In this, as in many other details of the hypothetical history, there is not a little of that straining of real evidence and subtle fabrication of unreal, which German criticism seems unable to avoid. But the acerbity displayed by the North German theologians towards the Tubingen critics appears to us unwarranted and humiliating; and we certainly wish that M. Bunsen, whose prompt admiration of excellence so n.o.bly distinguishes him from Ewald, could have expressed his dissent from Baur and Schwegler in a tone still further removed from the Gottingen pitch. At least, we do not find the positive a.s.sertion that the Tubingen theory is finally demolished by the "Philosophumena" at all borne out by the evidence; and are inclined to think that the case is very little altered by the new elements now contributed to its discussion. The critical offence which he thinks is now detected and exposed, is the ascription of a late origin to the fourth Gospel,[45]
and the treatment of it as the perfected product, instead of the misused source, of the Montanist conceptions of the Logos and the Paraclete. It cannot, however, be denied, that, in the previous absence of any external testimony to the existence of this Gospel earlier than the year 170,[46] the internal difficulties are sufficiently serious to redeem the doubt of its authenticity from the character of rashness or perversity. The irreconcilable opposition between its whole mode of thought and that of the Apocalypse is confessed by M. Bunsen himself, when he suggests that the proem on the Logos was directed against Cerinthus,--the very person whose sentiments the Apocalypse was supposed to express, and to whom, accordingly, it was ascribed by those who rejected it. _One_ of the two books must resign, then, the name of the beloved disciple; and, of the two, we need hardly say that the Apocalypse is incomparably the better authenticated. Moreover, the traditions which unite the names of James and John, as the authorities followed by the Church of Lesser Asia, render it hard to conceive that their doctrines can have taken precisely opposite directions; and that, while James represented the Judaic Christianity of the deepest dye, John can have produced the standard and conclusive work on the other side. In particular, the well-known fact, that the Asiatic Christians justified their Jewish mode of keeping Easter by the double plea, (1.) that James and John always did so, (2.) that Christ himself had done so before he suffered, seems incompatible with any knowledge of the fourth Gospel, which denies that Jesus ate the pa.s.sover before he suffered, and makes his own death to _be_ the pa.s.sover. How could this Quartodeciman controversy live a day among a people possessing and acknowledging John"s Gospel, which so bears upon it as to give a distinct contradiction to the view of the other Gospels, and to p.r.o.nounce in Asia Minor itself an unambiguous verdict in favor of the West? These are grave difficulties, which, after all the ingenuity, even of Bleek, remain, we fear, unrelieved; and in their presence we cannot feel the justice of M. Bunsen"s sentence, that Baur"s opinion is "the most unhappy of philological conjectures." Everything conjectural, however, must give way before real historical testimony; and, if new evidence is actually contained in the "Philosophumena," every true critic, of Tubingen or elsewhere, will be thankful for light to dissipate the doubt. Now, it is said that our Roman bishop, in treating of the heresy of Basilides, supplies pa.s.sages from the writings of this heresiarch which include quotations from the fourth Gospel; and thus prove its existence as early as the year 130. This argument, as stated by M.
Bunsen, appeared to us quite conclusive, and we hoped, that a decided step had been gained towards the settlement of the question. Great was our disappointment, on reading the account in the original, to find no evidence that any extract from Basilides was before us at all. A general description of the system bearing his name is given; but with no mention of any work of his, no profession that the words are his, and even so little individual reference to him, that the exposition is introduced as being a report of what "Basilides and Isidorus, and the whole troop of these people, falsely say" (?ata?e?deta?, sing.). Then follows the account of the dogmas of the sect, with the word f?s?? inserted from time to time, to indicate that the writer is still reporting the sentiments of others. The _singular_ form of this word implies nothing at all; it occurs immediately after the word ?ata?e?deta?, and has the same avowedly plural subject. The statement, therefore, within which are contained the Scripture citations, is a merely general one of the opinions of a sect which continued to subsist till a much later time than the lowest date ever a.s.signed for the composition of the fourth Gospel. If the actual words of any writings current among these heretics are given, they are the words of an author or authors wholly unknown, and to refer them to Basilides in particular is a mere arbitrary act of will. The change from the singular to the plural forms of citation in the midst of one and the same sentence, and the disregard of concord between verb and subject, show that no inference can be drawn from so loose a system of grammatical usage. All that can be affirmed is, that our author had in his hand _some_ production of the Basilidian ?????, in which the fourth Gospel was quoted; but this affords no chronological datum that can be of the smallest use.[47] The same remark applies to the use of John"s Gospel by the Ophites. That they did use it is evident; that they existed as far back as the time of Peter and Paul is certainly probable; yet it does not follow that the fourth Gospel was then extant. For they continued in existence through two or three centuries, dating, as Baur has shown, from a time anterior not only to the Christian heresies, but to Christianity itself, and extending down to Origen"s time; and to what part of this long period the writings belonged which the author of the "Philosophumena" employed, we are absolutely unable to determine. We do not know why M. Bunsen has not appealed also to a quotation from the Gospel which occurs (p. 194) in an account of the Valentinian system. If, as he affirms (I. 63), this account were really in "_Valentinus"s own words_," the citation would be of particular value in the controversy. For it has always been urged by the Tubingen critics as a highly significant fact, that while the _followers_ of Valentinus showed an especial eagerness to appeal to the Gospel of John, and one of the earliest, Heracleon, wrote a commentary upon it, no trace could be found of its use by the heresiarch himself.
From this circ.u.mstance, they have inferred that the Gospel was not available for him, and first appeared after his time. A single clause cited by him from the Gospel would demolish this argument at once. But the a.s.sertion that we have here "full eight pages of Valentinus"s own words" appears to us quite groundless. No such thing is affirmed by the writer of the eight pages. He promises to tell us how the strict adherents to the original principle of the sect expounded their doctrine (?? e?e???? d?das???s?); and then pa.s.ses over, as usual, to the singular f?s?, returning, however, from time to time, to the plural forms,--?e???s?, ?e???s?, &c.,--and thus leaving no pretext for the a.s.sumption that Valentinus is before us in person. The later Gnostics indisputably resorted to the Gospel of John with especial zeal and preference; and if their predecessors, Basilides and Valentinus, were acquainted with the book, it is surprising that no trace of their familiarity with it has been found; and that the former should have sought to authenticate the secret doctrine he professed to have received by the name of Matthew or Matthias instead of John. It deserves remark, that the citations preserved by our author are made, like those of Justin Martyr, as from an anonymous writing, without mentioning the name of the Evangelist; a circ.u.mstance less surprising in reference to the Synoptics alone, which present only varieties of the same fundamental tradition, than when the fourth Gospel, so evidently the independent production of a single mind, is thrown into the group. The Epistles of Paul and the books of the Old Testament are frequently quoted by name; and why this practice should invariably cease whenever the historical work of an Apostle was in the hand, it is not easy to explain. The Apocalypse is mentioned not without his name.[48]
For these reasons we are of opinion that the question about the date and authenticity of the fourth Gospel is wholly unaffected by the newly-discovered work. On this side, no new facilities are gained for confuting the Tubingen theory. The most positive and startling fact against it is presented from another direction. We know that the system of Theodotus, which was Unitarian, was condemned by Victor in the last decade of the second century.[49] Now Victor was the very pope to the end of whose period, according to the followers of Artemon, their monarchian faith was upheld in the Roman Church, and in the time of whose successor was the first importation of the higher doctrine of the Logos. On this complaint of the Artemonites, Baur and Schwegler lay great stress; but is it not refuted by Victor"s orthodox act of expelling a Unitarian? Undoubtedly it would be so, _if_ Theodotus were excommunicated precisely for his belief in the uni-personality of G.o.d.
But his scheme included many articles; and we know nothing of the ground taken in the proceedings against him. There was one question, however, which, however indifferent to us, was evidently very near to the feelings of the early Church, and on which Theodotus separated himself from the prevailing conceptions of his time,--viz. At what date did the Christ, the Divine principle, become united with Jesus, the human being? "At his baptism," replied Theodotus.[50] "Before his birth," said the general voice of the Christians. We are disposed to think _this_ was the obnoxious tenet which Victor construed into heresy; and if so, the strife had no bearing upon the doctrine of the personality of the Logos, which the pope and the heretic might both have rejected. Of the Unitarianism of that time, it was no essential feature to postpone till the baptism the heavenly element in Christ. We remember no reason for supposing that the Artemonites did so, though Theodotus did; and if they knew that the objection which had been fatal to him did not apply to them, their claim of ancient and orthodox sanction for what they held in common with him was not answered by pointing to his condemnation for what was special to himself. But is there, it will be asked, any evidence that the Roman Church attached importance to this particular ingredient of the Theodotian scheme, so that their bishop might feel impelled to visit it with ecclesiastical censure? We believe there is, and _that_ too in the "Philosophumena." In the author"s confession of faith occurs a pa.s.sage which produces at first a strange impression upon a modern reader, and appears like a violence done to the Gospel history. It affirms that Christ _pa.s.sed through every stage of human life_, that he might serve as the model to all. Nor is this idea a personal whim of the writer; but is borrowed from his master, Irenaeus, who gives it in more detail, and winds it up with the a.s.sertion, that Christ _lived to be fifty years old_.[51] Irenaeus thus falsifies the history to make good the moral; our presbyter, by respecting the history, apparently invalidates the moral: for it can scarcely be said of a life closed after thirty-one or thirty-two years, that it supplies a rule pasa ??????; at least it would seem more natural to apologize for its premature termination, than to lay stress on its absolute completeness. The truth is, there was a certain, obnoxious tenet behind, which these writers were anxious to contradict, and which their a.s.sertion exactly meets,--viz. the very tenet of Theodotus, that the Divine nature did not unite itself with the Saviour till his baptism.
Irenaeus and his pupil could not endure this limitation of what was highest in Christ to the interval between his first public preaching and his crucifixion. They thought that in this way it was reduced to a mere official invest.i.ture, not integral to his being, but externally superinduced; and that such a conception deprived it of all its moral significance. The union of the Logos with our nature was not a provision for temporary inspiration or a forensic redemption; but was intended to mould a life and shape a personal existence, according to the immaculate ideal of humanity. To accomplish this intention it was necessary that the Logos should never be absent from any part of his earthly being; but should have claimed his person from the first, and by preoccupation have neutralized the action of the natural (or psychic) element, throughout all the years of his continuance among men. The anxiety of Irenaeus"s school to put this interpretation on the manifestation of the Logos, their determination to distinguish it, on the one hand, from the _mediate_ communication of prophets as an _immediate_ presentation (a?t??e? fa?e?????a?), and, on the other, from the _transient_ occupancy of a ready-made man, as a _permanent_ and thorough-going incarnation (sa??????a? in opposition to fa?tas?a or t??p?), is apparent in their whole language on this subject. In the Son, we are carried to the fresh fountain-head of every kind of perfection, and find the unspoiled ideal of heavenly and terrestrial natures. In one of the fragments of Hippolytus, published by Mai, and noticed in M. Bunsen"s Appendix, this notion is conveyed by the remark, that He is first-born of G.o.d"s own essence, that he may have precedence of angels; first-born of a virgin, that he may be a fresh-created Adam; first-born of death, that he might become the first fruits of our resurrection.[52] This doctrine it is, we apprehend, which amplifies itself into the Irenaean statement, that the divine and ideal function of Christ coalesced with the historical throughout, so that to infants he was a consecrating infant; to little children, a consecrating child; to youth, a consecrating model of youth; and to elders, a still consecrating rule, not only by disclosure of truth, but by exhibiting the true type of their perfection.[53] The teaching of Theodotus, that the heavenly e???? remained at a distance till the baptism, was directly contradictory of this favorite notion; and might well produce hostile excitement, and provoke condemnation, in a church where the Irenaean influence is known to have been powerful. The att.i.tude that Victor a.s.sumed towards the Theodotians is thus perfectly compatible with Monarchian opinions, and with an att.i.tude equally hostile, in the opposite direction, towards the advancing Trinitarian claims of a distinct personality for the Logos. Though only the one hostility is recorded of Victor, the other is ascribed, as we have seen, to his immediate successors, Zephyrinus and Callistus, who maintained that it was no other person than the Father that dwelt as the Logos in the Son. The facts taken together, and spreading as they do over the periods of three popes, afford undeniable traces of a struggle at the turn of the second century, between a prevalent but threatened Monarchianism, and a new doctrine of the Divine Personality of the Son.
After all, why is M. Bunsen so anxious to disprove the late appearance of the fourth Gospel? Did he value it chiefly as a biographical sketch, and depend upon it for concrete facts, a first-hand authentication of its contents would be of primary moment. But his interest in it is evidently speculative rather than historical, and centres upon its doctrinal thought, not on its narrative attestation; and especially singles out the proem as a condensed and perfect expression of Christian ontology. The book speaks to him, and finds him, out of its mystic spiritual depths; sanctifies his own philosophy; glorifies with an ideal haze the greatest reality of history; blends with melting tints the tenderness of the human, and the sublimity of the divine life; and presents the Holy Spirit as immanent in the souls of the faithful and the destinies of humanity. But its enunciation of great truths, its penetration to the still sanctuary of devout consciousness, will not cease to be facts, or become doubtful as merits, or be changed in their endearing power, by an alteration in the superscription or the date.
These religious and philosophical features converse directly with Reason and Conscience, and have the same significance, whatever their critical history may be; and are not the less rich as inspirations from having pa.s.sed for interpretation through more minds than one. There is neither common sense nor piety, as M. Bunsen himself, we feel certain, will allow, in the a.s.sumption that Revelation is necessarily most perfect at its source, and can only grow earthy and turbid as it flows. Were it something entirely foreign to the mind, capable of holding no thought in solution, but inevitably spoiled by every abrasion it effects of philosophy and feeling, this mechanical view would be correct. But if it be the intenser presence, the quickened perception of a Being absent from none; if it be the infinite original of which philosophy is the finite reflection; if thus it speaks, not in the unknown tongue of isolated ecstasy, but in the expressive music of our common consciousness and secret prayer;--then is it so little unnatural, so related to the const.i.tution of our faculties, that the mind"s continuous reaction on it may bring it more clearly out; and, after being detained at first amid sluggish levels and unwholesome growths which mar its divine transparency, it may percolate through finer media, drop its accidental admixtures, and take up in each stratum of thought some elements given it by native affinity, and become more purely the spring of life in its descent than in its source. If, before the fourth Gospel was written, the figure of Christ, less close to the eye, was seen more in its relations to humanity and to G.o.d; if his deep hints, working in the experience of more than one generation, had expanded their marvellous contents; if, in a prolonged contact of his religion with h.e.l.lenism, elements had disclosed themselves of irresistible sympathy, and the first sharp boundary drawn by Jewish hands had melted away; if his concrete history itself was now subordinate to its ideal interpretation;--the book will present us still with a Christianity, not impoverished, but enriched. In proportion as its thoughts speak for themselves by their depth and beauty, may all anxiety cease about their external legitimation; their credentials become eternal instead of individual; and where the Father himself thus beareth witness, Christ needeth not the testimony of man. It cannot be, therefore, any religious issue that depends on the date of this Christian record; it cannot _make_ truth, it can only awaken the mind to discern it; and whether it has this power or not, the mind can only report according to its consciousness of quickening light or stagnant darkness. The interest of this question cannot surely be more than a _critical_ interest, to one who can feel and speak in this n.o.ble strain:--
"No divine authority is given to any set of men to make truth for mankind. The supreme judge is the Spirit in the Church, that is to say, in the universal body of men professing Christ. The universal conscience is G.o.d"s highest interpreter. If Christ speaks truth, his words must speak to the human reason and conscience, whenever and wherever they are preached: let them, therefore, be preached. If the Gospels contained inspired wisdom, they must themselves inspire with heavenly thoughts the conscientious inquirer and the serious thinker: let them, therefore, freely be made the object of inquiry and of thought. Scripture, to be believed true with full conviction, must be at one with reason: let it, therefore, be treated rationally. By taking this course, we shall not lose strength; but we shall gain a strength which no church ever had. There is strength in Christian discipline, if freely accepted by those who are to submit to it; there is strength in spiritual authority, if freely acknowledged by those who care for Christ; there is strength unto death in the enthusiasm of an unenlightened people, if sincere, and connected with lofty moral ideas. But there is no strength to be compared with that of a faith which identifies moral and intellectual conviction with religious belief, with that of an authority inst.i.tuted by such a faith, and of a Christian life based upon it, and striving to Christianize this world of ours, for which Christianity was proclaimed. Let those who are sincere, but timid, look into their conscience, and ask themselves whether their timidity proceeds from faith, or whether it does not rather betray a want of faith. Europe is in a critical state, politically, ecclesiastically, socially. Where is the power able to reclaim a world, which, if it be faithless, is become so under untenable and ineffective ordinances,--which, if it is in a state of confusion, has become confused by those who have spiritually guided it? Armies may subdue liberty; but armies cannot conquer ideas: much less can Jesuits and Jesuitical principles restore religion, or superst.i.tion revive faith. I deny the prevalence of a destructive and irreligious spirit in the hearts of the immense majority of the people. I believe that the world wants, not less, but more religion.
But however this be, I am firmly convinced that G.o.d governs the world, and that he governs it by the eternal ideas of truth and justice engraved on our conscience and reason; and I am sure that nations, who have conquered, or are conquering, civil liberty for themselves, will sooner or later as certainly demand liberty of religious thought, and that those whose fathers have victoriously acquired religious liberty will not fail to demand civil and political liberty also. With these ideas, and with the present irresistible power of communicating ideas, what can save us except religion, and therefore Christianity? But then it must be a Christianity based upon that which is eternally G.o.d"s own, and is as indestructible and as invincible as he is himself: it must be based upon Reason and Conscience, I mean reason spontaneously embracing the faith in Christ, and Christian faith feeling itself at one with reason and with the history of the world. Civilized Europe, as it is at present, will fall; or it will be pacified by this liberty, this reason, this faith. To prove that the cause of Protestantism in the nineteenth century is identical with the cause of Christianity, it is only necessary to attend to this fact; that they both must sink and fall, until they stand upon their indestructible ground, which, in my inmost conviction, is the real, genuine, original ground upon which Christ placed it. Let us, then, give up all notions of finding any other basis, all attempts to prop up faith by effete forms and outward things: let us cease to combat reason, whenever it contradicts conventional forms and formularies. We must take the ground pointed out by the Gospel, as well as by the history of Christianity. We may then hope to realize what Christ died for, to see the Church fulfil the high destinies of Christianity, and G.o.d"s will manifested by Christ to mankind, so as to make the kingdoms of this earth the kingdoms of the Most High."--p. 172.
We have given our readers no conception of the variety and richness of M. Bunsen"s work; having scarcely pa.s.sed beyond the limits of the first volume. It was impossible to pa.s.s by, without examination, the recovered monument of early Christianity, whence his materials and suggestions are primarily drawn; and it is equally impossible to pa.s.s beyond it, without entering on a field too wide to be surveyed. We can only record that, in the remaining volumes, which are, in fact, a series of separate productions, the early doctrine of the Eucharist is investigated, and the progress of its corruptions strikingly traced; the primitive system of ecclesiastical rules or canons, and the "Church-and-House Book," or manual of instruction and piety in use among the ante-Nicene Christians, are carefully and laboriously restored; and genuine Liturgies of the first centuries are reproduced.
In this arduous work of recovery, there is necessarily much need of critical tact, not to say much room for critical conjecture. But the one our author exercises with great felicity; and the other he takes all possible pains to reduce to its lowest amount by careful comparison of Syrian, Coptic, and Abyssinian texts. The general result is a truly interesting set of sketches for a picture of the early Church; which rises before us with no priestly pretensions, no scholastic creeds, no bibliolatry, dry and dead; but certainly with an aspect of genuine piety and affection, and with an air of mild authority over the whole of life, which are the more winning from the frightful corruption and dissolving civilization of the Old World around. That our author should be fascinated with the image he has re-created, and long to see it brought to life, in place of that body of death on which we hang the pomps and t.i.tles of our nominal Christianity, is not astonishing. But a greater change is needed--though a far less will be denied--than a return to the type of faith and worship in the second century. To destroy the fatal chasm between profession and conviction, and bring men to live fresh out of a real reverence instead of against a pretended or a fancied one, a greater lat.i.tude and flexibility must be given to the forms of spiritual culture than was needed in the ancient world. The unity of system which was once possible is unseasonable amid our growing varieties of condition and culture; and the methods which were natural among a people closely thrown together and constructing their life around the Church as a centre, would be highly artificial in a state of society in which the family is the real unit, and the congregation a precarious aggregate, of existence. Nothing, however, can be finer or more generous than the spirit of our author"s suggestions of reform; and we earnestly thank him for a profusion of pregnant thoughts and faithful warnings, the application of one half of which would change the fate of our churches,--the destiny of our nation,--the courses of the world.
FOOTNOTES:
[26] t??? e? e? p?a?as? d??a??? t?? a?d??? ap??a?s?? pa?as???t??, ta??
de t?? fa???? e?asta?? t?? a?????? ???as?? ap??e? a?t??. ?a? t??t???
e? t? p?? asest?? d?ae?e? ?a? ate?e?tet??, s???e? de t?? ep????, ?
te?e?t??, ?de s?a d?af?e????, apa?st? de ?d??? e? s?at?? e??a.s.s??
pa?ae?e?. ???t??? ??? ?p??? a?apa?se?, ?? ??? pa??????se?, ?? ?a?at??
t?? ???ase?? ap???se?, ?? pa?a???s?? s???e??? es?te?sa?t?? ???se?. S.
Hippol. adv. Graecos. Fabricii Hipp. Op. p. 222.
[27] Euseb. H. E., VI. 20.
[28] Attributed to him by Neander, Kirch. Geschichte, I. iii. 1150; and Schwegler, Montanismus, p. 224.
[29] Storr places him at their head, Zweck der Evang. Geschichte, p. 63; and Eichhorn a.s.sociates him with them, Einleitung in das N. T., II. 414.
[30] See the notice of the Nestorian Ebed Jesu, in a.s.seman"s Bibl.
Orient. III. i. ap. Gieseler, k. 9, -- 63.
[31] On their relation, and the doctrine connected with their names, see Baur"s "Christl. Gnosis," p. 310.
[32] Phot. Biblioth., cod. 48. ?? ?a? a?t?? (i. e. Ga???) e? t? te?e?
t?? ?a??????? d?ea?t??at?, ?a?t?? e??a? t?? pe?? t?? t?? pa?t??
??s?a? ?????.
[33] Theologische Jahrbucher, 12er Band, I. 1853, p. 154.
[34] Haeret. Fab. II. c. 5. ?ata t?? t??t?? ? s????? s??e??af?
?a???????, ?? t??e? O???e???? ?p??aa???s? p???a a?? ? ?a?a?t??
e?e??e? t??? ?e???ta?.
[35] He also describes its exact relation to the other, when he calls it a _special_ work (? d ? ? ?) in comparison with "The Labyrinth" as a general one: s??ta?a? de ?a? ?te??? ????? ?d??? ?ata t?? ??te????
a??ese??. Cod. 48.
[36] Ibid. ?spe? ?a? t?? ?a??????? t??e? epe??a?a? O???e????.
[37] Biblioth. cod. 48; Lardner"s "Credibility," Part II. ch. x.x.xii.; Bunsen"s Hippolytus, I. p. 150.
[38] Euseb. H. E., III. 28. a??a ?a? ????????, ? d? ap??a???e?? ?? ?p?
ap?st???? e?a??? ?e??ae??? te?at?????a? ??? ?? d? a??e??? a?t?
dede??e?a? ?e?d?e??? epe?sa?e?, ?e???, eta t?? a?astas?? ep??e???
e??a? t? as??e??? t?? ???st??, ?a? pa??? ep????a?? ?a? ?d??a?? e?
?e???sa?? t?? sa??a p???te??e??? d???e?e??. ?a? e????? ?pa???? ta??
??afa?? t?? ?e?? a????? ??????taet?a? e? ?a? ???t?? ?e??? p?a?a? ?e?e?
???es?a?. The pa.s.sage, preserving its obscurities, seems to run thus: "Cerinthus too, through the medium of revelations written as if by a great Apostle, has palmed off upon us marvellous accounts, pretending to have been shown him by angels; to the effect that, after the resurrection, the kingdom of Christ will be an earthly one, and that the flesh will again be at the head of affairs, and serve in Jerusalem the l.u.s.ts and pleasures of sense. And with wilful misguidance he says, setting himself in opposition to the Scriptures of G.o.d, that a period of a thousand years will be spent in nuptial festivities." On this much-controverted pa.s.sage, Lardner (Cred., P. II. ch. x.x.xii.) suspends his judgment, rather inclining to doubt whether our Apocalypse is referred to; Hug (Einl. -- 176), Paulus (Hist. Cerinth., P. I. -- 30), with Twells and Hartwig (whose criticisms we have not seen), deny that the Apocalypse is meant; while Eichhorn (Einl. in das N. T., VI. v. -- 194. 2), De Wette (Lehrbuch der Einl. in d. N. T., -- 192 a), Lucke (Commentar ub. d. Schriften des Ev. Johannes, Offenb. -- 33), and Schwegler (Das nachapost. Zeitalter, 2er B. p. 218), take the other side. It must be confessed also, that, till the rise of the present discussion about the "Philosophoumena," Baur agreed with these last writers. (See his Christl. Lehre v. d. Dreieinigkeit, 1er B. p. 283.) He now urges, however, that, in a case already so doubtful, the discovery of a lost book, which we have good reason to ascribe to Caius, necessarily brings in new evidence, and may turn the scale between two balanced interpretations. (Theol. Jahrb., p. 157.)
[39] Baur explains the slight treatment of the Montanist heresy in the "Philosophumena" by the intention which Caius already had of writing a special book against them: and contends that this intention is announced expressly in the words (p. 276), pe?? t??t?? a????
?ept?e?este??? e???s?a? p?????? ?a? af??? ?a??? ?e?e??ta? ?
t??t?? a??es??. These words, however, do not refer, as the connection evidently shows, to the Montanists generally; but only to a certain cla.s.s of them who fell in with the patripa.s.sian doctrine of Noctus.
The Noctian scheme Caius was going to discuss further on in this very book: and it is evidently to this later chapter, not to any separate work against Montanism, that he alludes.
[40] The word is perhaps not allowable in speaking of the earliest time (the reign of Alexander Severus) a.s.signable for the erection of separate buildings appropriate to Christian worship.