APPENDED NOTES.
NOTE A. See p. 26.
THE ROMAN EMPIRE RECOGNIZED BY CHRISTIAN
WRITERS AS A DIVINE PREPARATION FOR
THE SPREAD OF THE GOSPEL.
(1) The Spanish poet Prudentius (c. A.D. 400) fully appreciates the influence of the Roman Empire in welding together the world into a unity of government, laws, language, customs, and religious rites, to prepare the way for the universal Church. The stanzas are remarkable and worth quoting. They are put as a prayer into the mouth of the Roman deacon Laurence during his martyrdom. He recognizes what the Roman Empire has done, and prays that Rome may follow the example of the rest of the world in becoming Christian.
O Christe, numen unicum ut discrepantum gentium
O splendor, O virtus Patris, mores et observantiam,
O factor orbis et poli, linguas et ingenia et sacra,
atque auctor horum moenium! unis domares legibus.
Qui sceptra Romae in vertice En omne sub regnum Remi
rerum locasti, sanciens mortale concessit genus:
mundum quirinali togae idem loquuntur dissoni
servire et armis cedere: ritus, id ipsum sentiunt.
Hoc destinatum, quo magis Confoederantur omnia
ius Christiani nominis hinc inde membra in symbolum:
quodcunque terrarum iacet mansuescit orbis subditus:
uno illigaret vinculo. mansuescat et summum caput.
Da, Christe, Romanis tuis Peristephanon, ii. 413 ff.
sit Christiana ut civitas:
per quam dedisti ut caeteris
mens una sacrorum foret.
(2) The Pope, Leo the Great (c. A.D. 450), speaks thus (Serm. lxxxii. 2): 'That the result of this unspeakable grace (the Incarnation) might be spread abroad throughout the world, God's providence made ready the Roman Empire, whose growth has reached so far that the whole multitude of nations have been brought into neighbourhood and connexion. For it particularly suited the divinely planned work that many kingdoms should be leagued together in one empire, so that the universal preaching might make its way quickly through nations already united under the government of one state. And yet that state, in ignorance of the author of its aggrandisement, though it ruled almost all races, was enthralled by the errors of them all; and seemed to itself to have received a great religion, because it had rejected no falsehood. And for this very reason its emancipation through Christ was the more wondrous that it had been so fast bound by Satan.' Leo further recognizes that the Popes are entering into the position of the Caesars (c. 1), that Rome, 'made the head of the world by being the holy see of blessed Peter, should rule more widely by means of the divine religion than of earthly sovereignty.' But his statement of the relation of Peter to Paul in the evangelization of the world (c. 5) is remarkably unhistorical.
NOTE B. See p. 29.
THE (SO-CALLED) 'LETTERS OF HERACLEITUS.'
Nine letters under the name of the great philosopher of Ephesus remain to us. In one of them (iv) Heracleitus is represented as saying to some Ephesian adversaries, 'If you had been able to live again by a new birth 500 years hence, you would have discovered Heracleitus yet alive [i.e. in the memory of men] but not so much as a trace of your name.' This probably indicates that the author is writing 500 years after Heracleitus' supposed age. His age was differently estimated. But '500 years after Heracleitus' would mean, according to all reckonings, about the first half of the first century A.D. All the other indications of age in the letters agree with this. (See Jacob Bernays' Heraclitischen Briefe, Berlin, 1869, p. 112.) They were written presumably at Ephesus, and all or most of them by a Stoic philosopher. I do not think that it is necessary to assume traces of Jewish influence in these letters, any more than in the writings of Seneca. And the bulk of the letters is so thoroughly Stoic and contrary to Jewish feeling, that a Jew is hardly likely to have interpolated them. They illustrate therefore the current philosophic ideas which were at work in the world in which St. Paul lived and taught, when he was outside Judaea. That St. Paul was familiar with these ideas, however his familiarity may have been gained, is shown beyond possibility of mistake by his speeches—supposing them substantially genuine—at Lystra and Athens.
The following passages in these letters are interesting:
(1) (From Heracleitus' defence of himself against a charge of impiety in letter iv) 'Where is God? Is he shut up in the temples? You forsooth are pious who set up the God in a dark place. A man takes it for an insult if he is said to be "made of stone": and is God truly described as "born of the rocks"? Ignorant men, do ye not know that God is not fashioned with hands, nor can you make him a sufficient pedestal, nor shut him into one enclosure, but the whole world is his temple, decorated with animals and planets and stars? I inscribed my altar "to Heracles the Ephesian" [Greek: ERAKLEI TOI EPHESIOI] making the God your citizen, not—he continues—to myself "Heracleitus an Ephesian" [the same letters differently divided], as I am accused of doing by you in your ignorance. Yet Heracles was a man deified by his goodness and noble deeds; and were his virtues and labours greater than mine? I have conquered money and ambition: I have mastered fear and flattery,' &c. Then after a passage about the certainty of his own immortal renown, he returns to ridicule idolatry. 'If an altar of a god be not set up, is there no god? or if an altar be set up to what is not a god, is it a god—so that stones become the evidences (witnesses) of Gods? Nay it is his works which shall bear witness to God, as the sun, the day and night, the seasons, the whole fruitful earth, and the circle of the moon, his work and witness in the heavens.' The whole of this letter (iv), which can be paralleled in all its ideas from Stoic and Platonic sources, may compare and contrast with Acts xiv. 15-18; xvii. 22-29.
(2) Letter v is written by Heracleitus in sickness. He gives a theory of disease as an excess of some element in the body; and describes his soul as a divine thing reproducing in his body the healing activity of God in the world as a whole,—'imitating God' by knowledge of the method of nature. Even if his body prove unmanageable and succumb to fate, yet his soul will rise to heaven and 'I shall have my citizenship (Greek: politeúsouai) not among men but among Gods.' 'Perhaps my soul is giving prophetic intimation of its release even now from its prison house' so short lived and worthless. Letter vi is a continuation of v, containing a denunciation of contemporary medicine on the ground of its lack of science, and a further explanation of the Stoic doctrine of the immanence of God in all nature—forming, ordering, dissolving, transforming, healing everywhere. 'Him will I imitate in myself and dismiss all others.' We should compare and (even more) contrast St. Paul's assertions of independence of bodily circumstances; his belief in the higher sense of 'nature' (Rom. ii. 14), and such phrases as Phil. ii. 20, 'our citizenship is in heaven,' Eph. v. 1, 'Be ye imitators of God.'
(3) Letter vii is addressed to Hermodorus in exile. Heracleitus is to be exiled also 'for misanthropy and refusal to smile' by a law directed against him alone. After an interesting condemnation of privilegia, the letter explains his misanthropy. He does not hate men, but their vices. The law should run 'If any man hates vice let him leave the city.' Then he will go willingly. In fact he is already an exile while in the city, for he cannot share its vices. Then he describes Ephesian life in terms of fierce contempt, their lusts natural and unnatural, their frauds, their wars of words, their legal contentiousness, their faithlessness and perjuries, their robberies of temples. He denounces their vices in connexion with the worship of Cybele (beating the kettle-drum) and Dionysus (the eating of live flesh), and with religious vigils and banquets, and alludes to details of sensuality associated with these meetings. He condemns the submission of great principles to the verdicts of the crowd at their theatres, and passes to a further vivid onslaught on their quarrels and murders (they are no longer men but beasts), on their use of music to excite their bloodthirsty passions, and on war altogether as contrary to 'the law of nature,' and involving the pursuit of all sorts of vice. All this impeachment may be compared with St. Paul, who speaks however by comparison with marked reserve, in Rom. i. 24-31, Eph. iv. 17-19, and elsewhere.
(4) The eighth letter is again written to Hermodorus now on his way to Italy to assist the Decemvirs with the Ten Tables. It contains a somewhat remarkable 'judgement on wealthy Ephesus' and statement of the judicial function of wealth. 'God does not punish by taking wealth away, but rather gives it to the wicked, that through having opportunity to sin they may be convicted, and by the very abundance of their resources may exhibit their corruption on a wider stage.' Cf. 1 Tim. vi. 9.
(5) The banishment of Hermodorus had been on account of a proposed law to grant equal citizenship to freed men, and the right of public office to their children. This instance of Ephesian intolerance gives occasion for an enunciation of the Stoic doctrine that the only real freedom is moral freedom, and moral freedom constitutes a man a citizen of the world. 'The good Ephesian is a citizen of the world. For this is the common home of all, and its law is no written document but God (Greek: ou grámma alla theós), and he who transgresses his duty shall be impious; or rather he will not dare to transgress, for he will not escape justice.' 'Let the Ephesians cease to be the sort of men they are, and they will love all men in an equality of virtue.' 'Virtue, not the chance of birth, makes men equal.' 'Only vice enslaves, only virtue liberates.' For men to enslave their fellow men is to fall below the beasts; so also to mutilate them as the Ephesians do their Megabyzi—the eunuch-priests of the wooden image of Artemis. There must be inequality of function in the world, but not refusal of fellowship, as the higher parts of nature do not despise the lower, or the soul think scorn to dwell with the body, or the head despise the entrails, or God refuse to give the gifts of nature, such as the light of the sun, to all equally. Here again we have what is both like and unlike St. Paul's doctrine of true human liberty and 'fellowship in the body.'
On the whole I think these letters are worth more notice than they have received, both in themselves and as a good example of the sort of religious and moral doctrine current in the better heathen circles of the Asiatic cities, while St. Paul was teaching. It presents many points of connexion with St. Paul's teaching, and co-operated with the influence of the Jewish synagogue to prepare men's minds for it. But perhaps what chiefly strikes us is the contrast which the fierce and arrogant contempt of the Stoic presents to the loving hopefulness of the Christian messenger of the gospel.
NOTE C. See p. 74.
THE JEWISH DOCTRINE OF WORKS IN THE APOCALYPSE OF BARUCH.
Mr. R. H. Charles gives us the following statement[[1]]:—
'The Talmudic doctrine of works may be shortly summarized as follows: Every good work—whether the fulfilment of a command or an act of mercy—established a certain degree of merit with God, while every evil work entailed a corresponding demerit. A man's position with God depended on the relation existing between his merits and demerits, and his salvation on the preponderance of the former over the latter. The relation between his merits and demerits was determined daily by the weighing of his deeds. But as the results of such judgements were necessarily unknown, there could not fail to be much uneasiness; and, to allay this, the doctrine of the vicarious righteousness of the patriarchs and saints of Israel was developed not later than the beginning of the Christian era (cf. Matt. iii. 9). A man could thereby summon to his aid the merits of the fathers, and so counterbalance his demerits.
'It is obvious that such a system does not admit of forgiveness in any spiritual sense of the term. It can only mean in such a connexion a remission of penalty to the offender, on the ground that compensation is furnished, either through his own merit or through that of the righteous fathers. Thus, as Weber vigorously puts it: "Vergebung ohne Bezahlung gibt es nicht." Thus, according to popular Pharisaism, God never remitted a debt until He was paid in full, and so long as it was paid it mattered not by whom.
'It will be observed that with the Pharisees forgiveness was an external thing; it was concerned not with the man himself but with his works—with these indeed as affecting him, but yet as existing independently without him. This was not the view taken by the best thought in the Old Testament. There forgiveness dealt first and chiefly with the direct relation between man's spirit and God; it was essentially a restoration of man to communion with God. When, therefore, Christianity had to deal with these problems, it could not accept the Pharisaic solutions, but had in some measure to return to the Old Testament to authenticate and develope the highest therein taught, and in the person and life of Christ to give it a world-wide power and comprehensiveness.'
The doctrine called Talmudic in the above extract receives remarkable illustration in a Jewish work, The Apocalypse of Baruch, which dates from the same period as the writings of the New Testament (A.D. 50-100; or if the work be regarded as composite, we should say that its component elements are of that date), and represents to us in a very vivid and touching form the hopes and beliefs of a pious orthodox Jew. Thus—
1. The doctrine of the merit of good works, ii. 2 [words spoken to Jeremiah by God], 'Your works are to this city as a firm pillar.' xiv. 5: 'What have they profited who confessed before Thee, and have not walked in vanity as the rest of the nations ... but always feared Thee, and have not left Thy ways? And, lo, they have been carried off, nor on their account hast Thou had mercy on Zion. And if others did evil, it was due to Zion that on account of the works of those who wrought good works she should be forgiven, and should not be overwhelmed on account of the works of those who wrought unrighteousness.' lxiii. 3: 'Hezekiah trusted in his works, and had hope in his righteousness, and spake with the Mighty One ... and the Mighty One heard him.' lxxxv. 1: 'In the generations of old those our fathers had helpers, righteous men and holy prophets ... and they helped us when we sinned, and they prayed for us to Him who made us, because they trusted in their works, and the Mighty One heard their prayer and was gracious unto us.' li. 7: 'But those who have been saved by their works, and to whom the law has been now a hope, and understanding an expectation, and wisdom a confidence, to them wonders will appear in their time.'
It is very noticeable in the above quotations that it is the works of the righteous rather than their persons (as in Genesis xviii. 23-33) that are put forward as the grounds of confidence with God. The claim of righteousness in the second quotation (xiv. 5) may be paralleled in the somewhat earlier work called The Assumption of Moses[[2]]: 'Observe and know that neither did our fathers nor their forefathers tempt God so as to transgress His commandments.'
2. The doctrine of the treasury of merits. The good works of the righteous are laid up as in a treasury to avail for themselves and for others. Thus (xiv. 12): 'The righteous justly hope for the end, and without fear depart from this habitation, because they have with Thee a store of works preserved in treasuries.' xxiv. 1: 'Behold the days come when the books will be opened in which are written the sins of all those that have sinned, and again also the treasuries in which the righteousness of all those who have been righteous in creation is gathered.'
The connexion of the mediaeval doctrine of the treasury of merits with the similar Jewish doctrine needs to be traced out.
3. Righteousness identified with the keeping of the law. For the Pharisaic Jew righteousness meant simply the keeping of the law. Thus xv. 5: 'Man would not have rightly understood My judgement if he had not accepted the law.' Again, lxvii. 6: 'So far as Zion is delivered up and Jerusalem laid waste ... the vapour of the smoke of the incense of righteousness which is by the law is extinguished in Zion.' Thus the merits of Abraham are attributed to his having kept the law before it was written. lvii. 2: 'At that time the unwritten law was named among them, and the works of the commandments were then fulfilled.'
Of course it must be said that 'the Law' may mean the ceremonial law, as in the lower form of Jewish thought, or special stress may be laid on its moral precepts, as is the case in Baruch, and in the higher Jewish teaching generally.
4. The Gentiles are therefore incapable of righteousness. lxii. 7: 'But regarding the Gentiles it were tedious to tell how they always wrought impiety and wickedness, and never wrought righteousness.' Thus the best hope of the Gentiles is that in the Messianic kingdom they should become servants to Israel. This will be their lot if they have never vexed the holy people; see lxxii. 2-6.
5. The world created on account of Israel, xiv. 18: 'Thou didst say that Thou wouldst make for Thy world man as the administrator of Thy works, that it might be known that he was by no means made on account of the world but the world on account of him. [But "man" is at once interpreted as the Jewish race.] And now I see that as for the world which was made on account of us, lo! it abides, but we on account of whom it was made depart' [i.e. into captivity], xv. 7: 'As regards what thou didst say touching the righteous, that on account of them has this world come into being, nay more, even that world which is to come is on their account.' xxi. 23: 'Reprove therefore the angel of death ... and let the treasuries of souls restore them that are enclosed in them, for there have been many years like those that are desolate, from the days of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and of all those who are like them, who sleep in the earth, on whose account Thou didst say that Thou hadst created the world.' (This idea of the treasury of the souls of the righteous recurs in xxx. 2.) In The Assumption of Moses (i. 12) it is said, 'God hath created the world on behalf of His people. But He was not pleased to manifest this purpose of creation from the foundation of the world, in order that the Gentiles might thereby be convicted [i.e. of ignorance], yea to their own humiliation might by their arguments convict one another.'
The above teaching shows us exactly what it was to which St. Paul opposed his doctrine of Justification by Faith. We see it here on its own ground. Its close association with 'boasting' is apparent even in its better form; and its view of election contrasts, by its selfish narrowness, with the view of election put forward by St. Paul, viz. that God's election of a chosen people or society, together with His apparent reprobation of others left outside, both alike subserve a purpose of infinite width, the ultimate divine purpose to 'have mercy upon all.' See Romans ix-xi, especially xi. 32, and cf. Eph. i. 9-10: 'the secret of His will with a view to the dispensation of the fulness of the times, to bring together all things in the Christ, things in heaven and things in earth.'
The marked contrast between the doctrine of Baruch and the doctrine of St. Paul must of course be admitted in general; but it has been asked whether the doctrine of the Atonement is not a fragment of the abandoned Jewish doctrine of merit, borrowed inconsistently by St. Paul, or inconsistently tolerated by him. To this the reply is surely in the negative. The Jews undoubtedly held that Enoch, Moses, Jeremiah, and others were, on account of their righteousness, the accepted mediators with God on behalf of the chosen people, and propitiators of His wrath (see especially Assumption of Moses, xi, and passages from Baruch cited above). But the doctrine of the Atonement, when it is examined, proves to have one feature which puts it into marked opposition with the Judaic doctrine of human merit.
According to the Christian doctrine of the Atonement, Christ is purely and simply God's gift to man. He is the Son of God, given to man by the Father, in order that, taking our nature upon Him, living the perfect human life, and dying the death of perfect obedience, He might satisfy the divine requirement, which we could not satisfy, and procure for us what we could not procure for ourselves, no, not the best of us. Therefore this doctrine puts all men, the best and worst alike, in the common attitude of simply receiving from God, as an unmerited boon, the gift of forgiveness and reconciliation in Christ. It is in fact the strongest possible negation of the Jewish idea of human merit, personal or vicarious.
In other respects the doctrine of The Apocalypse of Baruch affords at once interesting contrasts and parallels to St. Paul's doctrine. Thus—
(a) In Baruch as in St. Paul, we have a combination of the doctrine of divine predestination with the insistence on human free will and responsibility. lxix. 4: 'Of the good works of the righteous which should be accomplished before Him, He foresaw six kinds' should be compared with Eph. ii. 10: 'Good works which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them.'
(b) The eschatology of the New Testament, including St. Paul's, is of course especially Jewish. It does not however concern us much in the Epistle to the Ephesians; but we notice that in The Apocalypse of Baruch the idea of 'the consummation of the times' (cf. Eph. i. 10, 'the fulness of the times') appears and reappears constantly. See xiii. 3; xxi. 8, 17; xxx. 3; xlii. 6; liv. 21; lvi. 2; lix. 4; lxix. 4, 5; cf. The Assumption of Moses, i. 18: 'The consummation of the end of the days.'
(c) The connexion of St. Paul's doctrine with the Jewish doctrine is also illustrated in The Apocalypse of Baruch on the following points. That the Gentiles had the opportunity of the knowledge of God through His works in nature, but refused it. See Baruch, liv. 18, and cf. Romans, i. 20: The pre-existence of the Messiah. This is suggested but not very clearly stated in xxx. 1, cf. Charles's note and The Assumption of Moses, i. 14, where the pre-existence of Moses seems to be asserted. Again, the Fall of Adam and its effect in introducing death (or premature death) into the world. See xxiii. 4; xlviii. 42; liv. 15; lvi. 6, and Charles's notes. Once more The Resurrection of the Body. See Baruch, l; li. On all these points we see what was the material in existing Jewish thought or, in other words, what were the existing developements of Old Testament belief, which the Christian inspiration had to work upon. The effect of the specifically Christian inspiration is chiefly seen (1) in selection among existing beliefs—taking some and utterly rejecting others; (2) in giving a definite and fixed form to current Messianic and other ideas which were continually shifting and incoherent; and (3) in spiritualizing and moralizing what it appropriated. Of course it is in the Revelation or Apocalypse of St. John that we have the most signal instance of the New Testament use of contemporary Jewish material. But such material holds a very large place in the whole of the New Testament, and there is no more important assistance to the study of the New Testament than is afforded by contemporary Jewish literature, especially that of an Apocalyptic character.
[[1]] The Apoc. of Baruch (A. and C. Black, 1896), p. lxxxii. The statement is compiled from Weber, Lehre des Talmuds.
[[2]] Edited also by R. H. Charles (A. and C. Black, 1897), p. 37.
NOTE D. See p. 120.
THE BROTHERHOOD OF ST. ANDREW
After the above passage was written, as to the need amongst us of a deeper idea of the obligations of church membership, it fell to my lot to go to the United States, to make acquaintance with the work of the Brotherhood of St. Andrew in that country, and to assist at its general convention in Buffalo. It seemed to me that nothing could be better calculated to revive the true spirit of laymanship than that society, 'formed in recognition of the fact that every Christian man is pledged to devote his life to the spread of the kingdom of Christ on earth.'
It was started among a small band of young men, of the number of the apostles, nearly fifteen years ago, in St. James's parish, Chicago, and has spread till to-day it numbers more than 1,200 parochial chapters in the United States alone, and has taken firm root in Canada and other parts of the world. It has a double rule of Prayer and of Service. The point of the service required is that it should have the character especially of witness among a man's equals. So much 'church work' is directed towards raising those who are in some ways our inferiors, that we forget that the real test of a man is the witness he bears for Christ among his equals. There is many a man who, especially in his youth, fails to confess Christ in his own society, and then, if I may so express it, sneaks round the corner to do something to raise the degraded or takes orders and preaches the gospel. Nobody can possibly disparage these efforts of love, but a certain character of cowardice continues to attach to them, if they are not based on a frank witness for Christ in a man's own walk of life, where it is hardest. It is this witness which the Brotherhood requires.
The particular rule is 'to make an earnest effort each week to bring some one young man within hearing of the Gospel of Christ as set forth in the services of the Church and in men's Bible classes.' This rule is no doubt open to criticism. But it is interpreted in the spirit rather than in the letter, and for its definite requirement it is successfully pleaded that it keeps the members from vagueness and slackness.
Certainly the result appears to be excellent. The brethren are pervaded by a spirit of frank religious profession and devotion. There appears to be a general tone among them of reality and good sense. Their missionary zeal does not degenerate into an intrusive prying into other men's souls.
The Brotherhood was developed in the atmosphere of the United States, and it remains a question whether it will flourish in England. The more sharply defined distinctions of classes among us; our exaggerated parochialism; the shyness and reserve in religious matters which characterizes many really religious Englishmen and degenerates into a sort of 'hypocrisy reversed,' or pretence of being less religious than one is—these things will constitute grave obstacles. But the need is at least as crying among us, as on the other side of the Atlantic, to emphasize among professing Christians and churchmen the duty of witness. At least we may trust the Brotherhood will be given a good trial. But if it is to have a fair chance among us, the greatest care must be taken that it should develope as a properly lay movement; and while it receives all encouragement from the clergy, should not be taken up by them to be turned into a guild of 'church workers,' useful for purposes of parochial organization.
One of the most striking facts about the Brotherhood in the States is that, while the church spirit is unmistakable—as no one who was present at the corporate Communion of 1,300 delegates in October of this year at half-past six in the morning in a great church at Buffalo could possibly doubt—it has successfully avoided becoming either a party society or a society rent by factions.
It is because I believe the witness of this Brotherhood to the true church spirit has already proved invaluable that I venture to dedicate this little exposition of the great book of brotherhood—though without leave granted or asked—to its founder and president.
NOTE E. See pp. 164, 166.
THE CONCEPTION OF THE CHURCH (CATHOLIC) IN ST. PAUL
IN ITS RELATION TO LOCAL CHURCHES.
By far the most frequent use of the word 'church' or 'churches' in the New Testament is to designate a local society of Christians or a number of such societies taken together, 'the church at Jerusalem,' 'the church at Antioch,' 'the churches of Galatia,' 'the seven churches which are in Asia,' 'all the churches.' But it is used also for the church as a whole. In fact, before Christ's coming the word in the Greek of the Old Testament had passed from meaning an assembly of the people, as in classical Greek, to meaning the sacred people as a whole[[1]], as St. Stephen uses it in his speech 'The church in the wilderness' (Acts vii. 38). And it is exactly in this sense that it is used by our Lord in St. Matthew, xvi. 18. 'The church' which our Lord there promises to 'build' is the Church of the New Covenant as a whole. We might paraphrase His words (as Dr. Hort suggests[[2]]) 'on this rock I will build my Israel.' Thus there is throughout the Acts and St. Paul's earlier epistles, a tendency to pass from the use of 'church' as a local society to its use as designating the whole body of the faithful. This was but natural seeing that each local society did but represent the one divine society, the church of the Old Covenant, refounded by Christ. See Acts ix. 31: 'The church throughout all Judaea and Galilee and Samaria.' xii. 1: 'Herod the king put forth his hands to afflict certain of the church.' xx. 28: 'The church of God which he purchased with his own blood.' Gal. i. 13: 'I persecuted the church of God.' 1 Cor. xii. 28: 'God hath set some in the church, first apostles,' &c. In this last passage and in St. Paul's speech to the Ephesian elders this general use of the term is unmistakable.
In the Epistle to the Ephesians, in which alone among his epistles St. Paul is writing not about the difficulties or needs of a particular congregation, but about the church in its general conception, this larger use of the term becomes dominant. And the point to be noticed is that the church in general, or catholic church, is conceived of, not as made up of local churches, but as made up of individual members. The local church would be regarded by St. Paul not as one element of a catholic confederacy[[3]], but as the local representative of the one divine and catholic society[[4]]. But the local church is not, according to St. Paul, a completely independent representative of the church as a whole. The apostles, as commissioned witnesses and representatives of Christ, are over all the churches. They, or their recognized associates and delegates, like Barnabas, Timothy and Titus, represent the general church which every local church must, so to speak, reproduce. The apostles therefore, or their representatives, give to each church when it is first founded 'the tradition' of truth and morals which is permanently to mould it; and they maintain the tradition by a more or less constant supervision. Thus they are the force which holds all 'the churches' together on a common basis. 'So ordain I,' says St. Paul, 'in all the churches[[5]].' 'Hold fast the traditions even as I delivered them to you[[6]].' The apostle has, he teaches, an 'authority' commensurate with his 'stewardship[[7]],' an authority 'which the Lord gave for the edification and not the destruction[[8]]' of the Christians, but which at times must take the form of a 'rod' of chastisement[[9]]. The complete doctrinal and moral independence of particular Churches is strongly denied by St. Paul in such phrases as 'Came the word of God unto you alone?' or, 'If any man preacheth unto you any gospel other than that which ye received, let him be anathema[[10]].'
Dr. Hort's work on The Christian Ecclesia, in many respects, as would be expected, most admirable, seems to me to minimize quite extraordinarily the apostolic authority. The apostles, he says, were only witnesses of Christ. 'There is no trace in Scripture of a formal commission of authority for government from Christ Himself.' This surprising conclusion is reached by omitting many considerations. Thus in St. Matthew xvi. 19 a definite grant of official authority—as appears in the passage, Is. xxii. 22, on which it is based—is promised to St. Peter, and he is on this occasion, as Dr. Hort himself maintains, the representative of the apostles generally. This stewardship granted to the apostles, to shepherd the flock and feed the household of God, is implied again in St. Luke xii. 42, St. John xxi. 15-17; and it seems to be quite unreasonable to dissociate the authoritative commission to 'absolve and retain,' St. John xx. 20-23, from the apostolic office. Dr. Hort would apparently dissociate such passages as those last referred to from the apostolic office, and assign them to the church as a whole. But how then does he account for the authority inherent in the apostolic office, as it is represented by St. Paul, and in the Acts? St. Paul's conception of the authority of the apostles is barely considered by him; and the authority of the apostolate in the Acts is strangely minimized. Nothing is said of Simon's impression—surely a true one—that the apostles had the 'authority' to convey the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands (viii. 19). Certainly the phrases used toward the churches of Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia, 'to whom we gave no commandment,' 'it seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things,' imply a governmental authority, which, if it is shared by the presbyters, is substantially that of the apostles (Acts xv. 24-28).
Dr. Hort also minimizes greatly the element of official authority which appears almost at once in the church by apostolic appointment and delegation. No doubt there was at first an authority allowed—as must always be allowed—to the acknowledged possessors of extraordinary divine gifts, especially to the 'prophets.' But in the period of St. Paul's later activity, when he is facing the future of the church and has apparently ceased to expect an immediate return of Christ, these special gifts retire into the background, while the ordinary functions of government, and administration of the word and sacraments, remain in the position which they are permanently to occupy in the hands of regularly ordained officers.
Dr. Hort deals, as it seems to me, most unreasonably with the pastoral epistles. It is surely arbitrary to dissociate 'the gift which was in Timothy by the laying on of St. Paul's hands,' the gift of power, and love, and discipline; which Timothy is to 'stir up' (2 Tim. i. 6), from that mentioned in the first epistle (iv. 14), 'the gift that is in thee, which was given thee by prophecy, with the laying on of the hands of the presbyters'; and to make the former a 'gift' of merely personal piety. And (even if the 'lay hands suddenly on no man' be interpreted, as Ellicott and Hort would interpret it, of the reception of a penitent) it seems absurd to doubt, in view of what is said about the laying on of hands in ordination of 'the seven' and of the 'evangelist' Timothy, and in view of the place it held generally for conveying spiritual gifts in the Christian Church, that this was the accepted method of ordination in all cases; there being in fact no evidence to the contrary.
Once more, Dr. Hort is surely maintaining an impossible position when, even in face of the salutation to the Philippians, he denies that the term 'episcopus' is used in the New Testament as a regular title of an ecclesiastical office.
Not even Dr. Hort's reputation for soundness of judgement could stand against many posthumous publications such as The Christian Ecclesia.
[[1]] Not, as Dr. Hort points out (Christian Ecclesia, p. 5), 'the elect (called-out) people.' The word has in fact no such association attached to it.
[[2]] pp. 10, 11.
[[3]] Unless indeed, in Eph. iii. 21, we should understand 'every building' as meaning every local church which, fitted together with every other, grows into a holy temple, i.e. into that which only a really catholic church can be.
[[4]] The same statement would be true of St. Ignatius of Antioch.
[[5]] 1 Cor. vii. 17.
[[6]] 1 Cor. xi. 2, xv. 2.
[[7]] 1 Cor. ix. 17.
[[8]] 2 Cor. x. 8.
[[9]] 1 Cor. iv, 21.
[[10]] 1 Cor. xiv. 36; Gal. i. 8.
NOTE F. See p. 188.
THE ETHICS OF CATHOLICISM.
The world at large is fully aware of the claim of 'Catholicism,' i.e. the claim of the one visible church for all sorts of men. But the ethical meaning of the claim has been strangely subordinated to its theological and sacerdotal aspects. Its ethical meaning seems to me to require developing under heads such as these:—
1. The requirement of mutual forbearance if men of all races and classes and idiosyncrasies are to be bound to belong to one organization and to worship in common, 'breaking the one bread.' Herein lies the moral discipline of Catholicism: see above, pp. 123 foll.
2. The consequent obligation of toleration in theology, ritual, &c., on all matters which do not touch the actual basis of the Christian faith. St. Cyprian, though he believed that those baptized outside the church were not baptized at all, yet deliberately remained in communion with those bishops who thought differently, trusting to the mercy of God to supply the supposed deficiency in those who, outside his jurisdiction, were admitted into the church, as he believed, without baptism. And St. Augustine, who, most of ancient writers, understands the moral meaning of Catholicism, repeatedly holds up this toleration of Cyprian as an example to the Donatist separatists of his own day: 'If you seek advice from the blessed Cyprian, hear how much he anticipates from the mere advantage of unity: so much so that he did not separate himself from those who held different opinions: and, though he thought that those who are baptized outside the communion of the church do not receive baptism at all, yet he believed that those who had thus been simply admitted into the church could on no other ground than the bond of unity come under the divine pardon.' Then he quotes Cyprian's words: 'But some one will say: what will happen to those who in the past, when coming from heresy to the church, have been admitted without baptism? (I reply): God is powerful to grant them forgiveness by His mercy, and not to separate from the gifts of His church those who, after being thus simply admitted into her, have fallen asleep.' And again: 'judging no man and separating no man from the rights of communion because he thinks differently.' And St. Augustine continues: 'All these catholic unity embraces in her motherly bosom, bearing one another's burdens in turn and endeavouring to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace, until, in whatever respect they disagreed, the Lord should reveal (the truth) to one or the other of them[[1]].' Not to St. Paul then, only, but to St. Cyprian and St. Augustine, doctrinal toleration is an essential of Catholicism. Would to God the claim of the one church had not come to be associated so generally with the opposite tendency! See above, pp. 158 f.
3. Catholicism, as meaning a church of all races and sorts of people, postulates a constant missionary enthusiasm in all the members of the church till this ideal be realized. 'To do the work of an evangelist,' to have the 'feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace,' to be content to leave nothing but evil outside the church—that is to be a real catholic.
4. To St. Paul's mind the Catholicism of the church is to lead the way to an even wider 'reconciliation.' Through the catholic union of men in the church the whole universe is to come back into unity. The kingdom of God is to be something wider than the church which exists to prepare for it. This principle once recognized secures that the church shall feel and exhibit a constant interest in all departments of knowledge and progress. The universe is one, and redemption is for the whole.
5. Catholicism is the antithesis of esotericism. All—men and women, slave or free, Greek or Scythian—are capable of full initiation into Christianity. All—not apostles and presbyter-bishops and deacons only—but all Christians make up the high priestly body and have on their foreheads the anointing oil: see above, pp. 111 ff.
Forbearance between divergent classes and races and individuals—doctrinal toleration—missionary enthusiasm—universal sympathy—recognition of a universal priesthood of Christianity—these constitute the moral content of Pauline Catholicism.
[[1]] S. Aug. de Baptismo, ii. [xiii.] 18, [xiv.] 20.
NOTE G. See p. 190.
THE LAMBETH CONFERENCE AND INDUSTRIAL PROBLEMS.
The 'Report of the Committee of the Lambeth Conference appointed to consider and report upon the office of the Church with respect to industrial problems—(a) the unemployed; (b) industrial co-operation,' is so much to the point as a statement of Christian social duty that I venture to reproduce the first part of it here.
'The Committee desire to begin their Report with words of thankful recognition that throughout the Church of Christ, and not least in the Churches of our own Communion, there has been a marked increase of solicitude about the problems of industrial and social life, and of sympathy with the struggles, sufferings, responsibilities, and anxieties, which those problems involve.
'They hope that they rightly discern in this some increasing reflection in modern shape of the likeness of the Lord, in whose blessed life zeal for the souls, and sympathy for the bodily needs of men were undivided fruits of a single love.
'The Committee, before proceeding to touch upon two specific parts of the subject, desire to record briefly what they deem to be certain principles of Christian duty in such matters.
'The primary duty of the Church, as such, and, within her, of the Clergy, is that of ministry to men in the things of character, conscience, and faith. In doing this, she also does her greatest social duty. Character in the citizen is the first social need; character, with its securities in a candid, enlightened, and vigorous conscience, and a strong faith in goodness and in God. The Church owes this duty to all classes alike. Nothing must be allowed to distract her from it, or needlessly to impede or prejudice her in its discharge; and this requires of the Clergy, as spiritual officers, the exercise of great discretion in any attempt to bring within their sphere work of a more distinctively social kind.
'But while this cannot be too strongly said, it is not the whole truth. Character is influenced at every point by social conditions; and active conscience, in an industrial society, will look for moral guidance on industrial matters.
'Economic science does not claim to give this, its task being to inform but not to determine the conscience and judgement. But we believe that Christ our Master does give such guidance by His example and teachings, and by the present workings of His Spirit; and therefore under Him Christian authority must in a measure do the same, the authority, that is, of the whole Christian body, and of an enlightened Christian opinion. This is part of the duty of the Christian Society, as witnessing for Christ and representing Him in this present world, occupied with His work of setting up the Kingdom of God, under and amidst the natural conditions of human life. In this work the clergy, whose special duty it is to ponder the bearings of Christian principles, have their part; but the Christian laity, who deal directly with the social and economic facts, can do even more.
'The Committee believe that it would be wholly wrong for Christian authority to attempt to interfere with the legitimate evolution of economic and social thought and life by taking a side corporately in the debates between rival social theories or systems. It will not (for example), at the present day, attempt to identify Christian duty with the acceptance of systems based respectively on collective or individual ownership of the means of production.
'But they submit that Christian social duty will operate in two directions:—
'1. The recognition, inculcation, and application of certain Christian principles. They offer the following as examples:—
(a) The principle of Brotherhood. This principle of Brotherhood, or Fellowship in Christ, proclaiming, as it does, that men are members one of another, should act in all the relations of life as a constant counterpoise to the instinct of competition.
(b) The principle of Labour. That every man is bound to service—the service of God and man. Labour and service are to be here understood in their widest and most inclusive sense; but in some sense they are obligatory on all. The wilfully idle man, and the man who lives only for himself, are out of place in a Christian community. Work, accordingly, is not to be looked upon as an irksome necessity for some, but as the honourable task and privilege of all.
(c) The principle of Justice. God is no respecter of persons. Inequalities, indeed, of every kind are inwoven with the whole providential order of human life, and are recognized emphatically in our Lord's words. But the social order cannot ignore the interests of any of its parts, and must, moreover, be tested by the degree in which it secures for each freedom for happy, useful, and untrammelled life, and distributes, as widely and equitably as may be, social advantages and opportunities.
(d) The principle of Public Responsibility. A Christian community, as a whole, is morally responsible for the character of its own economic and social order, and for deciding to what extent matters affecting that order are to be left to individual initiative, and to the unregulated play of economic forces. Factory and sanitary legislation, the institution of Government labour departments and the influence of Government, or of public opinion and the press, or of eminent citizens, in helping to avoid or reconcile industrial conflicts, are instances in point.
'2. Christian opinion should be awake to repudiate and condemn either open breaches of social justice and duty, or maxims and principles of an un-Christian character. It ought to condemn the belief that economic conditions are to be left to the action of material causes and mechanical laws, uncontrolled by any moral responsibility. It can pronounce certain conditions of labour to be intolerable. It can insist that the employer's personal responsibility, as such, is not lost by his membership in a commercial or industrial Company. It can press upon retail purchasers the obligation to consider not only the cheapness of the goods supplied to them, but also the probable conditions of their production. It can speak plainly of evils which attach to the economic system under which we live, such as certain forms of luxurious extravagance, the widespread pursuit of money by financial gambling, the dishonesties of trade into which men are driven by feverish competition, and the violences and reprisals of industrial warfare.
'It is plain that in these matters disapproval must take every different shade, from plain condemnation of undoubted wrong to tentative opinions about better and worse. Accordingly any organic action of the Church, or any action of the Church's officers, as such, should be very carefully restricted to cases where the rule of right is practically clear, and much the larger part of the matter should be left to the free and flexible agency of the awakened Christian conscience of the community at large, and of its individual members.
'If the Christian conscience be thus awakened and active, it will secure the best administration of particular systems, while they exist, and the modification or change of them, when this is required by the progress of knowledge, thought, and life.
'It appears to follow from what precedes that the great need of the Church, in this connexion, is the growth and extension of a serious, intelligent, and sympathetic opinion on these subjects, to which numberless Christians have as yet never thought of applying Christian principles. There has been of late no little improvement in this respect, but much remains to be done, and with this view the Committee desire to make the following definite recommendation.
'They suggest that, wherever possible, there should be formed, as a part of local Church organization, Committees consisting chiefly of laymen, whose work should be to study social and industrial problems from the Christian point of view, and to assist in creating and strengthening an enlightened public opinion in regard to such problems, and promoting a more active spirit of social service, as a part of Christian duty.
'Such Committees, or bodies of Church workers in the way of social service, while representing no one class of society, and abstaining from taking sides in any disputes between classes, should fearlessly draw attention to the various causes in our economic, industrial, and social system, which call for remedial measures on Christian principles.'
Abundant illustration of the kind of matters with which such Committees might deal will be found in the report.