“But gradually,” continues Mosheim, “the friends of philosophy and literature acquired the ascendency. To this issue Origen contributed very much; for having early imbibed the principles of the new Platonism, he inauspiciously applied them to theology, and earnestly recommended them to the numerous youth who attended on his instruction. And the greater the influence of this man, which quickly spread over the whole Christian world, the more readily was his method of explaining the sacred doctrines propagated.”
Origin of the papacy
The days when the papacy should be recognized as the beast of Revelation 13 were fast approaching. Such experiences in the history of education in the Christian church show how rapidly the life of the Master, the Spirit of truth, was giving place to the form of godliness which denied the power thereof. One reading thus the pages of history can not fail to see that the papacy was formed in the minds of men, was propagated in the schools, and really took birth in the educational system then developed. The political power, which was called upon to help the church, simply carried out at the point of the sword those principles which were developed in the schools. The two streams—paganism and apostate Christianity—united; and in the mad current which flowed from their confluence, men’s souls were lost forever.
Christian Education is the pure water of life, clear and sparkling, which flows from the throne of God; but when mingled with the turbid waters of the valley, it is lost sight of, and the current is evil. The part played by Platonic philosophy can not be overlooked. The foundation had already been laid in the third century for the scholasticism of the Middle Ages, and that “noontide of the papacy which was the world’s moral midnight” was fast approaching.
X
THE PAPACY—AN EDUCATIONAL PROBLEM
Previous chapters have revealed these facts: 1. That the Jewish nation was set as a light to the world. This light was to shine by means of education, and the Jews were to be teachers of the nations. 2. The Jewish nation lost its position as leader in educational reform, and, consequently, in all other particulars, because it departed from the pure system of education delivered to the Fathers, and mingled with the heathen, especially with the Greeks and the Egyptians.
In substantiation of this fact we have these words of Neander: “The Jews, completely imbued with the elements of Hellenic culture, endeavored to find a mean between it and the religion of their fathers, which they had no wish to renounce. To this end they availed themselves of the system most in vogue with those who, in Alexandria, busied themselves with religious matters—that of the Platonic philosophy, which had already acquired a mighty influence over their own intellectual life.... On the one hand, they firmly adhered to the religion of their fathers.... On the other hand, their minds were possessed by a philosophical culture at variance with these convictions. They were themselves not unconscious of the conflicting elements that filled their minds, and must have felt constrained to seek some artificial method of combining them into a harmonious whole. Thus they would be involuntarily driven to intercalate in the old records of religion, which for them possessed the highest authority, a sense foreign to their true spirit, supposing all the while that they were thereby really exalting their dignity as the source of all wisdom.”[67] 3. This intercalation of Greek philosophy with the truth delivered to the Jewish nation brought the schools of the Hebrews to such a position that the Son of man, when receiving His education, avoided them altogether, and in His public teaching warned His people against the schools of the doctors, who for the Word of God taught the traditions of men. This mingling of education then meant the crucifixion of Christ and the ruin of the Jewish nation. 4. The early Christian church, composed of members called out from the Jewish schools and from the purely pagan doctrines, at first taught their children truths based upon the Scriptures; but before the close of the first century, the tendency to commingle Christian teachings and heathen philosophy was already noticeable. Paul, writing to the Thessalonians, referring to this fact, said, “The mystery of iniquity doth already work.”
Papal education sophistry