465. In their metaphysical postulates the Paulists started, like all ancient philosophers, with the contrast between soul and body, but this they transformed into that between ‘spirit’ and ‘flesh.’ To them the ‘spirit’ included the whole message of Christianity, the ‘flesh’ the doctrine and practice of the Gentile world[41]. The terms themselves were in use in the oral gospel[42], but the Paulists developed the content of ‘spirit,’ until it included a whole world of conceptions, encircling and interfused with the world of sense-experience. But Paul did not desire that this spiritual world should be regarded as wanting in reality, or as a mere product of the imagination: and to express this objectivity of spirit he adopted the Stoic term ‘body.’ Body then expresses the underlying monistic principle of all nature; and we may say ‘spirit-body’ exists[43], with the same confidence with which we speak of animal body or ‘flesh-body.’ There has been a flesh-body of Jesus; with that we have no more concern[44]. There exists eternally a spirit-body of Christ; from that his church draws its life. The Christian feeds upon the spirit of his Master; but in paradoxical phrase we may say that he eats his body and drinks his blood[45]. What is not ‘body’ has no real existence at all[46].
The Christian universe.
466. St Paul in his letters appears entirely lacking in that reverent feeling towards the physical universe, that admiration for sun, moon and stars, which marked the earlier world-religions, and which he perhaps associated with Babylonian idolatry. As we have seen, he only used the Stoic term for universe in disapproval. And yet the conception of the history of the universe was deeply impressed upon the Paulists, and almost precisely in Stoic form. God, the Father, is the beginning of all things; from him they come, and to him they shall all return[47]. From the Father went forth an image of him[48], his first-born Son[49], his word, the Christ; by this he created the world, and for this the world exists[50]. By a further outpouring of the divine spirit, men are created with the capacity of becoming the ‘images’ or bodily representations of God and his Son[51]. To this general doctrine individual Paulists add special features; St Paul himself introduces ‘woman’ as a fourth order of creation, an image or ‘vessel’ bearing the same relation to man as man to Christ[52]; and a writer (of distinctly later date) seems to refer not only to the creation of the elements[53], but also to their coming destruction by the conflagration[54]. Of the creation of the animals no notice is taken[55].
The divine immanence.
467. From this theory of creation it would seem to follow as a consequence that the world is inhabited by the Deity, and is essentially good. This is the Stoic doctrine, and it is accepted boldly by Paul. God dwells in the universe, and the universe in him; man is not in the strict sense an individual, for apart from God he does not exist at all[56]. But there nevertheless remains the fact of the existence of evil, both physical and moral, in apparent defiance of the divine will. Here too the Paulists agree with Stoic teaching; they hold that evil serves a moral purpose as a training in virtue[57]; that God turns evil to his own purpose, so that in the final issue all things are working together for good[58]; that God is active through his Word in restoring a unity that has been for a time broken[59]. Neither can man shift on to his Maker the responsibility for his own wrongdoing; that is (as Cleanthes had taught before) the work of men following out their own ways in accordance with some bias which is in conflict with their divine origin[60]. In spite of all this common ground Paul maintains with at least equal emphasis doctrines of a gloomier type. The universe, as it is, is evil; its rulers are the powers of darkness[61]. St Paul by no means put out of sight, as the Stoics did, the doctrine of an Evil Spirit; on the contrary, this conception dominates his mind and multiplies itself in it. Sin in particular is in his eyes more widespread, more hideous, more dangerous than it is to the Stoic philosopher. To this point we must revert later.
Religion.
468. With regard to religious belief and practice (we are here using the word ‘religion’ in the narrower sense, as in the previous chapter on this subject) Paul was in the first place a monotheist, and addresses his prayers and praises alike to the Father in heaven, and to him alone. At the same time he does not regard the Deity as dwelling in a world apart; he is to be worshipped in and through the Christ, who is the point of contact between him and humanity[62]. From the ceremonial practices of Hebraism all the Paulists break away completely. Its bloody sacrifices take away no sin[63]; the solemn rite of circumcision is nothing in itself[64], and in practice it is an impediment to the acceptance of Christ[65]. The disposition to observe days and seasons, sabbaths and new moons, is a matter for serious alarm[66]. In place of this ritualism is to be substituted ‘a worship according to reason[67],’ which is in close agreement with Stoic practice. To think rightly of the Deity[68], to give thanks to him[69], to honour him by an innocent life[70], is well pleasing to God; and the writings of Paul, like those of Epictetus, include many a hymn of praise, and show us the existence at this time of the beginnings of a great body of religious poetry[71].