§ 5. Ethics: Popular and Philosophic
The parallels and coincidences between the teachings of Paul and of Seneca are fully set forth by Bishop Lightfoot in the excursus on Paul and Seneca reprinted in his Discussions on the Apostolic Age, where also the significance of the parallels is considered and the literature of the subject described. In the general connection may be consulted Havet’s Le Christianisme et ses origines, 4 tom. 1872–84; Martha’s Les Moralistes sous l’empire romain, 14e édit. 1881; Lecky’s History of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne; Professor Dill’s Roman Society During the Last Century of the Empire of the West; Baur’s Drei Abhandlungen zur Geschichte der alten Philosophie und ihres Verhältniss zum Christenthum (new ed. 1876), where there is a thorough discussion of Seneca’s case; Professor M. Baumgarten’s Lucius Annæus Seneca und das Christenthum (1895); Uhlhorn’s Conflict of Christianity with Heathenism (Eng. tr. from 3rd Ger. ed. 1879); Renan’s Marc Aurèle, and ch. xvii. of Les Apôtres; W. Soltau’s Das Fortleben des Heidentums in der altchristlichen Kirche, 1906; Professor Max Pohlenz’s Vom Zorne Gottes: Eine Studie über den Einfluss der Griechischen Philosophie auf das alte Christentum, 1909; J. A. Farrer’s Paganism and Christianity, 1891 (rep. R. P. A.); W. M. Flinders Petrie’s Religion and Conscience in Ancient Egypt, 1898; and Ludwig Feuerbach’s Essence of Christianity, Eng. tr. by Marian Evans (George Eliot). The Jewish Rabbinical ethic is defended as against Christian attack in an able article on “Rabbinic Judaism and the Epistles of Paul” by C. G. Montefiore in the Jewish Quarterly Review for January, 1901. Some of the other issues are discussed in detail in the author’s Short History of Freethought, vol. i, chs. iv, vi, vii.
Chapter III—Conditions of Survival
§ 1. Popular Appeal
See the references to ch. ii. § 5, concerning the prevalent moral ideas. As to the Montanists and other ascetic and antinomian sects see Baur, Church History, Eng. tr. vol. i, Pt. III, also Hatch, as cited. Concerning the results of the need to appeal to the pagan populace, note the admissions of Mosheim, Ecclesiastical History, 2 Cent. Pt. II, chs. iii and iv; of Dr. John Stoughton, Ages of the Church, 1855, Lect. iv; of Waddington, History of the Christian Church, 1833, pp. 87, 89; and of Milman, History of Christianity, B. iv, chs. i and iii.
§ 2. Economic Causation
The organization of the Assyrian and Babylonian priesthoods may be gathered from Sayce, Hibbert Lectures on the Religion of the Ancient Babylonians. On the Greek priesthoods compare Burckhardt, Griechische Culturgeschichte, Bd. II, Abs. II, § ii. As to the wealth of the priestly caste in Egypt see Diodorus Siculus; and on that of Rome, Gibbon’s 15th chapter. On the later Judaic priestly finance see the references given as to the Jewish Twelve Apostles under ch. i, § 4. The process of growth of an order of “ethical lecturers” is indicated by C. Martha, Les Moralistes sous l’empire romain, 4e édit. 1881; also by E. Havet, Le Christianisme et ses origines, tom. i, ch. iii. Compare Grote, History of Greece, end of ch. xlvi, and his Plato and the Other Companions of Sokrates, per index, as to the sophists. The financial side of the pagan mysteries is partly illustrated in the Metamorphoses of Apuleius. Compare also Foucart, Des Associations religieuses chez les Grecs. Gibbon’s fifteenth chapter deals in the main with a later period, but throws general light on this also. See also Renan’s Marc Aurèle, ch. xxxi; and especially Dr. Hatch’s Hibbert Lectures, lect. iv, and Lecky’s History of European Morals.
§ 3. Organization and Sacred Books
Dr. Hatch’s Organization of the Early Christian Churches recognizes, on nominally orthodox principles, the fact that the structure was a natural adaptation to environment, on old type-lines. Of the movement of Apollonius of Tyana, good accounts are given by Professor A. Réville, Apollonius of Tyana, the Pagan Christ of the Third Century, Eng. tr. 1866; by Mr. T. Whittaker in his Apollonius of Tyana, and other Essays (Sonnenschein, 1906); and in the essay of Baur in his Drei Abhandlungen. Two somewhat “free” translations of Philostratus’ Life of Apollonius have lately been produced—by Dr. F. C. Conybeare and Professor Phillimore (each 2 vols.)—as to which see the Literary Guide of April, 1913. On the formation of the canon see the references to ch. i, §§ 1, 3. As to Manichæism see those given below, Pt. II, ch. ii.