Footnote 29:[(return)]
The original is obscure, and has been variously rendered, [Greek: outos gar estai autois egkarpos kai teleia hae pros ton theon kai tous hagious met oiktirmon mneia.] The Editor refers his readers to Rom. xii. 13. "Distributing to the necessity of saints." The received translation is this, "Sic enim erit ipsis fructuosa et perfecta quæ est apud Deum et sanctos cum misericordia recordatio."
Ch. 58. "The all-seeing God, the Sovereign Ruler of spirits, and the Lord of all flesh, who hath chosen the Lord Jesus, and us through him, to be a peculiar people; grant to every soul that calleth on his glorious and holy name, faith, fear, peace, patience, long-suffering, self-control, purity, and temperance, to the good pleasure of his name, through our high-priest and protector Jesus Christ; through whom to him be glory and majesty, dominion and honour, now and for ever and ever, world without end. Amen."
SAINT IGNATIUS.
This martyr to the truth as it is in Jesus sealed that truth with his blood about seventy years after the death of our Lord. From Antioch in Syria, of which place he was bishop, he was sent to the imperial city, Rome; and there he ended his mortal career by a death which he had long expected, and which he was prepared to meet not only with resignation to the Divine will, but even with joy and gladness. His Epistles are written with much of the florid colouring of Asiatic eloquence; but they have all the raciness of originality, and they glow with that Christian fervour and charity which compels us to love him as a father and a friend, a father and friend in Christ. The remains of this apostolic father I have carefully studied, with the single view of ascertaining whether any vestige, however faint, might be traced in him of the invocation of saints and angels; but I can find none. Neither here, nor in the case of any of the apostolical fathers, whose remains we are examining, have I contented myself with merely ascertaining that they bear no direct and palpable evidence; I have always endeavoured to find, and then thoroughly to sift, any expressions which might with the slightest plea of justification be urged in testimony of primitive belief and practice sanctioning the invocation of saints. I find none. Brethren of the Church of Rome, search diligently for yourselves; "I speak as to wise men: Judge ye what I say."
The remains of Ignatius offer to us many a passage on which a Christian pastor would delight to dwell: but my province here is not to recommend his works to the notice of Christians; I am only to report the result of my inquiries touching the matter in question; and as bearing on that question, the following extracts will not be deemed burdensome in this place:—
In his Epistle to the Ephesians, exhorting Christians to united prayer, he says, "For if the prayer of one or two possesses such strength, how much more shall the prayer both of the bishop and of the whole Church?" [Page 13. § 5-7.] "For there is one physician of a corporeal and a spiritual nature, begotten and not begotten; become God in the flesh, true life in death, both from Mary and from God; first liable to suffering, and then incapable of suffering." [In the majority of the manuscripts the reading is, "in an immortal true life.">[
Here we must observe that these Epistles of Ignatius have come down to us also in an interpolated form, abounding indeed with substitutions and additions, but generally resembling paraphrases of the original text. Of the general character of that supposititious work, two passages corresponding with our quotations from the genuine productions of Ignatius may give a sufficiently accurate idea. The first passage above quoted is thus paraphrased: "For if the prayer of one or two possesses such strength that Christ stands among them, how much more shall the prayer both of the bishop and of the whole Church, ascending with one voice to God, induce him to grant all their requests made in Jesus Christ?" [Page 47. c. 5.] The paraphrase of the second is more full: "Our physician is the only true God, ungenerated and unapproachable; the Lord of all things, but the Father and Generator of the only-begotten Son. We have also as our physician our Lord God, Jesus Christ, who was before the world, the only-begotten Son and the Word, but also afterwards man of the Virgin Mary; 'for the Word was made flesh.' He who was incorporeal, now in a body; he who could not suffer, now in a body capable of suffering; he who was immortal in a mortal body, life in corruption—in order that he might free our immortal souls from death and corruption, and heal them, diseased with ungodliness and evil desires as they were." [Page 48. c. 7.]
It must here be observed, that though these are indisputably not the genuine works of Ignatius, but were the productions of a later age, yet no trace is to be found in them of the doctrine, or practice, of the invocation of saints. In this point of view their testimony is nothing more nor less than that of an anonymous paraphrast, who certainly had many opportunities of referring to that doctrine and practice; but who by his total silence seems to have been as ignorant of them as the author himself whose works he is paraphrasing.
To return to his genuine works: In his Epistle to the Magnesians we find these expressions: "For as the Lord did nothing without the Father, being one with him, neither by himself, nor by his Apostles; so neither do ye any thing without the bishop and priests, nor attempt to make any thing appear reasonable to yourselves individually. But at one place be there one prayer, and one supplication, one mind, one hope in love, in blameless rejoicing: Jesus Christ is one; than which nothing is better. All, then, throng as to one temple, as to one altar, as to one Jesus Christ, who proceeded from one Father, and is in one, and returned to one." [Page 19. § 7.] Again he says, "Remember me in your prayers, that I may attain to God. I am in need of your united prayer in God, and of your love."