Arius the Libyan: A Romance of the Primitive Church

by Nathan C. Kouns

"Dost thou really believe that thou hast seen a miracle with thine own eyes?"

"Yea, verily," said Ammonius, "and many of them."

The ancient paused a long time, and seemed lost in profoundest meditation. At length he answered in a tone of inexpressible sadness and weariness: "I was in the temple service at Thebes for nearly half a century, and much of the time a priest. At Ombos I was high-priest for five-and-twenty years, and until some five years ago. I have seen some wonders, indeed, which the people called miracles. but alas! alas! I know just how those things were done! The sun rises and sets, and no man hindereth it! The Nile overfloweth its banks, and refresheth all the land of Kem, and shrinketh back in his accustomed channel; the stars in heaven pursue their bright and tranquil way, and seed-time cometh, and the harvest; and life and death. All nature moves on in obedience to fixed, changeless, universal laws, which have been from the beginning; and I find myself unable to believe that these laws were ever violated, or suspended, in order to furnish evidences of any religion, or for any purpose whatever; although, no doubt, good men may believe that such things have occurred."

"And as to that," said Ammonius, "beyond any question thou art right. He hath but a poor conception of our God who thinketh that, in creating a world wherein he intended miracles to occur, he did not know enough to provide natural laws by which these phenomena might come to pass without violating or suspending the established order. But, if I could know that it violates or suspends any law of nature to raise the dead, I would not believe such a fact, although I have seen it done. But why dost thou suppose that the anastasis of the dead is contrary to natural law? Our Lord hath never said so; on the contrary, he came to fulfill, not to violate, the law. Surely thou canst not declare that any miracle violates or suspends, or is without law, unless thou canst first truthfully declare that all laws are known to thee, and that among them there is none by which the dead might be raised up. But although thou art wise and learned, thou knowest that Nature withholdeth many secrets yet from thee. Thou knowest that no man hath mastered all her laws; and even those which we know may be weak, and mean, and narrow, compared with those of which we are profoundly ignorant. But we Christians teach that God is not the author of confusion, but of order; that all laws of nature, physical, mental, spiritual, are but the expression of his will, which must be harmonious throughout, and can not be self-contradictory; and that just as he hath made some law by which water seeks a level, and by which heavy bodies tend toward the center of the world, and by which oil and water, that repel each other by nature, will unite with an alkali to make a new creature, just so he hath established laws by which the miracles are done; so that the anastasis of the dead, or any other miracle, must be as purely and truly a natural phenomenon as is the rising of the sun, or the falling of the dew--not so common, perhaps, because these phenomena involve powers and faculties of the human soul that do not act always and automatically as do the laws of physical nature; so neither does one sleep, or talk, or think always, but only when he wills to do so."

"That is a new, strange view of thaumaturgy! Thou sayst 'the miracles are under law'; perhaps, then, other men besides the Christians might be able to perform them."

"I know not to what extent it might be possible for other men to exercise the power of faith which is an essential condition in the working of miracles. I suppose they might do wonderful things, that would bear about the same relation to our Christian miracles that their various religions bear to our holy Christianity. And I suppose that the witchcraft and demonology denounced by Moses were the results of the exercise of faith in false gods. But a Christian miracle, depending upon faith in Christ as a primary condition for the exercise of thaumaturgical power, must remain impossible to all who possess not that faith. Thou hast read the Gospels, and thou knowest the Lord hath said, 'If ye had faith as a grain of mustard-seed, ye might say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the midst of the sea, and it should obey you.' But he also said, 'Without me ye can do nothing.'"

"I infer," said Am-nem-hat, "that thou thinkest faith to be the law of miracles; thou thinkest that this faith is itself a force in nature sufficient for the accomplishment of physical results; and that they who sincerely believe may, by means of this force, even raise up the dead. Why, then, are not all the dead raised up?"

"Thou hast stated the law rather too broadly," answered Ammonius. "The faith that worketh miracles must be applied under proper conditions to be of any avail. Water, oil, and alkali do not always produce soap, but only when the proper conditions are observed. So I suppose that no man could be raised up from the dead against his will; and, while there be many Christians that have sought for martyrdom, there be but few that were willing to be raised again, and fewer still that ever requested the brethren to pray for their anastasis, because they preferred to depart, and to be with the Lord, which is far better."

"I do remember," said Am-nem-hat, "that many years ago, when Decius was Emperor of Rome, a bitter persecution raged against the Christians at Alexandria. I saw Julian, and Macar, and Epimachus, and Alexander burned at the stake; and truly many seemed to seek for martyrdom rather than to shun it, a fact which we attributed to a certain incorrigible and hopeless wickedness in them, and not, as thou dost, to their assurance of obtaining a better life. I suppose, indeed, that such men as those would not have desired to be restored to a life which they seemed anxious to lose; and it seemeth reasonable enough that, even if it had been possible to do so, they should not have been recalled against their will. Wilt thou not state more fully yet the conditions upon which thou thinkest this thaumaturgy may be exercised?"

"Faith in Jesus is the primary condition," said Ammonius, "but there are also others. Once a man came unto our Lord and besought him to heal his son, saying that the disciples had been unable to do so. Our Lord did heal him with a word. Afterward the disciples inquired of him why it was that they had failed in doing the same work, and he said unto them that it was because of their unbelief. Now thou must perceive that it was not because of their want of faith in him, for they were then following him; so that it must have been because of their unbelief in their own power and authority to do the work in his name. It seemeth, therefore, that faith on the part of the thaumaturgist in his own power to accomplish the miracle in the Lord's name is one of the conditions of thaumaturgy."