It may be added that whatever this claim conveyed to the Jews of His own time (see Stanton’s Fewish and Christian Messiah) it is impossible to combine in one idea the Old Testament traits of the Coming One if we stop short of the identification of the Messiah with the God of Israel (see Delitzsch, Psa/ms, vol. i. pp. 94, 95, last English ed.). Secondly, Christ enjoys and confers the full authority of God (Matt. x. go; Luke x. 16; cf. also Matt. xxiv. 35; Mk. xiii. 31; Luke xxi. 33), gives and promises the Holy Spirit (‘the Spirit of the Fathe,’ see Matt. x. 17, &c.; Luke xii. 12, and especially xxi. 15, ¢y& yap 5éow, &c.), and apparently sends the prophets and holy men of old (cf. Matt. xxiii. 34, éy@ awooréAAw with Luke xi. 49). Thirdly, the foundation of all this is laid in a passage preserved by the first and third gospels, in which He claims the unqualified possession of the mind of the Father (Luke x. 22; 6 It is worth noting that the Nicene arrangement was successful in some few cases. See Index to this vol. s.v. Theon (ot Nilopolis), &c.
Matt. xi. 27), ‘No man knoweth [who] the Son [is], save the Father, neither knoweth any man [who] the Father lis} save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will (GvJAnra:) reveal Him.’ Observe the veceprocily of knowledge between the Son and the Father. This claim is a decisive zxstantia federis between the Synoptics and the Fourth Gospel, e.g. John xvi. 15; xiv. 9, &c. Fourthly, we observe the claim made by Him throughout the synoptic record to absolute confidence, absolute faith, obedience, self-surrender, such as no frail man is justified in claiming from another; the absence of any trace in the mind of the ‘meek and lowly’ one of that consciousness of sin, that need of reconciliation.with God, which is to us an indispensable condition of the religious temper, and the starting-point of Christian faith (contrast Isa. vi. 5).: We now turn to the Apostles. Here a few brief remarks must suffice. (A suggestive summary in Sanday, © What the first Christians thought about Christ,’ Oxford House Papers, First Series.) That S. Paul’s summary of the Gospel (1 Cor. xv. 3 sgg.) is given by him as common ground between himself and the older Apostles follows strictly from the fact that the verb used (rapéAaBor) links the facts of Redemption (v. 3, 4) with the personal experiences of the original disciples (5 sgg.). In fact it is not in dispute that the original Jewish nucleus of the Apostolic Church preached Jesus as the Messiah, and His death as the ground of forgiveness of sins (Pfleiderer, Urchrist.
p. 20; Acts ii. 36,38; iii. 26; iv. 12, &c.; the ‘Hebraic colouring’ of these early chapters is very characteristic and important). The question is, however, how much this implied as to the Divine Personality of the Saviour; how far the belief of the Apostles and their contemporaries was uniform and explicit on this point. Important light is thrown on this question by the controversy which divided S. Paul from the mass of Jewish Christians with respect to the observance of the Law. Our primary source of knowledge here is Galatians, ch. ii, We there learn that while S. Paul regarded this question as involving the whole essence of the Gospel, and resisted every attempt to impose circumcision on Gentile Christians, the older Apostles conceded the one point regarded as central, and, while reserving the obligation of the Law on those born under it (which S. Paul never directly assailed, 1 Cor. vii. 18) recognised the Gospel of the uncircumcision as legitimate. This concession, as the event proved, conceded everything; if the ‘gospel of the uncircumcision’ was sufficient for salvation, circumcision became a national, not a religious principle. Now this whole question was fundamentally a question about Christ. Men who believed, or were willing to grant, that the Law uttered from Sinai by the awful voice of the Most High Himself was no longer the supreme revelation of God, the one divinely ordained covenant of righteousness, certainly believed that some revelation of God different iz £2nd (for no revelation of God zo man could surpass the degree of Ex. xxxiii. 11) had taken place, an unique revelation of God zz man. The revelation of God in Christ, not the revelation of God to Moses, was the one fact in the world’s history; Sinai was dwarfed in comparison of Calvary. But it must be observed that while the older Apostles, by the very recognition of the gospel of the uncircumcision, went thus far with S. Paul, S. Paul realised as a central principle what to others lay at the circumference. What to the one was a result of their belief in Christ was to him the starting-point, from which logical conclusions were seen to follow, practical applications made in every direction. At the same time S. Paul taught nothing about Christ that was not zmplied in the belief of the older Apostles, or that they would not have felt impelled by their own religious position to accept. In fact it was their fundamental union in the implicit belief of the divinity of the Lord that made possible any agreement between S. Paul and the Jewish Apostles as to the gospel of the uncircumcision.
The apostles of the circumcision, however, stood between S. Paul and the zealot mass of Jewish Christians (Acts xxi. 20), many of whom were far from acquiescing in the recognition of S. Paul’s Gospel. On the same principle that we have used to determine the belief of the 37dA0 with regard to Christ, we must needs recognise that where the gospel of the uncircumcision was still assailed or disparaged, the Divinity of Christ was apprehended faintly, or not at all.
The name of the ‘Ebionite’ sect testifies to its continuity with a section of the Jerusalem Church (see Lightfoot’s Galatians, S. Paul and the Three). It should be observed, however, firstly that between the clear-sighted Apostle of the Gentiles and the straitest of the zealots, there lay every conceivable gradation of intermediate positions (Loofs, Zeitfé § 11. 2, 3); secondly, that while emancipation from legalism in the Apostolic Church ee what has been said above, a belief in the divinity of Jesus was in itself compatible with strict Jewish observance.
The divinity of Christ then was firmly held by S. Paul (the most remarkable passage is Rom. x. 9, II, 13, where Kipioy *Inoody =aitév=Kupiov=fy71) Joel ii. 32), and his belief was held by him in common with the Jewish Apostles, although with a clearer illumination as to its consequences. That this belief was absolutely universal in the Church is not to be maintained, the elimination of Ebionism was only gradual (Justin, Déad. xlviii. ad fin.); but that it, and not Ebionism, represented the common belief of the Apostles and New Testament writers is not to be doubted.; But taking this as proved, we do not find an equally clear answer to the question Zz what sense is Christ God? The synoptic record makes no ex/icit reference to the pre-existence of Christ: but the witness of John and descent of the Spirit (Mark i. 7—11) at His baptism, coupled with the Virginal Birth (Mt., Lk.), and with the traits of the synoptic porirait of Christ as collected above, if they do not compel us to assert, yet forbid us to deny the presence of this doctrine to the minds of the Evangelists. In the Pauline (including Hebrews) and Johannine writings the doctrine is strongly marked, and in the latter (Joh. i. 1, 14, 18, novoryevys @céds) Jesus Christ is expressly identified with the creative Word (Palestinian M/emra, rather than Alexandrian or from Philo; see also Rev. xix. 13), and the Word with God. Moreover such passages as Philipp. ii. 6 sgg., 2 Cor. xiii. 14 (the Apostolic benediction), &c., &c., are significant of the impression left upon the mind of the infant Churches as they started upon their history no longer under the personal guidance of the Apostles of the Lord.
Jesus Christ was God, was one with the Father and with the Spirit: that was enough for the faith, the love, the conduct of the primitive Church. The Church was nothing so little as a society of theologians; monotheists and worshippers of Christ by the same instinct, to analyse their faith as an intellectual problem was far from their thoughts: God Himself (and there is but one God) had suffered for them (Ign. Rom. vi.; Tat. Gr. 133 Melito Ar. 7), God’s sufferings were before their eyes (Clem. R. I. ii. 1), they desired the drink of God, even His blood (Ign. Rom. vii,, cf. Acts xx. 28); if enthusiastic devotion gave way for a moment to reflexion ‘ we must think of Jesus Christ as of God’ (‘Clem. R.’ II. 1).
_ The ‘Apostolic fathers’ are not theological in their aim or method. The earliest seat of theological reflexion in the primitive Church appears to have been Asia Minor, or rather Western Asia from Antioch to the Aigean, From this region proceed the Ignatian letters, which stand alone among the literature of their day in theological depth and reflexion. Their theology ‘is wonderfully mature in spite of its immaturity, full of reflexions and yet ANTECEDENTS OF ARIANISM: THE APOLOGISTS. XXili at the same time full of intuitive originality’ (Loofs, p. 61). The central idea is that of the renovation of man (Zh. 20), now under the power of Satan and Death (ib. 3, 19), which are undone (xaTéAvois) in Christ, the risen Saviour (Swzyrn. 3), who is ‘ our true Life,’ and endows us with immortality (Swzyr7. 4, Magn. 6, Eph. 17). This is by virtue of His Divinity (Zp. 109, Smyrn. 4) in union with His perfect Manhood. He is the only utter-- ance of God (Adyos amd avyiis mpoedddv, Magn. 8), the ‘ unlying mouth by which the Father spake’ (Rom. 8.)
‘God come (yevduevos) in the flesh,’ ‘our God’ (Zh. 7, 18). His flesh partaken mystically in the Eucharist unites our nature to His, is the ‘medicine of incorruption’ (Z~h. 20, Smyrn. 7, cf. Trail. 1). Ignatius does not distinguish the relation of the divine to the human in Christ; he is content to insist on both: ‘one Physician, of flesh and of spirit, begotten and unbegotten’ (Zp. 7). Nor does he clearly conceive the relation of the Eternal Son to the Father. He is unbegotten (as God) and begotten (as man): from eternity with the Father (AZagz. 6): through Him the One God manifested himself. The theological depth of Ignatius was perhaps in part called forth by the danger to the churches from the Docetic heretics, representative of a Judaic (Philad. 5, Magn. 8—10) syncretism which had long had a hold in Asia Minor (1 John and Lightfoot Coloss., p. 73, 81 5gq.). To this he opposes what is evidently a creed ( Zral. 9), with emphasis on the reality (aAnOa@s) of all the facts of Redemption comprised in it.
“i was in fact the controversies of the second century that produced a theology in the Catholic Church, — that in a sense produced the Catholic Church itself. The idea of the Church as distinct from and embracing the Churches is a New Testament idea (Eph. v. 25, cf. 1 Cor. xv. 9, &c.), and the name ‘ Catholic” occurs at the beginning of the second century (Lightfoot’s note on Ign. Swzyrn. 8); but the Gnostic and Montanist controversies compelled the Churches which held fast to the mapddoors of the Apostles to close their ranks (episcopal federation) and to reflect upon their creed. The Baptismal Creed (Rom. x. 9, Acts viii. 37, Zext. Rec., cf. 1 Cor. xv. 34) began to serve as a ¢essera or passport of right belief, and as a regulative standard, a ‘rule of faith.’ The ‘limits of the Christian Church’ began to be more clearly defined (Stanton, wi supr. p. 167).; Another influence which during the same period led to a gradual formation of theology was the necessity of defending the Church against heathenism. If the Gnostics were ‘the first Christian theologians aXe Harnack), the APOLOGISTS (120—200) are more directly important for our present enquiry. The usual title of Justin ‘Philosopher and Martyr’ is significant of his position and typical of the class of writers to which he belongs.
On the one hand the Apologists are philosophers rather than theologians, Christianity is ‘the only true philosophy’ (Justin); its doctrines are found piecemeal among the philosophers (Adyos omepuarixds), who are so far Christians, just as the Christians are the true philosophers (Justin and Minuc. Felix). But the Logos, who is imparted fragmentarily to the philosophers, is revealed in His entire divine Personality in Christ (so Justin beyond the others, AZo/, ii. 8, 10). In the doctrine of God, their thought is coloured by the eclectic Platonism of the age before Plotinus. God, the Father of all things, is Creator, Lord, Master, and as sach known to man, but in Himself Unoriginate (ayévntos), ineffable, mysterious (&ppyntos), without a name, One and alone, incapable of Incarnation (for references to Justin and to Plato, D.C.B. iii, 572). His ‘goodness’ is metaphysical perfection, or beneficence to man, His ‘righteousness’ that of Moral Governor of the Universe (contrast the deeper sense of St. Paul, Rom. iii. 21, &c.). But the abstractness of the conception of God gives way to personal vividness in the doctrine of the ‘visible God’ (Tert. Prax. 15 sq.), the Logos (the subject of the O. T. ‘ theophanies ' according to the Apologists) who was ‘with’ the Father before all things (Just. Déa/. 62), but was ‘ begotten’ or projected (mpoBAnGeis) by the will of the Father (ib. 128) as God from God, as a flame from fire. He is, like the ye ineffable (Xpiorés, Just. Afo/. ii. 6), yet is the &yyedos, banpérns of the Father. In particular He is the Father’s minister 7% Creation:; to create He proceeded from the Father, a doctrine expressly deduced from Prov. viii. 22 (Dial. 61, 129). Before this He was the Adyos évdia0eros, after it the Adyos Tpopopikds, the Word uttered (Ps. xlv. 1 LXX; this distinction is not in Justin, but is found Theophil. ad Autol. ii. 10, 22: it is the most marked trace of philosophic [Stoic] influence on the Apologists). The Apologists, then, conceive of ree theology as philosophers. Especially the Person of the Saviour is regarded by them from the cosmological, ae the soteriological view-point. From the latter, as we have seen, St. Paul starts; and his view gradually embraces the distant horizon of the former (1 Cor. viii. 6, Coloss. i. 15); from the soteriological side also (directly) he reaches the divinity of Christ (Rom. v. 1—8; 1 Cor. i. 30; Rom. x. 13, as above). Here, as we shall see, Athanasius meets the Arians substantially by St. Paul’s method. But the Apologists, under the rue of their philosophy rather than of their religion, start from the cosmological aspect of the problem. o engraft upon an Apostolic (Johannine) title of the Saviour an Alexandrine group of associations: they eo towards transmuting the Word of St. John to the Logos of Philo and the Eclectics. Hence ue ise f er Divinity and of his relation to the Father is embarrassed. His eternity and His generation ore to s Ao compatible: His distinct Personality is maintained at the expense of His true Divinity. He is Go ie ae e One God; He can manifest Himself (Theophanies) in a way the One God cannot; He is ee e ween God and the world. The question has become philosophical rather than directly religious, and p aoe y a lve it. But on the other hand, Justin was no Arian. If he was Philosopher, he was also I artyr. The serie sue d with Christian piety and personal enthusiastic devotion to Christ. Justin in eae Bnet ae ae wuts iat the life, the worship, the simple faith of the Primitive Chareh, and we can trace in him influences of ey re pec ee) of pe ee tee a ate an. article on Justin in D.C.B. vol. iii.). But our concern; Ree Ger ot faith; Te we see that unconsciously they have severed the pe on ae roe nal Father: not God (6 dvtws Aes) but a subordinate ae pene is revealed in Christ: the Logos, to adopt the word: ius, is no longer a true breach of the Divine Silence. > +f s eve a now Anse at the important period of pres os ee eee ac ees af IREN&ZUS, TERTULLIAN, and CLEMENT, the period of a conso: -. Da eee the New Testament, and a catholic rule of faith (see above, and Lumby, Cree ry ch. i. 5 Ys ae se ie +s: begins (180—250) was that of MONARCHIANISM; the Symbolica, i, —viii,), The problem of the period which ae -chianism is in itself the expression of the ivini i e reconciled with the Unity of God. Monarchianism is in itse p pet ection, that the &pxn or Originative Principle p oe nee Pere ee only. ia eee ere pou neyect ee eens a eae eae foe cphadice the distinction of jeli e contrary. «< sts, Z: 5 3 * ae: aca eee ti t Zz cts: of ee ike direction of ‘subordination;’ and axy distinction of Sones Hyper the Godhead involves to a Monotheist some subordination, in order to save the principle XXIV PROLEGOMENA, CHAPTER IL., § 3 (2).
The Monarchian denied any subordination or distinction of hypostases within the Godhead. This tendency we have now to follow up. We do not meet with it as a problem in IRENAUS. — oa ‘is said to have written against it,’ Newman, Av. 4, p. 117, citing Dodw. ix Zren.) This scholar of pupils o Apostles stands in the lines of the Asiatic theology. He is the successor of Ignatius and Polycarp. We find ae in sharp contrast to the Apologists, giving full expression to the revelation of God in Jesus (the ‘Son is the Measure of the Father, for He contains Him’), and the union of man with God in the Saviour, as the carrying out of the original destiny of man, by the destruction of sin, which had for the time frustrated it (III. xviii. p. 211, Deus antiquam hominis plasmationem in se recapitulans). Hence the ‘deification’ of man’s nature by union a Christ (a remarkable point of contact with Athanasius, see note on de /ncar. 54. 3); incorruption 1s attained to by the knowledge of God (cf. John xvii. 3) through faith (IV. xx.); we cannot comprehend God, but we learn to know Him by His Love (ib.). At the same time we trace the influence of the Apologists here and there in his Christology (III. 6, 19, and the explanation of the ‘Theophanies,’ iv. 20). But in his younger contemporary TERTULLIAN, the reaction of Monarchianism makes itself felt. He is himself one of the Apologists, and at the same time under Asiatic influences. The two trains of influence converge in the name 77712Zas, which he is the first to use (rplas first in the Aszatic Apologist Theophilus). In combating the Monarchian Praxeas (see below) he carries subordinationism very far (cf. Hermog. 3. ‘fuit tempus cum Ei filius non fuit ), he distinguishes the Word as ‘ rationalis deus’ from eternity, and ‘sermonalis’ not from eternity (cf. again, Theophilus, supra). The Generation of the Son is a mpoBoay (also ‘eructare’ from Ps. xlv. 1), but the divine * Substance remains the same (river and fountain, sun and ray, Prax. 8, 9). He aims at reconciling ‘subordination’ with the ‘Monarchia,’ (ib. 4). In the Incarnate Christ he distinguishes the divine and human as accurately as Leo the Great (ib. 27, 29). In spite of inconsistencies such as were inevitable in his strange individuality (Stoic, philosopher, lawyer, Apologist, ‘Asiatic’ theologian, Catholic, Montanist) we see in Tertullian the starting-point of Latin Theology (but see also Harnack ii. 287 note).. A Pe We must now examine more closely the history of MONARCHIAN tendencies, and firstly in Rome. The sub-Apostolic Church, simply holding the Divinity of Christ and the Unity of God, used language (see above) which may be called ‘naively Monarchian.’ This holds good even of Asiatic theology, as we find it in its earlier stage.
The baptismal creed (as we find it in the primitive basis of the Apostles’ Creed) does not solve the problem thus presented to Christian reflexion. Monarchianism attempted the solution in two ways. Zither the One God was simply identified with the Christ of the Gospels and the Creeds, the Incarnation being a mode of the Divine manifestation (Father as Creator, Son as Redeemer, Spirit as Sanctifier, or the like): ‘ Modalism’ or Modalistic Monarchianism (including Patripassianism, Sabellianism, and later on the theology of Marcellus); or (this being felt incompatible with the constant personal distinction of Christ from the Father) a special effluence, influence, or power of the one God was conceived of as residing in the man Jesus Christ, who was accordingly Sox of God by adoption, God by assimilation: ‘dynamic’ Monarchianism or Adoptionism (‘ Son’ and ‘ Spirit’ not so much modes of the Divine self-realisation as of the Divine Action). This letter, the echo but not the direct survival of Ebionism, was later on the doctrine of Photinus; we shall find it exemplified in Paul of Samosata; but our present concern is with its introduction at Rome by the two Theodoti, the elder of whom (a tanner from Byzantium) was excommunicated by Bishop Victor, while the younger, a student of the Peripatetic philosophy and grammatical interpreter of Scripture, taught there in the time of Zephyrinus. A later representative of this school, Artemon, claimed that its opinions were those of the Roman bishops down to Victor (Eus. 4.2. v. 28). This statement cannot be accepted seriously; but it appears to be founded on a real reminiscence of an epoch in the action and teachings of the Roman bishops at the time. It must be remembered that the two forms of Monarchianism—modalism and adoptionism—are, while very subtly distinguished in their essential principle, violently opposed in their appearance to the popular apprehension. ‘Their doctrine of God is one, at least in its strict unitarianism; but while to the Modalist Christ is the one God, to the Adoptionist He is essentially and exclusively man’.
Inthe one case His Personality is divine, inthe other human. Now there is clear proof of a strong Modalist tendency? in the Roman Church at this time; this would manifest itself in especial zeal against the doctrine of such men as Theodotus the younger, and give some colour to the tale of Artemon. Both Tertullian and Hippolytus complain bitterly of the ignorance of those responsible for the ascendancy which this teaching acquired in Rome (Zepupivoy avdpa 1d1d7T Hy Kal kreipov Ta&y exkAno.actixay bpwy, Hipp. ‘édotes quisque aut perversus,’ ‘ simplices, ne dicam smprudentes et tdiote.’ Tert.). The utterances of Zephyrinus support this: ‘I believe in one God, Jesus Christ’ (Hipp., see above on the language of the sub-Apost. Church). The Monarchian influences were strengthened by the arrival of fresh teachers from Asia (Cleomenes and Epigonus, see note 2) and began to arouse lively opposition. This was headed by Hippolytus, the most learned of the Roman presbytery, and eventually bishop 3 in opposition to Callistus, the successor of Zephyrinus. The theology of Hippolytus was not unlike that of Tertullian, and was hotly charged by Callistus with ‘Ditheism.’ The position of Callistus himself, like that of his predecessor, was one of compromise between the two forms of Monarchianism, but somewhat more developed.
A distinction was made between ‘Christ’ (the divine) and Jesus (the human); the latter suffered actually, the former indirectly (‘filius patitur, pater vero compatitur.’ (Tert.) tov Marépa cuprenovOévac TG vig, Hipp.; it is clear that under ‘ Praxeas ’ Tertullian is combating also the modified Praxeanism of Callistus. See adv. Prax. 27, 29; Hipp. ix. 7); not without reason does Hippolytus charge Callistus with combining the errors of Sabellius with those of Theodotus. The compromise of Callistus was only partially successful. On the one hand the of the Divine * Monarchia.’
t While yet the distinction between the ‘presence’ and ‘existence’ of God in Christ (Newman, A+. 4. p. 123) is very delicate: both ideas are covered by ‘ Dasein.’ The two forms of Monarchianism are related exactly as the Catholic doctrine of the Trinity is to the Nestorian.
2 Our authorities are Hippolytus Philosophum., Tertullian Against Praxeas, and the early fragment ‘against heresies’ printed in Tertullian’s works. The statements of Tertullian and Hippolytus agree remarkably, though obviously independent. The first (modalist) Monarchian teacher in Rome was Praxeas (Tert.) from Asia, who was followed by the pupils of Noetus, also an Asiatic (Hippol.), Epigonus (Renan Marc-Auréle 230, note, identifies ‘Praxeas’ with Epigonus; I cannot undertake to pronounce upon the point, but see Harnack, Dagwg. 11. p. 608), and Cleomenes. Praxeas arrived in Rome under Victor (or earlier, Harnack, p. 610), and combined strong opposition to Montanism, with equally strong modalism in his theology. In both respects his influence told upon the heads of the Church. Montanism was expelled, Modalism tolerated, Theodotus excommunicated; ‘Duo negotia diaboli Praxeas Rome procuravit: prophetiam expulit et heresin intulit: Paracletum fugavit et Patrem crucifixit.’ (Tert.) ‘Praxeas heresin introduxit quam Victor[inus] (perhaps a Confusion with Zephyrinus) corroborare curavit’ (‘ Tertullian’ adv. Her.)
3 This point is still in debate. Against it, see Lightfoot, S. Clement of Rome (ed. 1890), for it, Dillinger Hipp. and Call., and Neumann, Der Rom. Staat u. d. Allg. Kirche (Leipz. 1890).
ANTECEDENTS OF ARIANISM: ORIGEN. KKV strictly modalist SABELLIUS, who from about 215 takes the place of Cleomenes at the head of Roman Monarchianism (his doctrine of the viowdrwp, of the Trinity as successive mpdowma, ‘aspects,’ of the One God, pure modalism as defined above) scorned compromise (he constantly reproached Callistus with having changed his front, fipp.) was excommunicated, and became the head of a sect. And the fierce opposition of Hippolytus failed to command the support of more than a limited circle of enthusiastic admirers, or to maintain itself after his death. On the other hand (the process is quite in obscurity: see Harnack 1’, p. 620) the theology of Hippolytus and Tertullian eventually gained the day. NovaTIAn, whose ‘grande volumen’ (Jer.) on the Trinity represents the theology of Rome about 250 a.D., simply ‘epitomises Tertullian,’ and that ix explanation of the Rule of Faith. As to the Generation of the Son, he drops the ‘quando Ipse [Pater] voluit’ of Tertullian, but like him combines a (modified) ‘ subordination ’ with the ‘commaumnio substantia ’—in other words the éuootctv. Monarchianism was condemned in the West; its further history belongs to the East (under the name of Sabellianism first in Libya: see pp. 173, sgg.). But the hold which it maintained upon the Roman Church for about a generation (190—220)