History of Dogma Volume II Part 18

His idea of the _reconciliation_ of G.o.d is just as rudimentary, and merely suggested by Biblical pa.s.sages. He sometimes saw the means of reconciliation solely in obedience and in the "righteous flesh" as such, at other times in the "wood." Here also the recapitulation theory again appears: through disobedience at the tree Adam became a debtor to G.o.d, and through obedience at the tree G.o.d is reconciled.[615] But teachings as to vicarious suffering on the part of Christ are not found in Irenaeus, and his death is seldom presented from the point of view of a sacrifice offered to G.o.d.[616] According to this author the reconciliation virtually consists in Christ's restoring man to communion and friends.h.i.+p with G.o.d and procuring forgiveness of sins; he very seldom speaks of G.o.d being offended through Adam's sin (V. 16. 3). But the incidental mention of the forgiveness of sins resulting from the redemption by Christ has not the meaning of an _abolition_ of sin. He connects the redemption with this only in the form of Biblical and rhetorical phrases; for the vital point with him is the abolition of the _consequences_ of sin, and particularly of the sentence of death.[617]

Here we have the transition to the conception of Christ's work which makes this appear more as a completion than as a restoration. In this connection Irenaeus employed the following categories: _restoring of the likeness of G.o.d in humanity_; _abolition of death_; _connection and union of man with G.o.d_; _adoption of men as sons of G.o.d and as G.o.ds_; _imparting of the Spirit who now becomes accustomed to abide with men_;[618] _imparting of a knowledge of G.o.d culminating in beholding him_; _bestowal of everlasting life_. All these are only the different aspects of one and the same blessing, which, being of a divine order, could only be brought to us and implanted in our nature by G.o.d himself.

But inasmuch as this view represents Christ not as performing a reconciling but a perfecting work, his _acts_ are thrust more into the background; his work is contained in his const.i.tution as the G.o.d-man.

Hence this work has a universal significance for all men, not only as regards the present, but as regards the past from Adam downwards, in so far as they "according to their virtue in their generation have not only feared but also loved G.o.d, and have behaved justly and piously towards their neighbours, and have longed to see Christ and to hear his voice."[619] Those redeemed by Jesus are immediately joined by him into a unity, into the true humanity, the Church, whose head he himself is.[620] This Church is the communion of the Sons of G.o.d, who have attained to a contemplation of him and have been gifted with everlasting life. In this the work of Christ the G.o.d-man is fulfilled.

In Tertullian and Hippolytus, as the result of New Testament exegesis, we again find the same aspects of Christ's work as in Irenaeus, only with them the mystical form of redemption recedes into the background.[621]

Nevertheless the _eschatology_ as set forth by Irenaeus in the fifth Book by no means corresponds to this conception of the work of Christ as a restoring and completing one; it rather appears as a remnant of antiquity directly opposed to the speculative interpretation of redemption, but protected by the _regula fidei_, the New Testament, especially Revelation, and the material hopes of the great majority of Christians. But it would be a great mistake to a.s.sume that Irenaeus merely repeated the hopes of an earthly kingdom just because he still found them in tradition, and because they were completely rejected by the Gnostics and guaranteed by the _regula_ and the New Testament.[622]

The truth rather is that he as well as Melito, Hippolytus, Tertullian, Lactantius, Commodian, and Victorinus lived in these hopes no less than did Papias, the Asia Minor Presbyters and Justin.[623] But this is the clearest proof that all these theologians were but half-hearted in their theology, which was forced upon them, in defence of the traditional faith, by the historical situation in which they found themselves. The Christ, who will shortly come to overcome Antichrist, overthrow the Roman empire, establish in Jerusalem a kingdom of glory, and feed believers with the fat of a miraculously fruitful earth, is in fact a quite different being from the Christ who, as the incarnate G.o.d, has already virtually accomplished his work of imparting perfect knowledge and filling mankind with divine life and incorruptibility. The fact that the old Catholic Fathers have both Christs shows more clearly than any other the middle position that they occupy between the acutely h.e.l.lenised Christianity of the theologians, i.e., the Gnostics, and the old tradition of the Church. We have indeed seen that the twofold conception of Christ and his work dates back to the time of the Apostles, for there is a vast difference between the Christ of Paul and the Christ of the supposedly inspired Jewish Apocalypses; and also that the agency in producing this conjunction may be traced back to the oldest time; but the union of a precise Christological Gnosis, such as we find in Irenaeus and Tertullian, with the retention in their integrity of the imaginative series of thoughts about Antichrist, Christ as the warrior hero, the double resurrection, and the kingdom of glory in Jerusalem, is really a historical novelty. There is, however, no doubt that the strength of the old Catholic theology in opposition to the Gnostics lies in the accomplishment of this union, which, on the basis of the New Testament, appeared to the Fathers possible and necessary.

For it is not systematic consistency that secures the future of a religious conception within a church, but its elasticity, and its richness in dissimilar trains of thought. But no doubt this must be accompanied by a firm foundation, and this too the old Catholic Fathers possessed--the church system itself.

As regards the details of the eschatological hopes, they were fully set forth by Irenaeus himself in Book V. Apart from the belief that the returning Nero would be the Antichrist, an idea spread in the West during the third century by the Sibylline verses and proved from Revelation, the later teachers who preached chiliastic hopes did not seriously differ from the Gallic bishop; hence the interpretation of Revelation is in its main features the same. It is enough therefore to refer to the fifth Book of Irenaeus.[624] There is no need to show in detail that chiliasm leads to a peculiar view of history, which is as much opposed to that resulting from the Gnostic theory of redemption, as this doctrine itself forbids the hope of a bliss to be realised in an earthly kingdom of glory. This is not the proper place to demonstrate to what extent the two have been blended, and how the chiliastic scheme of history has been emptied of its content and utilised in the service of theological apologetics.

But the Gnostics were not the only opponents of chiliasm. Justin, even in his time, knew orthodox Christians who refused to believe in an earthly kingdom of Christ in Jerusalem, and Irenaeus (V. 33 ff.), Tertullian, and Hippolytus[625] expressly argued against these. Soon after the middle of the second century, we hear of an ecclesiastical party in Asia Minor, which not only repudiated chiliasm, but also rejected the Revelation of John as an untrustworthy book, and subjected it to sharp criticism. These were the so-called Alogi.[626] But in the second century such Christians were still in the minority in the Church.

It was only in the course of the third century that chiliasm was almost completely ousted in the East. This was the result of the Montanistic controversy and the Alexandrian theology. In the West, however, it was only threatened. In this Church the first literary opponent of chiliasm and of the Apocalypse appears to have been the Roman Presbyter Caius.

But his polemic did not prevail. On the other hand the learned bishops of the East in the third century used their utmost efforts to combat and extirpate chiliasm. The information given to us by Eusebius (H. E. VII.

24), from the letters of Dionysius of Alexandria, about that father's struggles with whole communities in Egypt, who would not give up chiliasm, is of the highest interest. This account shews that wherever philosophical theology had not yet made its way the chiliastic hopes were not only cherished and defended against being explained away, but were emphatically regarded as Christianity itself.[627] Cultured theologians were able to achieve the union of chiliasm and religious philosophy; but the "simplices et idiotae" could only understand the former. As the chiliastic hopes were gradually obliged to recede in exactly the same proportion as philosophic theology became naturalised, so also their subsidence denotes the progressive tutelage of the laity.

The religion they understood was taken from them, and they received in return a faith they could not understand; in other words, the old faith and the old hopes decayed of themselves and the _authority_ of a mysterious faith took their place. In this sense the extirpation or decay of chiliasm is perhaps the most momentous fact in the history of Christianity in the East. With chiliasm men also lost the living faith in the nearly impending return of Christ, and the consciousness that the prophetic spirit with its gifts is a real possession of Christendom.

Such of the old hopes as remained were at most particoloured harmless fancies which, when allowed by theology, were permitted to be added to dogmatics. In the West, on the contrary, the millennial hopes retained their vigour during the whole third century; we know of no bishop there who would have opposed chiliasm. With this, however, was preserved a portion of the earliest Christianity which was to exercise its effects far beyond the time of Augustine.

Finally, we have still to treat of the altered conceptions regarding the Old Testament which the creation of the New produced among the early-Catholic Fathers. In the case of Barnabas and the Apologists we became acquainted with a theory of the Old Testament which represented it as the Christian book of revelation and accordingly subjected it throughout to an allegorical process. Here nothing specifically new could be pointed out as having been brought by Christ. Sharply opposed to this conception was that of Marcion, according to which the whole Old Testament was regarded as the proclamation of a Jewish G.o.d hostile to the G.o.d of redemption. The views of the majority of the Gnostics occupied a middle position between the two notions. These distinguished different components of the Old Testament, some of which they traced to the supreme G.o.d himself and others to intermediate and malevolent beings. In this way they both established a connection between the Old Testament, and the Christian revelation and contrived to show that the latter contained a specific novelty. This historico-critical conception, such as we specially see it in the epistle of Ptolemy to Flora, could not be accepted by the Church because it abolished strict monotheism and endangered the proof from prophecy. No doubt, however, we already find in Justin and others the beginning of a compromise, in so far as a distinction was made between the moral law of nature contained in the Old Testament--the Decalogue--and the ceremonial law; and in so far as the literal interpretation of the latter, for which a pedagogic significance was claimed, was allowed in addition to its typical or Christian sense. With this theory it was possible, on the one hand, to do some sort of justice to the historical position of the Jewish people, and on the other, though indeed in a meagre fas.h.i.+on, to give expression to the novelty of Christianity. The latter now appears as the _new_ law or the law of freedom, in so far as the moral law of nature had been restored in its full purity without the burden of ceremonies, and a particular historical relation to G.o.d was allowed to the Jewish nation, though indeed more a wrathful than a covenant one. For the ceremonial regulations were conceived partly as tokens of the judgment on Israel, partly as concessions to the stiffneckedness of the people in order to protect them from the worst evil, polytheism.

Now the struggle with the Gnostics and Marcion, and the creation of a New Testament had necessarily a double consequence. On the one hand, the proposition that the "Father of Jesus Christ is the creator of the world and the G.o.d of the Old Testament" required the strictest adherence to the unity of the two Testaments, so that the traditional apologetic view of the older book had to undergo the most rigid development; on the other hand, as soon as the New Testament was created, it was impossible to avoid seeing that this book was superior to the earlier one, and thus the theory of the novelty of the Christian doctrine worked out by the Gnostics and Marcion had in some way or other to be set forth and demonstrated. We now see the old Catholic Fathers engaged in the solution of this twofold problem; and their method of accomplis.h.i.+ng it has continued to be the prevailing one in all Churches up to the present time, in so far as the ecclesiastical and dogmatic practice still continues to exhibit the inconsistencies of treating the Old Testament as a Christian book in the strict sense of the word and yet elevating the New above it, of giving a typical interpretation to the ceremonial law and yet acknowledging that the Jewish people had a covenant with G.o.d.

With regard to the first point, viz., the maintenance of the unity of the two Testaments, Irenaeus and Tertullian gave a most detailed demonstration of it in opposition to Marcion,[628] and primarily indeed with the same means as the older teachers had already used. It is Christ that prophesied and appeared in the Old Testament; he is the householder who produced both Old and New Testaments.[629] Moreover, as the two have the same origin, their meaning is also the same. Like Barnabas the early Catholic Fathers contrived to give all pa.s.sages in the Old Testament a typical Christian sense: it is the same truth which we can learn from the prophets and again from Christ and the Apostles. With regard to the Old Testament the watchword is: "Seek the type" ("Typum quaeras").[630]

But they went a step further still. In opposition to Marcion's ant.i.theses and his demonstration that the G.o.d of the Old Testament is a petty being and has enjoined petty, external observances, they seek to show in syntheses that the same may be said of the New. (See Irenaeus IV.

21-36). The effort of the older teachers to exclude everything outward and ceremonial is no longer met with to the same extent in Irenaeus and Tertullian, at least when they are arguing and defending their position against the Gnostics. This has to be explained by two causes. In the first place Judaism (and Jewish Christianity) was at bottom no longer an enemy to be feared; they therefore ceased to make such efforts to avoid the "Jewish" conception of the Old Testament. Irenaeus, for example, emphasised in the most nave manner the observance of the Old Testament law by the early Apostles and also by Paul. This is to him a complete proof that they did not separate the Old Testament G.o.d from the Christian Deity.[631] In connection with this we observe that the radical antijudaism of the earliest period more and more ceases. Irenaeus and Tertullian admitted that the Jewish nation had a covenant with G.o.d and that the literal interpretation of the Old Testament was justifiable. Both repeatedly testified that the Jews had the right doctrine and that they only lacked the knowledge of the Son. These thoughts indeed do not attain clear expression with them because their works contain no systematic discussions involving these principles. In the second place the Church itself had become an inst.i.tution where sacred ceremonial injunctions were necessary; and, in order to find a basis for these, they had to fall back on Old Testament commandments (see Vol. I., chap. 6, p. 291 ff.). In Tertullian we find this only in its most rudimentary form;[632] but in the course of the third century these needs grew mightily[633] and were satisfied. In this way the Old Testament threatened to become an authentic book of revelation to the Church, and that in a quite different and much more dangerous sense than was formerly the case with the Apostolic Fathers and the Apologists.

With reference to the second point, we may remark that just when the decay of antijudaism, the polemic against Marcion, and the new needs of the ecclesiastical system threatened the Church with an estimate of the Old Testament hitherto unheard of, the latter was nevertheless thrust back by the creation and authority of the New Testament, and this consequently revived the uncertain position in which the sacred book was henceforth to remain. Here also, as in every other case, the development in the Church ends with the _complexus oppositorum_, which nowhere allows all the conclusions to be drawn, but offers the great advantage of removing every perplexity up to a certain point. The early-Catholic Fathers adopted from Justin the distinction between the Decalogue, as the moral law of nature, and the ceremonial law; whilst the oldest theologians (the Gnostics) and the New Testament suggested to them the thought of the (relative) novelty of Christianity and therefore also of the New Testament. Like Marcion they acknowledged the literal sense of the ceremonial law and G.o.d's covenant with the Jews; and they sought to sum up and harmonise all these features in the thought of an economy of salvation and of a history of salvation. This economy and history of salvation which contained the conception of a divine _accommodation and pedagogy_, and which accordingly distinguished between const.i.tuent parts of different degrees of value (in the Old Testament also), is the great result presented in the main work of Irenaeus and accepted by Tertullian.

It is to exist beside the proof from prophecy without modifying it;[634]

and thus appears as something intermediate between the Valentinian conception that destroyed the unity of origin of the Old Testament and the old idea which neither acknowledged various const.i.tuents in the book nor recognised the peculiarities of Christianity. We are therefore justified in regarding this history of salvation approved by the Church, as well as the theological propositions of Irenaeus and Tertullian generally, as a Gnosis "toned down" and reconciled with Monotheism. This is shown too in the faint gleam of a historical view that still s.h.i.+nes forth from this "history of salvation" as a remnant of that bright light which may be recognised in the Gnostic conception of the Old Testament.[635] Still, it is a striking advance that Irenaeus has made beyond Justin and especially beyond Barnabas. No doubt it is mythological history that appears in this history of salvation and the recapitulating story of Jesus with its saving facts that is a.s.sociated with it; and it is a view that is not even logically worked out, but ever and anon crossed by the proof from prophecy; yet for all that it is development and history.

The fundamental features of Irenaeus' conception are as follow: The Mosaic law and the New Testament dispensation of grace both emanated from one and the same G.o.d, _and were granted for the salvation of the human race in a form appropriate to the times_.[636] The two are in part different; but the difference must be conceived as due to causes[637]

that do not affect the unity of the author and of the main points.[638]

We must make the nature of G.o.d and the nature of man our point of departure. G.o.d is always the same, man is ever advancing towards G.o.d; G.o.d is always the giver, man always the receiver;[639] G.o.d leads us ever to the highest goal; man, however, is not G.o.d from the beginning, but is destined to incorruptibility, which he is to attain step by step, advancing from the childhood stage to perfection (see above, p. 267 f.).

This progress, conditioned by the nature and destination of man, is, however, dependent on the revelation of G.o.d by his Son, culminating in the incarnation of the latter and closing with the subsequent bestowal of the Spirit on the human race. In Irenaeus therefore the place of the many different revelation-hypostases of the Valentinians is occupied by the one G.o.d, who stoops to the level of developing humanity, accommodates himself to it, guides it, and bestows on it increasing revelations of grace.[640] The fundamental knowledge of G.o.d and the moral law of nature, i.e., natural morality, were already revealed to man and placed in his heart[641] by the creator. He who preserves these, as for example the patriarchs did, is justified. (In this case Irenaeus leaves Adam's sin entirely out of sight). But it was G.o.d's will to bring men into a higher union with himself; wherefore his Son descended to men from the beginning and accustomed himself to dwell among them. The patriarchs loved G.o.d and refrained from injustice towards their neighbours; hence it was not necessary that they should be exhorted with the strict letter of the law, since they had the righteousness of the law in themselves.[642] But, as far as the great majority of men are concerned, they wandered away from G.o.d and fell into the sorriest condition. From this moment Irenaeus, keeping strictly to the Old Testament, only concerns himself with the Jewish people. These are to him the representatives of humanity. It is only at this period that the training of the human race is given to them; but it is really the Jewish _nation_ that he keeps in view, and through this he differs very decidedly from such as Barnabas.[643] When righteousness and love to G.o.d died out in Egypt, G.o.d led his people forth so that man might again become a disciple and imitator of G.o.d. He gave him the written law (the Decalogue), which contains nothing else than the moral law of nature that had fallen into oblivion.[644] But when they made to themselves a golden calf and chose to be slaves rather than free men, then the Word, through the instrumentality of Moses, gave to them, as a particular addition, the commandments of slavery (the ceremonial law) in a form suitable for their training. These were bodily commandments of bondage which did not separate them from G.o.d, but held them in the yoke. The ceremonial law was thus a pedagogic means of preserving the people from idolatry; but it was at the same time a type of the future. Each const.i.tuent of the ceremonial law has this double signification, and both of these meanings originate with G.o.d, i.e., with Christ; for "how is Christ the end of the law, if he be not the beginning of it?"

("quomodo finis legis Christus, si non et initium eius esset") IV. 12.

4. Everything in the law is therefore holy, and moreover we are only ent.i.tled to blame such portions of the history of the Jewish nation as Holy Scripture itself condemns. This nation was obliged to circ.u.mcise itself, keep Sabbaths, offer up sacrifices, and do whatever is related of it, so far as its action is not censured. All this belonged to the state of bondage in which men had a _covenant_ with G.o.d and in which they also possessed the right faith in the one G.o.d and were taught before hand to follow his Son (IV. 12, 5; "lex praedocuit hominem sequi oportere Christum"). In addition to this, Christ continually manifested himself to the people in the prophets, through whom also he indicated the future and prepared men for his appearance. In the prophets the Son of G.o.d accustomed men to be instruments of the Spirit of G.o.d and to have fellows.h.i.+p with the Father in them; and in them he habituated himself to enter bodily into humanity.[645] Hereupon began the last stage, in which men, being now sufficiently trained, were to receive the "testamentum libertatis" and be adopted as Sons of G.o.d. By the union of the Son of G.o.d with the flesh the _agnitio filii_ first became possible to all; that is the fundamental novelty. The next problem was to restore the law of freedom. Here a threefold process was necessary. In the first place the Law of Moses, the Decalogue, had been disfigured and blunted by the "traditio seniorum". First of all then the pure moral law had to be restored; secondly, it was now necessary to extend and fulfil it by expressly searching out the inclinations of the heart in all cases, thus unveiling the law in its whole severity; and lastly the _particularia legis_, i.e., the law of bondage, had to be abolished. But in the latter connection Christ and the Apostles themselves avoided every transgression of the ceremonial law, in order to prove that this also had a divine origin. The non-observance of this law was first permitted to the Gentile Christians. Thus, no doubt, Christ himself is the end of the law, but only in so far as he has abolished the law of bondage and restored the moral law in its whole purity and severity, and given us himself.

The question as to the difference between the New Testament and the Old is therefore answered by Irenaeus in the following manner. It consists (1) in the _agnitio filii_ and consequent transformation of the slaves into children of G.o.d; and (2) in the restoration of the law, which is a law of freedom just because it excludes bodily commandments, and with stricter interpretation lays the whole stress on the inclinations of the heart.[646] But in these two respects he finds a real addition, and hence, in his opinion, the Apostles stand higher than the prophets. He proves this higher position of the Apostles by a surprising interpretation of 1 Cor. XII. 28, conceiving the prophets named in that pa.s.sage to be those of the Old Testament.[647] He therefore views the two Testaments as of the same nature, but "greater is the legislation which confers liberty than that which brings bondage" ("maior est legisdatio quae in libertatem, quam quae data est in servitutem"). Through the two covenants the accomplishment of salvation was to be hastened "for there is one salvation and one G.o.d; but the precepts that form man are numerous, and the steps that lead man to G.o.d are not a few;" ("una est enim salus et unus deus; quae autem formant hominem, praecepta multa et non pauci gradus, qui adduc.u.n.t hominem ad deum"). A worldly king can increase his benefits to his subjects; and should it not also be lawful for G.o.d, though he is always the same, to honour continually with greater gifts those who are well pleasing to him? (IV. 9. 3). Irenaeus makes no direct statement as to the further importance which the Jewish people have, and in any case regards them as of no consequence after the appearance of the covenant of freedom. Nor does this nation appear any further even in the chiliastic train of thought. It furnishes the Antichrist and its holy city becomes the capital of Christ's earthly kingdom; but the nation itself, which, according to this theory, had represented all mankind from Moses to Christ, just as if all men had been Jews, now entirely disappears.[648]

This conception, in spite of its want of stringency, made an immense impression, and has continued to prevail down to the present time. It has, however, been modified by a combination with the Augustinian doctrine of sin and grace. It was soon reckoned as Paul's conception, to which in fact it has a distant relations.h.i.+p. Tertullian had already adopted it in its essential features, amplified it in some points, and, in accordance with his Montanist ideas, enriched it by adding a fourth stage (ab initio--Moses--Christ--Paraclete). But this addition was not accepted by the Church.[649]

3. _Results to ecclesiastical Christianity._

As we have shown, Irenaeus, Tertullian, and Hippolytus had no strictly systematised theology; they formulated theological propositions because their opponents were theologians. Hence the result of their labours, so far as this was accepted by the Western Church of the third century, does not appear in the adoption of a systematic philosophical dogmatic, but in theological fragments, namely, the rule of faith fixed and interpreted in an antignostic sense[650]. As yet the rule of faith and theology nowhere came into collision in the Western Churches of the third century, because Irenaeus and his younger contemporaries did not themselves notice any such discrepancies, but rather imagined all their teachings to be expositions of the faith itself, and did not trouble their heads about inconsistencies. If we wish to form a notion as to what ideas had become universally prevalent in the Church in the middle of the third century let us compare Cyprian's work "Testimonia", written for a layman, with Novatian's work "De Trinitate".

In the "Testimonia" the doctrine of the two Testaments, as developed by Irenaeus, forms the framework in which the individual dogmas are set. The doctrine of G.o.d, which should have been placed at the beginning, has been left out in this little book probably because the person addressed required no instruction on the point. Some of the dogmas already belong to philosophical theology in the strict sense of the word; in others we have merely a precise a.s.sertion of the truth of certain facts. All propositions are, however, supported by pa.s.sages from the two Testaments and thereby proved.[651] The theological counterpart to this is Novatian's work "De Trinitate". This first great Latin work that appeared in Rome is highly important. In regard to completeness, extent of Biblical proofs, and perhaps also its influence on succeeding times, it may in many respects be compared with Origen's work [Greek: peri archon]. Otherwise indeed it differs as much from that work, as the sober, meagre theology of the West, devoid of philosophy and speculation, differs in general from that of the East. But it sums up in cla.s.sic fas.h.i.+on the doctrines of Western orthodoxy, the main features of which were sketched by Tertullian in his antignostic writings and the work against Praxeas. The old Roman symbol forms the basis of the work.

In accordance with this the author gives a comprehensive exposition of his doctrine of G.o.d in the first eight chapters. Chapters 9-28 form the main portion; they establish the correct Christology in opposition to the heretics who look on Christ as a mere man or as the Father himself; the Holy Scriptures furnish the material for the proofs. Chapter 29 treats of the Holy Spirit. Chapters 30 and 31 contain the recapitulation and conclusion. The whole is based on Tertullian's treatise against Praxeas. No important argument in that work has escaped Novatian; but everything is extended, and made more systematic and polished. No trace of Platonism is to be found in this dogmatic; on the contrary he employs the Stoic and Aristotelian syllogistic and dialectic method used also by his Monarchian opponents. This plan together with its Biblical att.i.tude gives the work great outward completeness and certainty. We cannot help concluding that this work must have made a deep impression wherever it was read, although the real difficulties of the matter are not at all touched upon, but veiled by distinctions and formulae. It probably contributed not least to make Tertullian's type of Christology the universal Western one. This type, however, as will be set forth in greater detail hereafter, already approximates closely to the resolutions of Nicaea and Chalcedon.[652] Novatian adopted Tertullian's formulae "one substance, three persons" ("una substantia, tres personae"), "from the substance of G.o.d" ("ex substantia dei"), "always with the Father" ("semper apud patrem"), "G.o.d and man" ("deus et h.o.m.o"), "two substances" ("duae substantiae"), "one person" ("una persona"), as well as his expressions for the union and separation of the two natures adding to them similar ones and giving them a wider extension.[653] Taking his book in all we may see that he thereby created for the West a dogmatic _vademec.u.m_, which, from its copious and well-selected quotations from Scripture, must have been of extraordinary service.

The most important articles which were now fixed and transferred to the general creed along with the necessary proofs, especially in the West, were: (1) the unity of G.o.d, (2) the ident.i.ty of the supreme G.o.d and the creator of the world, that is, the ident.i.ty of the mediators of creation and redemption, (3) the ident.i.ty of the supreme G.o.d with the G.o.d of the Old Testament, and the declaration that the Old Testament is G.o.d's book of revelation, (4) the creation of the world out of nothing, (5) the unity of the human race, (6) the origin of evil from freedom, and the inalienable nature of freedom, (7) the two Testaments, (8) Christ as G.o.d and Man, the unity of his personality, the truth of his divinity, the actuality of his humanity, the reality of his fate, (9) the redemption and conclusion of a covenant through Christ as the new and crowning manifestation of G.o.d's grace to all men, (10) the resurrection of man in soul and body. But the transmission and interpretation of these propositions, by means of which the Gnostic theses were overthrown, necessarily involved the transmission of the Logos doctrine; for the doctrine of the revelation of G.o.d and of the two Testaments could not have prevailed without this theory. How this hypothesis gained acceptance in the course of the third century, and how it was the means of establis.h.i.+ng and legitimising philosophical theology as part of the faith, will be shown in the seventh chapter. We may remark in conclusion that the religious hope which looked forward to an earthly kingdom of Christ was still the more widely diffused among the Churches of the third century;[654] but that the other hope, viz., that of being deified, was gaining adherents more and more. The latter result was due to men's increasing indifference to daily life and growing aspiration after a higher one, a longing that was moreover nourished among the more cultured by the philosophy which was steadily gaining ground. The hope of deification is the expression of the idea that this world and human nature do not correspond to that exalted world which man has built up within his own mind and which he may reasonably demand to be realised, because it is only in it that he can come to himself. The fact that Christian teachers like Theophilus, Irenaeus, and Hippolytus expressly declared this to be a legitimate Christian hope and held out a sure prospect of its fulfilment through Christ, must have given the greatest impulse to the spread and adoption of this ecclesiastical Christianity.

But, when the Christian religion was represented as the belief in the incarnation of G.o.d and as the sure hope of the deification of man, a speculation that had originally never got beyond the fringe of religious knowledge was made the central point of the system and the simple content of the Gospel was obscured.[655]

Footnotes:

[Footnote 460: Authorities: The works of Irenaeus (Stieren's and Harvey's editions), Melito (Otto, Corp. Apol. IX.), Tertullian (Oehler's and Reiflerscheid's editions), Hippolytus (Fabricius', Lagarde's, Duncker's and Schneidewin's editions), Cyprian (Hartel's edition), Novatian (Jackson). Biographies of Bohringer, Die Kirche Christi und ihre Zeugen, 1873 ff. Werner, Der Paulinismus des Irenaus, 1889. Noldechen, Tertullian, 1890. Dollinger, "Hippolytus und Kallistus," 1853. Many monographs on Irenaeus and Tertullian.]

[Footnote 461: The following exposition will show how much Irenaeus and the later old Catholic teachers learned from the Gnostics. As a matter of fact the theology of Irenaeus remains a riddle so long as we try to explain it merely from the Apologists and only consider its ant.i.thetical relations to Gnosis. Little as we can understand modern orthodox theology from a historical point of view--if the comparison be here allowed--without keeping in mind what it has adopted from Schleiermacher and Hegel, we can just as little understand the theology of Irenaeus without taking into account the schools of Valentinus and Marcion.]

[Footnote 462: That Melito is to be named here follows both from Eusebius, H. E. V. 28. 5, and still more plainly from what we know of the writings of this bishop; see Texte und Untersuchungen zur Geschichte der altchristlichen Litteratur, I. 1, 2, p. 24 ff. The polemic writings of Justin and the Antignostic treatise of that "ancient" quoted by Irenaeus (see Patr. App. Opp. ed. Gebhardt etc. I. 2, p. 105 sq.) may in a certain sense be viewed as the precursors of Catholic literature.

We have no material for judging of them with certainty. The New Testament was not yet at the disposal of their authors, and consequently there is a gap between them and Irenaeus.]

[Footnote 463: See Eusebius, H. E. V. 13.]

[Footnote 464: Tertullian does indeed say in de praescr. 14: "Ceterum manente forma regulae fidei in suo ordine quantumlibet quaeras, et trades, et omnem libidinem curiositatis effundas, si quid tibi videtur vel ambiguitate pendere vel obscuritate ob.u.mbrari"; but the preceding exposition of the _regula_ shows that scarcely any scope remained for the "curiositas," and the one that follows proves that Tertullian did not mean that freedom seriously.]

[Footnote 465: The most important point was that the Pauline theology, towards which Gnostics, Marcionites, and Encrat.i.tes had already taken up a definite att.i.tude, could now no longer be ignored. See Overbeck's Basler Univ.--Programm, 1877. Irenaeus immediately shows the influence of Paulinism very clearly.]

[Footnote 466: See what Rhodon says about the issue of his conversation with Appelles in Euseb., H. E. V. 13. 7: [Greek: ego de gelasas kategnon autou, dioti dedaskalos einai legon oun edei to didaskomenon hup' autou kratunein].]

[Footnote 467: On the old "prophets and teachers" see my remarks on the [Greek: Didache], c. 11 ff., and the section, pp. 93-137, of the prolegomena to my edition of this work. The [Greek: didaskaloi apostolikoi kai prophetikoi] (Ep. Smyrn. ap. Euseb., H. E. IV. 15. 39) became lay-teachers who were skilful in the interpretation of the sacred traditions.]

[Footnote 468: In the case of Irenaeus, as is well known, there was absolutely no consciousness of this, as is well remarked by Eusebius in H. E. V. 7. In support of his own writings, however, Irenaeus appealed to no charisms.]

[Footnote 469: See the pa.s.sage already quoted on p. 63, note 1.]

[Footnote 470: Irenaeus and Tertullian scoffed at the Gnostic terminology in the most bitter way.]

[Footnote 471: Tertullian, adv. Prax. 3: "Simplices enim quique, ne dixerim imprudentes et idiotae, quae major semper credentium pars est, quoniam et ipsa regula fidei a pluribus diis saeculi ad unic.u.m et verum deum transfert, non intellegentes unic.u.m quidem, sed c.u.m sua [Greek: oikonomia] esse credendum, expavesc.u.n.t ad [Greek: oikonomian]." Similar remarks often occur in Origen. See also Hippol., c. Noet 11.]

[Footnote 472: The danger of speculation and of the desire to know everything was impressively emphasised by Irenaeus, II. 25-28. As a p.r.o.nounced ecclesiastical positivist and traditionalist, he seems in these chapters disposed to admit nothing but obedient and acquiescent faith in the words of Holy Scripture, and even to reject speculations like those of Tatian, Orat. 5. Cf. the disquisitions II. 25. 3: "Si autem et aliquis non invenerit causam omnium quae requiruntur, cogitet, quia h.o.m.o est in infinitum minor deo et qui ex parte (cf. II. 28.) acceperit gratiam et qui nondum aequalis vel similis sit factori"; II.

26. 1: [Greek: Ameinon kai symphoroteron idiotas kai oligomatheis huparchein, kai dia tes agapes plesion genesthai tou Theou e polymatheis kai empeirous dokountas einai, blasphemous eis ton heauton heuriskesthai despoten], and in addition to this the close of the paragraph, II. 27.

1: Concerning the sphere within which we are to search (the Holy Scriptures and "quae ante oculos nostros occurrunt", much remains dark to us even in the Holy Scriptures II. 28. 3); II. 28. 1 f. on the canon which is to be observed in all investigations, namely, the confident faith in G.o.d the creator, as the supreme and only Deity; II. 28. 2-7: specification of the great problems whose solution is hid from us, viz., the elementary natural phenomena, the relation of the Son to the Father, that is, the manner in which the Son was begotten, the way in which matter was created, the cause of evil. In opposition to the claim to absolute knowledge, i.e., to the complete discovery of all the processes of causation, which Irenaeus too alone regards as knowledge, he indeed pointed out the limits of our perception, supporting his statement by Bible pa.s.sages. But the ground of these limits, "ex parte accepimus gratiam," is not an early-Christian one, and it shows at the same time that the bishop also viewed knowledge as the goal, though indeed he thought it could not be attained on earth.]

[Footnote 473: The same observation applies to Tertullian, Cf. his point blank repudiation of philosophy in de praese. 7, and the use he himself nevertheless made of it everywhere.]

[Footnote 474: In point of form this standpoint is distinguished from the ordinary Gnostic position by its renunciation of absolute knowledge, and by its corresponding lack of systematic completeness. That, however, is an important distinction in favour of the Catholic Fathers. According to what has been set forth in the text I cannot agree with Zahn's judgment (Marcellus of Ancyra, p. 235 f.): "Irenaeus is the first ecclesiastical teacher who has grasped the idea of an independent science of Christianity, of a theology which, in spite of its width and magnitude, is a branch of knowledge distinguished from others; and was also the first to mark out the paths of this science."]

[Footnote 475: Tertullian seems even to have had no great appreciation for the degree of systematic exactness displayed in the disquisitions of Irenaeus. He did not reproduce these arguments at least, but preferred after considering them to fall back on the proof from prescription.]

[Footnote 476: The more closely we study the writings of Tertullian, the more frequently we meet with inconsistencies, and that in his treatment both of dogmatic and moral questions. Such inconsistencies could not but make their appearance, because Tertullian's dogmatising was only incidental. As far as he himself was concerned, he did not feel the slightest necessity for a systematic presentation of Christianity.]

[Footnote 477: With reference to certain articles of doctrine, however, Tertullian adopted from Irenaeus some guiding principles and some points of view arising from the nature of faith; but he almost everywhere changed them for the worse. The fact that he was capable of writing a treatise like the de praescr. haeret., in which all proof of the intrinsic necessity and of the connection of his dogmas is wanting, shows the limits of his interests and of his understanding.]

[Footnote 478: Further references to Tertullian in a future volume.

Tertullian is at the same time the first Christian _individual_ after Paul, of whose inward life and peculiarities we can form a picture to ourselves. His writings bring us near himself, but that cannot be said of Irenaeus.]

[Footnote 479: Consequently the _spirit_ of Irenaeus, though indeed strongly modified by that of Origen, prevails in the later Church dogmatic, whilst that of Tertullian is not to be traced there.]