Part 142

"The judges decided simply in accordance with the laws, and, in the great majority of cases, did so coolly, calmly, without passion, as men who were simply discharging their duty. … Not the priests, but the Emperors led the attack. … It is true the Christians never rebelled against the State. They cannot be reproached with even the appearance of a revolutionary spirit. Despised, persecuted, abused, they still never revolted, but showed themselves everywhere obedient to the laws, and ready to pay to the Emperors the honor which was their due. Yet in one particular they could not obey, the worship of idols, the strewing of incense to the Cæsar-god. And in this one thing it was made evident that in Christianity lay the germ of a wholly new political and social order. This is the character of the conflict which we are now to review. It is a contest of the spirit of Antiquity against that of Christianity, of the ancient heathen order of the world against the new Christian order. Ten persecutions are commonly enumerated, viz., under Nero, Domitian, Trajan, Hadrian, Marcus Aurelius, Septimius Severus, Maximinus the Thracian, Decius, Valerian, and Diocletian. This traditional enumeration is, however, very superficial, and leaves entirely unrecognized the real course of the struggles. … Though times of relative tranquillity occurred, Christianity remained, notwithstanding, a prohibited religion. This being the case, the simple arrangement of the persecutions in a series makes the impression that they were all of the same character, while in fact the persecution under Nero was wholly different from that under Trajan and his successors, and this again varied essentially from those under Decius and Diocletian. The first persecution which was really general and systematically aimed at the suppression of the Church, was the Decian [see ROME: A. D. 192-284]. That under Trajan and his successors [see ROME: A. D. 96-138, 138-180, and 303-305] consisted merely of more or less frequent processes against individual Christians, in which the established methods of trial were employed, and the existing laws were more or less sharply used against them. Finally, the persecutions under Nero and Domitian [see ROME: A. D. 64-68, and 70-96] were mere outbreaks of personal cruelty and tyrannical caprice. … Christianity is the growing might; with the energy of youth it looks the future in the face, and there sees victory beckoning onward. And how changed are now its ideas of that triumph! The earlier period had no thought of any victory but that which Christ was to bring at his coming. … But in the time of Cyprian the hopes of the Christians are directed towards another victory: they begin to grasp the idea that Christianity will vanquish heathenism from within, and become the dominant religion in the Roman Empire. … It is true that the Christians were still greatly in the minority. It is generally assumed that they formed about one-twelfth of the whole population in the East, and in the West about one-fifteenth. Even this is perhaps too high an estimate. But there were two things which gave a great importance to this minority. First, that no single religion of the much divided Heathenism had so many adherents as the Christian. Over against the scattered forces of Heathenism, the Christians formed a close phalanx; the Church was a compact and strongly framed organization. Second, the Christians were massed in the towns, while the rural population was almost exclusively devoted to Heathenism. There existed in Antioch, for instance, a Christian church of fifty thousand souls."

_G. Uhlhorn, The Conflict of Christianity with Heathenism, book 2._

"The Encyclopedia of Missions" on the authority of the late Professor R. D. Hitchcock states that there are on record "the names of churches existing at this period [at the close of the persecutions] in 525 cities: cities of Europe 188, of Asia 214, of Africa 123." (See Appendix D.) There were tendencies at work in many of these against that toward general catholic (universal) organization, but in suffering and sympathy the Christian Churches formed a vast body of believers. "Such a vast organisation of a perfectly new kind, with no analogy in previously existing institutions, was naturally slow in development. … The critical stage was passed when the destruction of Jerusalem annihilated all possibility of a localised centre for Christianity, and made it clear that the centralisation of the Church could reside only in an idea—viz., a process of intercommunication, union and brotherhood. It would be hardly possible to exaggerate the share which frequent intercourse from a very early stage between the separate congregations had in moulding the development of the Church. Most of the documents in the New Testament are products and monuments of this intercourse; all attest in numberless details the vivid interest which the scattered communities took in one another. From the first the Christian idea was to annihilate the separation due to space, and hold the most distant brother as near as the nearest. A clear consciousness of the importance of this idea first appears in the Pastoral Epistles, and is still stronger in writings of A. D. 80-100. … The close relations between different congregations is brought into strong relief by the circumstances disclosed in the letters of Ignatius: the welcome extended everywhere to him; the loving messages sent when he was writing to other churches; the deputations sent from churches off his road to meet him and convoy him; the rapidity with which news of his progress was sent round, so that deputations from Ephesus, Magnesia, and Tralles were ready to visit him in Smyrna; the news from Antioch which reached him in Troas, but which was unknown to him in Smyrna; the directions which he gave to call a council of the church in Smyrna, and send a messenger to congratulate the church in Antioch; the knowledge that his fate is known to and is engaging the efforts of the church in Rome."

_W. M. Ramsay, The Church in the Roman Empire, pages 364-366._

"The fellowship … thus strongly impressed by apostolic hands on the infant Church, is never wholly lost sight of throughout all the ages, and its permanent expression is found in the synod, whether œcumenic, provincial, or diocesan. This becomes fainter as we reach the age in which a presbyter, told off from the body to a distinct parish, attains gradual isolation from his brethren. But this comes some centuries later. … Everywhere, till that decline, the idea is that of a brotherhood or corporate office, a unity of function pervaded by an energy of brotherly love. … It is no mere confluence of units before distinct."

_H. Hayman, Diocesan Synods (Contemporary Review, October, 1882)._

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"It is the age when the New Testament writings begin to come together to form a generally recognized canon. The opposition too to the sovereign spirit of Montanist prophecy undoubtedly increased the need for it. … After the example of the Gnostics, a beginning is also made with exegetical explanation of New Testament writings; Melito with one on the Revelation of John, a certain Heraclitus with one on the Apostles. … Finally, in this same opposition to the heretics, it is sought to secure the agreement of the different churches with one another, and in this relation importance is gained by the idea of a universal (Catholic) Church. So-called catholic Epistles of men of repute in the church to different communities are highly regarded. As illustrations take those of Bishop Dionysius of Corinth to Lacedæmon, Athens, Crete, Paphlagonia, Pontus, Rome (Euseb. 4, 23)."

_W. Moeller, History of the Christian Church, pages 183-184._

"This period [100-312] may be divided into the Post-Apostolic Age which reaches down to the middle of the second century, and the Age of the Old Catholic Church which ends with the establishment of the Church under Constantine. … The point of transition from one Age to the other may be unhesitatingly set down at A. D. 170. The following are the most important data in regard thereto. The death about A. D. 165 of Justin Martyr, who marks the highest point reached in the Post-Apostolic Age and forms also the transition to the Old Catholic Age; and Irenaeus, flourishing somewhere about A. D. 170, who was the real inaugurator of this latter age. Besides these we come upon the beginnings of the Trinitarian controversies about the year 170. Finally, the rejection of Montanism from the universal Catholic Church was effected about the year 170 by means of the synodal institution called into existence for that purpose."

_J. H. Kurtz, Church History, volume 1, page 70._

"If every church must so live in the world as to be a part of its collective being, then it must always be construed in and through the place and time in which it lives."

_A. M. Fairbairn, The Place of Christ in Modern Theology._

"The Church of the first three centuries was never, except perhaps on the day of Pentecost, in an absolutely ideal condition. But yet during the ages of persecution, the Church as a whole was visibly an unworldly institution. It was a spiritual empire in recognized antagonism with the world-empire."

_F. W. Puller, The Primitive Saints and The See of Rome, page 153._

All the greater forces of the age, political and legal, and commercial, aided those working within the church to create an organic unity. "Speaking with some qualifications, the patristic church was Greek, as the primitive church had been Jewish, and the mediæval church was to be Latin. Its unity, like that of the Greek nation, was federative; each church, like each of the Grecian states, was a little commonwealth. As the Greece which resisted the Persians was one, not by any imperial organization, but by common ideas and a common love of liberty, so the church of the fathers was one, not by any organic connection, but by common thoughts and sympathies, above all by a common loyalty to Christ. Naturally the questions which agitated such a church were those which concern the individual soul rather than society. Its members made much of personal beliefs and speculative opinions; and so long as the old free spirit lasted they allowed one another large freedom of thought, only requiring that common instinct of loyalty to Christ. Happily for the world, that free spirit did not die out from the East for at least two centuries after Paul had proclaimed the individual relationship of the soul to God. … The genius of the Greek expressing itself in thought, of the Latin in ruling power, the Christianity which was to the former a body of truth, became to the latter a system of government."

_G. A. Jackson, The Fathers of the Third Century, pages 154-156._

The Apostolic ideal was set forth, and within a few generations forgotten. The vision was only for a time and then vanished. "The kingdom of Christ, not being a kingdom of this world, is not limited by the restrictions which fetter other societies, political or religious. It is in the fullest sense free, comprehensive, universal. … It is most important that we should keep this ideal definitely in view, and I have therefore stated it as broadly as possible. Yet the broad statement, if allowed to stand alone, would suggest a false impression, or at least would convey only a half truth. It must be evident that no society of men could hold together without officers, without rules, without institutions of any kind; and the Church of Christ is not exempt from this universal law. The conception in short is strictly an ideal, which we must ever hold before our eyes. … Every member of the human family was potentially a member of the Church, and, as such, a priest of God. … It will hardly be denied, I think, by those who have studied the history of modern civilization with attention, that this conception of the Christian Church has been mainly instrumental in the emancipation of the degraded and oppressed, in the removal of artificial barriers between class and class, and in the diffusion of a general philanthropy untrammelled by the fetters of party or race; in short, that to it mainly must be attributed the most important advantages which constitute the superiority of modern societies over ancient. Consciously or unconsciously, the idea of an universal priesthood, of the religious equality of all men, which, though not untaught before, was first embodied in the Church of Christ, has worked and is working untold blessings in political institutions and in social life. But the careful student will also observe that this idea has hitherto been very imperfectly apprehended; that throughout the history of the Church it has been struggling for recognition, at most times discerned in some of its aspects but at all times wholly ignored in others; and that therefore the actual results are a very inadequate measure of its efficacy, if only it could assume due prominence and were allowed free scope in action. … It may be a general rule, it may be under ordinary circumstances a practically universal law, that the highest acts of congregational worship shall be performed through the principal officers of the congregation. But an emergency may arise when the spirit and not the letter must decide, The Christian ideal will then … interpret our duty. The higher ordinance of the universal priesthood will overrule all special limitations. The layman will assume functions which are otherwise restricted to the ordained minister."

_J. B. Lightfoot, Dissertations on the Apostolic Age, pages 137-140, 237._

"No Church now existing is an exact counterpart of the Apostolic Church. … Allusions bear out the idea that the Church at Corinth was as yet almost struetureless—little more than an aggregate of individuals—with no bishop, presbyter or deacon."

_J. W. Cunningham, The Growth of the Church in its Organization and Institutions, pages 73, 18._

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"Some time before the middle of the second century heresy began sadly to distract the Christian community; and to avoid imminent danger of schism, it was deemed expedient in a few great towns to arm the chairman of the eldership with additional power. A modified form of prelacy was thus introduced."

_W. D. Killen, The Old Catholic Church, page 51._

Respecting the rise of the Episcopate as a distinct office there is a difference of opinion among scholars,—some holding that it was expressly ordained by the Apostles, others that it arose quite independently of them; a third class think that it was developed gradually out of the eldership, but not without the sanction of one or more of the Apostles. "For the Church is a catholic society, that is, a society belonging to all nations and ages. As a catholic society it lacks the bonds of the life of a city or a nation—local contiguity, common language, common customs. We cannot then very well conceive how its corporate continuity could have been maintained otherwise than through some succession of persons such as, bearing the apostolic commission for ministry, should be in each generation the necessary centres of the Church's life."

_C. Gore, The Mission of the Church, pages 10, 11._

"Jewish presbyteries existed already in all the principal cities of the dispersion, and Christian presbyteries would early occupy a not less wide area. … The name of the presbyter then presents no difficulty. But what must be said of the term bishop? … But these notices, besides establishing the general prevalence of episcopacy, also throw considerable light on its origin. They indicate that the relation suggested by the history of the word 'bishop' and its transference from the lower to the higher office is the true solution, and that the episcopate was created out of the presbytery. … They seem to hint also that, so far as this development was affected at all by national temper and characteristics, it was slower where the prevailing influences were more purely Greek, as at Corinth and Philippi and Rome, and more rapid where an Oriental spirit predominated, as at Jerusalem and Antioch and Ephesus. Above all, they establish this result clearly, that its maturer forms are seen first in those regions where the latest surviving Apostles (more especially St. John) fixed their abode, and at a time when its prevalence cannot be dissociated from their influence or their sanction."

_J. B. Lightfoot, Dissertations on the Apostolic Age, pages 151, 190, 191._

"Since then in the constitution of the church two elements met together—the aristocratic and the monarchical—it could not fail to be the case that a conflict would ensue between them. … These struggles between the presbyterial and episcopal systems belong among the most important phenomena connected with the process of the development of church life in the third century. Many presbyters made a capricious use of their power, hurtful to good discipline and order in the communities."

_A. Neander, General History of the Christian Religion and Church, volume 1, section 2._

"As a rule Christianity would get a footing first in the metropolis of its region. The lesser cities would be evangelized by missions sent from thence; and so the suffragan sees would look on themselves as daughters of the metropolitan see. The metropolitan bishop is the natural center of unity for the bishops of the province. … The bishops of the metropolitan sees acquired certain rights which were delegated to them by their brother bishops. Moreover, among the most important churches a certain order of precedence grew up which corresponded with the civil dignity of the cities in which those churches existed; and finally the churches which were founded by the apostles were treated with peculiar reverence."

_F. W. Puller, The Primitive Saints and the See of Rome, pages 11 and 18._

"The triumph of the episcopal system undoubtedly promoted unity, order, and tranquillity. But, on the other hand, it was unfavourable to the free development of the life of the church; and while the latter promoted the formation of a priesthood foreign to the essence of that development of the kingdom of God which the New Testament sets forth, on the other hand a revolution of sentiment which had already been prepared—an altered view of the idea of the priesthood—had no small influence on the development of the episcopal system. Thus does this change of the original constitution of the Christian communities stand intimately connected with another and still more radical change,—the formation of a sacerdotal caste in the Christian church. … Out of the husk of Judaism Christianity had evolved itself to freedom and independence,—had stripped off the forms in which it first sprang up, and within which the new spirit lay at first concealed, until by its own inherent power it broke through them. This development belonged more particularly to the Pauline position, from which proceeded the form of the church in the Gentile world. In the struggle with the Jewish elements which opposed the free development of Christianity, this principle had triumphantly made its way. In the churches of pagan Christians the new creation stood forth completely unfolded; but the Jewish principle, which had been vanquished, pressed in once more from another quarter. Humanity was as yet incapable of maintaining itself at the lofty position of pure spiritual religion. The Jewish position was better adapted to the mass, which needed first to be trained before it could apprehend Christianity in its purity,—needed to be disabused from paganism. Out of Christianity, now become independent, a principle once more sprang forth akin to the principles of the Old Testament,—a new outward shaping of the kingdom of God, a new discipline of the law which one day was to serve for the training of rude nations, a new tutorship for the spirit of humanity, until it should arrive at the maturity of the perfect manhood in Christ. This investiture of the Christian spirit in a form nearly akin to the position arrived at in the Old Testament, could not fail, after the fruitful principle had once made its appearance, to unfold itself more and more, and to bring to light one after another all the consequences which it involved; but there also began with it a reaction of the Christian consciousness as it yearned after freedom, which was continually bursting forth anew in an endless variety of appearances, until it attained its triumph at the Reformation."

_A. Neander, General History of the Christian Religion and Church, volume 1, section 2, B._

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"Though the forms of [pagan] religion had broken away, the spirit of religion was still quick; it had even developed: the sense of sin, an almost new phenomenon, began to invade Society and Philosophy; and along with this, an almost importunate craving after a revelation. The changed tone of philosophy, the spread of mysticism, the rapid growth of mystery-worship, the revived Platonism, are all articulate expressions of this need. The old Philosophy begins not only to preach but to pray: the new strives to catch the revealed voice of God in the oracles of less unfaithful days. … In the teeth of an organised and concentrated despotism a new society had grown up, self-supporting, self-regulated, a State within the State. Calm and assured amid a world that hid its fears only in blind excitement, free amid the servile, sanguine amid the despairing, Christians lived with an object. United in loyal fellowship by sacred pledges more binding than the sacramentum of the soldier, welded together by a stringent discipline, led by trained and tried commanders, the Church had succeeded in attaining unity. It had proved itself able to command self-devotion even to the death. It had not feared to assimilate the choicest fruits of the choicest intellects of East and West. … Yet the centripetal forces were stronger; Tertullian had died an heresiarch, and Origen but narrowly and somewhat of grace escaped a like fate. If rent with schisms and threatened with disintegration, the Church was still an undivided whole."

_G. H. Rendall, The Emperor Julian, Paganism and Christianity, pages 21-22._