§3 (1) The Council of Nicæa (part 1 of 3)

An ecumenical council was a new experiment. Local councils had long since grown to be a recognised organ of the Church both for legislation and for judicial proceedings. But no precedent as yet prescribed, no ecclesiastical law or theological principle had as yet enthroned, the General Council' as the supreme expression of the Church's mind. Constantine had already referred the case of the Donatists first to a select council at Rome under bishop Miltiades, then to what Augustine (Ep. 43) has been understood to call a plenarium ecclesiæ universæ concilium' at Arles in 314. This remedy for schism was now to be tried on a grander scale. That the heads of all the Churches of Christendom should meet in free and brotherly deliberation, and should testify to all the world their agreement in the Faith handed down independently but harmoniously from the earliest times in Churches widely remote in situation, and separated by differences of language, race, and civilisation, is a grand and impressive idea, an idea approximately realised at Nicæa as in no other assembly that has ever met. The testimony of such an assembly carries the strongest evidential weight; and the almost unanimous horror of the Nicene Bishops at the novelty and profaneness of Arianism condemns it irrevocably as alien to the immemorial belief of the Churches. But it was one thing to perceive this, another to formulate the positive belief of the Church in such a way as to exclude the heresy; one thing to agree in condemning Arian formulæ, another to agree upon an adequate test of orthodoxy. This was the problem which lay before the council, and with which only its more clearsighted members tenaciously grappled: this is the explanation of the reaction which followed, and which for more than a generation, for well nigh half a century after, placed its results in jeopardy. The number of bishops who met at Nicæa was over 250⁶ . They represented many nationalities (Euseb. ubi supra.), but only a handful came from the West, the chief being Hosius, Cæcilian of Carthage, and the presbyters sent by Silvester of Rome, whose age prevented his presence in person. The council lasted from the end of May till Aug. 25 (see D.C.A., 1389). With the many picturesque stories told of its incidents we have nothing to do (Stanley's Eastern Church, Socr. i. 10-12, Soz. i. 17, 18, Rufin. H. E. i. 3-5); but it may be well to note the division of parties. (1) Of thoroughgoing partisans of Arius, Secundus⁷ and Theonas alone scorned all compromise. But Eusebius of Nicomedia, Theognis, Bishop of Nicæa itself, and Maris of Chalcedon, also belonged to the inner circle of Arians by conviction (Socr. i. 8; Soz. i. 21 makes up the same number, but wrongly). The three last-named were pupils of Lucian (Philost. ii. 15). Some twelve others (the chief names are Athanasius of Anazarbus and Narcissus of Neronias, in Cilicia; Patrophilus of Scythopolis, Aetius of Lydda, Paulinus of Tyre, Theodotus of Laodicea, Gregory of Berytus, in Syria and Palestine; Menophantus of Ephesus; for a fuller discussion see Gwatk. p. 31, n. 3) completed the strength of the Arian party proper. (2) On the other hand a clearly formulated doctrinal position in contrast to Arianism was taken up by a minority only, although this minority carried the day. Alexander of Alexandria of course was the rallying point of this wing, but the choice of the formula proceeded from other minds. gpostasis and housia are one in the Nicene formula: Alexander in 323 writes of treis upostaseis.

The test formula of Nicæa was the work of two concurrent influences, that of the anti-Origenists of the East, especially Marcellus of Ancyra, Eustathius of Antioch, supported by Macarius of Ælia,' Hellanicus of Tripolis, and Asclepas of Gaza, and that of the Western bishops, especially Hosius of Cordova. The latter fact explains the energetic intervention of Constantine at the critical moment on behalf of the test (see below, and Ep. Eus. p. 75); the word was commended to the Fathers by Constantine, but Constantine was prompted' by Hosius (Harnack, Dogmg. ii. 226); houtos ten en Nikai& 139; piotin exetheto (infr. p. 285, §42). Alexander (the Origenist) had been prepared for this by Hosius beforehand (Soc. iii. 7; Philost. i. 7; cf. Zahn Marcell. p. 23, and Harnack's important note, p. 229). Least of all was Athanasius the author of the homoousion; his whole attitude toward the famous test (infr. p. 303) is that of loyal acceptance and assimilation rather than of native inward affinity. He was moulded by the Nicene Creed, did not mould it himself' (Loofs, p. 134). The theological keynote of the council was struck by a small minority; Eustathius, Marcellus, perhaps Macarius, and the Westerns, above all Hosius; the numbers were doubtless contributed by the Egyptian bishops who had condemned Arius in 321. The signatures, which seem partly incorrect, preserve a list of about 20. The party then which rallied round Alexander in formal opposition to the Arians may be put down at over thirty. The men who best understood Arianism were most decided on the necessity of its formal condemnation.' (Gwatkin.) To this compact and determined group the result of the council was due, and in their struggle they owed much—how much it is hard to determine—to the energy and eloquence of the deacon Athanasius, who had accompanied his bishop to the council as an indispensable companion (infr. p. 103; Soz. i. 17 fin.). (3) Between the convinced Arians and their reasoned opponents lay the great mass of the bishops, 200 and more, nearly all from Syria and Asia Minor, who wished for nothing more than that they might hand on to those who came after them the faith they had received at baptism, and had learned from their predecessors. These were the conservatives⁸ ,' or middle party, composed of all those who, for whatever reason, while untainted with Arianism, yet either failed to feel its urgent danger to the Church, or else to hold steadily in view the necessity of an adequate test if it was to be banished. Simple shepherds like Spyridion of Cyprus; men of the world who were more interested in their libelli than in the magnitude of the doctrinal issue; theologians, a numerous class, who on the basis of half-understood Origenist ideas were prepared to recognise in Christ only the Mediator appointed (no doubt before all ages) between God and the World' (Zahn Marc. p. 30); men who in the best of faith yet failed from lack of intellectual clearsightedness to grasp the question for themselves; a few, possibly, who were inclined to think that Arius was hardly used and might be right after all; such were the main elements which made up the mass of the council, and upon whose indefiniteness, sympathy, or unwillingness to impose any effective test, the Arian party based their hopes at any rate of toleration. Spokesman and leader of the middle party was the most learned Churchman of the age, Eusebius of Cæsarea. A devoted admirer of Origen, but independent of the school of Lucian, he had, during the early stages of the controversy, thrown his weight on the side of toleration for Arius. He had himself used compromising language, and in his letter to the Cæsarean Church (infra, p. 76 sq.) does so again. But equally strong language can be cited from him on the other side, and belonging as he does properly to the pre-Nicene age, it is highly invidious to make the most of his Arianising passages, and, ignoring or explaining away those on the other side, and depreciating his splendid and lasting services to Christian learning, to class him summarily with his namesake of Nicomedia⁹ . (See Prolegg. to vol. 1 of this series, and above all the article in D.C.B.) The fact however remains, that Eusebius gave something more than moral support to the Arians. He was neither a great man nor a clear thinker' (Gwatkin); his own theology was hazy and involved; as an Origenist, his main dread was of Monarchianism, and his policy in the council was to stave off at least such a condemnation of Arianism as should open the door to confounding the Persons.' Eusebius apparently represents, therefore, the left wing,' or the last mentioned, of the conservative' elements in the council (supra, and Gwatkin, p. 38); but his learning, age, position, and the ascendency of Origenist Theology in the East, marked him out as the leader of the whole.

But the conservatism' of the great mass of bishops rejected Arianism more promptly than had been expected by its adherents or patrons.

The real work of the council did not begin at once. The way was blocked by innumerable applications to the Christian Emperor from bishops and clergy, mainly for the redress of personal grievances. Commonplace men often fail to see the proportion of things, and to rise to the magnitude of the events in which they play their part. At last Constantine appointed a day for the formal and final reception of all personal complaints, and burnt the libelli' in the presence of the assembled fathers. He then named a day by which the bishops were to be ready for a formal decision of the matters in dispute. The way was now open for the leaders to set to work. Quasi-formal meetings were held, Arius and his supporters met the bishops, and the situation began to clear (Soz. i. 17). To their dismay (de Decr. 3) the Arian leaders realised that they could only count on some seventeen supporters out of the entire body of bishops. They would seem to have seriously and honestly underrated the novelty of their own teaching (cf. the letter of Arius in Thdt. i. 5), and to have come to the council with the expectation of victory over the party of Alexander. But they discovered their mistake:—

Sectamur ultro, quos opimus

Fallere et effugere est triumphus."

Fallere et effugere' was in fact the problem which now confronted them. It seems to have been agreed at an early stage, perhaps it was understood from the first, that some formula of the unanimous belief of the Church must be fixed upon to make an end of controversy. The Alexandrians and Conservatives' confronted the Arians with the traditional Scriptural phrases (pp. 163, 491) which appeared to leave no doubt as to the eternal Godhead of the Son. But to their surprise they were met with perfect acquiescence. Only as each test was propounded, it was observed that the suspected party whispered and gesticulated to one another, evidently hinting that each could be safely accepted, since it admitted of evasion. If their assent was asked to the formula like to the Father in all things,' it was given with the reservation that man as such is the image and glory of God.' The power of God' elicited the whispered explanation that the host of Israel was spoken of as dunamis kuriou, and that even the locust and caterpillar are called the power of God.' The eternity' of the Son was countered by the text, We that live are alway (2 Cor. iv. 11)!' The fathers were baffled, and the test of homoousion, with which the minority had been ready from the first, was being forced (p. 172) upon the majority by the evasions of the Arians. When the day for the decisive meeting arrived it was felt that the choice lay between the adoption of the word, cost what it might, and the admission of Arianism to a position of toleration and influence in the Church. But then, was Arianism all that Alexander and Eustathius made it out to be? was Arianism so very intolerable, that this novel test must be imposed on the Church? The answer came (Newman Ar. 4 p. 252) from Eusebius of Nicomedia. Upon the assembling of the bishops for their momentous debate (hos de ezeteito tes pisteos ho tropos, Eustath.) he presented them with a statement of his belief. The previous course of events may have convinced him that half-measures would defeat their own purpose, and that a challenge to the enemy, a forlorn hope, was the only resort left to him¹⁰ . At any rate the statement was an unambiguous assertion of the Arian formulæ, and it cleared the situation at once. An angry clamour silenced the innovator, and his document was publicly torn to shreds (hup' opsei panton, says an eye-witness in Thdt. i. 8). Even the majority of the Arians were cowed, and the party were reduced to the inner circle of five (supra). It was now agreed on all hands that a stringent formula was needed. But Eusebius of Cæsarea came forward with a last effort to stave off the inevitable. He produced a formula, not of his own devising (Kölling, pp. 208 sqq.), but consisting of the creed of his own Church with an addition intended to guard against Sabellianism (Hort, Two Diss. pp. 56, sq. 138). The formula was unassailable on the basis of Scripture and of tradition. No one had a word to say against it, and the Emperor expressed his personal anxiety that it should be adopted, with the single improvement of the homoousion. The suggestion thus quietly made was momentous in its result. We cannot but recognise the prompter' Hosius behind the Imperial recommendation: the friends of Alexander had patiently waited their time, and now their time was come: the two Eusebii had placed the result in their hands. But how and where was the necessary word to be inserted? and if some change must be made in the Cæsarean formula, would it not be as well to set one or two other details right? At any rate, the creed of Eusebius was carefully overhauled clause by clause, and eventually took a form materially different from that in which it was first presented¹¹ , and with affinities to the creeds of Antioch and Jerusalem as well as Cæsarea.

All was now ready; the creed, the result of minute and careful deliberations (we do not know their history, nor even how long they occupied¹² ), lay before the council. We are told the council paused.' The evidence fails us; but it may well have been so. All the bishops who were genuinely horrified at the naked Arianism of Eusebius of Nicomedia were yet far from sharing the clearsighted definiteness of the few: they knew that the test proposed was not in Scripture, that it had a suspicious history in the Church. The history of the subsequent generation shews that the mind of Eastern Christendom was not wholly ripe for its adoption. But the fathers were reminded of the previous discussions, of the futility of the Scriptural tests, of the locust and the caterpillar, of the whisperings, the nods, winks, and evasions. With a great revulsion of feeling the council closed its ranks and marched triumphantly to its conclusion. All signed,—all but two, Secundus and Theonas. Maris signed and Theognis, Menophantus and Patrophilus, and all the rest. Eusebius of Nicomedia signed; signed everything, even the condemnation of his own convictions and of his genuine fellow-Lucianist' Arius; not the last time that an Arian leader was found to turn against a friend in the hour of trial. Eusebius justified his signature by a mental reservation;' but we can sympathise with the bitter scorn of Secundus, who as he departed to his exile warned Eusebius that he would not long escape the same fate (Philost. i. 9).

The council broke up after being entertained by the Emperor at a sumptuous banquet in honour of his Vicennalia. The recalcitrant bishops with Arius and some others were sent into exile (an unhappy and fateful precedent), a fate which soon after overtook Eusebius of Nicomedia and Theognis (see the discussion in D.C.B. ii. 364 sq.). But in 329 we find Eusebius once more in high favour with Constantine, discharging his episcopal functions, persuading Constantine that he and Arius held substantially the Creed of Nicæa.'

The council also dealt with the Paschal question (see Vit. Const. iii. 18; so far as the question bears on Athanasius see below, p. 500), and with the Meletian schism in Egypt. The latter was the main subject of a letter (Soc. i. 9; Thdt. i. 9) to the Alexandrian Church. Meletius himself was to retain the honorary title of bishop, to remain strictly at home, and to be in lay communion for the rest of his life. The bishops and clergy of his party were to receive a mustikotera cheirotonia (see Bright, Notes on Canons, pp. 25 sqq.; Gore, The Church and the Ministry, ed. 1, p. 192 note), and to be allowed to discharge their office, but in the strictest subordination to the Catholic Clergy of Alexander. But on vacancies occurring, the Meletian incumbents were to succeed subject to (1) their fitness, (2) the wishes of the people, (3) the approval of the Bishop of Alexandria. The terms were mild, and even the gentle nature of Alexander seems to have feared that immediate peace might have been purchased at the expense of future trouble (his successor openly blames the compromise, p. 131, and more strongly p. 137); accordingly, before carrying out the settlement he required Meletius to draw up an exact list of his clergy at the time of the council, so as to bar an indefinite multiplication of claims. Meletius, who must have been even less pleased with the settlement than his metropolitan, seems to have taken his time. At last nothing would satisfy both parties but the personal presentation of the Meletian bishops from all Egypt, and of their clergy from Alexandria itself, to Alexander (p. 137, toutous kai parontas paredoken to 'Alexandro), who was thus enabled to check the Brevium or schedule handed in by their chief¹³ . All this must have taken a long time after Alexander's return, and the peace was soon broken by his death.

Five months after the conclusion of the negotiations, Alexander having now died, the flame of schism broke out afresh (infr. p. 131. Montfaucon, in Migne xxv. p. lvii., shews conclusively that the above is the meaning of the menas pente.) On his death-bed, Alexander called for Athanasius. He was away from Alexandria, but the other deacon of that name (see signatures p. 71), stepped forward in answer to the call. But without noticing him, the Bishop repeated the name, adding, You think to escape, but it cannot be.' (Sozom. ii. 17.) Alexander had already written his Easter Letter for the year 328 (it was apparently still extant at the end of the century, p. 503). He died on April 17 of that year (Pharmuthi 22), and on the eighth of June Athanasius was chosen bishop in his stead.

§3 (2). The situation after the Council of Nicæa.

The council (a) had testified, by its horrified and spontaneous rejection of it, that Arianism was a novelty subversive of the Christian faith as they had received it from their fathers. They had (b) banished it from the Church by an inexorable test, which even the leading supporters of Arius had been induced to subscribe. In the years immediately following, we find (c) a large majority of the Eastern bishops, especially of Syria and Asia Minor, the very regions whence the numerical strength of the council was drawn, in full reaction against the council; first against the leaders of the victorious party, eventually and for nearly a whole generation against the symbol itself; the final victory of the latter in the East being the result of the slow growth of conviction, a growth independent of the authority of the council which it eventually was led to recognise. To understand this paradox of history, which determines the whole story of the life of Athanasius as bishop, it is necessary to estimate at some length the theological and ecclesiastical situation at the close of the council: this will best be done by examining each point in turn (a) the novelty of Arianism, (b) the homoousion as a theological formula, (c) the materials for reaction.

(a) Arianism was a new doctrine in the Church' (Harnack, p. 218); but it claimed to be no novelty. And it was successful for a long time in gaining conservative' patronage. Its novelty, as observed above, is sufficiently shewn by its reception at the Council of Nicæa. But no novelty springs into existence without antecedents. What were the antecedents of Arianism? How does it stand related to the history within the Church of the momentous question, What think ye of Christ?'

In examining such a question, two methods are possible. We may take as our point of departure the formulated dogma say of Nicæa, and examine in the light of it variations in theological statements in preceding periods, to shew that they do not warrant us in regarding the dogma as an innovation. That is the dogmatic method. Or we may take our start from the beginning, and trace the history of doctrine in the order of cause and effect, so as to detect the divergence and convergence of streams of influence, and arrive at an answer to the question, How came men to think and speak as they did? That is the historical method. Both methods have their recommendations, and either has been ably applied to the problem before us. In electing the latter I choose the more difficult road; but I do so with the conviction, firstly, that the former has tended (and especially in the ablest hands) to obscure our perception of the actual facts, secondly, that the saving faith of Christ has everything to gain from a method which appeals directly to our sense of historical truth, and satisfies, not merely overawes, the mind.

Let us then go back to the beginning of the Gospel.' Taking the synoptic gospels as our primary evidence, we ask, what did Christ our Lord teach about Himself? We do not find formal definitions of doctrine concerning His Person. Doubtless it may seem that such a definition on His part would have saved infinite dispute and searchings of heart in the history of the Church. But recognising in Him the unique and supreme Revealer of the Father, it is not for us to say what He should have taught; we must accept His method of teaching as that which Divine Wisdom chose as the best, and its sequel in history as the way in which God willed man to learn. We find then in the materials which we possess for the history of His Life and Teaching fully enough to explain the belief of His disciples (see below) in His Divinity. Firstly, there is no serious doubt as to His claim to be the Messiah. (The confession of Peter in all four Gospels, Matt. xvi. 16; Mark viii. 29; Luke ix. 27; John vi. 69; Son of Man,' Dan. vii. 13; ix. 24, &c.). In this character He is King in the kingdom of Heaven (Matt. xxv. 31-36, cf. Mk. viii. 38), and revises the Law with full authority (Matt. v. 21-44, cf. Luke v. 24; Matt. xii. 8). It may be added that whatever this claim conveyed to the Jews of His own time (see Stanton's Jewish 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, Psalms, vol. i. pp. 94, 95, last English ed.). Secondly, Christ enjoys and confers the full authority of God (Matt. x. 40; Luke x. 16; cf. also Matt. xxiv. 35; Mk. xiii. 31; Luke xxi. 33), gives and promises the Holy Spirit (the Spirit of the Father,' see Matt. x. 17, &c.; Luke xii. 12, and especially Luke xxi. 15, ego gar doso, &c.), and apparently sends the prophets and holy men of old (cf. Matt. xxiii. 34, ego apostello 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; Matt. xi. 27), No man knoweth [who] the Son [is], save the Father, neither knoweth any man [who] the Father [is] save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will (bouletai) reveal Him.' Observe the reciprocity of knowledge between the Son and the Father. This claim is a decisive instantia foederis 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 sqq.) is given by him as common ground between himself and the older Apostles follows strictly from the fact that the verb used (parelabon) links the facts of Redemption (v. 3, 4) with the personal experiences of the original disciples (5 sqq.). 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 in kind (for no revelation of God to man could surpass the degree of Ex. xxxiii. 11) had taken place, an unique revelation of God in 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 implied 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 Stuloi 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, Leitf. §11. 2, 3); secondly, that while emancipation from legalism in the Apostolic Church implied 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, 11, 13, where Kurion 'Iesoun = auton = Kurion = hvhy 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, Dial. 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 In what sense is Christ God? The synoptic record makes no explicit 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 portrait 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, monogenes Theos) Jesus Christ is expressly identified with the creative Word (Palestinian Memra, rather than Alexandrian or from Philo; see also Rev. xix. 13), and the Word with God. Moreover such passages as Philipp. ii. 6 sqq., 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. 13; Melito Fr. 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 Ægean. 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 at the same time full of intuitive originality' (Loofs, p. 61). The central idea is that of the renovation of man (Eph. 20), now under the power of Satan and Death (ib. 3, 19), which are undone (katalusis) in Christ, the risen Saviour (Smyrn. 3), who is our true Life,' and endows us with immortality (Smyrn. 4, Magn. 6, Eph. 17). This is by virtue of His Divinity (Eph. 19, Smyrn. 4) in union with His perfect Manhood. He is the only utterance of God (logos apo siges proelthon, Magn. 8), the unlying mouth by which the Father spake' (Rom. 8.) God come (genomenos) in the flesh,' our God' (Eph. 7, 18). His flesh partaken mystically in the Eucharist unites our nature to His, is the medicine of incorruption' (Eph. 20, Smyrn. 7, cf. Trall. 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' (Eph. 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 (Magn. 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 sqq.). To this he opposes what is evidently a creed (Trall. 9), with emphasis on the reality (alethos) of all the facts of Redemption comprised in it.

It 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. Smyrn. 8); but the Gnostic and Montanist controversies compelled the Churches which held fast to the paradosis of the Apostles to close their ranks (episcopal federation) and to reflect upon their creed. The Baptismal Creed (Rom. x. 9, Acts viii. 37, Text. Rec., cf. 1 Cor. xv. 3-4) began to serve as a tessera 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, ubi 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' (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 (logos spermatikos), 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, Apol. 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 such known to man, but in Himself Unoriginate (agenetos), ineffable, mysterious (arretos), 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. Dial. 62), but was begotten' or projected (probletheis) by the will of the Father (ib. 128) as God from God, as a flame from fire. He is, like the Father, ineffable (Christos, Just. Apol. ii. 6), yet is the angelos, huperetes of the Father. In particular He is the Father's minister in Creation: to create He proceeded from the Father, a doctrine expressly deduced from Prov. viii. 22 (Dial. 61, 129). Before this He was the logos endiathetos, after it the logos prophorikos, 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 Christian theology as philosophers. Especially the Person of the Saviour is regarded by them from the cosmological, not 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 influence of their philosophy rather than of their religion, start from the cosmological aspect of the problem. They engraft upon an Apostolic (Johannine) title of the Saviour an Alexandrine group of associations: they go far towards transmuting the Word of St. John to the Logos of Philo and the Eclectics. Hence their view of His Divinity and of his relation to the Father is embarrassed. His eternity and His generation are felt to be hardly compatible: His distinct Personality is maintained at the expense of His true Divinity. He is God, and not the One God; He can manifest Himself (Theophanies) in a way the One God cannot; He is an intermediary between God and the world. The question has become philosophical rather than directly religious, and philosophy cannot solve it. But on the other hand, Justin was no Arian. If he was Philosopher, he was also Martyr. The Apologists are deeply saturated with Christian piety and personal enthusiastic devotion to Christ. Justin in particular introduces us, as no other so early writer, into the life, the worship, the simple faith of the Primitive Church, and we can trace in him influences of the deeper theology of Asia Minor (Loofs, p. 72 sq. but see more fully the noble article on Justin in D.C.B. vol. iii.). But our concern is with their influence on the analysis of the object of faith; and here we see that unconsciously they have severed the Incarnate Son from the Eternal Father: not God (ho ontos theos) but a subordinate divine being is revealed in Christ: the Logos, to adopt the words of Ignatius, is no longer a true breach of the Divine Silence.

We must now glance at the important period of developed Catholicism marked especially by the names of Irenæus, Tertullian, and Clement, the period of a consolidated organisation, a (relatively) fixed Canon of the New Testament, and a catholic rule of faith (see above, and Lumby, Creeds, ch. i.; Heurtley, Harmonia Symbolica, i.-viii.). The problem of the period which now begins (180-250) was that of Monarchianism; the Divinity of Christ must be reconciled with the Unity of God. Monarchianism is in itself the expression of the truth common to all monotheism, that the arche or Originative Principle is strictly and Personally One and one only (in contrast to the plurality of archikai hupostaseis, see Newman, Arians^4, p. 112 note). No Christian deliberately maintains the contrary. The Apologists, as we have seen, tended to emphasise the distinction of Father and Son; but this tendency makes of necessity in the direction of subordination;' and any distinction of Persons' or Hypostases in the Godhead involves to a Monotheist some subordination, in order to save the principle of the Divine Monarchia.' 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 Irenæus. (He is said to have written against it,' Newman, Ar.^4, p. 117, citing Dodw. in Iren.) This scholar of pupils of Apostles stands in the lines of the Asiatic theology. He is the successor of Ignatius and Polycarp. We find him, 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 with Christ (a remarkable point of contact with Athanasius, see note on de Incar. 54. 3); incorruption is 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 Trinitas, which he is the first to use (trias first in the Asiatic 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 probole (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).

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. Either 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 Son 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. H. E. 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.¹⁴ In the one case His Personality is divine, in the other human. Now there is clear proof of a strong Modalist tendency¹⁵ 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 (Zephurinon andra idioten kai apeiron ton ekklesiastikon horon, Hipp. idiotes quisque aut perversus,' simplices, ne dicam imprudentes et idiotæ.' 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 bishop¹⁶ 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.) ton Patera sumpeponthenai to hui& 254;, 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 strictly modalist Sabellius, who from about 215 takes the place of Cleomenes at the head of Roman Monarchianism (his doctrine of the huiopator, of the Trinity as successive prosopa, aspects,' of the One God, pure modalism as defined above) scorned compromise (he constantly reproached Callistus with having changed his front, Hipp.) 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 in 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 communio substantiæ'—in other words the homoousion. Monarchianism was condemned in the West; its further history belongs to the East (under the name of Sabellianism first in Libya: see pp. 173, sqq.). But the hold which it maintained upon the Roman Church for about a generation (190-220) left its mark. Rome condemned Origen, the ally of Hippolytus; Rome was invoked against Dionysius of Alexandria; (Rome and) the West formulated the homoousion at Nicæa; Rome received Marcellus; Rome rejected the treis hupostaseis and supported the Eustathians at Antioch; it was with Rome rather than with the prevalent theology of the East that Athanasius felt himself one. (Cf. also Harnack, Dg. 1^1, p. 622 sqq.) Monarchianism was too little in harmony with the New Testament, or with the traditional convictions of the Churches, to live as a formulated theology. The naive modalism' of the simplices quae major semper pars credentium est' (Tert.) was corrected as soon as the attempt was made to give it formal expression¹⁷ . But the attempt to do so was a valuable challenge to the conception of God involved in the system of the Apologists. To their abstract, transcendent, philosophical first Principle, Monarchianism opposed a living, self-revealing, redeeming God, made known in Christ. This was a great gain. But it was obtained at the expense of the divine immutability. A God who passed through phases or modes, now Father, now Son, now Spirit, a God who could suffer, was not the God of the Christians. There is some justice in Tertullian's scoff at their Deum versipellem.'

The third great name associated with the end of the second century, that of Clement, is important to us chiefly as that of the teacher of Origen, whose influence we must now attempt to estimate. Origen (185-254) was the first theologian in the full sense of the term; the first, that is, to erect upon the basis of the rule of faith (Preface to de Princ.) a complete theological system, synthesising revealed religion with a theory of the Universe, of God, of man, which should take into account the entire range of truth and knowledge, of faith and philosophy. And in this sense for the Eastern Church he was the last theologian as well. In the case of Origen the Vincentian epigram, absolvuntur magistri condemnantur discipuli (too often applicable in the history of doctrine) is reversed. In a modified form his theology from the first took possession of the Eastern Church; in the Cappadocian fathers it took out a new lease of power, in spite of many vicissitudes it conquered opposing forces (the sixth general council crushed the party who had prevailed at the fifth); John of Damascus, in whom the Eastern Church says its last word, depends upon the Origenist theology of Basil and the Gregories. But this theology was Origenism with a difference. What was the Origenism of Origen? To condense into the compass of our present purpose the many-sidedness of Origen is a hopeless task. The reader will turn to the fifth and sixth of Bigg's Bampton Lectures for the best recent presentation; to Newman's Arians (I. §3), especially the apology' at the end); to Harnack (ed. 1, pp. 510-556) and Loofs (§28); Shedd (vol. i. 288-305, should be read before Bigg and corrected by him) and Dorner; to the sections in Bull (Defens. ii. 9, iii. 3) and Petavius (who in Trin. I. iv. pursues with fluent malignity omnigenis errorum portentis infamem scriptorem'); to the Origeniana of Huet and the dissertations of the standard editors; to the article Origenist Controversies, and to the comprehensive, exact, and sympathetic article Origen in the Dictionary of Christian Biography. The fundamental works of Origen for our purpose are the de Principiis, the contra Celsum, and the de Oratione; but the exegetical works are necessary to fill out and correct first impressions.

The general position of Origen with regard to the Person of Christ is akin to that of Hippolytus and Tertullian. It is to some extent determined by opposition to Gnosticism and to Monarchianism. His visit to Rome (Eus. H. E., vi. 14) coincided with the battle of Hippolytus against Zephyrinus and his destined successor: on practical as well as on doctrinal points he was at one with Hippolytus. His doctrine of God is reached by the soteriological rather than the cosmological method. God is known to us in the Incarnate Word; his point of view is moral, not...pseudo-metaphysical.' The impassibility of the abstract philosophical idea of God is broken into by the passion of Love' (Bigg, p. 158). In opposition to the perfection of God lies the material world, conditioned by evil, the result of the exercise of will. This cause of evil is antecedent to the genesis of the material universe, the katabole kosmou; materiality is the penalty and measure of evil. (This part of Origen's doctrine is markedly Platonic. Plotinus, we read, refused to observe his own birthday; in like manner Origen quaintly notes that only wicked men are recorded in Scripture to have kept their birthdays; Bigg, 203, note; cf. Harnack, p. 523, note.) The soul (psuche as if from psuchesthai) has in a previous state waxed cold,' i.e. lost its original integrity, and in this condition enters the body, i.e. is subjected to vanity' in common with the rest of the creature, and needs redemption (qualify this by Bigg, pp. 202 sqq., on Origen's belief in Original Sin). To meet this need the Word takes a Soul (but one that has never swerved from Him in its pre-existent state: on this antinomy Bigg, 190, note, 199) and mediante Anima, or rather mediante hac substantia animæ (Prin. II. vi.) unites the nature of God and of Man in One. (On the union of the two natures in the theanthropos, in Ezek. iii. 3, he is as precise as Tertullian: we find the Hypostatic Union and Communicatio Idiomatum formally explicit; Bigg, 190.) The Word deifies' Human Nature, first His Own, then in others as well (Cels. iii. 28, hina genetui theia: he does not use theopoieisthai; the thought is subtly but really different from that which we found in Irenæus: see Harnack, p. 551), by that perfect apprehension of Him hoper en prin genetai sarx, of which faith in the Incarnate is the earliest but not the final stage (applying 2 Cor. v. 16; cf. the Commentary on the Song of Songs).