08. Chapter 7: The Church Deteriorates, 100-461

CHAPTER 7 The Church Deteriorates, 100-461

1. Many Evils Were Present From the above dates you will notice that in this chapter we shall again go through a part of the same period of time already cov­ered in the previous chapters. What has been told you so far is not all that happened during the first five hundred years of the Church’s existence. The history of the Church is not a simple but a very complicated story. Many dif­ferent things happened at the same time.

What we have learned about the history of the Church so far is, for the most part, very good and in­spiring. We saw the Church, heaven-born on the day of Pentecost, growing both outwardly and in­wardly. We saw it emerge from bloody persecutions, victorious over heathenism and firmly estab­lishing its position. But in this same time also many things happened which are not so pleasant and inspiring. We shall learn about those things in this chapter. The story we tell about the Church should be a true story. We should face the facts as they are. What we learned in the pre­vious chapters is true, but it is not the whole truth. It is a true pic­ture, but it is not a complete pic­ture.

2. Signs of Deterioration Can Be Detected from the Very Be­ginning In the epistles of the apostles, and in the letters to the seven churches in Asia which Christ him­self dictated to John on Patmos, we can already detect references to the first faint beginnings of deterioration. The Apostolic Age came to a close around the year 100. The apostles were followed by the Apostolic Fathers (ch. 3, sec. 3). From their writings we can see that, in the time immediately fol­lowing the death of the apostles, the signs of deterioration were be­coming more noticeable. In the course of the next four hundred years that deterioration increased steadily. By the year 500, that is, toward the end of the time we have studied so far, we find strange and wide departures from the teach­ings of God’s Word, in both doc­trine and practice.

    Toward the end of the fifth century the following unscriptural ideas and practices had become deeply rooted in the Church: Exor­cism (expelling of evil spirits); prayers for the dead; a belief in purgatory (place in which souls are purified after death before they can enter heaven); the forty-day Lenten season; the view that the Lord’s supper is a sacrifice, and that its administrators are priests; a sharp division of the members of the church into clergy (officers of the church) and laity (ordinary church members); the veneration (adoration) of martyrs and saints, and above all the adoration of Mary; the burning of tapers or candles in their honor; veneration of the relics of martyrs and saints; the ascription of magical powers to these relics; pictures, images, and altars in the churches; gor­geous vestments for the clergy; more and more elaborate and splendid ritual (form of worship); less and less preaching: pilgrim­ages to holy places (ch. 19, sec. 2); monasticism (sec. 5); worldliness; persecution of heathen and here­tics.

3. The Causes of Deterioration Are Many

You may wonder at this great and sad deterioration of the Church. You will soon cease to wonder when you take notice of certain things thus far touched on only very lightly. Without tracing the origin and development of these deteriorations in detail, let us together consider some of the causes that were at work to bring them about. The snow freshly fallen from heaven is pure white. Soon it is soiled with the dirt of earth. The heaven-born Church was soon polluted when it came into contact with a sinful world.

First of all there were the Chris­tians themselves. Every Christian is a saint, but every saint is a sinner. Even when regenerated, the sinner still has an inborn tend­ency to commit sin and error.

Next, there is the Bible. In a way the Bible is plain. But because it is the Word of God it is also very deep. It took the Church centuries to study out the meaning of the Bible, and that task is not yet finished. The ancient Church mis­understood and misinterpreted certain teachings of the Old Tes­tament, of Christ, and of the apostles.

Finally, there was he heathen environment (surroundings). For centuries heathenism continued to exist. The Church grew and de­veloped in a heathen world. The whole life of the people was sat­urated with heathen ideas. When Constantine the Great gave the Christians freedom of religion, and when he showered favors upon the Church, thousands upon thousands of heathen flocked into the Church without having become true Chris­tians. A flood of worldliness en­gulfed the Church. It was over­whelmed, and could not handle the situation. So many heathen clam­ored for admission that the Church was not able to instruct them all properly in the Christian religion. They took their heathen ideas along with them into the Church. The moment of the Church’s vic­tory over heathenism became the hour of the Church’s greatest dan­ger from heathenism.

4.Heathenism Influences the Early Church

All heathen religions had their sacrifices, their priests, and their altars. Soon the Church had its sacrifice, its priests, and its altars. The heathen had gods innumera­ble, and their images were to be seen on every hand. Soon martyrs and saints took the place of the old heathen gods, and their images and those of Christ and of Mary appeared in the churches. Hea­thendom was full of superstition. Soon that superstition was trans­ferred to pieces of the cross, and to the relics of saints and martyrs, such as bones and hair and frag­ments of clothing. Emperor Julian the Apostate called the Christians bone worshippers. In many lands among the heathen there were monks. Before long many Chris­tians became monks and nuns.

5. Monasticism Develops

Christian monasticism began in Egypt. Its founder was Anthony of Thebes. About the year 270 he took up the life of a monk in his native village. After some fifteen years he went to live alone in a cave in the desert, and thus be­came what is known as a hermit — one who withdraws from the world and lives alone. Many followed his example. Others lived together in large houses called monasteries, in which each monk had his cell. From Egypt monasticism spread rapidly over the entire East. Some­times it took very queer forms. In Syria a certain Simon lived for thirty years, until the very day of his death, on top of a pillar or stylus. He built several pillars, each one higher than the one before. His last pillar was sixty feet high and the top four feet square. He is known as Simon Stylites. Between the fifth and the twelfth centuries there were many pillar saints in Syria. On a trip to Rome, Athanasius introduced monasti­cism into the West. Ambrose, Jerome, and Augustine (ch. 6, sec. 5, 6, and 7) did much to promote it. Monasticism was to be one of the outstanding features of the life of the Middle Ages.

MONKS IN THE DINING ROOM OF THEIR MONASTERY
Religious News Service

Why did people become monks and nuns? They did so for various reasons, but the original motive was to flee from a world that was wicked in order to lead a holy life.

6. The Church Begins to Persecute Heretics

Almost as soon as the heathen stopped persecution of the Church, the Church began to persecute the heathen and also the heretics. The Church at this time did not tor­ture or put persons to death (ch. 22, sec. 5). But the emperors who were now Christians forbade heathen worship, and banished many of the leading heretics. Sometimes Christians persecuted each other. Through the scheming of Theophilus, bishop of Alexan­dria, the greatest preacher of the Church was banished to a far dis­tant, miserable little village. This preacher was Chrysostom, bishop of Constantinople. The name Chry­sostom means golden mouth. This name had been given to him be­cause he was the most eloquent preacher the ancient Church pro­duced. Now an old man, he was forced to march barefooted through the hot sand and bare­headed under a blazing sun. He died on the way.

Augustine advocated persecu­tion on the basis of a statement in one of the parables of Jesus: "Compel them to come in" (Luke 14:23). This idea was to bear bitter fruit in the persecutions of the Middle Ages and of the time of the Reformation (ch. 22. sec. 5; ch. 30, sec. 6).