Chapter V: [369] "Adfirmabant autem [i.e., the Christians under examination] hanc

[369] "Adfirmabant autem [i.e., the Christians under examination] hanc fuisse summam vel culpae suae vel erroris, quod essent soliti stato die ante lucem convenire carmenque Christo quasi deo dicere secum invicem, seque sacramento non in scelus aliquod obstringere, sed ne furta, ne latrocinia, ne adulteria committerent, ne fidem fallerent, ne depositum appellati abnegarent" ("They maintained that the head and front of their offending or error had been this, that they were accustomed on a stated day to assemble ere daylight and sing in turn a hymn to Christ as a god, and also that they bound themselves by an oath, not for any criminal end, but to avoid theft or robbery or adultery, never to break their word, or to repudiate a deposit when called upon to refund it").

[370] Both of course qualify their admission. Epictetus (Arrian, Epict. Diss., iv. 7. 6) declares that the Galileans' aphobia before tyrants was due to habit, while Aurelius attributes the readiness of Christians to die, to ostentation (Med. xi. 3).

[371] Extant in Arabic in the Hist. anteislam. Abulfedae (ed. Fleischer, p. 109). Cp. Kalbfleisch in the Festschrift für Gomperz (1902), pp. 96 f., and Norden's Kunstprosa, pp. 518 f.

[372] From the time of Justin (and probably even earlier) Christians were always pointing, by way of contrast to the heathen, to the group of their brethren and sisters who totally abjured marriage. Obviously they counted on the fact that such conduct would evoke applause and astonishment even among their opponents (even castration was known, as in the case of Origen and of another person mentioned by Justin). Nor was this calculation quite mistaken, for the religious philosophy of the age was ascetic. Still, the applause was not unanimous, even among strict moralists. The pagan in Macarius Magnes, III. xxxvi. (i.e., Porphyry) urged strongly against Paul that in 1 Tim. iv. 1 he censures those who forbid marriage, while in 1 Cor. 7 he recommends celibacy, even although he has to admit he has no word of the Lord upon virgins. "Then is it not wrong to live as a celibate, and also to refrain from marriage at the order of a mere man, seeing that there is no command of Jesus extant upon celibacy? And how can some women who live as virgins boast so loudly of the fact, declaring they are filled with the Holy Ghost like her who bore Jesus?" The suspicious attitude of the early Christians towards sexual intercourse (even in marriage) comes out in Paul unmistakably. On this point the apocryphal Acts of the Apostles (beginning with the Acts of Paul) are specially significant, as they mirror the popular ideas on the subject. The following facts may be set down in this connection. (1) Marriage was still tolerated as a concession to human weakness. (2) The restriction of sexual intercourse, or even entire abstinence from it, was advocated and urgently commended. (3) Second marriage was designated "a specious adultery" (heuprepes moicheia). (4) Virgins were persuaded to remain as they were. (5) Instead of marriage, platonic ties ("virgines subintroductæ") were formed, audaciously and riskily. Cp. Tertull., de Resurr., viii.: "Virginitas et viduitas et modesta in occulto matrimonii dissimulatio et una notitia eius ("Virginity and widowhood and secret self-restraint upon the marriage-bed and the sole practical recognition of that restraint [i.e., monogamy]"). Such, in the order of diminuendo, were the four forms assumed by sexual asceticism.

[373] "As a rule, men are unable to follow consecutively any argumentative speech, so that they need to be educated by means of parables. Just as in our own day we see the people who are called Christians seking their faith from parables. Still, they occasionally act just as true philosophers do. For their contempt of death is patent to us all, as is their abstinence from the use of sexual organs, by a certain impulse of modesty. For they include women and men who refrain from cohabiting all through their lives, and they also number individuals who in ruling and controlling themselves, and in their keen pursuit of virtue, have attained a pitch not inferior to that of real philosophers." Galen, of course, condemns the faith of Christians as a mere obstinate adherence to what is quite unproven: peri diaphoras sphugmon, II. iv. (hina me tis euthus kat' archas, hos eis Mousou kai Christou diatriben aphigmenos, nomon anapodeikton akoue--"That no one may hastily give credence to unproven laws, as if he had reached the way of life enjoined by Moses and Christ"), and III. iii. (thatton an tis tous apo Mousou kai Christou metadidaxeien e tous tais hairesi prostetekotas iatrous te kai philosophous--"One could more easily teach novelties to the adherents of Moses and Christ than to doctors and philosophers who are stuck fast in the schools").

[374] The number of those who lapsed during the persecutions of Decius and Diocletian was extraordinarily large; but Tertullian had already spoken of "people who are only Christians if the wind happens to be favorable" (Scorp., i.).

[375] The "Shepherd" of Hermas shows, however, the amount of trouble which even at an earlier period had to be encountered.

[376] It is surprising that the attractiveness of these (gnostic) ideas was not greater than it seems to have been. But by the time that they sought to establish their situation on Christian soil or to force their way in, the church's organization was well knit together, so that gnosticism could do no more in the way of breaking it up or creating a rival institution.

[377] The ascetics are not only the "perfect" but also the "religious," strictly speaking. Cp. Origen (Hom. ii. in Num., vol. x. p. 20), who describes virgins, ascetics, and so forth, as those "qui in professione religionis videntur"; also Hom. xvii. in Luc. (vol. v. p. 151), where, on 1 Cor. i. 2, he observes: "Memini cum interpretarer 1 Cor. i. 2 dixisse me diversitatem ecclesiae et eorum qui invocant nomen domini. Puto enim monogamum et virginem et eum, qui in castimonia perseverat, esse de ecclesia dei, eum vero, qui sit digamus, licet bonam habeat conversationem et ceteris virtutibus polleat, tamen non esse de ecclesia et de numero, qui non habent rugam aut maculam aut aliquid istius modi, sed esse de secundo gradu et de his qui invocant nomen domini, et qui salvantur quidem in nomine Jesu Christi, nequaquam tamen coronantur ab eo" (church = virgins, ascetics, and the once married: those who call on the name of the Lord = the second rank, i.e., the twice married, even though their lives are pure otherwise).

[378] Goethe, Wanderjahre xxiv., p. 243.

[379] Goethe (ibid., p. 255) has said the right word on this as well: "We draw a veil over those sufferings (the sufferings of Christ in particular), just because we reverence them so highly. We hold it is a damnable audacity to take these mysterious secrets, in which the depth of the divine sorrow lies hid, and play with them, fondle them, trick them out, and never rest until the supreme object of reverence appears vulgar and paltry." __________________________________________________________________