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III

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but you, gods, will give us Some faults to make us men.

Antony and Cleopatra (Act V) *.

.. You're too fond of your own ways.'

"Yes, I think I'm very fond of them. But I always want to know the things one shouldn't do.'

'So as to do them?' asked her aunt.

'So as to choose,' said Isabel.

H. JAMES, The-Portrait of a Lady B y exploding the thesis of dualism Clement had demonstrated to his satisfaction that some malevolent deity was not responsible for the creation of the universe and the presence of evil in it. In his anti-deterministic polemic Clement's essential point was that man was not totally irresponsible for his eternal destiny as the Gnostics believed. Man was 'determined' only in the sense that God by his omniscience knows whether each individual is lost or saved, but this judgement, Clement maintained, was made in the light of what action man would willingly either choose or neglect to perform. The responsibility, then, continues to fall back on man. It is here that Clement lays the blame for the origin of evil in the world. How this came about and what effect it had is the subject of the present inquiry.

Clement was not the first to single out man as responsible for evil. Late Jewish thought pondered this possibility. Paul derived his doctrine from this, and in turn transmitted it to early Christian tradition. Jewish thought was preoccupied with 'fall-speculation' after the Exile, when the sense of sin which this experience fostered! dramatized the contradiction between the words of Genesis—'*And God saw that it was good'—and the facts of human existence. The only rational explanation seemed to be that man's circumstances had been radically changed. The Jews searched the Scriptures for 1 See N. P. Williams, Ideas of the Fall and of Original Sin (London, 1927), pp. 18 f. ;

W. D. Davies, Paul and Rabbinic Judaism (London, 1948), pp. 44 f.

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an event which might explain this volte-face in the cosmic situation —a fall. The first post-Exilic Jewish exegetes explained this in the light of the angelic transgression described in Genesis 6: 1-4. The Sons of God who were inferior to Yahweh succumbed to lust and mingled their divine essence with the seed of men. In this manner evil was thought to have been introduced into humanity.!

In order to eradicate the blemish, the exigency of the Flood was introduced.? Satisfactory though this solution at first appeared, upon reflection it failed to explain the continuance of evil in man and the cosmos in a post-diluvian epoch. To say that the ghosts of the drowned giants were perpetrators of evil? hardly seemed sufficient. In view of this, Genesis 3 was turned to as a more plausible solution, and with it the emphasis shifted from angels to man.* From the Book of Jubilees onwards the Watcher-story completely disappears and a primitive version of the Adamnarrative replaces it as the generally accepted fall-story.s Paul, in turn, combined both these ideas. Blending the lust of the angelic strand of Genesis 6 and the disobedience of the Adam-event of Genesis 3, he also introduced the psychological ground contributed by Rabbinic Judaism. This school saw in man an 'evil imagination' which was implanted in him by God and was the source of the tragic flaw. The interweaving of these motifs comprised the fabric of Paul's Fall doctrine and of Original Sin and was the basis for all later Christian interpretation." This was the 1 1 Enoch 6-11.

2 Ibid. 66-7; cf. Gen. 6: 5-22.

3 Cf. Jubilees 7: 26-39; 10: I-15.

4 This groping from one text to another for a satisfactory solution is, according to Williams, evidence that the true foundation of the Fall and Original Sin does not rest upon the Paradise-story of Gen. 3, but is 'based on bed-rock facts of ethical and spiritual experience—the consciousness of the moral struggle, and the feeling of a ceaseless strain and tension between duty and the clamorous appetites, which ever and anon burst victoriously forth into crude external expression, whilst reason looks on in helpless dismay and shame' (op. cit., p. 31).

5 See The Books of Adam and Eve 5-8, 15-19, 30-43; 2 Baruch 23: 4, 48: 42f., 56:5f.; and 4 Ezra 3: 4-6:

® Gen. 6: 5 (Heb. yeser hd-ra'), 8: 21; cf. Sir. 15: 11-17, 27: 5-6, 21: 11a. 'The fact is that, in its quest for the source of evil in man, the official Jewish theology had stumbled upon, though it never quite succeeded in disentangling from confusing associations, that central conception of modern psycho-analytic theory which is generally designated by the term libido.' (Williams, op. cit., pp. 67 f. Williams seems to see this as more closely approximating the élan vital of Bergson than the libido of either Freud or Jung.) 7 For complete details of this history, see Williams, op. cit., chs. 1-3; cf. Hick's summary, Evil, pp. 208 ff.

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foundation on which Clement of Alexandria's treatment of this issue was built. Which motif he emphasized hinged on the way he read the Genesis text.

In this respect Clement was very much a product of the academic atmosphere in which he was reared. As a member of the Alexandrian School and a kindred spirit of Philo,! it is not surprising that Clement exhibited a noticeable partiality towards the allegorical interpretation of the Scriptures.? He did not, however, do this at the expense of good sense ; 'Alexandrian' and 'allegorical' were in no sense interchangeable terms.3 Clement, then, was not a pioneer in this art. It had apostolic sanction* and enjoyed widespread popularity in the ancient East, so Philo recounts.5 With this zmprimatur Clement had few qualms about utilizing a similar approach.

Clement distinguishes four senses of scripture : literal, mystical, moral, and prophetical.* The reason for these different modes of t For Philo's influence on Clement's interpretation of the Scriptures, see Mondésert, Clément d'Alexandrie, pp. 163-81; R. M. Grant, The Letter and the Spirit

(London, 1957), p. 89. Chadwick notes that 'Clement's debt to Philo is large but measurable and is not to be exaggerated', Early Christian Thought, pp. 141 f., n. 65.

2 See Str. v. 20-82 for Clement's systematic treatment of symbolic interpretation.

On figurative speech, cf. Str. vi. 129. 3. The verb 'to allegorize' (dAAnyopeiv) is first found in Philo, but he was not in fact the first to allegorize. Rather, he stands at the end of a long tradition. Aristobulus is apparently the first (cf. C. Cels. iv. 51;

N. Walter, Der Thoraausleger Aristobulos (Berlin, 1964), has given the final coup de grace to the mistaken thesis of Elter and Wendland that 'Aristobulus' depends on Philo) ; and Pseudo-Aristeas, the second (the most recent discussion of the date of Aristeas is by O. Murray, 'Aristeas and Ptolemaic Kingship', 7.7.5. n.s.

(1967), pp. 337-71)- 3 'Although Neo-Platonism was essentially a religious philosophy, and Alexandrian theology a philosophical religion, it is possible to maintain the distinction.'

Inge, art. cit., H.E.R.E. i. 308.

4 Gal. 4:24.

5 Prob. 82, among the Essenes; V. contempl. 28 f., 78, among the Therapeutae.

Clement notes that it was common among the Egyptian intelligentsia (Str. v. 20.

3), as well as the Greeks and barbarians (Str. v. 21. 4).

6 Str. i. 179. 3 actually speaks of three senses (symbolical, moral, and prophetical), but Bigg emends tpryds to retpaxds following a variant manuscript reading

(Christian Platonists, pp. 86 f., n. 2). This procedure harmonizes this text with Str. i. 176. 1, which divides Mosaic philosophy into four parts: History, Legislation

(= Ethics), Sacrifice (= Physics), and Theology or Epopteia (= Dialectic or Metaphysics). But cf. Exc. ex Theod. 66: three senses (literal, parabolic, and metaphysical). Two centuries later Cassian re-established the fourfold division (literal, allegorical, tropological or moral, and anagogical) which remained popular throughout the Middle Ages: Cassian, Collat. xiv. 8 (cf. Raphael's 'Disputation of the Sacraments' (Stanza della Segnatura, Vatican) where Sts. Jerome, Ambrose,

Gregory, and Augustine symbolize these interpretations).

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interpretation Clement makes equally clear: it stimulates the intelligent to search deeper for the words of salvation ; it enhances the truth! and at the same time acts as a foil, protecting the innocent and unlettered from being led astray by misguided exegesis. In addition to these reasons, however, it had a considerable snobisme. Allegory singled out a select group who were privy to the secrets of God and alone were able to understand the convoluted reasoning and the solution of the enigmas.3

In contrast to Philo, who applied the 'rules of allegory'4 as a defence mechanism, a disguise to dupe his audience whenever the historical sense of the Scriptures seemed slightly implausible, trivial, or simply inadequate, Clement combined the merits of the allegorical system without falling prey to its inherent weakness.

Clement fits the interpretation to the context (be it Old Testament or New),5 sometimes interpreting the text literally, at other times allegorically, depending on whichever seemed the more appropriate.

At his most allegorical, Clement expounds Genesis exactly like Philo, almost as if he had the Philonic text in front of him. In a characteristic passage Clement says® that Adam fell a victim of pleasure, 'for the serpent that creeps upon the belly, an earthy evil, reared to return to matter, is an allegory for pleasure'. Else1 Str. v. 56. 5: 'all things seen through a veil and only in part show the truth and grandeur in a more imposing manner'.

2 Str. vi. 126. 1 f. Clement notices that caution was also advocated by Plato (Epist. ii. 312 d, 314 be = Str. v. 65) and Paul (1 Cor. 2:6—7, 3: 1-3 = Str. v.

66. 1). On Clement's use of symbolism, see Osborn, Clement of Alexandria, pp.

168 ff.

3 Str. vi. 92. 3; cf. Philo, Plant. 36: 'allegory is the method dear to men with their eyes opened'.

4 Philo, Spec. Leg. i. 287. R. P. C. Hanson doubts if this is indicative of a systematic procedure: Allegory and Event (London,

1959), p. 40. H. Chadwick disagrees and remarks that the fact that the Therapeutae possessed allegorical commentaries indicates that procedures were already systematized: 'St. Paul and Philo of Alexandria', Bulletin of the John Rylands Library, 48 (1966), p. 290, n. 4.

5 Grant interprets Clement as strictly confining his allegory to the O.T.; cf.

Letter and Spirit, p. 89. Hanson, on the other hand, thinks Clement is perfectly capable of allegorizing the N.T. as well and uses Q.D.5S. 29 to illustrate his criticism of Grant: ibid., p. 119. To this might be added Paed. ii. 61 f. (on Matt. 26: 6 ff.) ;

Str. vi. 94 (on Matt. 15: 32-9; Mark 8: 1-10); etc.

® Protr. 111. 1 (cf. Philo, Opif. 157). In Paed. ii. 123, the loose-living women of Alexandria wear bracelets and brooches in the form of serpents as a manifest badge of the pleasures of their profession. Cf. Justin's etymology of 'Satan' as 'apostate', Dial. 103. 5 (see A. L. Williams's note on this text: Justin Martyr: The Dialogue with Trypho (London, 1930), pp. 216 f.) ; in Origen, C. Cels. vi. 44.

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where the serpent is the embodiment of deception! or wisdom of a crafty and subtle variety.

Besides this, however, Clement is convinced that the Genesis narrative can stand up to a literal investigation. There is ample evidence that there was a primal rebellion and fall of the angels ;3 that Adam was formed from the face of the earth ;4 that he tilled the fields of Paradise' and named the creatures over which he had dominion ;° and, finally, that the serpent deceived Eve? and she in turn induced Adam to follow her example.' So certain is

Clement of the historicity of these events that he cites Adam as the terminus a quo for all historical reckoning.? With this preliminary remark we may now pass on to the discussion proper.

The Gnostics forced Clement to consider Adam's pristine condition prior to the Fall by posing the question, 'Whether Adam was created perfect or imperfect ?'!° Either answer seemed to be a point in their favour : if he was created imperfect, then how was he the work of a perfect God; if perfect, how was he able to transgress the divine command ?!! For Clement the issue was not so black and white. Under no circumstances would he admit that God had given his creatures faults to make them men. This would have made the Fall inevitable. Instead, as others before him had done,!3 Clement distinguishes between the 'image' and 'likeness' x Sir. iv. 12. 45 ct. Protr. 7. 6, 2 Str. vi. 155. 1.

3 Gen. 6: 2. Cf. Str. iii. 59. 2; v. 10. 2; and compare Paed. iii. 14. 2.

4 Gen. 2: 7; cf. Str. v. 63. 5. Philo uses Gen. 1: 27 and Gen. 2: 7 to distinguish a 'Heavenly Man' from an 'Earthly Man' (Leg. Alleg. i. 31), an idea which springs from the dualism of popular Platonism. As to the creation of Eve from Adam's rib

(Gen. 2: 21-2), Philo regards this as mythological (Leg. Alleg. ii. 19). Clement, however, does not dismiss the literal fact, but adds by way of allegorical qualification that the portion removed contained the 'essence of feminine softness' (Paed. iii. 19. 1).

5 Gen. 2: 5, 153 3: 23. Cf. Protr. 92. 3.

7 Gen. 3: 1-7. Cf. Paed. ii. 123. 3; Protr. 7. 6; Str. iii. 74. 3, 94. I.

8 Gen. 3: 6. Cf. Str. ii. 98. 3.

9 Str. i. 140. 2 (Adam to the Flood = 1,148 yrs./4 days), 144. 3 (Adam to the death of Commodus = 5,784 yrs./2 mos./12 days).

10 Str. vi. 96.

11 Tbid.

12 Cf. C. G. Jung's metaphysico-psychic approach which appears to remove evil from the sphere of conscious activity and makes it an unconscious predetermination. See especially his Answer to Job, trans. by R. F. C. Hull (London, 1963) ; cf. criticisms by White, God and the Unconscious; H. L. Philip, Jung and the Problem of Evil (London, 1958).

13 See Irenaeus, Adv. Haer. v. 6. 1, 16. 2. Irenaeus' view is that man as a personal and moral being already exists in the image, but has not yet been formed into the finite likeness of God.

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of Genesis 1: 26. Adam was the perfect image of God, for in no respect did his formation lack the intellectual and physical powers to which he was entitled as a sharer in the species homo sapiens. He was not, however, the perfect likeness of God ;* this involved the attainment of virtue. Adam was not created with this task complete, but was adapted with the capacity for acquiring it.2 Only the last Adam,? 'who for us clothed himself with humanity',4 was perfect in all things while still human. Any further details which Clement might add about the condition of unfallen man are only refinements of this basic premiss: Adam was a perfect human being, a divine creation and therefore a child of God.' But he was not a 'Child of God' in the Pauline sense.° That was only achieved at 'maturity' with the attainment of perfect virtue and assimilation to God through grace."

Clement assumes that Adam, asa perfect example of the human species, exhibited all those characteristics which are intrinsic to human nature itself. His body was one which was suited to tilling the fields of Paradise' in order to produce the sustenance upon which it depended.? As Rousseau says of his 'noble savage' :

'I see him satisfying his hunger at the first oak, and slaking his thirst at the first brook; finding his bed at the foot of the tree which afforded him a repast; and, with that, all he wants supplied.'!¢ Furthermore, the sexual appetites are no less natural than food and drink." In fact, Clement says,'? 'All desires which are in the living Lord are good and pure.' Hence, since God exhorted the first man to increase and multiply and such an injunction would not have been in vain, since all beings beget and give birth

I Str. vi. 96. 2.

2 Str. vi. 95-6; cf. Str. vii. 16. A similar evolutionary theory has recently received popularity in the writings of P. Teilhard de Chardin. He says that we are creatures

'who already exist, but are not yet complete' (Le Milieu Divin, trans. by B. Wall

(London: Fontana Library, 1964), p. 85).

3 1 Cor. 15: 45.

4 Str. iv. 130. 23 cf. Paed. iii. 93. 3.

5 Protr. 111. 1. It is possible that this was intended to be an implicit refutation of the Gnostics, for vjmos was used by them in a pejorative sense to indicate those who were ignorant and devoid of gnosis (Paed. i, chs. 5 and 6 passim; cf. Origen,

C. Cels. ili. 44, 59).

® e.g. Rom. 8: 15-17; Gal. 4: 5-7.

7 See below, ch. 5, pp. 84 ff.

8 Cf. Protr. 92. 3.

9 Cf. Gen. 1: 29; 2:16.

10 J. J. Rousseau, 'A Discourse on the Origin of Inequality', The Social Contract and Discourses, trans. by G. D. H. Cole (London : Everyman's Library, 1913), p. 177.

Ir Str. iti. 48. 1.

12 Str. ill. 103. 4.

13 Gen. 1: 28; Str. iii, 101. 2.

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alike, having received by God's righteousness an innate quality, it appears that Adam and Eve had sexual intercourse in Paradise by virtue of their human nature.! Such union was natural to them, though, Clement confesses, not necessary. The biological drive itself did not make man like the beasts; only when channelled towards strangers was this the case.3 Although both man and woman possess the same human nature and the same capacity for virtue, Clement states that the female sex was created specifically for pregnancy and childbirth.s Without the realization of these characteristically human functions, Eve could not have been the perfect woman that the unfallen state implies.®

Eve, then, was a helpmeet sexually fit for Adam.7 Had they had no experience of that sexual aspect of their human personalities, there was scarcely need for two sexes biologically distinct in Paradise.' This will be of some importance when evaluating the nature of the Original Sin.

It is in keeping with this perfect human state that Adam as a rational animal also possessed a faultless human intellect. At creation God breathed into Adam what was peculiar to himself? and thereby communicated that spiritual principle,!° the germ of supernal essence, life itself.!! Along with this went a knowledge which exceeded all normal proportion. (The Gnostics interpreted this as an excuse for that angelic jealousy which resulted in their scheme to lead the first man astray.)! As aresult of this Adam had a prophetic clairvoyance which enabled him to name every living creature, an action which signified his dominion over them.'3

1 Str. iii. 102. 4. It is difficult to ascertain whether Clement thought that the procreation of Seth described in Gen. 4:25 occurred before the Fall or not.

Clement cites this as an example of the right time to procreate (Str. ili. 81. 5).

2 Str. iii. 3. 2; cf. Epicurus, Fr. 456 Usener.

3 Str. iii. 102. 3; cf. Tertullian, De an. 27, 4: it is lust, not natural usage, which has brought shame on the intercourse of the sexes.

4 Str. iv. 58-9; cf. Chrysipp. Fr. mor. 254 Arnim.

5 Str. iv. 59. 4.

6 Str. iv. 59. 5.

7 Gen. 2:18; Protr. 111. 1.

8 For the Jewish tradition of Adam as bisexual, see Davies, op. cit., p. 46.

9 Paed.i. 7.13; cf. Gen. 2: 7. For the Jewish tradition of the 'breath of Yahweh'

(neSamah) as making man unique in the created order as well as giving him an intimate relation to the creator God, see R. Scroggs, The Last Adam: A Study in Pauline

Anthropology (Oxford, 1966), p. 4.

10 Str. vi. 134. 2.

11 Str. ii. 36. For the Gnostics, this was the determining factor; see above, pp. 25 f.

12 Ibid.

13 Gen. 2: 19 f., 23; Str. i. 135. 3. Cf. Tertullian, De an. 11; Adam as a prophet.

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In short, God infused in man a soul which Clement modelled on Plato's tripartite exemplar. First, there is the ruling faculty or reason which through the intellective powers and free will dictates the way in which a man lives;? secondly, the higher emotions or impulses like love and hate; and finally, the base passions and desires of the lower appetites. In the pre-lapsarian existence, all of these were perfectly harnessed to right reason ;3 after the Fall the two steeds vied for the lead. Adam, then, as an ideal man, was a perfect embodiment of the Decalogue made up of five senses, the power of speech, reproduction, the spiritual principle, reason, and finally the distinctive characteristic of the Holy Spirit which comes to him through faith.5

In addition to these purely natural attributes, Adam was also endowed with immortality. In Clement's mind this followed logically on his nearness to God? and obedience to the divine commandments.' Disobedience, then, inevitably brought corruption. Only in this respect is Clement willing to consider unfallen man as a superhuman being. The natural tendency indulged in, particularly by later Christian theology, which from Adam's immortality posited the existence of other physical, mental, and moral endowments of a supernatural kind,° is for him totally

Str. v. 80. 9 (rpimepis bux; cf. Plutarch, Moralia 808 e). Paed. iii. 1. 2 (cf.

Plato, Rep. 441 a). For Plato, puyy = vods—Ovpds—embupia: Rep. 588 c—589 b (man allegorized as a combination of beast, lion, and man) ; Phaedrus 246 a ff. (the celebrated allegory of the charioteer and his two horses ; cf. Paed. iii. 53). In Plato's later thought, man is divided according to a different scheme: av@pwros = vots— uxn—odpa (cf. Tim. 30 b, 69 c).

2 Str. vi. 134-6; however, Clement distinguishes the 'corporeal spirit' (avedpa oapkixdv) which perceives, desires, rejoices, etc., and the 'rational spirit' (Aoyorexov kal #yepwovrxdv) which chooses. Yet on the distinction of these powers Clement invites misunderstanding. He speaks of the 'intellectual or spiritual faculty... or whatever you choose to call it' (Str. ii. 50. 4).

3 Paed.i. 101. 2; cf. Diogenes Laertius, vii. 89. Right reason exercised in matters of conduct was defined by Aristotle as prudence (dpdvnats): Eth. Nic. vi. 13,

114.428.

4 Cf. Phaedrus, 246 a. Evil action, then, is one contrary to right reason (Sér. vi.

113. 3).

5 Str. vi. 134. 2; cf. Str. ii. 50. Cf. Philo, Mut. 110 f.; the first seven are faculties of the unreasoning element in man. For the significance of the number 10, see Str. vi. 133. 1; clearly it is drawn from the Pythagoreans.

6 Str. vi. 97. 1; cf. Wisd. 2: 22 f.

7 Str. vi. 121. 2.

8 Str. vi. 121. 33 cf. Wisd. 6: 17-20.

9 See, e.g., J. N. D. Kelly's account of the preternatural state enjoyed by Adam as in described it: Early Christian Doctrines (London, 3rd edn. 1965), p362.

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unwarranted. Clement did not think of the first man asa mythical Urmensch invested with preternatural gifts, but simply as a perfect human being with natural (though perhaps slightly heightened) attributes.

At the same time, however, Clement maintains that this primeval man enjoyed a unique relationship to his Creator.

Morally, he was just. Adam 'playing in Paradise with childlike freedom'! suggests a state of unspeakable bliss, clearly indicative of Adam's original innocence. Moreover, as a child, Adam was totally dependent upon God for his continued beneficence and confronted him with openness and simplicity,? as a child its parent. In short, Clement says, God created Adam naturally social and just.3 Yet this justification was not the effect of the original implantation alone.* Rather, the act of 'being justified' involved obedience,' which was indicative of man's love for his

Creator.® As long as Adam's will remained in conformity with God's and concord reigned in the divisions of his soul, Adam persisted in that original righteousness' and grew in divine likeness.

However, from postulating freedom as part of Adam's natural disposition, the possibility of misuse of freedom and therefore the possibility of evil at once arose. Freedom to disobey was the logical correlative to freedom to obey. Adam availed himself of this prerogative and sinned.

According to Clement, sin is not a 'state' ; it has no metaphysical existence and, therefore, cannot be said to derive its being from God.' Rather, it is a type of action performed by a human agent.°

Therefore, emphasizing the negative concept of evil,!° Clement insists that there can be neither enmity nor sin without the enemy or the sinner in which the fault resides. Sin is to do something wrong, no different gua activity than to do something right."!

Regarding the nature of the action, however, sin stems from excessive indulgence of some sort, or goes against nature. !? Itis not what has been ill done, but what ought not to have been done at all."

I Protr. 111. 1.

2 Str. iii. 94. 13; cf. Str. iii. 74. 3, 80.

3 Str. i. 34. 4.

4 Str. i. 35.

5 Str. iv. 150. 4.

Ou Sire VIN 125s OF chy Sir. Ive O35 2.

7 Paed.i. 102. 4 (cf. Chrysipp. Fr. mor. 293 Arnim) ; cf. Str. i. 94. 2. On righteousness as harmony in the soul, see Str. iv. 163. 4; cf. Albinus in Hermann's Plato, vi. 182.

32.

Ba Sine Hn 933.

9 Str. iv. 94. 2.

10 See above, p. 21 f.

II Str. iti. 27. 2.

12 Str. ii. 109. 1; cf. Sér. iv. 94. 4.

13 Str. vi. 97. 3.

826707 E

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Given the purely natural state of the first parents, they were not preserved from actions of this sort. There was nothing unique about their human activity. Like that of any man, their action was prompted by knowledge and impulse.! Ignorance and weakness, deficiencies which stand antithetically to those two initiating powers, bring about failure.2 Ignorance makes men judge wrongly ; weakness prevents them from following out right judgements. 'Neither could any one act rightly if he were deceived in his judgement, even though he was perfectly able to carry out his determinations; nor, on the other hand, would he show himself blameless if he were a weakling in act, whatever might be his capacity to discern what was right.'3 Because of his youth, it appears that Adam was vulnerable on both counts, but only subject to his own choosing. The morality of his action, as in the case of our own, depends on its freedom. 'What is voluntary is what is by desire or by choice or what is of intention.'* Furthermore, the objective standard of correctness which determines a licit free action as opposed to a sinful one is right reason, the ruling faculty of the soul: every action that is contrary to this is sinful.s Adam's sin, then, was a freely chosen human act which was irrational® and went against the express command of God. The question one now asks is, What event satisfied these conditions ?

Clement reconstructs the tragic transgression with startling originality. Like everyone else, he bases his conjecture on Genesis, but he interprets it differently. There is no direct suggestion, for example, that Adam acted out of pride and sought to make himself 'like God'."? Nor does Clement specify that the sin amounted to some sort of intellectual stimulation by which Adam might know the secrets of the universe.§ Equally absent is the popular notion that the fruit of the tree was an aphrodisiac and the action which ensued was the first act of sexual communion.? Instead

I Str. vi. 68-9: yrdous and dp. 'Impulse' is logically subsequent to an assent; cf. Chrysipp. Fr. mor. 462 Arnim.

2 Str. vii. ror. 6.

3 Str. vii. 101. 73 cf. Str. ii. 62. 33 vii. 16. 2.

4 Str. ii. 62. 1. In this context, Clement distinguishes between mistake, crime, and sin. Cf. Aristotle, Eth. Eud. ii. 7, 1223223-122434.

5 Paed. i. 101. 1.

6 Paed. i. 102. 1.

7 Gen. 3: 5. Cf. Ambrose, Ps. 118 expos. 7, 8; Epist. 73, 5; Ambrosiaster, In Rom.

5:14; Aquinas, S.T. Ila. Ilae. Qs. 162-5, 'De Superbia'.

8 Gen. 3: 5.

® Gen. 3: 7. Cf. Augustine, De nupt. et concup. i. 28 f.; Contra duas epp. Pelag. i. 27.

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Clement, like Irenaeus, pictures it as something that occurred in the childhood of the race, an understandable lapse due to weakness and immaturity rather than an adult crime full of malice and pregnant with perpetual guilt. Dominated by a primitivistic ideal which characterized Adam's pre-fall state, and viewing the history of Adam and Eve as a growth from infancy, the Original

Sin becomes a childish blunder. With the Fall the child-Adam discarded childish ways and through disobedience! attained manhood. Original Sin, then, was the realization of Adam's maturity.

Whether this may have been dictated by the normal course of events, Clement makes no comment.

This interpretation was not Clement's own invention, but was suggested to him by his donnish pursuits. Rabbinic theology was accustomed to stress the man-child quality of the Adamic state rather than the paradisal glories. Furthermore, Scripture customarily identified maturity with the ability to know good and evil. The celebrated Emmanuel passage describes coming of age in the following manner: 'He shall eat curds and honey when he knows how to refuse the evil and choose the good.'3 But this approach was not confined to religious speculation. Homer evinces the same. In the speech to Ctesippus at the festival banquet held for Penelope's suitors in the house of Odysseus, 'Telemachus declares that he has abandoned childhood now that he knows all things, the good and the evil. In Clement's mind, Adam follows in this pattern. By eating from the tree of knowledge and knowing good from evil, he too had reached maturity.

Disobedience is, however, only part of the explanation of Adam's sin. The incentive which prompted it is less easily identifiable. Conceivably Clement was nearer to Augustine's bewilderment regarding the nature of the 'ancient sin's than he was willing to admit.® The sexual interpretation of the sin, which was prevalent in Alexandrian Judaism,' was not without its effect on him. He sees Adam, asa result of his newly gained manhood, eager t Protr. 111. 1: mals avdpuldpevos azrebeig.

2 L. Ligier, Péché d'Adam et Péché du Monde (Paris, 1960), i. 176.

3 Isa. 7:15.

4 Homer, Odyssey xx. 309 f.

5 Augustine, De mor. eccl. cath. i. 40.

6 H. Rondet is utterly defeated by Clement's lack of systematization on this topic: Le Péché Originel (Paris, 1967), pp. 81-4. The only merit he can see in Clement is as a precursor of Origen.

7 Cf. Philo, Opif. 151-2 (where Eve is totally blamed) ; Virt. 203-5.

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to perpetuate his stock and plan his family. In a novel rendering Clement considers this precipitousness as constituting the matter of disobedience.! He says,? "The first man of our race did not bide his time, but desired the favour of marriage} before the hour, and fell into sin by not waiting for the time of God's will.' The sin, then, was not the sexual act per se as many Western Fathers would have it, for marriage on rational principles, Clement insists,* is not a sin. Satan did not introduce sexual intercourse as a new toy,' for Adam and Eve presumably enjoyed that already. Rather, the pleasure by which Satan deceived the first parents (at least in this context) was none other than the joys which come from having a family.

To the Gnostics this interpretation must have meant little, if anything at all. For them, there was no 'original sin' as such.

There was no fault of man or guilt of the human soul: there was instead the time-preceding guilt of an Aeon, a divine upheaval, whose reparation in its course required the creation of the world and that of man. The role of the will is not supreme, but is reduced to a natural downward movement of the divine— a guilty 'inclination' of the soul (as a mythical entity) toward the lower realms, with various motivations such as curiosity, vanity, sensual desire.6 This was how they explained man's cosmic plight.

Although Clement visualizes Original Sin as a 'coming of age', it was not without its consequences. It brought in its train a radical transformation in Adam and in his environment ;7 in a word,

Evil. First and foremost, however, it meant a change in his relationship with God. Obedience had characterized Adam's original state of righteousness ;° disobedience meant estrangement from God. Other consequences followed in the wake of this.

1 Cf. J. Héring, Etude sur la Doctrine de la Chute et de la Préexistence des dmes chez

Clément d' Alexandrie' (Paris, 1923), p. 19: 'Mais loin de constituer un péché par elle-méme, elle n'est condamnée que pour avoir été réalisée prématurément.'

See Philo who observes that an action right in itself may be wrong in the actual doing (Cher. 14).

2 Str. iii. 94. 3; cf. Str. iii. 81.

3 xdpis Tod ydou. Cf. Str. iii. 67.

1: 'Each one of us is master of his own will in deciding whether to beget children.'

4 Str. ili. 67. 1 and passim; cf. Str. ii, 142. 2. Héring notices that the incriminating action coincides materially with the ovvovaia, but that is not the essence of the sin

(op. cit., p. 19).

5 Str. ili, 102. 4.

® See Jonas, Gnostic Religion, pp. 93, 196, etc.

7 Cf. Protr. 111.

8 Str. iv. 150. 4.

9 Str. iv. 94.

'UNDE MALUM??

Immortality was supplanted by death.! Expulsion from Paradise? meant man's struggle in a world racked with physical and cosmic ills. Man's new environment included physical suffering and pain of every variety: namely poverty,3 disgrace,* disease,' old age which is 'natural disease',® etc. On the cosmic level, the original harmony was dissolved. Instead, there were disturbances such as drought,' famine, the sirocco,® cyclones,? and other harmful natural phenomena. But the sin involved more than mere deprivations of the delights of Eden. As a result of the transgression,

Adam acquired a positive proneness to sin.!? Human nature had become depraved so that sin was the common lot of all. Its forms were various. Clement's catalogue of moral delinquency includes 'adultery, uncleanness, paederasty, ignorance, wickedness, soul-disease, and death (not that which severs the soul from the body, but that which severs the soul from truth)'.!2 Moreover, coupled with this tendency to sin and partially responsible for it is the weakening of the will and clouding of the intellect. In consequence, man is either unable to know what ought to be done or is incapable of doing it.!3 Yet these effects did not confine themselves to Adam and his epoch. How they were transmitted to posterity is another issue.

Clement seems to want to say that it is not because Adam sinned that we sin, but it is because we sin that Adam's sin is understandable.'+ In other words, the relationship between the two is not one of cause and effect, but ontological: both are participants in the finite and consequently both are subject to natural limitations. In view of this Clement will not admit

I Str. ii. 98. 4 (cf. Philo, Virt. 205) ; iii. 64 (cf. Rom. 5:12).

2 Protra tr 3.cf. Geni: 24:

3 Str. vii. 65. 15 il. 34. I.

4 Str. vii. 65. 1. Under this heading Clement also thinks of obscurity and humble birth (cf. Str. ii. 34. 1), an attitude clearly dictated by the social milieu in which he taught.

5 Str. ii. 34. 13 iv. 14. 43 Vi. 145. 15 vil. 65. 1.

19-20; Chrysipp. Fr. mor.

150 Arnim).

7 Str. vi. 28. 4 ff.

8 Str. vi. 29. 4 ff.

9 Str. vi. 30.

10 Str. iv. 103. 1; cf. Heb. 12:1; Sir. 25:24.

11 Paed. iii. 93. 3. Cf. Augustine, De perfect. iustit. hom. 9; Op. imperf. c. Iul. i. 106; v. 61: 'the cruel necessity of sinning'.

12 Str. ii. 34. 2; cf. Plato, Gorg. 524 b on the parenthetical phrase.

13 Str. ii. 62, both morally and practically. See Paed. iii. 100. 1: knowledge of God meant control over the elements.

14 Substantially the thesis of Héring, op. cit., p. 12.

'UNDE MALUM?'

a physiological transmission or inheritance of Adam's sin' which attributes the wickedness of the child's character from birth to the lustful relationship in which it was conceived. As a more optimistic alternative, Clement suggests that Adam's offspring is tainted by a social heredity conveyed through parental example and environmental influence. A. Farrer voices this well: "We have an inheritance of false or sinful attitudes and ways of thinking ..

. I inherited the selfish tendencies of a sinful race, implicit in the very speech I learnt, and impressed by a thousand silent examples.'?

Clement rules out the physiological theory on a number of counts. Firstly, it played directly into the hands of the Gnostics by supporting their dualist view that birth was a tragedy and the body was evil. As we have already seen,3 Clement saw nothing intrinsically evil in marriage, even though it meant co-operation with creation.' In fact, he almost seems to hold the married man in higher esteem than the unmarried because of the daily exasperations from wife and family which the former undoubtedly has to endure.s The second reason for dismissing the physiological view was its incompatibility with his voluntarist ethic. Clement believed that sin was a wilful act performed by an individual through an error of reason and judgement against the divine command.° Only such acts imputed guilt. Therefore, it followed that since we did not ourselves eat of the forbidden fruit, we are not guilty of that act.

Voluntary actions, then, are culpable, be they obedient or disobedient acts ;7 what is performed involuntarily is not a matter for judgement, even if it be through ignorance or necessity.8 Furthermore, if man is guiltless even when he is led astray by demons (an opinion which Clement does not eschew)? how can we in any sense

1 Supported by Inge, art. cit. H.E.R.E. i, p. 314; Bigg, Christian Platonists, p. 112; Chadwick, Early Christian Thought, p. 48; Hick, Evil, p. 213.

2 Farrer, Love Almighty, p. 152. A very modern theme; cf. W. Golding, Lord of the Flies (London: Penguin, 1960) ; J. D. Salinger, Catcher in the Rye (London: Penguin,

1951).

3 See above, p. 23.

4 Str. iii. 66. 3; Paed. ii. 83. 2.

5 Str. vii. 70; iii. 105, celibacy wrongly regarded as inherently nearer to God than the married state. Clement suggests that even Paul was married (Wer. iii. 53) ; what better advertisement was needed for that state? But according to Sir. iv.

147-9 marriage is good, virginity better.

6 Paed. i. 101.

7 Str. ii. 59. 6.

8 Str. ii. 60. 1; cf. Aristotle, Eth. Nic. iii. 2, 111143-15.

9 Str. vi. 98. 1.

'UNDE MALUM??

be blamed for the sin of Adam? Sin is strictly an autonomous event :! everyone makes himself righteous or disobedient,? since the causes of failure are in our own power.3 Thus, for Clement, guilt (malum culpae) is in no way passed on. But the corollary to this is not that every man is born virtuous. We already know from Clement's evolutionary theory that every man is able from birth to acquire virtue, but is not actually endowed with it.4

At the same time, however, the concept of corporate personality was too much a part of Clement's heritages to warrant a total dissolution of the bond between Adam and his descendants.

Clement willingly admits a physical but not a moral solidarity between the two. Since the human race is monophylic, Clement sees all humanity as ultimately deriving its earthly existence from Adam and Eve. Adam is 'father of all men' ;° Eve is similarly responsible for all those who are born and even for those who fall into sin.? To that couple, then, all men owe their existence.

This did not mean, however, that birth is a corruption of the soul, but rather the beginning of a certain type of life which through Adam's sin all his offspring are subject to.8 We share in the effects of Original Sin (malum poenae)—mortality, ignorance, and especially that proneness to act wrongly'—but not the pollution of guilt: crimes, like lands, Are not inherited.'

In a most explicit text Clement sums up his view of social heredity: 'sic etiam peccato Adae subiacemus secundum peccati similitudinem.'!! It is probable that Clement devised this

I Str. ii. 60, 66.

2 Str. iii. 65. 1.

3 Str. vii. 101. 6. This is equally applicable to Old Testament figures: Noah had a natural birth and was none the less saved (Str. ii. 99. 1; cf. Philo, Virt. 201) ;

Abraham had three wives specifically in order to multiply the human race (Sir. ii. 99. 1; cf. Philo, Virt. 207-9).

4 Str. vi. 95-6.

5 The notion of Adam as a microcosmos and universal man in both Rabbinic and Hellenistic thought is indicative of this. See Scroggs, op. cit., pp. 113 f.; Davies, op. cit., pp. 36-57. vy 6 Str. ii. 98. 3.

7 Str. iii. 65. 1.

8 Str. iii. 63. Guilt cannot be transmitted, for then the Lord would have shared in it (Str. iii, 102); but his incarnation did mean exposure to the same world as ours.

9 Protr. 111. 1.

10 Shakespeare, Timon of Athens, v. iv. 35 f.

11 Adumbratio in Epistola Iudae Catholica 11. (Bigg doubts very much whether this text is from Clement's pen: Christian Platonists, pp. 112 f. n. 1.) Cf. Str. vii. 19:

'UNDE MALUM??

interpretation of Original Sin so that he might give the impression of rendering lip-homage to a doctrine which was part of ecclesiastical tradition even at this early date! without in fact committing himself wholeheartedly to it.

Clement has no difficulty in reconciling this anti-mechanistic view of Original Sin with the Scriptures. Even the set texts he manages to recruit for his service. For example, Jeremiah's curse of his birth (Jeremiah 20:14, 18), Esdras' wish that he had been aborted during pregnancy (2 Esdras 5: 35), Job's insistence on the guilt of the short-lived (Job 14:4f.), and the Psalmist's awareness that he was polluted in intercourse (Psalms 51: 5) are all taken by Clement to mean that birth is evil only in so far as it exposes man to a sinful environment. It does not corrupt the soul.2 Even Romans 5:12, the test formula for the doctrine of inherited guilt, did not shake Clement from his former interpretation. He looked to Job for further support. 'Naked came I out of my mother's womb, and naked shall I return there',* clearly means, Clement explains,' that man is not 'naked' of possessions, but naked of evil and sin; that is, a just man. In conclusion, we see that Clement interprets our dependence on the primogenitors,

Adam and Eve, as involving us in the effects of their sin, but at the same time his insistence on the primacy of the human will as the source of all morality prohibits our implication in their guilt.

This view is supported, moreover, by two other major topics of inquiry which can only occupy brief attention here: the origin of the soul and infant baptism. On the subject of the origin of the soul, Clement is faced with a choice among three alternatives.

There is the Platonic pre-existence theory, according to which immortal and pre-existent souls temporarily reside in the body; the Traducianist view (Generationism) that the soul is derived, vice is contagious. Kelly interprets Clement as teaching the inheritance of a 'disordered sensuality which entails the dominance of the irrational element in our nature': op. cit., p. 180.

1 See even Str. iii. 100. 6; and cf. Str. vi. 97. 4, which suggests that one can have repentance not only for actual transgressions, but even for the existence of sin in the world.

2 Str. iii. 100; cf. Str, iil. 65.

3 Cf. Str. ili. 64. 2.

4 Job 1: 21.

5 Str. iv. 160. Yet, Clement adds, "He would have us be such as also he generated us from our mother—the water' (ibid.), implying that Baptism alone produces the state of innocence.

'UNDE MALUM??'

like the body, from the parents; and finally, Creationism, that God creates each soul individually. 'Creationism seemed to involve God in endless fuss ;

Traducianism seemed to endanger the transcendence of the soul in relation to the body by making it something corporeal. Pre-existence had the merit of making a theodicy possible which answered the Gnostics' complaint against the goodness and justice of the Creator.' None the less,

Clement opts for Creationism.

Although Photius implied that Clement taught a theory of preexistence of souls,2 a more accurate appraisal seems to be that Clement discussed the doctrine without making clear his attitude towards it.3 If the promised treatise on the soul+ had been forthcoming, we might be somewhat more certain about Clement's thought in this regard. What is unquestionable is that Clement was acquainted with the doctrine as Plato had expounded it and alludes to it without comment. But Clement is not always so noncommittal. He states emphatically that the soul is not sent down from heaven to something worse,® as the Gnostics would argue.

Furthermore, what seems more positive proof, his whole antideterminist polemic as we have elaborated it argues against this.

There is also no trace of Tertullian's brand of Traducianism7 in the writings of Clement. Clement's account of our share in the effects of Adam's sin, but innocence of the original guilt, did not demand such a materialistic interpretation of the origin of the soul. Strongly influenced by Stoicism, Tertullian conceived of the soul as a substance,' a vapor spiritus.2 Consequently, it was

_ thought to have been generated in the act of sexual intercourse t H. Chadwick, 'Origen' (ch. 11), Cambridge History, p. 191.

2 Cf. Bibl. Cod. 109.

3 The nearest Clement comes is the allusive language of Str. vii. 10 and 12.

In contrast, Philo can write of transmigration without a qualm: Plant. 14; Som. i. 138; Gig. 7 ff. For a résumé of the status quaestionis at the turn of the century, see

Héring, op. cit., p. 28, although he personally discredits the existence of such a theory in the thought of Clement (pp. 28-34).

4 Str. li. 113; ll. 13. 3; v. 88. 3.

5 Tim. 47 ab, cited Str. i. 67. 4. Cf. Str. iv. 165. 2, for the soul sojourning in the body.

6 Str. iv. 167. 4; cf. Sér. iii. 13 (condemning the Marcionites for this view), 94. 2.

7 See J. H. Waszink's text, introduction, and commentary: Tertulliani De Anima (Amsterdam, 1947), chs. 23-41.

8 De an. 36. 4; cf. 19. 2—non modo ut dei opus... sed ut dei flatus. The soul has a sex: De an. 36.

9 De an. 27. 7: Quid aliud afflatus dei quam vapor spiritus? Cf. De an. 24. 2.

'UNDE MALUM?'

simultaneously with the body, for the soul is the beginning of life, and life commences at conception.! The logical inference from this was that the semen of the parent contained all that was necessary for producing a soul.? Were this not the case, two eventualities would arise: either the soul existed before the body (which was an implicit acceptance of the Platonic pre-existence theory) ,3 or it was infused later (which meant there was a time when there was no life in the womb despite the existence of a fertilized ovum, a ridiculous assertion).+ Rejecting both these alternatives, Tertullian concluded' that every soul is, as it were, a twig from the parent-stem of Adam and is planted as an independent tree. Yet, because the soul preserves some semblance of its original goodness, Tertullian can say, 'anima naturaliter Christiana'.® In this manner, Tertullian (in contrast to Clement and others)' supported the physiological transmission of Adam's guilt in a most extreme form.

Unconvinced of the orthodoxy of the two previous view-points, Clement advocates strict Creationism as the happiest solution.

It preserved the transcendence of the human soul, maintained the unique relationship between the Creator and creature, and was compatible with the view that guilt was not inherited but imputed by personal behaviour. Creationism meant that every man (like Adam) received his soul directly from God,* not as a natural by-product of procreation.? All other works were fabricated by divine command, but the soul was personally breathed t Devan. 27).

2 De an. 27. 8. Against the Stoic view that the soul originates from both parents,

Tertullian argues that there are two components in the sperm: corporeal humor and psychic calor. Furthermore, the limus and flatus Dei which figure in the creation of Adam were the prototypes of these two components. Thus, both productive elements are in the male semen alone. Cf. De an. 5. 43 25. 9.

3 De an. 33.

4 De an. 37. 2.

5 De an. 19. 6 (the locus classicus for Traducianism) : cuius anima velut surculus quidam ex matrice Adam in propaginem deducta et genitalibus feminae foveis commendata cum omni sua paratura pullulavit tam intellectu quam et sensu. Tertullian is refuting the Stoics who did not believe that children were born with all their reasoning faculties

(cf. S.V.F. ii, Fr. 757 Arnim). See Waszink, op. cit., p. 276, for his comments on the agrarian imagery in this important text.

6 Dean. 41, though this phrase does not actually occur here.

7 Cf. Augustine's displeasure with this materialist interpretation of Tertullian's

Traducianism (Fpist. cxc. 14) and his more spiritual interpretation (de Gen. ad litt. x. 23 ff.). Waszink, however, has brought out the predominantly medical character of Tertullian's discussion of heredity.

8 Protr. 92. 2.

9 Str. vi. 135. 1.

'UNDE MALUM?'

hy) into the body, its earthly tabernacle.! Thus, in giving to man what was peculiarly his own,? God made him in his divine image, like unto himself.3

The second major topic which confirms Clement's disparagement of any sort of physiological transmission of Original Sin concerns infant baptism. Had Clement thought in terms of all men born tainted with hereditary guilt, it is more probable than not that he would have conceived of infant baptism as the cure for sinful birth. Despite the pitched battles which have been fought over this subject, there is universal agreement that the practice is never certainly mentioned by Clement,* although by the time of Origen it seems to have been a common feature of the Church in general (observantia ecclesiae).5

From this it is not a rash hypothesis to suppose that baptism was not considered by Clement primarily as a remedy for Adam's disobedience. Sins forgiven by baptism seem to be actual sins committed by the individual prior to that event.® Baptism of children had little significance for him.

The chief aim of that sacrament was not remission, but illumination—an antidote to ignorance by which, according to the Gnostics, all sin entered the world. In a sententious passage he summarizes the effects as follows: 'Being baptized, we are illuminated ; illuminated, we become sons; being made sons, we are made perfect ; being made perfect, we are made immortal.'"7 Sin is conspicuous by its absence.

I Paed. i. '7. 13; Str. v. 94. 3.

2 Paed. i. 7. 1. Clement denies the suggestion that the Spirit is in each man as a part of God (as a quasi-pneumatic substance) ; this is equally true of the soul

(Str. v. 88. 3).

3 Str. vii. 16. 5.

4 Bigg, Christian Platonists, pp.

112 f., n. 1. For the controversy, see J. Jeremias, Infant Baptism in the First Four Centuries, trans. by D. Cairns (London, 1960), who sees it as existing in the early church; K. Aland, Did the Early Church Baptize Infants?, trans. by G. R. Beasley-Murray (London, 1963), who puts its beginning in the third century; and Jeremias's uncompromising reply, Origins of Infant Baptism, trans. by D. M. Barton (London, 1963). Both Jeremias and Aland agree (though for very different reasons) that Paed. iii. 59. 2 may refer to child baptism, but more likely than not refers to children in faith whom the missionary brings to Baptism

(cf. 1 Pet. 2:1 f.). Note, however, that this text had been commonly taken to be a direct reference to the practice; W. B. Marriott, art. 'Baptism', Dictionary of Christian Antiquities, W. Smith and S. Cheetham (eds.) (London, 1875), i. 155-72.

5 Origen, Hom. in Lev. viii. 3; Hom. in Luc. xiv; Comm. in Rom. v. 19.

6 Str. iv. ch. 24; cf. Str. ii. 11. 2.

7 Paed.i. 26. 1. Aland notes in this passage and throughout Paed. i, chs. 5 and 6, that Clement is not really speaking about children but about Christian adults

(op. cit., pp. 59 f.).

'UNDE MALUM??'

Clement, then, had answered Tertullian's famous question by pointing toman. Man caused evil by an act of free choice and continues so to do. The question now is whether or not man is always entirely free and able to perform independent actions. Might he not be constrained by unconscious motivations or even seduced by demonic agencies or a personification of evil which invade the natural sphere and conspire against him?

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