§ 158. Chiliasm.
§ 158. Chiliasm.
Corrodi: Kritische Geschichte des Chiliasmus. 1781. Second ed. Zürich, 1794. 4 vols. Very unsatisfactory.
Münscher.: Lehre vom tausendjährigen Reich in den 3 ersten Jahrh. (in Henke’s "Magazin." VI. 2, p. 233 sqq.)
D. T. Taylor: The Voice of the Church on the Coming and Kingdom of the Redeemer; a History of the Doctrine of the Reign of Christ on Earth. Revised by Hastings. Second ed. Peace Dale, R. I. 1855. Pre-millennial.
W. Volck: Der Chiliasmus. Eine historisch exeget. Studie. Dorpat, 1869 Millennarian.
A. Koch: Das tausendjährige Reich. Basel, 1872. Millennarian against Hengstenberg.
C. A. Briggs: Origin and History of Premillennarianism. In the "Lutheran Quarterly Review." Gettysburg, Pa., for April, 1879. 38 pages. Anti-millennial, occasioned by the "Prophetic Conference" of Pre-millennarians, held in New York, Nov. 1878. Discusses the ante-Nicene doctrine.
Geo. N. H. Peters: The Theocratic Kingdom of our Lord Jesus, the Christ. N. York, announced for publ. in 3 vols. 1884. Pre-millennarian.
A complete critical history is wanting, but the controversial and devotional literature on the subject is very large, especially in the English language. We mention 1) on the millennial side (embracing widely different shades of opinion). (a) English and American divines: Jos. Mede (1627), Twisse, Abbadie, Beverly T. Burnet, Bishop Newton, Edward Irving, Birks, Bickersteth, Horatio and Andrew Bonar (two brothers), E. B. Elliott (Horae Apoc.), John Cumming, Dean Alford, Nathan Lord, John Lillie, James H. Brooks, E. R. Craven, Nath. West, J. A. Seiss, S. H. Kellogg, Peters, and the writings of the Second Adventists, the Irvingites, and the Plymouth Brethren. (b) German divines: Spener (Hoffnung besserer Zeiten), Peterson, Bengel (Erklärte Offenbarung Johannis, 1740), Oetinger, Stilling, Lavater, Auberlen (on Dan. and Revel.), Martensen, Rothe, von Hofmann, Löhe, Delitzsch, Volck, Luthardt. 2) On the anti-millennial side—(a) English and American: Bishop Hall, R. Baxter, David Brown (Christ’s Second Advent), Fairbairn, Urwick, G. Bush, Mos. Stuart (on Revel.), Cowles (on Dan. ind Revel.), Briggs, etc. (b) German: Gerhard, Maresius, Hengstenberg, Keil, Kliefoth, Philippi, and many others. See the articles "Millennarianism" by Semisch, and "Pre-Millennarianism" by Kellog, in Schaff-Herzog, vols. II. and III., and the literature there given.
The most striking point in the eschatology of the ante-Nicene age is the prominent chiliasm, or millennarianism, that is the belief of a visible reign of Christ in glory on earth with the risen saints for a thousand years, before the general resurrection and judgment.1160 It was indeed not the doctrine of the church embodied in any creed or form of devotion, but a widely current opinion of distinguished teachers, such as Barnabas, Papias, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Methodius, and Lactantius; while Caius, Origen, Dionysius the Great, Eusebius (as afterwards Jerome and Augustin) opposed it.
The Jewish chiliasm rested on a carnal misapprehension of the Messianic kingdom, a literal interpretation of prophetic figures, and an overestimate of the importance of the Jewish people and the holy city as the centre of that kingdom. It was developed shortly before and after Christ in the apocalyptic literature, as the Book of Enoch, the Apocalypse of Baruch, 4th Esdras, the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, and the Sibylline Books. It was adopted by the heretical sect of the Ebionites, and the Gnostic Cerinthus.1161
The Christian chiliasm is the Jewish chiliasm spiritualized and fixed upon the second, instead of the first, coming of Christ. It distinguishes, moreover, two resurrections, one before and another after the millennium, and makes the millennial reign of Christ only a prelude to his eternal reign in heaven, from which it is separated by a short interregnum of Satan. The millennium is expected to come not as the legitimate result of a historical process but as a sudden supernatural revelation.
The advocates of this theory appeal to the certain promises of the Lord,1162 but particularly to the hieroglyphic passage of the Apocalypse, which teaches a millennial reign of Christ upon this earth after the first resurrection and before the creation of the new heavens and the new earth.1163
In connection with this the general expectation prevailed that the return of the Lord was near, though uncertain and unascertainable as to its day and hour, so that believers may be always ready for it.1164 This hope, through the whole age of persecution, was a copious fountain of encouragement and comfort under the pains of that martyrdom which sowed in blood the seed of a bountiful harvest for the church.
Among the Apostolic Fathers Barnabas is the first and the only one who expressly teaches a pre-millennial reign of Christ on earth. He considers the Mosaic history of the creation a type of six ages of labor for the world, each lasting a thousand years, and of a millennium of rest; since with God "one day is as a thousand years." The millennial Sabbath on earth will be followed by an eighth and eternal day in a new world, of which the Lord’s Day (called by Barnabas "the eighth day") is the type.1165
Papias of Hierapolis, a pious but credulous contemporary of Polycarp, entertained quaint and extravagant notions of the happiness of the millennial reign, for which he appealed to apostolic tradition. He put into the mouth of Christ himself a highly figurative description of the more than tropical fertility of that period, which is preserved and approved by Irenaeus, but sounds very apocryphal.1166
Justin Martyr represents the transition from the Jewish Christian to the Gentile Christian chiliasm. He speaks repeatedly of the second parousia of Christ in the clouds of heaven, surrounded by the holy angels. It will be preceded by the near manifestation of the man of sin (a[nqrwpo" th'" ajnomiva") who speaks blasphemies against the most high God, and will rule three and a half years. He is preceded by heresies and false prophets.1167 Christ will then raise the patriarchs, prophets, and pious Jews, establish the millennium, restore Jerusalem, and reign there in the midst of his saints; after which the second and general resurrection and judgment of the world will take place. He regarded this expectation of the earthly perfection of Christ’s kingdom as the key-stone of pure doctrine, but adds that many pure and devout Christians of his day did not share this opinion.1168 After the millennium the world will be annihilated, or transformed.1169 In his two Apologies, Justin teaches the usual view of the general resurrection and judgment, and makes no mention of the millennium, but does not exclude it.1170 The other Greek Apologists are silent on the subject, and cannot be quoted either for or against chiliasm.
Irenaeus, on the strength of tradition from St. John and his disciples, taught that after the destruction of the Roman empire, and the brief raging of antichrist (lasting three and a half years or 1260 days), Christ will visibly appear, will bind Satan, will reign at the rebuilt city of Jerusalem with the little band of faithful confessors and the host of risen martyrs over the nations of the earth, and will celebrate the millennial sabbath of preparation for the eternal glory of heaven; then, after a temporary liberation of Satan, follows the final victory, the general resurrection, the judgment of the world, and the consummation in the new heavens and the new earth.1171
Tertullian was an enthusiastic Chiliast, and pointed not only to the Apocalypse, but also to the predictions of the Montanist prophets.1172 But the Montanists substituted Pepuza in Phrygia for Jerusalem, as the centre of Christ’s reign, and ran into fanatical excesses, which brought chiliasm into discredit, and resulted in its condemnation by several synods in Asia Minor.1173
After Tertullian, and independently of Montanism, chiliasm was taught by Commodian towards the close of the third century,1174 Lactantius,1175 and Victorinus of Petau,1176 at the beginning of the fourth. Its last distinguished advocates in the East were Methodius (d., a martyr, 311), the opponent of Origen,1177 and Apollinaris of Laodicea in Syria.
We now turn to the anti-Chiliasts. The opposition began during the Montanist movement in Asia Minor. Caius of Rome attacked both Chiliasm and Montanism, and traced the former to the hated heretic Cerinthus.1178 The Roman church seems never to have sympathized with either, and prepared itself for a comfortable settlement and normal development in this world. In Alexandria, Origen opposed chiliasm as a Jewish dream, and spiritualized the symbolical language of the prophets.1179 His distinguished pupil, Dionysius the Great (d. about 264), checked the chiliastic movement when it was revived by Nepos in Egypt, and wrote an elaborate work against it, which is lost. He denied the Apocalypse to the apostle John, and ascribed it to a presbyter of that name.1180 Eusebius inclined to the same view.
But the crushing blow came from the great change in the social condition and prospects of the church in the Nicene age. After Christianity, contrary to all expectation, triumphed in the Roman empire, and was embraced by the Caesars themselves, the millennial reign, instead of being anxiously waited and prayed for, began to be dated either from the first appearance of Christ, or from the conversion of Constantine and the downfall of paganism, and to be regarded as realized in the glory of the dominant imperial state-church. Augustin, who himself had formerly entertained chiliastic hopes, framed the new theory which reflected the social change, and was generally accepted. The apocalyptic millennium he understood to be the present reign of Christ in the Catholic church, and the first resurrection, the translation of the martyrs and saints to heaven, where they participate in Christ’s reign.1181 It was consistent with this theory that towards the close of the first millennium of the Christian era there was a wide-spread expectation in Western Europe that the final judgment was at hand.
From the time of Constantine and Augustin chiliasm took its place among the heresies, and was rejected subsequently even by the Protestant reformers as a Jewish dream.1182 But it was revived from time to time as an article of faith and hope by pious individuals and whole sects, often in connection with historic pessimism, with distrust in mission work, as carried on by human agencies, with literal interpretations of prophecy, and with peculiar notions about Antichrist, the conversion and restoration of the Jews, their return to the Holy Land, and also with abortive attempts to calculate "the times and seasons" of the Second Advent, which "the Father hath put in his own power" (Acts 1:7), and did not choose to reveal to his own Son in the days of his flesh. In a free spiritual sense, however, millennarianism will always survive as the hope of a golden age of the church on earth, and of a great sabbath of history after its many centuries of labor and strife. The church militant ever longs after the church triumphant, and looks "for new heavens and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness" (2 Pet. 3:13). "There remaineth a sabbath rest for the people of God." (Heb. 4:9).
logikwvteron, as Eusebius has it.
The term catholic is first used in its ecclesiastical sense by Ignatius, the zealous advocate of episcopacy. Ad Smyrn. c. 8: o{pou a]n h\/ Cristo;s jIhsou" , evkei' hJ kaqolikh; ejkklhsivaubi est Christus Jesus, illic Catholica Ecclesia. So also in the Letter of the Church of Smyrna on the martyrdom of Polycarp (155), in Eusebius, H. E. IV. 15.
From ai{resi". See notes below.
] [Elegco" kai; ajnatroph; th'" yeudwnuvmou gnwvsew"
Called simply hJ grafhv, aiJ grafaivscriptura, scripturae.
ejn pavsai" tai'" ejpistolai'".
ta;" loipa;" (notta;" a[lla")grafav"
Comp. Clement of Rome, Ad Cor. c. 47; Polycarp, Ad Phil. 3; Ignatius, Ad Eph. 12; Ad Philad. 5; Barnabas, Ep. c. 1; Papias, testimonies on Matthew and Mark, preserved in Euseb. III. 39; Justin Martyr, Apol. I. 61 Dial.c. Tryph. 63, 81, 103, 106, and his frequent quotations from the so called "Memoir, by the Apostles;" Tatian, Diatessaron, etc. To these must be added the testimonies of the early heretics as Basilides (125), Valentine (140), Heracleon, etc. See on this subject the works on the Canon, and the critical Introductions to the N.T. The Didache quotes often from Matthew, and shows acquaintance with other books; Chs. 1, 3, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16. See Schaff, Did., p. 81 sqq.
The Muratorian Canon (so called from its discoverer and first publisher, Muratori, 1740) is a fragment of Roman origin, though translated from the Greek, between a.d. 170 and 180, begins with Mark, passes to Luke as the third Gospel, then to John, Acts, thirteen Epistles of Paul, mentions two Epp. of John, one of Jude, and the Apocalypses of John and Peter; thus omitting James, Hebrews, third John, first and second Peter, and mentioning instead an apocryphal Apocalypse of Peter, but adding that "some of our body will not have it read in the church." The interesting fragment has been much discussed by Credner, Kirchhofer, Reuss, Tregelles, Hilgenfeld, Westcott, Hesse, Harnack, Overbeck, Salmon, and Zahn.
Which was regarded as canonical indeed, but not as genuine or Pauline in the West.
Which has the strongest external testimony, that of Justin, Irenaeus etc., in its favor, and came into question only in the third century through some antichiliasts on dogmatical grounds.
See lists of patristic canons in Charteris, Canonicity, p. 12 sqq.
diaqhvkh, covenant, comp. Matt. 26:28, where the Vulgate translates "testamentum," instead of faedus
ta; eujaggelika; kai; ta; ajpostolikav, or to; eujaggevlion kai; oJ ajpovstolo"_ instrumentum evangelicum, apostolicum, or evangelium, apostolus. Hence the Scripture lessons in the liturgical churches are divided into " Gospels" and " Epistles."
kanwn th'" pivstew",or th'" ajlhqeiva" , paravdosi" tw'n ajpostovlwn, or par. ajpostolikhv, kanw;n ejkklhsiastikov" , to; ajrcai'on th'" ejkklhsiva" , suvsthma, regula fidei, regula veritatis, traditio apostolica, lex fidei, fides catholica. Sometimes these terms are used in a wider sense, and embrace the whole course of catechetical instruction.
"Christus veritatem se, non consuetudinem cognominavit .... Haereses non tam novitas quam veritas revincit. Quodcunque adversus veritatem sapit hoc erit haeresis, etiam vetus consuetudo."De Virg. vel. c. 1.
"Cosuetudo sine veritate vetustas erroris est."Ep. 74 (contra Stephanum), c. 9.
So Paul uses the word paravdosi", 2 Thess. 2:15: " hold the tradition, which ye were taught, whether by word (dia; lovgou), or by epistle of ours (di j ejpistolh'" hJmwn) Comp. 3: 6 (kata; th;n paravdosin h}n parelavbete par j hJmwn); 1 Cor. 11:2. In all other passages, however, where the word paravdosi", traditio, occurs, it is used in an unfavorable sense of extra-scriptural teaching, especially that of the Pharisees. Comp. Matt. 15:2, 6; Mark 7:3, 5, 9, 13; Gal. 1:14; Col. 2:8. The Reformers attached the same censure to the mediaeval tradition of the Roman church, which obscured and virtually set aside the written word of God.
See a collection of these ante-Nicene rules of faith in Hahn, Denzinger, Heurtley, Caspari, and Schaff (II.11-41).
This obsolete opinion, first mentioned by Ambrose and Rufinus is still defended by Pet. Meyers, l.c. and by Abbé Martigny in his French Dictionary of Christ. Antiquities (sub Symbole des apôtres. Longfellow, in his Divine Tragedy (1871) makes poetic use of it, and arranges the Creed in twelve articles, with the names of the supposed apostolic authors. The apostolic origin was first called in question by Laurentius Valla, Erasmus, and Calvin. See particulars in Schaff’s Creeds I. 22-23.
Rufinus speaks of it as an ancestral tradition (tradunt majores nostri) and supports it by a false explanation of symbolum, as "collatio, hoc est quod plures in unum conferunt." See Migne, XXI. fol. 337.
In the Graeco-Latin Codex Laudianus (Cod. E of the Acts) in the Bodleian Library at Oxford, from the sixth century, and known to the Venerable Bede (731). The Creed is attached at the end, is written in uncial letters, and was first made known by Archbishop Ussher. Heurtley (p. 61 sq.) gives a facsimile. It is reprinted in Caspari, Hahn (second ed. p. 16), and Schaff (II. 47). Another copy is found in a MS. of the eighth century in the British Museum, published by Swainson, The Nic. and Ap. Creeds, p. 161, and by Hahn in a Nachtrag to the Preface, p. xvi. This document, however, inserts catholicam after ecclesiam. Comp. also the form in the Explanatio Symboli ad initiandos, by Ambrose in Caspari, II. 48 and 128, and Schaff, II. 50. The Creed of Aquileja, as given by Rufinus, has a few additions, but marks them as such so that we can infer from it the words of the Roman Creed. With these Latin documents agree the Greek in the Psalterium of King Aethelstan, and of Marcellus (see next note).
In Epiphanius, Haer. LXXII. it is assigned to a.d. 341, by others to 337. It is printed in Schaff (II. 47), Hahn, and in the first table below. It contains, according to Caspari, the original form of the Roman creed as current at the time in the Greek portion of the Roman congregation. It differs from the oldest Latin form only by the omission of patevra, and the addition of zwh;n aijwvnion
The Psalterium Aethelstani, in the Cotton Library of the British Museum, written in Anglo-Saxon letters, first published by Ussher, then by Heurtley, Caspari, and Hahn (p. 15). It differs from the text of Marcellus by the insertion of patevra and the omission of zwh;n aijwvnion, in both points agreeing with the Latin text.
On the Greek original of the Roman symbol Caspari’s researches (III. 267-466) are conclusive. Harnack (in Herzog 2, vol. I. 567) agrees: "Der griechische Text ist als das Original zu betrachten; griechisch wurde das Symbol zu Rom eine lange Zeit hindurch ausschliesslich tradirt. Dann trat der lateinisch übersetzte Text als Parallelform hinzu." Both are disposed to trace the symbol to Johannean circles in Asia Minor on account of the term "only begotten, (monogenhv"), which is used of Christ only by John.
Descendit ad inferna, first found in Arian Creeds (eij" a{/dou or eij" a{/dhn) about a.d. 360; then in the Creed of Aquileja, about a.d. 390; then in the Creed of Venantius Fortunatus, 590, in the Sacramentarium Gallicanum, 650, and in the ultimate text of the Apostles’ Creed in Pirminius, 750. See the table in Schaff’s Creeds, II. 54, and critical note on p. 46. Rufinus says expressly that this clause was not contained in the Roman creed and explains it wrongly as being identical with "buried." Com. c. 18 (in Migne, f. 356): "Sciendum sane est, quod in Ecclesiae Romanae Symbolo non habetur additum, ’descendit ad inferna:’ sed neque in Orientis Ecclesiis habetur hic sermo: via tamen verbi eadem videtur esse in eo, quod ’sepultis dicitur.’" The article of the descent is based upon Peter’s teaching, Acts 2: 31 ("he was not left in Hades, " eij" a{dou, consequently he was there); 1 Pet. 3:19; 4:6; and the promise of Christ to the, dying robber, Luke 23:34 (" to day thou shalt be with Me in paradise," ejn tw'/ paradeivsw/), and undoubtedly means a self exhibition of Christ to the spirits of the departed. The translation " descended into hell" is unfortunate and misleading. We do not know whether Christ was in hell; but we do know from his own lips that he was in paradise between his death and resurrection. The term Hades is much more comprehensive than Hell (Gehenna), which is confined to the state and place of the lost.
It is found first in the Sacramentarium Gallicanum, 650. The older creeds of Cyprian, Rufinus, Augustin, read simply sanctam ecclesiam, Marcellus ajgivan ejkklhsivan
Sanctorum communionem. After 650.
Contained in Marcellus and Augustin, but wanting in Rufinus and in the Psalter of Aethelstan. See on all these additions and their probable date the tables in my Creeds of Christendom, II. 54 and 55.
We usually speak of three œcumenical creeds; but the Greek church has never adopted the Apostles’ Creed and the Athanasian Creed, although she holds the doctrines therein contained. The Nicene Creed was adopted in the West, and so far is universal, but the insertion of the formula Filioque created and perpetuates the split between the Greek and Latin churches.
The second table is transferred from the author’s Creeds of Christendom, vol. II. 40 and 41 (by permission of the publishers, Messrs. Harpers). In the same work will be found other comparative illustrative and chronological tables of the oldest symbols. See vol. I. 21 and 28 sq.; and vol. II. 54, 55.
The Roman Creed, according to Rufinus (390), ends with carnis resurrctionem; but the Greek version of the Roman Creed by Marcellus (341) with zwh;n aijwvnion
"Omne quod est corpus est sui generis. Nihil est incorporale, nisi quod non est. Habente igitur anima invisible corpus, " etc. (De Carne Christi, c. 11)."Quis enim negabit, Deum corpus esse, etsi Deus spiritus est? Spiritus enim corpus sui generis in sua effigie." (Adv. Prax. c. 7).
Comp. Gen. c. 1 and 2; Psalm 33:9; 148:5; John 1:3; Col. 1:15; Heb. 1:2; 11:3; Rev. 4:11.
Gen. 1:31; Comp. Ps. 104:24; 1 Tim. 4:4.
For a full exposition of Origen’s cosmology see Möller, l. c. p. 536-560. He justly calls it a "kirchlich-wissenschaftliches Gegenbild der gnostischen Weltanschauung." Comp. also Huetius (Origeniana), Neander, Dorner, Redepenning.
From tradux, a branch for preparation, frequently used by Tertullian, Adv. Valent. c. 25, etc.
Tertullian, De Anima, c. 27: "Ex uno homine toti haec animarum redundantia." Cap. 36: "Anima in utero seminata pariter cum carne pariter cum ipsa sortitur et sexum, " i.e."the soul, being sown in the womb at the same time with the body, receives likewise along with it its sex;" and this takes place so simultaneously "that neither of the two substances can be alone regarded as the cause of the sex (ita pariter, ut in causa sexus neutra substantia teneatur)." In Tertullian this theory was connected with a somewhat materialistic or strongly realistic tendency of thought.
"Tradux aninae tradux peccati."
Notably in our century by one of the profoundest and soundest evangelical divines, Dr. Julius Mailer, in his masterly work on The Christian Doctrine of Sin. (Urwick’s translation, Edinb. 1868, vol. II. pp. 357 sqq, , Comp. pp. 73, 147, 397). He assumes that man in a transcendental, pre-temporal or extratemporal existence, by an act of free self-decision, fixed his moral character and fate for his present life. This conclusion, he thinks, reconciles the fact of the universalness of sin with that of individual guilt, and accords with the unfathomable depth of our consciousness of guilt and the mystery of that inextinguishable melancholy and sadness which is most profound in the noblest natures. But Müller found no response, and was opposed by Rothe, Dorner, and others. In America, the theory of pre-existence was independently advocated by Dr. Edward Beecher in his book: The Conflict of Ages. Boston, 1853.
Inesse nobis to; aujtexouvsionnaturaliter, jam et Marcioni ostendimus et Hermogeni"De Anima, c. 21. Comp. Adv. Marc. II. 5 sqq.
Definimus animam Dei flatu natam, immortalem, corporalem, effigiatam, sub stantia simplicem, de suo sapientem, varie procedentem, liberam arbitrii, accidentiis obnoxiam, per ingenia mutabilem, rationalem, dominatricem, divinatricem, ex una redundantem."De Anima, c. 22.
See vol. III. p. 783 sqq.
Matt. 16:16-19 sqq
. 1 John 4:1-3.
Comp. Matt. 2:11; 9:18; 17:14, 15; 28:9, 17; Luke 17:15, 16; 23:42; John 20:28; Acts 7:59, 60; 9:14, 21; 1 Cor. 1:2; Phil. 2:10; Hebr. 1:6; 1 John 5:13-15; Rev. 5:6-13, etc.
See p. 279.
See p. 230.
Contra Cels. 1. VIII.c. 67.
"Carnem Christo quasi Deo dicere," Epp. X. 97. A heathen mock-crucifix which was discovered in 1857 in Rome, represents a Christian as worshipping a crucified ass as "his God." See above, p. 272.
to;n lovgon tou' qeou' to;n Cristo;n uJmnou'si qeologou'nte". Hist. Eccl. V. 28.
Comp. Ruinart, Acta Mart.; Prudentius, Peristeph., Liddon, l.c. pp. 400 sqq. "If there be one doctrine of our faith" (says Canon Liddon, p. 406) "which the martyrs especially confessed at death, it is the doctrine of our Lord’s Divinity. The learned and the illiterate, the young and the old, the noble and the lowly, the slave and his master united in this confession. Sometimes it is wrung from the martyr reluctantly by cross-examination, sometimes it is proclaimed as a truth with which the Christian heart is full to bursting, and which, out of the heart’s abundance, the Christian mouth cannot but speak. Sometimes Christ’s Divinity is professed as belonging to the great Christian contradiction of the polytheism of the heathen world around. Sometimes it is explained as involving Christ’s unity with the Father, against the pagan imputation of ditheism; sometimes it is proclaimed as justifying the worship which, as the heathens knew, Christians paid to Christ." Many illustrations are given.
Ad. Eph. c. 18: oJ ga;r Qeo;" hJmw'n Ihsou'" oJ Cristo;" ejkuoforhvqh uJpo; Mariva" (Deus noster Jesus Christus conceptus est ex Maria); c.7: ejn sapki; genovmeno" Qeov". Ignatius calls the blood of Jesus the "blood of God" (ejn ai{mati qeou), Ad. Eph. 1.He desires to imitate the sufferings of "his God,"mimhth;" ei\vnai tou' pavqo" tou' QeouÀ mou, Ad Rom. 6. Polycarp calls Christ the eternal Son of God, to whom all things in heaven and earth are subject (Ad Phil. c. 2,8 and his last prayer in Martyr. Polyc. c. 14). The anonymous author of the Epistle to Diognetus (c. 7,8) teaches that the Father sent to men, not one of his servants, whether man or angel, but the very architect and author of all things, by whom all has been ordered, and on whom all depends; he sent him as God, and because he is God, his advent is a revelation of God. On the Christology of the Apost. Fathers comp., besides Dorner, Schwane’s Ante-Nicene Doctrine History, pp. 60ff., and Liddon’s Lectures on the Divinity of Christ, pp. 379 and 411 sqq.
On the Logos doctrine of Philo, which probably was known to John much has been written by Gfrörer (1831), Dähne (1834), Grossmann (1829 and 1841), Dorner (1845), Langen, (1867), Heinze (1872), Schürer (1874), Siegfried (1875), Soulier, Pahud, Klasen, and others.
For thorough discussions of Justin’s Logos doctrine see Semisch. Justin der Märtyrer, 11. 289 sqq.; Dorner, Entwicklungsgesch. etc. I. 415-435; Weizsäcker. Die Theologie des Märt. Justinus, in Dorner’s "Jahrbücher für deutsche Theol." Bd XII. 1867, p. 60 sqq.; and M. von Engelbardt, Das Christenthum Justins des Märt. (1878), p. 107-120, and his art. in the revised ed. of Herzog, vol. VII. (1880), p. 326.
Lovgo" ejndiavqeto".
Lovgo" proforikov" .
proevrcesqai.
genna'n, genna'sqai.
He calls Christ "the first begotten of God,"prwtovtoko" tou' qeou' and the prw'ton gevnnhma (but not ktivsma or poivhma tou' qeou'). See Apol. I. 21, 23, 33, 46, 63; and Engelhardt, l.c. p. 116-120: "Der Logos ist vorweltlich, aber nicht ewig."
Lovgo" a[sarko" .
See the proof in the monograph of Semisch.
Comp. Apol. II. 8, 10, 13. He says that the moral teaching of the Stoics and some of the Greek poets was admirable on account of the seed of the Logos implanted in every race of men (dia; to; e[mfuton panti; gevnei ajnqrwvpwn spevrma tou' lovgou), and mentions as examples Heraclitus, Musonius, and others, who for this reason were hated and put to death.
On the relation of Justin to John’s Gospel, see especially the very careful examination of Ezra Abbot, The Authorship of the Fourth Gospel (Boston, 1880), pp. 29-56. He says (p. 41) While Justin’s conceptions in regard to the Logos were undoubtedly greatly affected by Philo and the Alexandrian philosophy, the doctrine of the incarnation of the Logos was utterly foreign to that philosophy, and could only have been derived, it would seem, from the Gospel of John. He accordingly speaks very often in language similar to that of John (1:14) of the Logos as ’ made flesh,’ or as ’having become man.’That in the last phrase he should prefer the term ’man’ to the Hebraistic ’flesh’ can excite no surprise. With reference to the deity of the Logos and his instrumental agency in creation, compare also especially Apol. II. 6, ’through him God created all things’ (di j aujtou' pavnta e[ktise) Dial. c. 56, and Apol. I. 63, with John 1:1-3. Since the Fathers who immediately followed Justin, as Theophilus, Irenaeus Clement, Tertullian, unquestionably founded their doctrine of the incarnation of the Logos on the Gospel of John, the presumption is that Justin did the same. He professes to hold his view, in which he owns that some Christians do not agree with him ’because we have been comminded by Christ himself not to follow the doctrines of men, but those which were proclaimed by the blessed prophets and taught by Him.’(Dial. c. 48). Now, as Canon Westcott observes, ’the Synoptists do not anywhere declare Christ’s pre-existence.’ And where could Justin suppose himself to have found this doctrine taught by Christ except in the Fourth Gospel? Compare Apol. I. 46: ’That Christ is the first-born of God, being the Logos [the divine Reason] of which every race of men have been partakers [Comp. John 1:4, 5, 9], we have been taught and have declared before. And those who have lived according to Reason are Christians, even though they were deemed atheists; as for example, Socrates and Heraclitus and those like them among the Greeks.’’
Comp. here Neander, Baur, Dorner (I. 635-695), the monographs on Origen by Redepenning (II. 295-307), and Thomasius, H. Schultz, Die Christologie des Origenes, in the "Jahrb. f. Protest. Theol." 1875, No. II. and III, and the art. of Möller in Herzog2 XI. 105 sqq.
aujtosofiva, aujtoalhvqeia, aujtodikaiosuvnh, aujtoduvnami", aujtovlogo", etc. Contra Cels. III. 41; V. 39. Origen repeatedly uses the term "God Jesus, " qeo;s jIhsou'", without the article, ibid. V. 51; VI. 66.
In a fragment on the Ep. to the Hebrews (IV. 697, de la Rue): ajpovrroia oJmoouvsio".
De Princip. IV. 28: "Sicut lux numquam sine splendore esse potuit, ita nec Filius quidem sine Patre intelligi potest "
De Princ. I. 2, 4: "Est aeterna et sempiterna generatio, sicut splendor generatur a luce."Horn. in Jerem. IX. 4. ajeiv genna' oJ Path;r to;n UiJovn
eJtirovth" th'" oujsiva" ortou' uJpokeimevnou, which the advocates of his orthodoxy, probably without reason, take is merely opposing the Patripassian conception of the oJmoousiva. Redepenning, II. 300-306, gives the principal passages for the homo-ousia and the hetero-ousia.
phghv, rJivza th'" qeovthto".
De Orat. c. 15.
For example, Ad Rom. I. p. 472: "Adorare alium quempiam praeter Patrem et Filium et Spiritum sanctum, impietatis est crimen."Contra Cels. VIII. 67. He closes his homilies with a doxology to Christ.
The lovgo" ejndiavqeto" and lovgo" proforikov" .
Adv. Haer. II. 28, 6 "Si quis nobis dixerit: quomodo ergo Filius prolatus a Patre est? dicimus ei—nemo novit nisi solus, qui generavit Pater et qui natus est Filius."
The lovgo" a[sarko" and the lovgo" e[nsarko" .
As Duncker in his monograph: Die Christologie des heil. Irenaeus, p. 50 sqq., has unanswerably shown
Adv. Prax. c. 9 "Pater tota subsiantia est, Filius vero derivatio totius et portio, sicut ipse profitetur Quia Pater major Me est " (John 14:28).
Hence he says (Adv. Prax. c. 5), by way of illustration: "Quodcunque cogitaveris, sermo est; quodcunque senseris ratio est. Loquaris illud in animo necesse est, et dum loqueris, conlocutorem pateris sermonem, in quo inest haec ipsa ratio qua cum eo cogitans loquaris, per quem loquens cogitas."
In German terminology this progress in the filiation (Hypostasirung) may, be expressed: die werdende Persönlichkeit, die gewordene Persönlichkeit, die erscheinende Persönlichkeit.
See the exposition of Döllinger, Hippol. p. 195 sqq.
Ep. ad Smyrn. c. 2-5.
ejn sarki; genovmeno" qeov" (ad Ephes. c. 7); also e[nwsi" sarko;" kai; pneuvmato". Comp. Rom. 1:3, 4; 9:5; 1 John 4:1-3
ajnakefalaivwsi", recapitulatio, a term frequently used by Irenaeus. Comp. Rom. 13:9; Eph. 1:10.
Adv. Haer. II. 22, § 4-6. He appeals to tradition and to the loose conjecture of the Jews that Christ was near fifty years, John 8:57. The Valentinian Gnostics allowed only thirty years to Christ, corresponding to the number of their aeons.
Adv. Marcionem, and De Carne Christi.
Adv. Praxean.
The view of the ubiquity of Christ’s body was adopted by Gregory of Nyssa, revived by Scotus Erigena, but in a pantheistic sense, and by Luther, who made it a support to his doctrine of the Lord’s Supper. See Creeds of Christendom, vol. I. p. 286 sqq.
qeavnqrwpo".
"Et sibi et universo generi humano causa facta est salutis."Adv. Haer. III. 22, § 4.
At least according to Dorner, I. 495.
Credo in Spiritum Sanctum.
ejn deutevra/ cwvra/.
ejn trivth/ tavxei, Apol. I. 13.
Apol. I. 6: Ekei'novn te(i.e. qeo;n), kai; to;n par j aujtou' UiJo;n ejlqovnta kai; didavxanta hJma'" tau'ta kai; to;n tw'n a[llwn eJpomevnwn kai; ejxomoioumevnwn ajgaqw'n ajggevlwn strato;n, Pneu'mav te to; profhtiko;n sebovmeqa kai; proskunou'men. This passage has been variously explained. The questions arise, whether a[ggelo" here is not to be taken in the wider sense, in which Justin often uses it, and even applies it to Christ; whether stratovndepends on sebovmeqa, and not rather on didavxanta, so as to be co-ordinate with hJma'", or with tau'ta, and not with YiJovn andPneu'ma. Still others suspect that stratovn is a false reading for strathgovn, which would characterize Christ as the leader of the angelic host. It is impossible to co-ordinate the host of angels with the Father, Son, and Spirit, as objects of worship, without involving Justin in gross self-contradiction (Apol I. 17: qeo;n movnon proskunou'men, etc.). We must either join stratovn with hJma'" , in the sense that Christ is the teacher, not of men only, but also of the host of angels; or with tau'ta in the sense that the Son of God taught us (didavxanta hJma'") about these things (tau'ta, i.e. evil spirits, compare the preceding chapter I. 5), but also concerning the good angels—to;n ajggevlwn strato;n being in this case elliptically put for ta; peri; tou'... ajggevlwn stratou'. The former is more natural, although a more careful writer than Justin would in this case have said tau'ta hJma'" instead of hJma'" tau'ta. For a summary of the different interpretations see Otto’s notes in the third ed. of Justin’s Opera, I. 20-23.
Hence the frequent designation, to; Pneu'ma profhtikovn, together with the other, Pneu�ma a!gion; and hence also even in the Symb. Nic. Constantin. the definition: Pneu'ma ... to; lalh'san dia; tw'n profhtw'n, "who spoke through the prophets."
Paed. III. p. 311: jEucaristou'nta" aijnei'n tw'/ movnw/ Patri; kai; UiJw'/ —su;n kai; tw'/ aJgivw/ Pneu'mati.
Not as u{lh tw'n carismavtwn, as Neander and others represent it, but as th;n u{lhn tw'n carism. parevcon, as offering the substance and fairness of the spiritual gifts; therefore as the ajrchv and phghv of them. In Joh. II. § 6.
De Princip. I. 3, 3.
In Joh. tom. II. § 6: timiwvteron—this comparative, by the way, should be noticed as possibly saying more than the superlative, and perhaps designed to distinguish the Spirit from all creatures—pavntwn tw'n uJpo; tou' Patro;" dia; Cristou' gegennhmevnwn.
According to John 1:3
Adv. Haer. IV. 20, §1.
triav", first in Theophilus; trinitas, first in Tertullian; from the fourth century more distinctly monotriav" , mona;" ejn travdi, triunitas.
oujsiva, fuvsi", substantia; sometimes also, inaccurately, uJpovstasi" .
trei'" uJpostavsei" , triva provswpa, personae.
Comp. Plato, Ep. 2 and 6, which, however, are spurious or doubtful. Legg. IV. p. 185: JO qeo;" ajrchvn te kai; teleuth;n kai; mesa; tw'n o[ntwn aJpavntwn e[cwn.
Plotinus (in Enn. V. 1) and Porphyry (in Cyril. Alex. c. Jul.) who, however, were already unconsciously affected by Christian ideas, speak of trei'" uJpostavsei" but in a sense altogether different from that of the church.
"Ubi amor, ibi trinitas," says St. Augustin.
C. 14, where Polycarp concludes his prayer at the stake with the words, di ou|(i.e. Christ) soiv (i.e. the Father), sun aujtw'/ (Christ) kai; Pneuvmati aJgivw/ dovxa kai; nu'n kai; eiv" tou;'" mevllonta" aijw'na"Comp. at the end of c. 22: oJ kuvrios jIh". Cristov"... w|/ hJ dovxa, su;n Patri; kai; aJgivw/ Pneuvmati, eij" tou;'" aijw'na" tw'n aijw'nwn.. "Dominus Jesus Christus, cui sit gloria cum Patre et Spiritu Sancto in sœcula sœcutorum. Amen."I quote the text from Funk, Patr. Apost. I. 298 and 308.
In the Const. MS. Ad Cor. 58: zh'/ oJ qeo;" kai; zh'/ oJ kuvrios jIhsou'" Cristo;" kai; to; pneu'ma a{gion, h{ te pivsti" kai; hJ ejlpi;" tw'n eklektw'n."As surely as God liveth ... so surely, " etc.
In Irenaeus: Adv. Haer. V. 36, 2.
qeov", Lovgo" and Sofiva. By Sofiva, like Irenaeus, he means the Holy Spirit.
Adv. Haer. V. 18, 2.
Adv. Praxean, c. 8.
"Tertius"—says he, Adv. Prax. c. 8—"est Spiritus a Deo et Filio, sicut tertius a radice fructus ex frutice, et tertius a fonte rivus ex flumine, et tertius a sole apex ex radio. Nihil tamen a matrice alienatur, a qua proprietates suas ducit. Ita trinitas [here this word appears for the first time, comp. c. 2: oijkonomivaquae unitatem in trinitatem disponit] per consertos [al. consortes] et connexos gradus a Patre decurrens et monarchioe nihil obstrepit et oijkonomiva"statum protegit."
C. 2: "Tres autem non statu, sed gradu, nec substantia, sed forma, nec potestate, sed specie, unius autem substantiae, et unius status, et unius potestatis, quia unus Deus, ex quo et gradus isti et formae et species, in nomine Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti deputantur."
Nothing is known of him except his effective effort against the Sabellian heresy. He was consecrated after the death of Xystus, July 22, 259, during the persecution of Valerian. He acted with Dionysius of Alexandria in condemning and degrading Paul of Samosata, in 264. He died Dec. 26, 269.
Th;n qeivan triavda eij" e{na w{sper eij" korufhvn tina (to;n qeo;n tw'n o{lwn, to;n pantokravtora levgw)sunkefalaiou'sqaiv te kai; sunavgesqai pa'sa ajnavgkh. Athanasius, De Sent. Dionysii, c. 4 sqq. (Opera, I. 252); De Decr. Syn. Nic. 26 (Routh, Reliqu. Sacrae, iii. p. 384, ed. alt.).
The designation Monarchiani as a sectarian name is first used by Tertullian, Adv. Prox. c. 10 ("vanissimi isti Monarchiani"); but the Monarchians themselves used monarciva in the good sense (Adv. Prax. 3."Monarchiam, inquiunt, tenemus"), in which it was employed by the orthodox fathers in opposition to dualism and polytheism. Irenaeus wrote (according to Jerome) a book "De Monarchia, sive quod Deus non sit auctor malorum." In a somewhat different sense, the Greek fathers in opposition to the Latin Filioque insist on the monarcivaof the Father, i.e. the sovereign dignity of the first Person of the Trinity, as the root and fountain of the Deity.
From aj privative and lovgo", which may mean both irrational, and opponents of the Logos doctrine. The designation occurs first in Epiphanius, who invented the term (Haer. 51, c. 3) to characterize sarcastically their unreasonable rejection of the Divine Reason preached by John.
Hence Epiphanius asks (Haer. 51, 3): pw'" e[stai Khrivnqou ta; kata; Khrivnqou levgonta?
Comp. on the Alogi, Iren. Adv. Haer. III. 11. 9 (alii ... simul evangelium [Joannis] et propheticum repellunt spiritum;"but the application of this passage is doubtful); Epiphanius, Haer. 51 and 54. M. Merkel, Historish-kritische Aufklärung der Streitigkeiten der Aloger über die Apokalypsis, Frankf. and Leipz. 1782; by the same: Umständlicher Beweis dass die Apok. ein untergeschobenes Buch sei, Leipz. 1785; F. A. Heinichen, De Alogis, Theodotianis atque Artemonites, Leipzig, 1829; Neander, Kirchengesch. l. II. 906, 1003; Dorner, l. c. Bd. II. 500-503; Schaff, Alogians in " Smith and Wace," I. 87; Lipsius, Quellen der ältesten Ketzergeschichte, 93 and 214; Schwane, l. c. 145-148; Döllinger, Hippolytus and Callistus, 273-288 (in Plummer’s transl.); Zahn, in the " Zeitschrift für Hist. Theol."1875, p. 72 sq.; Harnack, in Herzog2, 183-186. Harnack infers from Irenaeus that the Alogi were churchly or catholic opponents of the Montanistic prophecy as well as the millennarian Gnosticism of Cerinth at a time before the canon was fixed; but it is doubtful whether Irenaeus; refers to them at all, and in the year 170 the fourth Gospel was undoubtedly recognized throughout the Catholic church.
On the older Theodotus see Hippol. Philos., VII. 35; X. 23 (in D. and Schu. p. 406 and 526); Epiph., Haer. 54; Philastr., Haer. 50; Pseudo Tert., Haer. 28; Euseb., H. E. V. 28, On the younger Theodotus, see Hippol., VII. 36; Euseb., V. 28; Pseudo-Tert., 29; Epiph., Haer. 55 (Contra Melchisedecianos).
Euseb. V. 28. Eusebius derived his information from an anonymous book which Nicephorus (IV. 21) calls mikro;n labuvrinqon, "the little labyrinth," and which Photius (Bibl. c. 48) ascribes to Caius, but which was probably written b v Hippolytus of Rome. See the note of Heinichen in Tom. III. 243 sq., and Döllinger, Hippolytus, p. 3 (Engl. transl.).
The sources of our fragmentary information about Artemon are Epiphanius, Haer. 65, c. 1-4; Euseb., H. E. V. 28; VII. 30; Theodoret, Haer. Fab. II. 8. Comp. Kapp, Historia Artemonis, 1737, Schleiermacher, Dorner, and Harnack.
"Ducenarius procurator." He was viceroy of the queen of Palmyra, to which Antioch belonged at that time.
Aqeopoivhsi" ejk prokoph'" or agegonevnai qeo;n ejx ajnqrwvpou. He anticipated the doctrine of the Socinians who were at first frequently called Samosaterians (e.g. in the Second Helvetic Confession). They teach that Christ began as a man and ended as a God, being elevated after the resurrection to a quasi-divinity, so as to become an object of adoration and worship. But the logical tendency of Socinianism is towards mere humanitarianism. The idea of divinity necessarily includes aseity and eternity. A divinity communicated in time is only a finite being.
qeo;" ejk th'" parqevnou.
Probably he meant the impersonal, pre-existent Logos. But the Synod of Antioch declined the term oJmoouvsio"impersonal (Sabellian) sense.
Sources: The fragmentary acts of the Synod of Antioch in Eusebius, VII. 27-30; Jerome, De Viris ill. 71; Epiphanius, Haer 65 (or 45 kata; tou' Pauvlou tou' Samosatevw", In Oehler’s ed. II. 2, P. 380-397); five fragments of sermons of Paul of doubtful genuineness, in Ang. Mai’s Vet. Script. Nova Coll. VII. 68 sq.; scattered notices in Athanasius, Hilary, and other Nicene fathers; Theodoret Fab. Haer. II. 8. Comp. Dorner and Harnack.
The Orientals usually call them "Sabellians" from their most prominent representative.
Pseudo-Tert.: "Praxeas hoeresim introduxit quam Victorinus [probably = Victor] corroborare curavit." It is certain from Hippolytus, that Victor’s successors, Zephyrinus and Callistus sympathized with Patripassianism.
The chief source: Tertullian, Adv. Praxean (39 chs., written about 210). Comp. Pseudo-Tertull. 20. Hippolytus strangely never mentions Praxeas. Hence some have conjectured that he was identical with Noëtus, who came likewise from Asia Minor; others identify him with Epigonus, or with Callistus, and regard Praxeas as a nickname. The proper view is that Praxeas appeared in Rome before Epigonus, probably under Eleutherus, and remained but a short time. On the other hand Tertullian nowhere mentions the names of Noëtus, Epigonus, Cleomenes, and Callistus.
tiv ou\n kako;n poiw', he asked, doxavzwn to;n Cristovn.
On Noëtus see Hippol., Philos. IX. 7-9 (p. 410-442), and his tract against Noëtus (JOmiliva eij" th;n ai{resin Nohvtou tino", perhaps the last chapter of his lost work against the 32 heresies). Epiphanius, Haer. 57, used both these books, but falsely put Noëtus back from the close of the second century to about 130.
Not his teachers, as was supposed by former historians, including Neander. See Hippolytus, IX. 7.
John 14:11.
provswpon, Callistus, however, rectified this statement, which seems to be merely an inference of Hippolytus.
divqeoi.
Döllinger here dissents from, Harnack agrees with, the charge of Hippolytus.
On Callistus see Hippol. IX. 11, 12 (p. 450-462) and c. 27 (p. 528-530). Comp. Döllinger, Hippol. und Callistus, ch. IV. (Engl. transl. p. 183 sqq., especially p. 215), and other works on Hippolytus; also Langen, Gesch. der röm. Kirche, p. 192-216. Döllinger charges Hippolytus with misrepresenting the views of Callistus; while Bishop Wordsworth (St. Hippolytus and the Church of Rome, ch. XIV. p. 214 sqq.), charges Callistus with the Sabellian heresy, and defends the orthodoxy of Hippolytus by such easy reasoning as this (p. 254): "Callistus is asserted by Hippolytus to have been a heretic. No church historian affirms Callistus to have been orthodox. All church history that has spoken of Hippolytus,—and his name is one of the most celebrated in its annals,—has concurred in bearing witness to the soundness of his faith." Harnack (in Herzog X. 202) considers the formula of Callistus as the bridge from the original monarchianism of the Roman church to the hypostasis-christology (Die Bücke, auf welcher di ursprünglich monarchianisch gesinnten römischen Crhisten, dem Zuge der Zeit und der kirchtichen,WIssenschaft folgend, zur Anerkennung der Hypostasen- Christologie übergegangen sind.")
H. E. VI. 33.
ijdiva oujsiva" perigrafhvi.e. a circumscribed, limited, separate existence.
ijdiva qeovth".
hJ patrikh; qeovth".
The Acts of the Synod of Bostra, known to Eusebius and Jerome, are lost. Our scanty information on Beryllus is derived from Eusebius, already quoted, from Jerome, De Vir. ill. c. 60, and from a fragment of Origen in the Apology of Pamphilus, Orig. Opera, IV. 22 (ed. Bened.) Comp. Ullmann, De Beryllo Bostr., Hamb. 1835. Fock, Dissert. de Christologia Berylli, 1843; Kober, Beryll v. B. in the Tüb."Theol. Quartalschrift," for 1848. Also Baur, Dorner (I. 545 sqq.), Harnack, and Hefele (Conc. Gesch. I. 109).
We will only mention Marcellus of Ancyra., Schleiermacher, and Bushnell. Schleiermacher’s doctrine of the trinity is a very ingenious improvement of Sabellianism.
This we learn from Hippolytus, who introduces him rather incidentally (in his account of Callistus) as a man well known at his time in the Roman church.
Sabellius must have been an old man at that time.
Comp. the close of § 149 (this vol.).
hJ mona;" platunqei'sa gevgone triva".
ojnovmata, provswpa,—not in the orthodox sense of hypostasis, however, but in the primary sense of mask, or part (in a play)—, also morfaiv, schvmata.
Which was for the first time duly brought out by Dr. Baur.
qeo;" lalw'n.
qeo;" siwpw'n.
diavlexi"
e{ktasi", orplatutmov" andsustolhv.
dia; th;n hJmetevran swthrivan.
1 Cor. 2:8, misapprehended.
This strange theory is variously held by Irenaeus, Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Nazianzen, Ambrose, Augustin, Leo the Great and Gregory the Great. See Baur, ch. I. and II. p. 30-118.
Comp. § 146.
Apol. I. 50, etc. See von Engelhardt, p. 182.
Ep. ad Diognetum, c. 9.
This as already intimated in a former connection, is the sense of his frequent expression: ajnakefalaiou'n, ajnakefalaivwsi" recapitulare, recapitulatio.
Dissuasio.
By suadela, persuasion, announcement of truth, not overreaching or deception.
lovgo" peri; th'" ejnanqrwphvsew" tou' lovgou.. It was written before the outbreak of the Arian controversy. The Athanasian authorship has been contested without good reason; but another work with the similar Peri; th'" sarkwvsew" tou' qeou' lovgou, pseudo-Athanasian, and belongs to the younger Apollinaris of Laodicea. See Ritschl, I. 8 sq.
See especially § 53, (this vol.).
See §§ 66 to 74, (this vol.).
Decline and Fall of the R. Emp. ch. XV
Plato, Apol. 40.
See Friedlaender, l.c. 682 sq.
See Friedlaender, p. 685. So in our age, too, the number of sceptics, materialists, and atheists, though by no means inconsiderable, is a very small minority compared with the mass of believers in a future life.
Gen. 2:9; 3:22, 24.
Gen. 5:24.
Deut. 18:11; comp. 1 Sam. 28:7.
Gen. 25:8; 35:29; 49:29, 33.
Ex. 3:6, 16; comp. Matt. 22:32.
Comp. the famous Goël-passage, Job 19:25–27, which strongly teaches the immortality of the soul and the future rectification of the wrongs of this life; Eccles. 12:7 ("the spirit shall return to God who gave it"), and 12:14 ("God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil").
Dan. 12:2, 3; Comp. Isa. 65:17; 66:22-24.
See the passages sub Sheol in the Hebrew Concordance. The very name Sheol l/av] expresses either the inexorable demand and insatiability of death (if derived from la'v;, to ask pressingly, to urge), or the subterranean character of the region, an abyss (if derived from l['v:, to be hollow, comp. hell, hollow, Höhle), and is essentially the same as the Greek Hades and the Roman Orcus. The distinction of two regions in the spirit-world (Abraham’s Bosom or Paradise, and Gehenna, comp. Luke 16:22, 23) does not appear clearly in the canonical books, and is of later origin. Oehler (Theol. des A. Test., I. 264) says: "Von einem Unterschied des Looses der im Todtenreich Befindlichen ist im Alten Test. nirgends deutlich geredet. Wie vielmehr dort Alles gleich werde, schildert Hiob. 3:17-19. Nur in Jes. 14:15; Ez. 32:23, wo den gestürzten Eroberern die äusserste Tiefe (r/b-teB]dy") angewiesen wird, kann mann die Andeutung verschiedener Abstufungen des Todtenreichs finden, etwa in dem Sinn, wie Josephus (Bell. Jud. III. 8, 5) den Selbstmördern einen, a{/dh" skotiwvtero" in Aussicht stellt. Sonst ist nur von einer Sonderung nach Völkern und Geschlechtern die Rede, nicht von einer Sonderung der Gerechten und Ungerechten."
See these and other curious particulars, with references in Wünsche, l. c. p. 361 sqq., and 494 sqq. He confesses, however, that it is exceedingly difficult to present a coherent system from the various sayings of the Rabbis. The views of the Essenes differed from the common Jewish notions; they believed only in the immortality of the soul, and greeted death as a deliverance from the prison of the body.
De Anima, c. 58. The doctrine of the psychopannychia was renewed by the Anabaptists, and refuted by Calvin in one of his earliest books. (Paris, 1534.)
Eusebius, VI. 37, mentions this view as held by some in Arabia.
Luke 23:43; Acts 2:31; 1 Pet. 3:19; 4:6.
Comp. among other passages Justin M. Dial. c. 5, 72, 80, 99, 105 (Engelhardt, l.c. p 308); Irenaeus, IV. 27, 2; V. 31; Tertullian, De Anima, c. 7, 31, 50, 55, 58; Adv. Marc. IV. 34; Cyprian, Ep. 52; Clemens Alex., Strom. VI. 762 sq.; Origen, Contra Cels. V. 15; Hom. in Luc. XIV. (Tom. III. 948) Hom. in Ez I. (III. 360); Ambrose, De Bono Mortis and Ep. 20.
The mediaeval scholastics called that part of Sheol the Limbus Patrum, and assumed that it was emptied by Christ at his descent, and replaced by Purgatory, which in turn will be emptied it the second Advent, so that after the judgment there will be only heaven and hell. The evangelical confessions agree with the Roman Catholic in the twofold state after the judgment, but deny the preceding state of Purgatory between heaven and hell. They allow, however, different degrees of holiness and happiness as well as guilt and punishment before and after the judgment.
Adv. Haer. IV. 27, § 2: "It was for this reason that the Lord descended into the regions beneath the earth, preaching His advent to them also, and [declaring] the remission of sins to those who believe in Him. Now all those believed in Him who had hope towards him, that is, those who proclaimed His advent, and submitted to His dispensations, the righteous men, the prophets, and the patriarchs, to whom He remitted sins in the same way, as He did to us, which sins we should not lay to their charge, if we would not despise the grace of God." This passage exists only in the Latin version
The Gnostics taught that all souls return immediately to God, but this was rejected as heretical. Justin, Dial. 80.
So apparently Tertullian, who calls Gehenna "a reservoir of secret fire under the earth," and Paradise "the place of divine bliss appointed to receive the spirits of the saints, separated from the knowledge of this world by that fiery zone [i.e. the river Pyriphlegeton as by a sort of enclosure." ] Apol. c. 47.
So Irenaeus, Adv. Haer. V. 5, § 1: "Wherefore also the elders who were disciples of the apostles tell us that those who were translated were transferred to that place (for paradise has been prepared for righteous men, such as have the Spirit; in which place also Paul the apostle, when he was caught up, heard words which are unspeakable as regards us in our present condition), and that there shall they who have been translated remain until the consummation [of all things], as a prelude to immortality."
Apol. I. 46: oiJ meta; Lovgou biwvsante" Cristianoiv eijsi, ka]n a[qeoi ejnomivsqhsan, oi\on ejn {Ellhsi Swkravth" kai; JHravkleito" kai; oiJ o{moioi aujtoi'". . Comp. Apol. I. 20, 44; Apol. II. 8, 13. He does not say anywhere expressly that the nobler heathen are saved; but it follows from his view of the Logos spermaticos (see p. 550). It was renewed in the sixteenth century by Zwingli, and may be consistently held by all who make salvation depend on eternal election rather than on water-baptism. God is not bound by his own ordinances, and may save whom and when and how he pleases.
2 Macc. 12:39 sqq. Roman Catholic divines use this passage (besides Matt. 5:26; 12:32 and 1 Cor. 1:13-15) as an argument for the doctrine of purgatory. But it would prove too much for them; for the sin here spoken of was not venial, but the deadly sin of idolatry, which is excluded from purgatory and from the reach of efficacious; intercession.
See specimens in Luckock, l. c. p. 58 sqq.
De Cor. Mil. c. 3: "Oblationes pro defunctis, pro natalitiis annua dei facimus." Comp. the notes in Oehler’s ed. Tom. I. 422.
De Monog. c. 10: "Pro anima ejus orat et refrigerium interim adpostulat ei et in prima resurrectione consortium."
Vita Const. IV. 71: su;n klauqmw'/ pleivoni ta;" euca;" uJpe;r th'" basilevw" yuch'" ajpedivdosan tw'/ qew'/.
Sermo 172. He also inferred from the passage on the unpardonable sin (Matt. 12:32) that other sins may be forgiven in the future world. De Civit. Dei, XXI. 24. In the Council of Chalcedon (452), Dioscurus was charged with a breach of trust for not having executed the will of a saintly woman who had left large sums of money to monasteries, hospitals, and alms-houses, in the hope of being benefited by the prayers of the faithful recipients.
tw'n pneumavtwn ... ojrqodovxwn. The Greek church lays great stress on orthodoxy; but it has here evidently a very wide meaning, as it includes the faith of Abel and all Old Testament saints.
Not Purgatory. This shows the difference between the ante-Nicene and post-Nicene faith. See below.
Sometimes, however, this is expressed in the form of a wish or prayer: Mayest thou live in God" (Vivas in Deo, or in Christo); " May God refresh thy spirit"(Deus refrigeret spiritum tuum); " Mayest thou have eternal light in Christ," etc. Comp. § 86, (this vol.).
Longer Russian Catechism, in Schaff’s Creeds, vol. II. p. 503.
pu'r kaqavrsion. It is mentioned also before Origen in the Clementine Homilies, IX. 13. The Scripture passage on which the term ignis purgatorius was based, is 1 Cor. 3:13, 15, ’the fire shall prove each man’s work he himself shall be saved; yet so as through fire. (wJ" dia; purov").
As Möhler, Klee, and others.
The point is disputed, but the 4th Maccabees, the 4th Esdras, the Book of Enoch, the Apocalypse of Baruch, and the Psalms of Solomon, contain very strong passages, which Dr. Pusey has collected, l.c. 48-100, and are not invalidated by the reply of Farrar, ch. VIII. 180-221. Josephus (whose testimony Farrar arbitrarily sets aside as worthless) attests the belief of the Pharisees and Essenes in eternal punishment, Ant. XVIII. 1, 3; Bell. Jud. II. 8, 11, Rabbi Akiba (about 120) limited the punishment of Gehenna to twelve months; but only for the Jews. The Talmud assigns certain classes to everlasting punishment, especially apostates and those who despise the wisdom of the Rabbis. The chief passage is Rosh Hoshanah, f. 16 and 17: "There will be three divisions on the day of judgment, the perfectly righteous, the perfectly wicked, and the intermediate class. The first will be at once inscribed and sealed to life eternal; the second at once to Gehenna (Dan. 12:2); the third will descend into Gehenna and keep rising and sinking" (Zech. 12:10). This opinion was endorsed by the two great schools of Shammai and Hillel, but Hillel inclined to a liberal and charitable construction (see p. 596). Farrar maintains that Gehenna does not necessarily and usually mean hell in our sense, but 1) for Jews, or the majority of Jews, a short punishment, followed by forgiveness and escape; 2) for worse offenders a long but still terminable punishment; 3) for the worst offenders, especially Gentiles—punishment followed by annihilation. He quotes several modern Jewish authorities of the rationalistic type, eg. Dr. Deutsch, who says: "There is not a word in the Talmud that lends any support to the damnable dogma of endless torment." But Dr. Ferd. Weber who is as good authority, says, that some passages in the Talmud teach total annihilation of the wicked, others teach everlasting punishment, e.g. Pesachim 54a: "The fire of Gehenna is never extinguished." Syst. der altsynag. Poläst. Theologie, p. 375. The Mohammedans share the Jewish belief, but change the inhabitants: the Koran assigns Paradise to the orthodox Moslems, and Hell to all unbelievers (Jews, Gentiles, and Christians), and to apostates from Islam.
Matt. 12:32 (the unpardonable sin); 26:24 (Judas had better never been born); 25:46 ("eternal punishment" contrasted with "eternal life"); Mark 9:48 ("Gehenna, where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched"). In the light of these solemn declarations we must interpret the passages of Paul (Rom. 5:12 sqq.; 14:9; 1 Cor. 15:22, 28), which look towards universal restoration. The exegetical discussion lies outside of our scope, but is the meaning of aijwvnio"has been drawn into the patristic discussion, it is necessary to remark that the argumentative force lies not in the etymological and independent meaning of the word, which is limited to aeon, but in its connection with future punishment as contrasted with future reward, which no man doubts to be everlasting (Matt. 25:46). On the exegetical question see M. Stuart, l.c., and especially the excursus of Taylor Lewis on Olamic and Aeonian words in Scripture, in Lange’s Com. on Ecclesiastes (Am. ed. p. 44-51).
Ep. ad Eph. C. 16: oJ toiou'to", rJuparo;" genovmeno", eij" to; pu'r to; ajsbeston cwrhvsei..
Vis. III. 2, 7; Simil. VIII. 9 (ed. Funk, 1. p. 256, 488 sq.). Dr. Pusey claims also Polycarp (?), Barrnabas, and the spurious second Ep. of Clement, and many martyrs (from their Acts) on his side, p. 151-166.
Apol. I. 8. (Comp. Plato, Phaedr. I). 249 A; De Republ.p. 615 A.)
Apol. I. 21: Comp. C. 28, 45, 52; II. 2, 7, 8, 9; Dial. 45, 130. Also v. Engelhardt, p. 206, and Donaldson, II. 321.
By Petavius, Beecher (p. 206), Farrar (p. 236), and others.
Dial.c. Tr. 4. 5; Comp. Apol. I. 21. Tatian, his disciple, says; against the Platonists) Adv. Graec. c. 13) "The soul is not immortal in itself, O Greeks, but mortal (oujk ejstin ajqavnato" hJ yuch; kaq j eJauthvn, qnhth; dev). Yet it is possible for it not to die."Irenaeus, Theophilus of Antioch, Arnobius, and Lactantius held the same view. See Nitzsch, I. 35l-353.
In Dial.c. 5, he puts into the mouth of the aged man by whom he was converted, the sentence: "Such as are worthy to see God die no more, but others shall undergo punishment as long as it shall please Him that they shall exist and be punished." But just before he had said: "I do not say that all souls die: for that would be a godsend to the wicked. What then? the souls of the pious remain in a better place, while those of the unjust and wicked are in a worse, waiting for the time of judgment." Comp. the note of Otto on the passage, Op. II. 26.
Adv. Haer. 11. 34, § 3: "omnia quae facta sunt ... perseverant quoadusque ea Deus et esse et perseverare voluerit." Irenaeus reasons that whatever is created had a beginning, and therefore may have an end. Whether it will continue or not, depends upon man’s gratitude or ingratitude. He who preserves the gift of life and is grateful to the Giver, shall receive length of days forever and ever )accipiet et in saeculum saeculi longitudinem dierum); but he who casts it away and becomes ungrateful to his Maker, "deprives himself of perseverance forever "(ipse se privat in saeculum saeculi perseverantia). From this passage, which exists only in the imperfect Latin version, Dodwell, Beecher (p. 260), and Farrar (241) infer that Irenaeus taught annihilation, and interpret perseverantia to mean continued existence; while Massuet (see his note in Stieren 1. 415), and Pusey (p. 183) explain perseverantia of continuance in real life in God, or eternal happiness. The passage, it must be admitted, is not clear, for longitudo dierum and perseverantia are not identical, nor is perseverantia equivalent to existentia or vita. In Bk. IV. 20, 7, Irenaeus says that Christ "became the dispenser of the paternal grace for the benefit of man ... lest man, failing away from God altogether, should cease to exist " (cessaret esse); but he adds, "the life of man consists in beholding God " (vita autem hominus visio Dei). In the fourth Pfaffian Fragment ascribed to him (Stieren I. 889), he says that Christ "will come at the end of time to destroy all evil (eij" to; katargh'sai pa'n to; kako;n) and to reconcile all things (eij" to; ajpokatallavxai to; pavnta, from Col. 1:20) that there may be an end of all impurity." This passage, like 1 Cor. 15:28 and Col. 1:20, looks towards universal restoration rather than annihilation, but admits, like the Pauline passages, of an interpretation consistent with eternal punishment. See the long note in Stieren.
Adv. Haer. III. 4, 1; If. 28, 7. See Pusey, p. 177-181. Ziegler (Irenäus, p. 312) says that Irenaeus teaches the eternity of punishment in several passages, or presupposes it, and quotes III. 23, 3; IV. 27, 4; 28, 1; IV. 33, 11; 39, 4; 40, 1 and 2.
Philos. IX. 23, 30.
Apol. c. 45. Comp. De Test. An. 4; De Spect. 19, 30. Pusey 184 sq.
De Mortal. 10; Ep. VIII. 2. Pusey, 190. he quotes also the Rocognitions of Clement, and the Clementine Homilies, (XI. 11) on this side.
Orig. C. Cels. VIII. 48. Origen in his answer does not deny the fact, but aims to prove that the truth is with the Christians.
Adv. Gent. 11. 14. The theory of conditional immortality and the annihilation of the wicked has been recently renewed by a devout English author, Rev. Edward White, Life in Christ. Dr. R. Rothe also advocates annihilation, but not till after the conversion of the wicked has become a moral impossibility. See his posthumous Dogmatik, ed. by Schenkel, II. 335.
De Princ. I. 6, 3. Comp. In Jer. Hom. 19; C. Cels. VI. 26.
It is usually asserted from Augustin down to Nitzsch (I. 402), that Origen included Satan in the ajpokatavstasi" tw'n pavntwn, but In Ep. ad Rom. l. VIII. 9 (Opera IV. 634) he says that Satan will not be converted, not even at the end of the world, and in a letter Ad quosdam amicos Alex. (Opera I. 5, quoted by Pusey, p. 125) " Although they say that the father of malice and of the perdition of those who shall be cast out of the kingdom of God, can be saved which no one can say, even if bereft of reason."
After the apokatastasis has been completed in certain aeons, he speaks of pavlin a[llh ajrch;. See the judicious remarks of Neander, I. 656 (Am. ed.)
Nitzsch (I. 403 sq.) includes also Gregory Nazianzen, and possibly Chrysostom among universalists. So does Farrar more confidently (249 sqq., 271 sqq.). But the passages on the other side are stronger, see Pusey, 209 sqq., 244 sqq., and cannot be explained from mere "accommodation to the popular view." It is true, however, that Chrysostom honored the memory of Origen, and eulogized his teacher Diodorus, of Tarsus, and his comments on 1 Cor. 15:28 look towards an apokatatasIs. Pusey speaks too disparagingly of Diodor and Theodore of Mopsuestia, as the fathers of Nestorianism, and unjustly asserts that they denied the incarnation (223-226). They and Chrysostom were the fathers of a sound grammatical exegesis against the allegorizing extravagances of the Origenistic school.
Posey contends (125-137), that Origen was condemned by the fifth Œcumenical Council, 553, but Hefele conclusively proves that the fifteen anathematisms against Origen were passed by a local Synod of Constantinople in 543 under Mennas. See his Conciliengesch., second ed., II. 859 sqq. The same view was before advocated by Dupin, Walch, and Döllinger.
At least in the Lutheran church of Germany and in the church of England. Bengel very cautiously intimates the apokatastasis, and the Pietists in Würtemberg generally hold it. Among recent divines Schleiermacher, the Origen of Germany, is the most distinguished Universalist. He started not, like Origen, from freedom, but from the opposite Calvinistic theory of a particular election of individuals and nations, which necessarily involves a particular reprobation or praetermission rather, but only for time, until the election shall reach at last the fulness of the Gentiles and the whole of Israel. Satan was no obstacle with him, as he denied his personal existence. A denomination of recent American origin, the Universalists, have a creed of three articles called the Winchester Confession (1803), and one article teaches the ultimate restoration of "the whole family of mankind to holiness and happiness."
1160 Chiliasm (from civlia e[th, a thousand years, Rev. 20:2, 3) is the Greek, millennarianism or millennialism (from mille anni), the Latin term for the same theory. The adherents are called Chiliasts, or Millennarians, also Pre-millennarians, or Pre-millennialists (to indicate the belief that Christ will appear again before the millennium), but among them many are counted who simply believe in a golden age of Christianity which is yet to come. Post-millennarians or Anti-millennarians are those who put the Second Advent after the millennium.
1161 See Euseb. H. E. III. 27 and 28.
1162 Matt. 5:4; 19:28; Luke 14:12 sqq.
1163 Rev. 20:1-6. This is the only strictly millennarian passage in the whole Bible. Commentators are still divided as to the literal or symbolical meaning of the millennium, and as to its beginning in the past or in the future. But a number of other passages are drawn into the service of the millennarian theory, as affording indirect support, especially Isa. 11:4-9; Acts 3:21; Rom. 11:15. Modern Pre-millennarians also appeal to what they call the unfulfilled prophecies of the Old Testament regarding the restoration of the Jews in the holy land. But the ancient Chiliasts applied those prophecies to the Christian church as the true Israel.
1164 Comp. Matt. 24:33, 36; Mark 13:32; Acts 1:7; 1 Thess. 5:1, 2; 2 Pet. 3:10; Rev. 1:3; 3:3.
1165 Barn. Epist. ch. 15. He seems to have drawn his views from Ps. 90:4, 2 Pet. 3:8, but chiefly from Jewish tradition. He does not quote the Apocalypse. See Otto in Hilgenfeld’s "Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Theologie." 1877, p. 525-529, and Funk’s note in Patr. Apost. I. 46.
1166 Adv. Haer. V. 33, § 3 (ed. Stieren I. 809), quoted from the fourth book of The Oracles of the Lord:" " The days will come when vines shall grow, each having ten thousand branches, and in each branch ten thousand twigs, and in each true twig ten thousand shoots, and in every one of the shoots ten thousand clusters, and on every one of the clusters ten thousand grapes, and every grape when pressed will give five-and-twenty measures of wine. And when any one of the saints shall lay hold of a cluster, another shall cry out, ’I am a better cluster, take me; bless the Lord through me.’ In like manner [He said], ’that a grain of wheat shall produce ten thousand ears, and that every ear shall have ten thousand grains, and every grain shall yield ten pounds of pure, fine flour; and that apples, and seeds, and grass shall produce in similar proportions; and that all animals, feeding on the productions of the earth, shall then live in peace and harmony, and be in perfect subjection to man."’ These words were communicated to Papias by " the presbyters, who saw John the disciple of the Lord." and who remembered having beard them from John as coming from the Lord. There is a similar description of the Messianic times in the twenty-ninth chapter of the Apocalypse of Baruch, from the close of the first or beginning of the second century, as follows: " The earth shall yield its fruits, one producing ten thousand, and in one vine shall be a thousand bunches, and one bunch shall produce one thousand grapes, and one grape shall produce one thousand berries, and one berry shall yield a measure of wine. And those who have been hungry shall rejoice, and they shall again see prodigies every day. For spirits shall go forth from my sight to bring every morning the fragrance of spices, and at the end of the day clouds dropping the dew of health. And it shall come to pass, at that time, that the treasure of manna shall again descend from above, and they shall eat of it in these years." See the Latin in Fritzsche’s ed. of the Libri Apoc. V. T., p. 666.
1167 Dial.c. Tryph. c. 32, 51, 110. Comp. Dan. 7:25 and 2 Thess. 2:8.
1168 Dial.c. 80 and 81. He appeals to the prophecies of Isaiah (65:17 sqq.), Ezekiel, Ps. 90:4, and the Apocalypse of "a man named John, one of the apostles of Christ." In another passage, Dial. c. 113, Justin says that as Joshua led Israel into the holy land and distributed it among the tribes, so Christ will convert the diaspora and distribute the goodly land, yet not as an earthly possession, but give us (hJmi'n) an eternal inheritance. He will shine in Jerusalem as the eternal light, for he is the King of Salem after the order of Melchisedek, and the eternal priest of the Most High. But be makes no mention of the loosing of Satan after the millennium. Comp. the discussion of Justin’s eschatology by M. von Engelhardt, Das Christenthum Justins des Märt. )1878), p. 302-307, and by Donaldson, Crit. Hist. of Christ. Lit. II 316-322.
1169 This point is disputed. Semisch contends for annihilation, Weizsäcker for transformation. von Engelhardt (p. 309) leaves the matter undecided. In the Dial. c. 113 Justin says that God through Christ will renew (kainourgei'n ) the heaven and the earth; in the Apologies, that the world will be burnt up.
1170 Apol. I. 50, 51, 52. For this reason Donaldson (11. 263), and Dr. Briggs (l.c. p. 21) suspect that the chiliastic passages in the Dialogue (at least ch. 81) are an interpolation, or corrupted, but without any warrant. The omission of Justin in Jerome’s lists of Chiliasts can prove nothing against the testimony of all the manuscripts.
1171 Adv. Haer. V. 23-36. On the eschatology of Irenaeus see Ziegler, Iren.der B. v. Lyon (Berl. 1871), 298-320; and Kirchner, Die Eschatol. d. Iren. in the "Studien und Kritiken" for 1863, p. 315-358.
1172 De Res. Carn. 25; Adv. Marc. III. 24; IV. 29, etc. He discussed the subject in a special work, De Spe Fidelium, which is lost.
1173 See § 111, p. 424 sq.
1174 Instruct. adv. Gentium Deos, 43, 44, with the Jewish notion of fruitful millennial marriages.
1175 Instit. VII. 24; Epit. 71, 72. He quotes from the Sibylline books, and expects the speedy end of the world, but not while the city of Rome remains.
1176 In his Commentary on Revelation, and the fragment De Fabrica Mundi (part of a Com. on Genesis). Jerome classes him among the Chiliasts.
1177 In his Banquet of the Ten Virgins, I X. 5, and Discourse on Resurrection
1178 Euseb. H. E. II. 25 (against the Montanist Proclus), and III. 28 (against chiliasm).
1179 De Princ. II. 11. He had, however, in view a very sensuous idea of the millennium with marriages and luxuriant feasts.
1180 Euseb. VII. 24, 25.
1181 De Civit. Dei, XX. 6-10.
1182 The Augsburg Confession, Art. XVII., condemns the Anabaptists and others "who now scatter Jewish opinions that, before the resurrection of the dead, the godly shall occupy the kingdom of the world, the wicked being everywhere suppressed." The 41st of the Anglican Articles, drawn up by Cranmer (1553), but omitted afterwards in the revision under Elizabeth (1563), describes the millennium as "a fable of Jewish dotage."