c. Historical , or historico-polemical (6, 8—10, 13—19, 23).

c. Historical , or historico-polemical (6, 8—10, 13—19, 23).

It will be attempted to give a complete list of his writings in chronological order; those included in this volume will be marked with an asterisk and enumerated in this place without remark. The figures prefixed indicate the probable date.

(I) 318: * Two books ‘contra Gentes,’ viz. c. Gent. and De Incarn. (2) 321–2: * Depositio Arii (on its authorship, see Introd.) (3) 328–373: * Festal Letters. (4) 328–335? * Ecthesis or Expositio Fidel. (5) Id.? * In Illud Omnia, etc. (6) 339: * Encyclica ad Episcopos ecclesiae catholicae. (7) 343: * Sardican Letters (46, 47, in this vol.). (8) 351? * Apologia Contra Arianos. (9) 352? * De Decretis Concilii Nicaeni, with the * Epistola Eusebii (a.d. 325) as appendix. (10) Id.? * De Sententia Dionysii. (11) 350–353? * Ad Amun, (Letter 48). (12) 354: * Ad Dracontium (Letter 49 in this vol.). (13) 356–362? Vita Antoni. (14) 356:* Epistola ad Episc. Aegypti et Libyae. (15) 356–7: *Apol. Ad Constantium. (16) 357: * Apol. De Fuga. (17) 358: * Epist. Ad Serapionem de Morte Arii (Letter 54). (18) ID. * Two Letters To Monks (52, 53). (19) 358? * Historia Arianorum ‘ad monachos.’ (20) Id. * Orationes Adversus Arianos IV. (21) 359? * Ad Luciferum (Letters 50, 51). (22) Id.? Ad Serapionem Orationes IV. (Migne xxvi. 529, sqq.). These logoi or dogmatic letters are the most important work omitted in the preseut volume. Serapion of Thmuis, who appears from the silence respecting him in the lists of exiles to have escaped banishment in 356–7, reported to Athanasius the growth of the doctrine that, while the Son was co-essential with the Father, the Spirit was merely a creature superior to Angels. Athanasius replied in a long dogmatic letter, upon receiving which Serapion was begged to induce the author to abridge it for the benefit of the simple. After some hesitation Athanasius sent two more letters, the second drawing out the proofs of the Godhead of the Son, the third restating more concisely the argument of the first. The objections by which these letters were met were replied to in a fourth letter which Athanasius declared to be his last word. The persons combated are not the Macedonians, who only formed a party on this question at a later date, and whose position was not quite that combated in these letters. Athanasius calls them Tropigoi, or Figurists, from the sense in which they understood passages of Scripture which seemed to deify the Holy Spirit. It is not within our compass to summarise the treatises. but it may be noted that Ath. argues that where pnxuma is absolute or anarthrous in Scripture it never refers to the Holy Spirit unless the context already supplies such reference (i. 4, sqq.). He meets the objection that the Spirit, if God and of God, must needs be a Son, by falling back upon the language of Scripture as our guide where human analogies fail us. He also presses his opponents with the consequence that they substitute a Dyad for a Trinity. In the fourth letter, at the request of Serapion, he gives an explanation of the words of Christ about Sin Against the Spirit. Rejecting the view (Origen, Theognostus) that post-baptismal sin is meant (§§9, sqq.), as favouring Novatianist rigour, he examines the circumstances under which our Lord uttered the warning. The Pharisees refused to regard the Lord as divine when they saw His miracles, but ascribed them to Beelzebub. They blasphemed ‘the Spirit,’ i.e. the Divine Personality of Christ (§19, cf. Lam. iv. 20, LXX.). So far as the words relate to the Holy Spirit, it is not because the Spirit worked through Him (as through a prophet) but because He worked through the Spirit (20). Blasphemy against the Spirit, then, is blasphemy against Christ in its worst form (see also below, ch. iv., §6). It may be noted lastly that he refers to Origen in the same terms of somewhat measured praise (o polumaoh? kai flopono?), as in the De Decretis.

(23) 359–60. *De Synodis Arimini et Seleuciae celebratis. (24) 362: *Tomus Ad Antiochenos. (25) Id. Syntagma Doctrinae (?) see chapter ii. §9, above. (26) 362: *Letter to Rufinianus (Letter 55). (27) 363–4: *Letter to Jovian (Letter 56). (28) 364 ? *Two small Letters to Orsisius (57, 58)* (29) 369? *Synodal Letter Ad Afros. (30) Id.? *Letter to Epictetus (59). (31) Id.? *Letters to Adelphius and Maximus (60, 61). (32) 363–372 ? *Letter to Diodorus of Tyre (fragment, Letter 64). (33) 372: *Letters to John and Antiochus and to Palladius (62, 63). (34) 372? Two books against Apollinarianism (Migne xxvi. 1093, sqq. Translated with notes, &c., in Bright, Later Treatises of St. Athan.). The two books are also known under separate titles: Book I. as ‘De Incarnatione D.n.j.C. Contra Apollinarium,’ Book II. as ‘De Salutari Adventu D.N.J.C.’ The Athanasian authorship has been doubted, chiefly on the ground of certain peculiar expressions in the opening of Book I.; a searching investigation of the question has not yet been made, but on the whole the favourable verdict of Montfaucon holds the field. He lays stress on the affinity of the work to letters 59–61. I would add that the studious omission of any personal reference to Apollinarius is highly characteristic.) In the first book Athanasius insists on the reality of the human nature of Christ in the Gospels, and that it cannot be co-essential with the Godhead. ‘We do not worship a creature?’ No; for we worship not the Flesh of Christ as such but the Person who wears it, viz. the Son of God. Lastly, he urges that the reality of redemption is destroyed if the Incarnation does not extend to the spirit of man, the seat of that sin which Christ came to atone for (§19), and seeks to fasten upon his opponents a renewal (§§20, 21) of the system of Paul of Samosata.

The second book is addressed to the question of the compatibility of the entire manhood with the entire sinlessness of Christ. This difficulty he meets by insisting that the Word took in our nature all that God had made, and nothing that is the work of the devil. This excludes sin, and includes the totality of our nature.

This closes the list of the dated works which can be ascribed with fair probability to Athanasius.

The remainder of the writings of Athanasius may be enumerated under groups, to which the ‘dated’ works will also be assigned by their numbers as given above. Works falling into more than one class are given under each.

a. Letters. (Numbers 3, 7, 11, 12, 17, 18, 21, 26—28, 30—33; spurious letters, see infr. p. 581.)

b. Dogmatic. (2, 4, 5, 9, 10, 14. 20, 22—24, 26, 27, 29—31, 34.)

(35.) De Trinitate el Spiritu Sancto (Migne xxvi. 1191). Preserved in Latin only, but evidently from the Greek. Pronounced genuine by Montfaucon, and dated (?) 365.

(36) De Incarnatione et Contra Arianos (ib. 984). The Athanasian authorship of this short tract is very questionable. It is quoted as genuine by Theodoret Dial. ii. and by Gelasius de duabus naturis. In some councils it is referred to as ‘On the Trinity against Apollinarius;’ by Facundus as ‘On the Trinity.’ The tract is in no sense directed against Apollinarius. In reality it is an argument, mainly from Scripture, for the divinity of Christ, with a digression (13—19) on that of the Holy Spirit. On the whole the evidence is against the favourable verdict of Montfaucon, Ceillier, &c. That Athanasius should, at any date possible for this tract, have referred to the Trinity as ‘the three Hypostases’ is out of the question (§10): his explanation of Prov. viii. 22 in Orat. ii. 44 sqq. is in sharp contrast with its reference to the Church in §6; at a time when the ideas of Apollinarius were in the air and were combated by Athanasius (since 362) he would not have used language savouring of that system (§§2, 3, 5, 7, &c.). It has been thought that we have here one of the Apollinarian tracts which were so industriously and successfully circulated under celebrated names (infra, on No. 40); the express insistence on two wills in Christ (§21), if not in favour of Athanasian might seem decisive against Apollinarian authorship, but the peculiar turn of the passage, which correlates the one will with sarx the other with pnevma and qeo? is not incompatible with the latter, which is, moreover, supported by the constant insistance on God having come, en sarki and en omoiwmati anqrwpou. The anqrwpo? teleio? of §8 and the wmoiwqh katanta of §11 lose their edge in the context of those passages. The first part of §7 could scarcely have been written by an earnest opponent of Apollinarianism. This evidence is not conclusive, but it is worth considering, and, at any rate, leaves it very difficult to meet the strong negative case against the genuineness of the Tract. (Best discussion of the latter in Bright, Later Treatises of St. A., p. 143; he is supported by Card. Newman in a private letter.)

(37) The Sermo Maior de Fide. (Migne xxvi. 1263 sqq., with an additional fragment p. 1292 from Mai Bibl. nov.). This is a puzzling document in many ways. It has points of contact with the earliest works of Ath. (especially pieces nearly verbatim from the de Incarn., see notes there), also with the Expos. Fid. Card. Newman calls it with some truth ‘Hardly more than a set of small fragments from Ath.’s other works.’ However this may be, it is quoted by Theodoret as Athanasian more than once. The peculiarity lies in the constant iteration of [ Anqrwpo" for the Lord’s human nature (see note on Exp. Fid.), and in some places as though it were merely the equivalent to swma or sarx, while in others the [ Anqrwpo" might be taken as the seat of Personality (26, 32). Accordingly the tract might be taken advantage of either by Nestorians, or still more by Apollinarians. The ‘syllogistic method,’ praised in the work by Montfaucon, was not unknown to the last-mentioned school. (Prov. viii. 22 is explained in the Athanasian way. For a fuller discussion, result unfavourable, see Bright, ubi supr. p. 145.)

(38) Fragments against Paul of Samosata, Macedonians, Novatians (Migne xxvi. 1293, 1313—1317). The first of these may well be genuine. It repeats the (mistaken) statement of Hist. Ar. 71, that Zenobia was a Jewess. Of the second, all that can be said is that it attacks the Macedonians in language borrowed from Ep. Aeg. 11. The third, consisting of a somewhat larger group of five fragments, comprise a short sentence comparing the instrumentality of the priest in absolving to his instrumentality in baptizing.

It may be observed that fragments of this brevity rarely furnish a decisive criterion of genuineness.

(39) Interpretatio Symboli (ib. 1232, Hahn, §66). Discussed fully by Caspari, Ungedruckte u.s.w. Quelleni. pp. 1—72, and proved to be an adaptation of a baptismal creed drawn up by Epiphanius (Ancor. ad fin.) in 374. It may be Alexandrian, and, if so, by Bishop Peter or Theophilus about 380. It is a Ermhneia, or rather an expansion, of the Nicene, not as Montf. says, of the Apostles’(!), Creed.

(40) De Incarnatione Verbi Dei (Migne xxviii. 25—29). Quoted as Athanasian by Cyril of Alex., &c., and famous as containing the phrase Mian fusin. Apollinarian; one of the many forgeries from this school circulated under the names of Athanasius, Gregory Thaumaturgus, Julius, &c. See Caspari, ubi supra 151, Loofs, Leontius, p. 82, sqq. Caspari’s proof is full and conclusive. See also Hahn, §120.

(41) Verona Creed (Hahn, §41, q.v.), a Latin fragment of a Western creed; nothing Athanasian but the ms. title.

(42) ‘Damasine’ Creed (Opp. ed. Ben. ii. 626, Migne P.L lxii. 237 in Vig. Thaps.) forms the ‘eighth’ of the Libri de Trinitate ascribed now to Athan. now to Damasus, &c., &c.: see Hahn, §128 and note.

(43) ‘de Irncarnatione’ (Migne xxviii. 89), Anti-Nestorian: fifth century.

c. Historical, or historico-polemical (6, 8—10, 13—19, 23).

(44) Fragment concerning Stephen and the Envoys at Antioch (Migne xxvi. 1293). Closely related (relative priority not clear) to the account in Thdt. H.E., ii. 9.

d. Apologetic. To this class belong only the works under No. (1).

e. Exegetical (5). The other exegetical works attributed to Athan, are mainly in Migne, vol. xxvii.

(45) Ad Marcellinum de Interpretatione Psalmornm. Certainly genuine. A thoughtful and devout tract on the devotional use of the Psalter. He lays stress on its universality, as summing up the spirit of all the other elements of Scripture, and as applying to the spiritual needs of every soul in all conditions. He remarks that the Psalms are sung not for musical effect, but that the worshippers may have longer time to dwell upon their meaning. The whole is presented as the discourse tino? filoponou geronto?, possibly an ideal character.

(46) Expositiones in Psalmos, with an Argumentum (upoqesi>v) prefixed. The latter notices the arrangement of the Hebrew Psalter, the division into books, &c., and accounts for the absence of logical order by the supposition that during the Captivity some prophet collected as best he could the Scriptures which the carelessness of the Israelites had allowed to fall into disorder. The titles are to be followed as regards authorship. Imprecatory passages relate to our ghostly enemies. In the Expositions each Psalm is prefaced by a short statement of the general subject. He occasionally refers to the rendering of Aquila, Theodotion, and Symmachus.

(47) Fragmenta in Psalmos. Published by Felckmann from the Catena of Nicetas Heracleota, who has used his materials somewhat freely, often combining the comments of more than one Father into a single whole.

(48) De Titulis Psalmorum. First published by Antonelli in I746. This work, consisting of very brief notes on the Psalter verse by verse, is spoken of disparagingly by Alzog, Patrol., p. 229, and regarded as spurious, on good prima facie grounds, by Gwatkin, p. 69, note. Eichhorn, de Vit. Ascet., p. 43, note, threatens the latter (1886) with a refutation which, however, I have not seen.

(49)Fracmentum in Cantica. (Photius mentions a Commentary on Eccles. and Cant.) From a Catena published by Meursius in 1617. Very brief (on Cant. i. 6, 7, iii. 1, 2, vi. 1). A spurious homily is printed (pp. 1349–1361) as an appendix to it.

(50) Fragmenta in Evang. Matthaei. Also from ms. catenae. Contain a remarkable reference to the Eucharist (p. 1380, on Matt. vii. 6) and a somewhat disparaging reference to Origen (infr. p. 33) in reference to Matt. xii. 32, which passage is explained as in Serap. iv. (vide supra 22). The extracts purport in some cases to be taken from a homiletical or expository work of Athanasius divided into separate logoi. The passage ‘on the nine incurable diseases of Herod’ is grotesque (Migne xxvi. 1252), but taken from Joseph., B. J. I. xxiii. 5. Cf. Euseb. H. E. i. 8.

(51) Fragmenta in Lucam. Also from ms. catenae. At the end, a remarkable passage on the extent to which prayers can help the departed.

(52) Fragmenta in Job. From Nicetas and ms. catenae. Contains little remarkable. ‘Behemoth’ is Satan, as elsewhere in Athan.

(53) Fragmentum in L Cor. A short paragraph on 1 Cor. vii. I, or rather on vi. 18, somewhat inadequately explained.

f. Moral and Ascetic, (11—13, [25], 28).

(54) Sermo de Patientia. (Migne xxvi. 1295.) Of doubtful genuineness (Montf., Gwatkin).

(55) De Virginitate. (Migne xxviii. 251). Pronounced dubious by Montf., spurious by Gwatkin, genuine by Eichhorn (ubi supr., pp. 27, sqq.), who rightly lays stress on the early stage of feminine asceticism which is implied. But I incline to agree with Mr. Gwatkin as to its claims to come from Athanasius. ‘Three hypostases’ are laid down in a way incompatible with Athanasius’ way of speaking in later life.

(56) Mlscellaneous Fragments. These are too slight and uncertain to be either classed or discussed here. De Amuletis (xxvi. 1319); de Azymis, (1327), very dubious; In Ramos palmarum (1319), also dubious; various small homiletical and controversial pieces (pp. 1224—1258) of various value and claims to genuineness. (See also Migne xxv. p. xiv. No. xx.)

(57) Of Los Works (in addition to those of which fragments have been mentioned above) a Refutation of Arianism is referred to in Letter 52. We also hear of a treatise against heresics (a fragment above, No. 56). A ‘Synodicon,’ with the names of all Bishops present at Nicaea, is quoted by Socr. i. 13, but is referred by Revillout to his alleged Acts of the Synod of Alexandria in 362, which he supposes to have reissued the Acts of Nicaea. See above, p. lix. A consolatory address to the Virgins maltreated by George is mentioned by Theodoret, H. E. ii. 14; he quotes a few words, referring to the fact that the Arians would not even allow them peaceable burial, but ‘sit about the tombs like demons’ to prevent it. The Oratio de defunctis (infra, ch. iv. §6, fragment above, 56) is ascribed to him by John Damasc., but by others to Cyril of Alexandria. Many of his letters must have been lost. The Festal Letters are still very incomplete, and his letters to S. Basil would be a welcome discovery if they exist anywhere. A doctrinal letter against the Arians, not preserved to us, is mentioned de Decr. 5. (See also Montfaucon’s Proef. ii. (Migne xxv. p. xxv., sqq), and Jerome, de Vir. illustr. 87, a somewhat careless and scanty list.)

The above enumeration includes all the writings attributed with any probability to S. Athanasius. The fragmentary character of many of them is no great presumption against their genuineness. The Abbat Cosmas in the sixth century advised all who met with anything by Athanasius to copy it, and if they had no paper, to use their clothes for the purpose. This will readily explain (if explanation is needed) the transmission of such numerous scraps of writing under the name of the great bishop. It will also partly explain the large body of Spurious Works which have sheltered themselves under his authority. To this class we have already assigned several writings (25, 36, 37 ? 39–43, 44 ? 48 ? 53 ? 55, 56 in part). Others whose claims are even less strong may be passed over, with only the mention of one or two of the more important. They are all printed in Migne, vol. xxviii., and parallels to some, especially the ‘dubious’ In Passionem Et Crucem Domini, are marked in Williams’ notes to the Festal Letters, partly incorporated in this volume. The epistola catholica and Synopsis Scripturae sacrae are among the better known, and are classed with a few others as ‘dubia’ by Montfaucon, the fictitious Disputerio habita in concilio Nicaeno contra Arium, among the ‘spuria.’ The silly tale de Imagine Berytensi seems to have enjoyed a wide circulation in the middle ages. Of the other undoubtedly ‘spurious’ works the most famous is the ‘Athanasian Creed’ or Quicunque Vult. It is needless to say that it is unconnected with Athanasius: its origin is still sub judice. The second part of it bears traces of the period circa 430 a.d., and the question which still awaits a last word is whether the Symbol is or is not a fusion of two originally independent documents. Messrs. Lumby, Swainson and others have ably maintained this, but the difficulties of their hypothesis that the fusion took place as late as about 800 a.d. are very great, and I incline to think will eventually prove fatal to it. But the discussion does not belong to our present subject.

§2. Athanasius as an Author. Style and Characteristics.

Athanasius was not an author by choice. With the exception of the early apologetic tracts all the writings that he has left were drawn from him by the stress of theological controversy or by the necessities of his work as a Christian pastor. We have no systematic doctrinal treatise, no historical monograph from his pen, although his writings are rich in materials for history and dogmatics alike. The exception to this is in the exegetical remains, especially those on the Psalms, which (supra, No. 45, sqq.) imply something more than occasional work, some intention of systematic composition. For this, a work congenial to one who was engaged in preaching, his long intervals of quiet at Alexandria (especially 328—335, 346—356, 365—373) may well have given him leisure. But on the whole, his writings are those of a man of powerful mind indeed and profound theological training, but still of a man of action The style of Athanasius is accordingly distinguished from that of many older and younger contemporaries (Eusebius, Gregory Naz., &c.) by its inartificiality. This was already observed by Erasmus, who did not know many of his best works, but who notes his freedom from the harshness of Tertullian, the exaggeration of Jerome, the laboured style of Hilary, the overloaded manner of Augustine and Chrysostom, the imitation of the Attic orators so conspicuous in Gregory; ‘sed totus est in explicanda re.’ That is true. Athanasius never writes for effect, but merely to make his meaning plain and impress it on others. This leads to his principal fault, namely his constant self-repetition (see p. 47, note 6); even in apologising for this he repeats the offence. The praise by Photius (quoted below, Introd. to Orat.) of his aperitton seems to apply to his freedom not from repetition but from extravagance, or studied brilliancy. This simplicity led Philostorgius, reflecting the false taste of his age, to pronounce Athanasius a child as compared with Basil, Gregory, or Apollinarius. To a modern reader the manliness of his character is reflected in the unaffected earnestness of his style. Some will admire him most when, in addressing a carefully calculated appeal to an emperor, he models his periods on Demosthenes de Corona (see p. 237). To others the unrestrained utterance of the real man, in such a gem of feeling and character as the Letter (p. 557) to Draeontius, will be worth more than any studied apology. With all his occasional repetition, with all the feebleness of the Greek language of that day as an instrument of expression, if we compare it with the Greek of Thucydides or Plato, Athanasius writes with nerve and keenness, even with a silent but constant underflow of humour. His style is not free from Latinisms; preda (= praeda) in the Encycl., beterano" (= veteranus), bhlon (= velum), magistro", &c., are barbarisms belonging to the later decadence of Greek, but not without analogy even in the earliest Christian Literature. xunwri" is used in an unusual sense, p. 447. ÆAreiomanitai seems to be coined by himself; akaqhkwn, apoxenizein, epakouein (= answer), egkuklein, &c., are Alexandrinisms (see Fialon, p. 289). On the whole, no man was ever less of a stylist, while at the same time making the fullest use of the resources furnished by the language at his command. When he wrote, seven centuries of decay had passed over the language of Thucydides, the tragedians, Plato and the Orators. The Latin Fathers of the day had at their disposal a language only two centuries or so past its prime. The heritage of Thucydides had passed through Tacitus to the Latin prose writers of the silver age. The Latin of Tertullian, Cyprian, Jerome, Augustin, Leo, with all its mannerisms and often false antithesis and laboured epigram, was yet a terse incisive weapon compared with the patristic Greek. But among the Greek Fathers Athanasius is the most readable, simply because his style is natural and direct, because it reflects the man rather than the age.

§3. Personal characteristics (see Stanley’s Eastern Church, Lect. vii.). To write an elaborate character of Athanasius is superfluous. The full account of his life (chap. ii.), and the specimens of his writings in this volume, may be trusted to convey the right impression without the aid of analysis. But it may be well to emphasise one or two salient points

In Athanasius we feel ourselves in contact with a commanding personality. His early rise to decisive epoch-making infiuence,—he was scarcely more than 27 at the council of Nicaea,—his election as bishop when barely of canonical age, the speedy ascendancy which he gained over all Egypt and Libya, the rapid consolidation of the distracted province under his rule, the enthusiastic personal loyalty of his clergy and monks, the extraordinary popularity enjoyed by him at Alexandria even among the heathen (excepting, perhaps, ‘the more abandoned among them,’ Hist. Ar. 58), the evident feeling of the Arians that as long as he was intact their cause could not prosper, the jealously of his influence shewn by Constantius and Julian, all this is a combined and impressive tribute to his personal greatness. In what then did this consist?

Principally, no doubt, in his moral and mental vigour; resolute ability characterises his writings and life throughout. He had the not too common gift of seeing the proportions of things. A great crisis was fully appreciated by him; he always saw at once where principles separated or united men, where the bond or the divergence was merely accidental. With Arius and Arianism no compromise was to be thought of; but he did not fail to distinguish men really at one with him on essentials, even where their conduct toward himself had been indefensible (de Syn.). So long as the cause was advanced, personal questions were insignificant. So far Athanasius was a partisan. It may be admitted that he saw little good in his opponents; but unless the evidence is singularly misleading there was little good to see. The leaders of the Arian interest were unscrupulous men, either bitter and unreasoning fanatics like Secundus and Maris, or more often political theologians, like Eusebius of Nicomedia, Valens, Acacius, who lacked religious earnestness. It may be admitted that he refused to admit error in his friends. His long alliance with Marcellus, his unvarying refusal to utter a syllable of condemnation of him by name; his refusal to name even Photinus, while yet (Orat. iv.) exposing the error associated with his name; his suppression of the name of Apollinarius, even when writing directly against him; all this was inconsistent with strict impartiality, and, no doubt, placed his adversaries partly in the right. But it was the partiality of a generous and loyal spirit, and he could be generous to personal enemies if he saw in them an approximation to himself in principle. When men were dead, unlike too many theologians of his own and later times, he restrained himself in speaking of them, even if the dead man were Arius himself.

In the whole of our minute knowledge of his life there is a total lack of self-interest. The glory of God and the welfare of the Church absorbed him fully at all times. We see the immense power he exercised in Egypt; the Emperors recognised him as a political force of the first order; Magnentius bid for his support, Constantius first cajoled, then made war upon him; but on no occasion does he yield to the temptation of using the arm of flesh. Almost unconscious of his own power, he treats Serapion and the monks as equals or superiors, degging them to correct and alter anything amiss in his writings. His humility is the more real for never being conspicuously paraded.

Like most men of great power, he had a real sense of humour (Stanley, p. 231, sq.,ed. 1883). Even in his youthful works we trace it (infr. p. 2), and it is always present, though very rarely employed with purpose. But the exposure of the Arsenius calumny at Tyre, the smile with which he answered the importunate catechising of an Epiphanius about ‘old’ Marcellus, the oracular interpretation of the crow’s ‘cras’ in answer to the heathen (Sozom. iv. 10), the grave irony with which he often confronts his opponents with some surprising application of Scripture, his reply to the pursuers from the Nile boat in 362, allow us to see the twinkle of his keen, searching eye. Courage, self-sacrifice, steadiness of purpose, versatility and resourcefulness, width of ready sympathy, were all harmonised by deep reverence and the discipline of a single-minded lover of Christ. The Arian controversy was to him no battle for ecclesiastical power, nor for theological triumph. It was a religious crisis involving the reality of revelation and redemption. He felt about it as he wrote to the bishopsof Egypt, ‘we are contending for our all’ (p. 234).

‘A certain cloud of romance encircled him’ (Reynolds). His escapes from Philagrius, Syrianus, Julian, his secret presence in Alexandria, his life among the monasteries of Egypt inhis third exile, his reputed visits to distant councils, all impress the imagination and lend themselves to legend and fable Later a es even claimed that he had fled in disguise to Spainand served as cook in a monastery near Calahorra (Act. SS. 2 Maii)! But he is also surrounded by an atmosphere of truth. Not a single miracle of any kind is related of him To invest him with the halo of miracle the Bollandists have to come down to the ‘translation’ of his body, not to Constantinople (an event surrounded with no little uncertainty), but to Venice, whither a thievish sea-captain, who had stolen it from a church in Stamboul, brought a body, which decisively proved its identity by prodigies which left no room for doubt. But the Athanasius of history is not the subject of any such tales. It has been said that no saint outside the New Testament has ever claimed the gift of miracles for himself. At any rate (though he displays credulity with regard to Antony), the saintly reputation of Athanasius rested on his life and character alone, without the aid of any reputation for miraculous power.

And resting upon this firm foundation, it has won the respect and admiration even of those who do not feel that they owe to him the vindication of all that is sacred and precious. Not only a Gregory or an Epiphanius, an Augustine or a Cyril, a Luther or a Hooker, not only Montfaucon and Tillemont, Newman and Stanley pay tribute to him as a Christian hero. Secular as well as Church historians fall under the spell of his personality, and even Gibbon lays aside his ‘solemn sneer’ to do homage to Athanasius the great.

Chapter IV.—The Theology of S. Athanasius.

§1. General Considerations.

The theological training of Athanasius was in the school of Alexandria, and under the still predominant although modified influence of Origen (see above, pp. xiv., xxvii.). The resistance which the theology of that famous man had everywhere encountered had not availed, in the Greek-speaking churches of the East, to stem its influence; at the same time it had made its way at the cost of much of its distinctive character. Its principal opponent, Methodius, who represented the ancient Asiatic tradition, was himself not uninfluenced by the theology he opposed. The legacy of his generation to the Nicene age was an Origenism tempered in various degrees by the Asiatic theology and by accommodations to the traditional canon of ecclesiastical teaching. The degrees of this modification were various, and the variety was reflected in the indeterminate body of theological conviction which we find at the time of the outbreak of Arianism, and which, as already explained, lies at the basis of the reaction against the definition of Nicaea. The theology of Alexandria remained Origenist, and the Origenist character is purest and most marked in Pierius, Theognostus, and in the non-episcopal heads of the Alexandrian School. The bishops of Alexandria after Dionysius represent a more tempered Origenism. Especially this holds good of the martyred Peter, whom we find expressly correcting distinctive parts of the system of his spiritual ancestor. In Alexander of Alexandria, the theological sponsor of the young Athanasius, the combination of a fundamentally 0rigenist theology with ideas traceable to the Asiatic tradition is conspicuous .

Athanasius, then, received his first theological ideas from Origenist sources, and in so far as he eventually diverged from Origen we must seek the explanation partly in his own theological or religious idiosyncrasy and in the influences which he encountered as time went on, partly in the extent to which the Origenism of his masters was already modified by different currents of theological influence.

To work out this problem satisfactorily would involve a separate treatise and a searching study, not only of Athanasius but on the one hand of Origen and his school, on the other of Methodius and the earlier pre-Nicene theologians. What is here attempted is the more modest task of briefly drawing attention to some of the more conspicuous evidences of the process and to some of its results in the developed theology of the saintly bishop.

It has been said by Harnack that the theology of Athanasius underwent no development, but was the same from first to last. The truth of this verdict is I think limited by the fact that the Origenism of Athanasius distinctly undergoes a change, or rather fades away, in his later works. A non-Origenist element is present from the first, and after the contest with Arianism begins, Origen’s ideas recede more and more from view. Athanasius was influenced negatively by the stress of the Arian controversy: while the vague and loose Origenism of the current Greek theology inclined the majority of bishops to dread Sabellianism rather than Arianism, and to underrate the danger of the latter (pp. xviii., xxxv.), Athanasius, deeply impressed, from personal experience, with the negation of the first principles of redemption which Arianism involved, stood apart from the first from the theology of his Asiatic contemporaries and went back to the authority of Scripture and the Rule of Faith. He was influenced positively by the Nicene formula, which represents the combination of Western with anti-Origenist Eastern traditions in opposition to the dominant Eastern theology. The Nicene formula found in Athanasius a mind predisposed to enter into its spirit, to employ in its defence the richest resources of theological and biblical training, of spiritual depth and vigour, of self-sacrificing but sober and tactful enthusiasm; its victory in the East is due under God to him alone.

Athanasius was not a systematic theologian: that is he produced no many-sided theology like that of Origen or Augustine. He had no interest in theological speculation, none of the instincts of a schoolman or philosopher. His theological greatness lies in his firm grasp of soteriological principles, in his resolute subordination of everything else, even the formula omoousio", to the central fact of Redemption, and to what that fact implied as to the Person of the Redeemer. He goes back from the Logos of the philosophers to the Logos of S. John, from the God of the philosophers to God in Christ reconciling the world to Himself. His legacy to later ages has been felicitously compared (Harnack, Dg. ii. 26, note) to that of the Christian spirit of his age in the realm of architecture. ‘To the many forms of architectural conception which lived in Rome and Alexandria in the fourth century, the Christian spirit added nothing fresh. Its achievement was of a different kind. Out of the many it selected and consecrated one; the multiplicity of forms it carded back to a single dominant idea, not so much by a change in the spirit of the art as by the restoration of Religion to its place as the central motive. It bequeathed to the art of the middle ages the Basilica, and rendered possible the birth of Gothic, a style, like that of the old Greek Temple, truly organic. What the Basilica was in the history of the material, the central idea of Athanasius has been in that of the spiritual fabric; an auspicious reduction, full of promise for the future, of the exuberant speculation of Greek theology to the one idea in which the power of religion then resided’ (lb. and pp. 22 sqq., freely reproduced).

§2. Fundamental Ideas of Man and His Redemption.

To Athanasius the Incarnation of the Son of God, and especially his Death on the Cross, is the centre of faith and theology (Incar. 19, kefalaion th" pistew", cf. 9. 1 and 5, 20. 2, &c.). ‘For our salvation’ (Incar. 1) the Word became Man and died. But how did Athanasius conceive of ‘salvation’? from what are we saved, to what destiny does salvation bring us, and what idea does he form of the efficacy of the Saviour’s death? Now it is not too much to say that no one age of the Church’s existence has done full justice to the profundity and manysidedness of the Christian idea of Redemption as effected in Christ and as unfolded by S. Paul. The kingdom of God and His Righteousness; the forgiveness of sins and the adoption of sons as a present gift; the consummation of all at the great judgment;—Christian men of different ages, countries, characters and mental antecedents, while united in personal devotion to the Saviour and in the sanctifying Power of His Grace, have interpreted these central ideas of the Gospel in terms of their own respective categories, and have succeeded in bringing out now one, now another aspect of the mystery of Redemption rather than in preserving the balance of the whole. Who will claim that the last word has yet been said on S. Paul’s deep conception of God’s (not mercy but) Righteousness as the new and peculiar element (Rom. i. 17, iii. 22, 26) of the Gospel Revelation? to search out the unsearchable riches of Christ is the prerogative of Christian faith, but is denied, save to the most limited extent, to Christian knowledge (1 Cor. xiii. 9). The onesidedness of any given age in apprehending the work of Christ is to be recognised by us not in a censorious spirit of self-complacency, but with reverent sympathy, and with the necessity in view of correcting our own: panta dokimazte, to kalon katecete.

Different ages and classes have necessarily thought under different categories. The categories of the post-apostolic age were mainly ethical; the Gospel is the new law, and the promise of eternal life, founded on true knowledge of God, and accepted by faith. Those of the Asiatic fathers from Ignatius downwards were largely physical or realistic. Mankind is brought in Christ (the physician) from death to life, from fqora to afqarsia (Ign. passim); to euaggelion …apartioma afqarsia" (Ign., Melit.); human nature is changed by the Incarnation, man made God. Tertullian introduced into Western theology forensic categories. He applied them to the Person, not yet to the Work, of Christ: but the latter application, pushed to a repellent length in the middle ages, and still more so since the Reformation, may without fancifulness be traced back to the fact that the first Latin Father was a lawyer. Again, Redemption was viewed by Origen and others under cosmological categories, as the turning point in the great conflict of good with evil, of demons with God, as the inauguration of the deliverance of the creation and its reunion with God. The many-sidedness of Origen combined, indeed, almost every representation of Redemption then current, from the propitiatory and mediatorial, which most nearly approached the thought of S. Paul, to the grotesque but widely-spread view of a ransom due to the devil which he was induced to accept by a stratagem. It may be said that with the exception of the last-named every one cf the above conceptions finds some point of contact in the New Testament; even the forensic idea, thoroughly unbiblical in its extremer forms, would not have influenced Christian thought as it has done had it not corresponded to something in the language of S. Paul.

Now Athanasius does not totally ignore any one of these conceptions, unless it be that of a transaction with the devil, which he scarcely touches even in Orat. ii. 52 (see note there). Of the forensic view he is indeed almost clear. His reference to the ‘debt’’ (to ofeilomenon, Incar. 20, Orat. ii. 66) which had to be paid is connected not so much with the Anselmic idea of a satisfaction due, as with the fact that death was by the divine word (Gen. iii.), attached to sin as its penalty.

The aspect of the death of Christ as a vicarious sacrifice (anti pantwn, de Incar. 9; prosforaand qusia, 10) is not passed over. But on the whole another aspect predominates. The categories under which Athanasius again and again states the soteriological problem are those of zwh and qanato", and afqarsia. So far as he works the problem out in detail it is under physical categories, without doing full justice to the ideas of guilt and reconciliation, of the reunion of will between man and God. The numberless passages which bear this. out cannot be quoted in full, but the point is of sufficient importance to demand the production of a few details.

(a) The original state of man was not one of ‘nature,’ for man’s nature is fqora; (thn enqanatw kata fusin fqoran, Incar. 3, cf. 8, 10, 44) the Word was imparted to them in that they were made kata thn tou qeou eikona (ib). Hence what later theology marks off as an exclusively supernatural gift is according to Athanasius inalienable from human nature, i.e. it can be impaired but not absolutely lost (Incar. 14, and apparently Orat. iii. 10 fin.; the question of the teaching of Athan. upon the natural endowments of man belongs specially to the Introd to de Incarnatione, where it will be briefly discussed). Accordingly their infraction of the divine command (by turning their minds, c. Gent. 3, to lower things instead of to the qewria twn qeiwn), logically involved them in non-existence (de Incar. 4), but actually, inasmuch as the likeness of God was only gradually lost, in fqora, regarded as a process toward non-existence. This again involved men in increasing ignorance of God, by the gradual obliteration of the eikwv, the indwelling Logos, by virtue of which alone men could read the open book (c. Gent-34 fin.) of God’s manifestation of Himself in the Universe. It is evident that the pathological point of view here prevails over the purely ethical: the perversion of man’s will mergesin the general idea of fqora, the first need of man is a change in his nature; or rather the renewed infusion of that higher and divine nature which he has gradually lost. (Cf. de Incar. 44, crhzontwn th" autou qeothto" dia tou omoiou).

(b) Accordingly the mere presence of the Word in a human body, the mere fact of the Incarnation, is the essential factor in our restoration (simile of the city and the king, ib. 9. 3, &c., cf. Orat. ii. 67, 70). But if so, what was the special need of the Cross? Athanasius felt, as we have already mentioned, the supremacy of the Cross as the purpose of the Saviour’s coming, but he does not in fact give to it the central place in his system of thought which it occupies in his instincts. Man had involved himself in the sentence of death; death must therefore take place to satisfy this sentence (Orat. ii. 69; de Incar. 20. 2, 5); the Saviour’s death, then, put an end to death regarded as penal and as symptomatic of man’s gqora (cf. ib. 21. I, &c.). It must be confessed that Athanasius does not penetrate to the full meaning of S. Paul. The latter also ascribed a central import to the mere fact of the Incarnation (Rom. viii. 3, pemya"), but primarily in relation to sin (yet see Athan. c. Apoll. ii. 6); and the destruction of the practical power of sin stands indissolubly correlated (Rom. viii. 1) with the removal of guilt and so with the Righteousness of God realising itself in the-propitiation of the blood of Christ (ib. iii. 21—26).

To Athanasius nature is the central, will a secondary or implied factor in the problem. The aspect of the death of Christ most repeatedly dwelt upon is that in it death spent its force (plhrwqeish" th" exousia" en tw kuriakw rwuati, ib. 8) agains human nature, that the ‘corruption’ of mankind might run its full course and be spent in the Lord’s body, and so cease for the future. Of this Victory over death and the demons the Resurrection is the trophy. His death is therefore to us (ib. 10) the arch, zwh" we are henceforth afqarti dia th" anastasew" (27. 2, 32. 6, cf. 34. 1, &c.), and have a portion in the divine nature, are in fact deified (cf. de Incarn. 54, and note there). This last thought, which became (Harnack, vol. ii. p. 46) the common property of Eastern theology, goes back through Origen and Hippolytus to Irenaeeus. On the whole, its presentation in Athanasius is more akin to the Asiatic than to the Origenist form of the conception. To Origen, man’s highest destiny could only be the return to his original source and condition: to Irenaeeus and the Asiatics, man had been created for a destiny which he had never realised; the interruption in the history of our race introduced by sin was repaired by the Incarnation, which carried back the race to a new head, and so carried it forward to a destiny of which under its original head it was incapable. To Origen the Incarnation was a restoration to, to Irenaeeus and to Athanasius (Or. ii. 67), an advance upon, the original state of man. (Pell, pp. 167—17, labours to prove the contrary, but he does not convince.)

(c) This leads us to the important observation that momentous as are to Athanasius the consequences of the introduction of sin into the world, he yet makes no such vast difference betweenthe condition of fallen and unfallen men as has commonly been assumed to exist. The latter state was inferior to that of the members of Christ (Orat. ii. 67, 68), while the immense (c. Gent. 8,de Incar. 5) consequences of its forfeiture came about only by a gradual course of deterioration (de Incar. 6. 1, hfanizeto; observe the tense), and in different degrees in different cases. The only difference of kind between the two conditions is in the universal reign of Death since the (partial) forfeiture of the kat eikona cari": and even this difference is a subtle one; for man’s existence in Paradise was not one of afqarsia except prospectively (de Incar. 3. 4). He enjoyed present happiness, alupo" anwdun" amerimno" zwh, with promise of afqarsia in heaven. That is, death would have taken place, but not death as unredeemed mankind know it (cf. de Incar. 21. 1). In other words, man was created not so much in a state of perfection (teleio" ktisqei",p. 384) as with a capacity for perfection (and for even more than perfection, p. 385 sq.) and with a destiny to correspond with such capacity. This destination remains in force even after man has failed to correspond to it, and is in fact assigned by Athanasius as the reason why the Incarnation was a necessity on God’s part (de Incar. 6. 4—7, 10. 3, 13. 2—4, Orat. ii. 66, &c., &c.). Accordingly, while man was created (Orat. ii. 59) through the Word, the Word became Flesh that man might receive the yet higher dignity of Sonship ; and while even before the Incarnation some men were de facto pure from sin (Orat. iii. 33) by virtue of the cari" th" klhsew" involved in  Jto kat eikonaÆ (see ib. 10, fin.; Orat. i. 39 is even stronger, cf. iv. 22), they were yet qnhtoi and fqartoi; whereas those in Christ die, no longer kata thn proteran genesin en tw ÆAdam, but to live again logwqeish" th" sarko" (Orat. iii. 33,fin., cf. de Incar. 21. 1).

(d) The above slight sketch of the Athanasian doctrine of man’s need of redemption and of the satisfaction of that need brings to light a system free from much that causes many modern thinkers to stumble at the current doctrine of the original state and the religious history of mankind. That mankind did not start upon their development with a perfect nature, but have fought their way up from an undeveloped stage through many lower phases of development that this development has been infinitely varied and complex, and that sin and its attendant consequences have a pathological aspect which practically is as important as the forensic aspect, are commonplaces of modern thought, resting upon the wider knowledge of our age, and hard to reconcile with the (to us) traditional theological account of these things. The Athanasian account of them leaves room for the results of modern knowledge, or at least does not rudely clash with the instincts of the modern anthropologist. The recovery of the Athanasian point of view is prima facie again. At what cost is it obtained? Does its recognition involve us in mere naturalism veiled under religious forms of speech? That was certainly not the mind of Athanasius, nor does his system really lend itself to such a result. To begin with, the divine destiny of man from, the first is an essential principle with our writer. Man was made and is still exclusively destined for knowledge of and fellowship with his Creator. Secondly the means, and the only means, to this end is Christ the Incarnate Son of God. In Him the religious history of mankind has its centre, and from Him it proceeds upon its new course, or rather is enabled once more to run the course designed for it from the first. How far Athanasius exhausted the significance of this fact may be a question; that he placed the fact itself in the centre is his lasting service to Christian thought.

(e) The categories of Athanasius in dealing with the question before us are primarily physical, i.e., on the one hand cosmological, on the other pathological. But it is well before leaving the subject to insist that this was not exclusively the case. The purpose of the Incarnation was at once to renew us, and to make known the Father (de Incarn. 16); or as he elsewhere puts it (ib. 7 fin.), anaktisai ta ola, uper pantn, paqein, and peri pantwn presbeusui proston Patera. The idea of afqarsia which so often stands with him for the summum bonum imparted to us in Christ, involves a moral and spiritual restoration of our nature, not merely the physical supersession of fqora by aqanasia (de Incarn. 47, 51, 52, &c., &c.).

§3. Fundamental Ideas of God, the World, and Creation.

The Athanasian idea of God has been singled out for special recognition in recent times; he has been claimed, and on the whole with justice, as a witness for the immanence of God in the universe in contrast to the insistence in many Christian systems on God’s transcendence or remoteness from all created things. (Fiske, Idea of God, discussed by Moore in Lux Mundi (ed. 1) pp. 95—102.) The problem was one which Christian thought was decisively compelled to face by the Arian controversy (supra, p. xxix. sq.). The Apologists and Alexandrians had partially succeeded in the problem expressed in the dying words of Plotinus, ‘to bring the God which is within into harmony with the God which is in the universe,’ or rather to reconcile the transcendence with the immanence of God. But their success was only partial: the immanence of the Word had been emphasised, but in contrast with the transcendence of the Father. This could not be more than a temporary resting-place for the Christian mind, and Arius forced a solution. That solution was found by Athanasius. The mediatorial work of the Logos is not necessary as though nature could not bear the untempered hand of the Father. The Divine Will is the direct and sole source of all things, and the idea of a mediatorial nature is inconsistent with the true idea of God (pp. 87, 155, 362, comparing carefully p. 383). ‘All things created are capable of sustaining God’s absolute hand. The hand which fashioned Adam now also and ever is fashioning and giving entire consistence to those who come after him.’ The immanence, or intimate presence and unceasing agency of God in nature, does not belong to the Word as distinct from the Father, but to the Father in and through the Word, in a word to God as God (cf. de Decr. 11, where the language of de Incarn. 17 about the Word is applied to God as such). This is a point which marks an advance upon anything that we find in the earliest writings of Athanasius, and upon the theology of his preceptor Alexander, to whom, amongst other not very clear formulae, the Word is a uesiteuusa fusi" mngenh" (Thdt. H.E. ii. 4; Alexander cannot distinguish fusi" from upstasi" or usia; Father and Son are du acrista pragmata, but yet th upstasei du fusei"). This is indeed the principal particular in which Athanasius left the modified Origenism of his age, and of his own school, behind. If on the other hand he resembled Arius in drawing a sharper line than had been drawn previously between the one God and the World, it must also be remembered that his God was not the far off purely transcendent God of Arius, but a God not far from every one of us (Orat. ii. p. 361 sq.).

That God is beyond all essence uperkeina pash" usia" (c. Gent. 2. 2, 40. 2, 35. I genhth" usia") is a thought common to Origen and the Platonists, but adopted by Athanasius with a difference, marked by the addition of genhth". That God created all things out of pure bounty of being (c. Gent. §2. 2, §41. 2, de Incarn. §3. 3, and note there) is common to Origen and Philo, being taken by the latter from Plato’s Timoeus. The Universe, and especially the human soul, reflects the being of its Author (c. Gent. passim). Hence there are two main paths by which man can arrive at the knowledge of God, the book of the Universe (c. Gent. 34 fin.), and the contemplation or self-knowledge of the soul itself (ib. 33, 34). So far Athanasius is on common ground with the Platonists (cf. Fialon, pp. 270, sqq.); but he takes up distinctively Christian ground, firstly, in emphasising the insufficiency of these proofs after sin has clouded the soul’s vision, and, above all, in insisting on the divine Incarnation as the sole remedy for this inability, as the sole means by which man as he is can reach a true knowledge of God. Religion not philosophy is the sphere in which the God of Athanasius is manifest to man. Here, again, Athanasius is ‘Christo-centric.’ With Origen, Athanasius refuses to allow evil any substantive existence (c. Gent. §§2, 6, de Incarn. §4. 5); evil resides in the will only, and is the result of the abuse of its power of free choice (c. Gent. 5 and 7). The evil in the Universe is mainly the work of demons, who have aggravated the consequences of human sin also (de Incarn. 52. 4). On the other hand, the evil does not extend beyond the sphere of personal agency, and the Providence of God (upon which Athanasius insists with remarkable frequency, especially in the de Fuga and c. Gent. and de Incarn., also in Vit. Anton.) exercises untiring care over the whole. The problem of suffering and death in the animal creation is not discussed by him; he touches very incidentally, Orat. ii. 63, on the deliverance of creation in connection with Ro viii 19–21.

§4. Vehicles of Revelation; Scripture, the Church, Tradition.

(a) The supreme and unique revelation of God to man is in the Person of the Incarnate Son. But though unique the Incarnation is not solitary. Before it there was the divine institution of the Law and the Prophets, the former a typical anticipation (de Incarn. 40. 2) of the destined reality, and along with the latter (ib. 12. 2 and 5) ‘for all the world a holy school of the knowledge of God and the conduct of the soul.’ After it there is the history of the life and teaching of Christ and the writings of His first Disciples, left on record for the instruction of all ages. Athanasius again and again applies to the Scriptures the terms qeia and qeopneusta (e.g. de Decr. 15, de Incarn. 33. 3, &c.; the latter word, which he also applies to his own martyr teachers, is, of course, from 2 Ti iii. 16). The implications of this as bearing on the literal exactness of Scripture he nowhere draws out. His strongest language (de Decr. ubi supra) is incidental to a controversial point: on Ps lii (liii.) 2, he maintains that ‘there is no hyperbola in Scripture; all is strictly true,’ but he proceeds on the strength of that principle to allegorise the verse he is discussing. In c. Gent. 2, 3, he treats the account of Eden and the Fall as figurative. But in his later writings there is, so far as I know, nothing to match this. In fact, although he always employs the allegorical method, sometimes rather strangely (e.g. De xxviii. 66, in de Incarn. 35, Orat. ii. 19, after Irenaeus, Origen, &c.), we discern, especially in his later writings, a tendency toward a more literal exegesis than was usual in the Alexandrian school. His discussion, e.g., of the sinlessness of Christ (c. Apol. i. 7, 17, ii. 9, 10) contrasts in this respect with that of his master Alexander, who appeals, following Origen’s somewhat startling allegorical application, to Pr xxx. 19, a text nowhere used by Ath. in this way (Thdt. H.E. i. 4). This is doubtless largely due to the pressure of the controversy with the Arians, who certainly had more to gain than their opponents from the prevalent unhistorical methods of exegesis, as we see from the use made by them of 2 Co iv.11 at Nicaea, and of Pr viii. 22 throughout . Accordingly Athanasius complains loudly of their exegesis (Ep. Aeg. 3–4, cf. Orat. i. 8, 52), and insists (id. i. 54, cf. already de Decr. 14) on the primary necessity of always conscientiously studying the circumstances of time and place, the person addressed, the subject matter, and purpose of the writer, in order not to miss the true sense. This rule is the same as applies (de Sent. Dion. 4) to the interpretation of any writings whatever, and carries with it the strict subordination of the allegorical to the historical sense, contended for by the later school of Antioch, and now accepted by all reasonable Christians (see Kihn in Wetzer-Hergenrother’s Kirchen-Lex. vol. i. pp. 955–959, who calls the Antiochene exegesis ‘certainly a providential phenomenon;’ also supra, p. xxviii., note 1).

(b) The Canon of Scripture accepted by Athanasius has long been known from the fragments of the thirty-ninth Festal Letter (Easter, 367). The New Testament Canon comprises all the books received at the present day, but in the older order, viz., Gospels, Acts, Catholic Epistles, Pauline Epistles (Hebrews expressly included as S. Paul’s between Thess. and Tim.), Apocalypse. The Old Testament canon is remarkable in several ways. The number of books is 22, corresponding to the Alexandrian Jewish reckoning, not to the (probably) older Jewish or Talmudic reckoning of 24 (the rolls of Ruth and Lam. counted separately, and with the Hagiographa). This at once excludes from the Canon proper the so-called ‘Apocrypha,’ with the exception of the additions to Daniel, and of Baruch and ‘the Epistle,’ which are counted as one book with Jeremiah. The latter is also the case with Lamentations, while on the other hand the number of 22 is preserved by the reckoning of Ruth as a separate book from Judges to make up for the exclusion of Esther. This last point is archaic, and brings Athanasius into connection with Melito (171 a.d.), who gives (Eus. H.E. iv. 26. 14, see also vol. 1, p. 144, note 1, in this series) a Canon which he has obtained by careful enquiry in Palestine. This Canon agrees with that of Athanasius except with regard to the order assigned to ‘Esdras’ (i.e. Ezra and Nehemiah, placed by M. at the end), to ‘the twelve in one book’ (placed by M. after Jer.), and Daniel (placed by M. before Ezekiel). Now, Esther is nowhere mentioned in the N.T., and the Rabbinical discussions as to whether Esther ‘defiled the hands’ (i.e. was ‘canonical’) went on to the time of R. Akiba (†135), an older, and even of R. Juda ‘the holy’ (150–210), a younger, contemporary of Melito (see Wildeboer, Ontstaan van den Kanon, pp. 58, sq., 65, &c.). The latter, therefore, may represent the penultimate stage in the history of the Hebrew canon before its close in the second century, (doubted by Bleek, Einl. , §242, but not unlikely). Here, then, Ath. represents an earlier stage of opinion than Origen (Eus. H.E. vi. 25), who gives the finally fixed Hebrew Canon of his own time, but puts Esther at the end. As to the number of books, Athan. agrees with Josephus, Melito, Origen, and with Jerome, who, however, knows of the other reckoning of 24 (’nonnulli’ in Prol. Gal.). Athansius enumerates, as ‘outside the Canon, but appointed by the Fathers to be read by those who newly join us,’ Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus, Esther, Judith, and Tobit, as well as what is called the Teaching of the Apostles and the Shepherd. In practice, however, he quotes several of the latter as ‘Scripture’ (Wisdom repeatedly so, see index to this vol.); ‘The Shepherd’ is ‘most profitable,’ and quoted for the Unity of the Creator (and cf. de Decr. 4), but not as ‘Scripture;’ the ‘Didache’ is not used by him unless the Syntagma (vide supra, p. lix.) be his genuine work. He also quotes 1 Esdras for the praise of Truth, and 2 Esdras once, as a ‘prophet.’ ‘Daniel’ includes Susanna and Bel and the Dragon.

(c) On the sufficiency of Scripture for the establishment of all necessary doctrine Athanasius insists repeatedly and emphatically (c. Gent. 1, de Incarn. 5, de Decr. 32, Vit. Ant. 16, &c., &c.); and he follows up precept by example. ‘His works are a continuous appeal to Scripture.’ There is no passage in his writings which recognises tradition as supplementing Scripture, i.e., as sanctioning articles of faith not contained in Scripture. Tradition is recognised as authoritative in two ways: (1) Negatively, in the sense that doctrines which are novel are prima acie condemned by the very fact (de Decr. 7, note 2, ib. 18, Orat. i. 8, 10, ii. 34, 40, de Syn. 3, 6, 7, and Letter 59, §3); and (2) positively, as furnishing a guide to the sense of Scripture (see references in note on Orat. iii. 58, end of ch. xxix.). In other words, tradition with Athanasius is a formal, not a material, source of doctrine. His language exemplifies the necessity of distinguishing, in the case of strong patristic utterances on the authority of tradition, between different senses of the word. Often it means simply truth conveyed in Scripture, and in that sense ‘handed down’ from the first, as for example c. Apol. i. 22, ‘the Gospel tradition,’ and Letter 60. 6 (cf. Cypr. Ep. 74. 10, where Scripture is ‘divinae traditionis caput et origo.’). Moreover, tradition as distinct from Scripture is with Athanasius not a secret unwritten body of teaching handed down orally , but is to be found in the documents of antiquity and the writings of the Fathers, such as those to whom he appeals in de Deer., &c. That ‘the appeal of Athanasius was to Scripture, that of the Arians to tradition’ (Gwatkin) is an overstatement, in part supported by the pre-Nicene history of the word omoousion (supra, p. xxxi. sq.). The rejection of this word by the Antiochene Council (in 268–9) is met by Athanasius, de Synod. 43, sqq., partly by an appeal to still older witnesses in its favour, parly by the observation (§45) that ‘writing in simplicity [the Fathers] arrived not at accuracy concerning the omoousion, but spoke of the word as they understood it,’ an argument strangely like that of the Homoeans (Creed of Nike, ib. §30) that the Fathers [of Nicoea] adopted the word ‘in simplicity.’

(d) Connected with the function and authority of tradition is that of the Church. On the essential idea of the Church there is little or nothing of definite statement. The term ‘Catholic Church’ is of course commonly used, both of the Church as a whole, and of the orthodox body in this or that place. The unity of the Church is emphatically dwelt on in the opening of the encyclical written in the name of Alexander (infr., p. 69 and supr., p. xvi.) as the reason for communicating the deposition of Arius at Alexandria to the Church at large. ‘The joyful mother of children’ (Exp. in Ps. cxiii. 9) is interpreted of the Gentile Church, ‘made to keep house,’ ate ton kurion enoikon ecousa, joyful ‘because her children are saved through faith in Christ,’ whereas those of the ‘synagogue’ are apwleia paradedomena: the ‘strong city’ poli" perioch" and ‘Edom’ of Ps lx. 11 are likewise interpreted of the Church as gathered from all nations; similarly the Ethiopians of Ps lxxxvii. 4 (where the de Tit. pss. gives a quite different and more allegorical sense, referring the verse to baptism). The full perfection of the Church is referred by Athanasius not to the (even ideal) Church on earth but to the Church in heaven. The kingdom of God’ (Matt. vi. 33) is explained as ‘the enjoyment of the good things of the future, namely the contemplation and knowledge of God so far as man’s soul is capable of it,’ while the city of Ps. lxxxvii. 1–3 is h anw `Ierousalhm in the de Titulis, but in the Expositio the Church glorified by ‘the indwelling of the Only-begotten.’ In all this we miss any decisive utterance as to the doctrinal authority of the Church except in so far as the recognition of such authority is involved in what has been cited above in favour of tradition. It may be said that the conditions which lead the mind to throw upon the Church the weight of responsibility for what is believed were absent in the case of Athanasius as indeed in the earlier Greek Church generally.

But Athanasius was far from undervaluing the evidence of the Church’s tradition. The organ by which the tradition of the Church does its work is the teaching function of her officers, especially of the Episcopate (de Syn. 3, &c.). But to provide against erroneous teaching on the part of bishops, as well as to provide for the due administration of matters affecting the Church generally, and for ecclesiastical legislation, some authority beyond that of the individual bishop is necessary. This necessity is met, in the Church as conceived by Athanasius, in two ways, firstly by Councils, secondly in the pre-eminent authority of certain sees which exercise some sort of jurisdiction over their neighbours. Neither of these resources of Church organisation meets us, in Athanasius, in a completely organised shape. A word must be said about each separately, then about their correlation.

(a) Synods. Synods as a part of the machinery of the Church grew up spontaneously. The meeting of the ‘Apostles and Eiders’ at Jerusalem (Acts xv.) exemplifies the only way in which a practical resolution on a matter affecting a number of persons with independent rights can possibly be arrived at, viz., by mutual discussion and agreement. Long before the age of Athanasius it had been recognised in the Church that the bishops were the persons exclusively entitled to represent their flocks for such a purpose; in other words, Councils of bishops had come to constitute the legislative and judicial body in the Church (Eus. V.C. i. 51). Both of these functions, and especially the latter, involved the further prerogative of judging of doctrine, as in the case of Paul of Samosata. But the whole system had grown up out of occasional emergencies, and no recognised laws existed to define the extent of conciliar authority, or the relations between one Council and another should their decisions conflict. Not even the area covered by the jurisdiction of a given Council was defined (Can. Nic. 5). We see a Synod at Arles deciding a case affecting Africa, and reviewing the decision of a previous Synod at Rome; a Council at Tyre trying the case of a bishop of Alexandria; a Council at Sardica in the West deposing bishops in the East, and restoring those whom Eastern Synods had deposed; we find Acacius and his fellows deposed at Seleucia, then in a few weeks deposing their deposers at Constantinople; Meletius appointed and deposed by the same Synod at Antioch in 361, and in the following year resuming his see without question. All is chaos. The extent to which a Synod succeeds in enforcing its decisions depends on the extent to which it obtains de facto recognition. The canons of the Council of Antioch (341) are accepted as Church law, while its creeds are condemned as Arian (de Syn. 22–25).

We look in vain for any statement of principle on the part of Athanasius to reduce this confusion to order. The classical passage in his writings is the letter he has preserved from Julius of Rome to the Eastern bishops (Apol. c. Ar. 20–35). The Easterns insist strongly on the authority of Councils, in the interests of their deposition of Athanasius, &c., at Tyre. Julius can only reply by invoking an old-established custom of the Church, ratified, he says, at Nicaea (Can. 5?), that the decisions of one Council may be revised by another; a process which leads to no finality. The Sardican canons of three years later drew up, for judicial purposes only, a system of procedure, devolving on Julius (or possibly on the Roman bishop for the time being) the duty of deciding, upon the initiative of the parties concerned, whether in the case of a deposed bishop a new trial of the case was desirable, and permitting him to take part in such new trial by his deputies. But Athanasius never alludes to any such procedure, nor to the canons in question. (Compare above, pp. xlii., xlvi.).

The absence of any a priori law relating to the authority of Synods applies to general as well as to local Councils. The conception of a general Council did not give rise to Nicaea, but vice versa (see above, p. xvii.). The precedent for great Councils had already been set at Antioch (268–9) and Arles (314); the latter in fact seems to be indirectly called by S. Augustine plenarium universoe ecclesioe concilium; but the widely representative character of the Nicene Council, and the impressive circumstances under which it met, stamped upon it from the first a recognised character of its own. Again and again (de Decr. 4, 27, Orat. i. 7, Ep. Aeg. 5, &c., &c.) Athanasius presses the Arians with their rejection of the decision of a ‘world-wide’ Council, contrasting it (e.g. de Syn. 21) with the numerous and indecisive Councils held by them. He protests (Ep. Aeg. 5, Tom. ad Ant., &c.) against the idea that any new creed is necessary or to be desired in addition to the Nicene. But in doing so, he does not suggest by a syllable that the Council was formally and a priori infallible, independently of the character of its decision as faithfully corresponding to the tradition of the Apostles. Its authority is secondary to that of Scripture (de Syn. 6, sub. fin.), and its scriptural character is its justification (ib.). In short, Mr. Gwatkin speaks within the mark when he disclaims for Athan. any mechanical theory of conciliar infallibility. To admit this candidly is not to depreciate, but to acknowledge, the value of the great Synod of Nicaea; and to acknowledge it, not on the technical grounds of later ecclesiastical law, but on grounds which are those of Athanasius himself. (On the general subject see D.C.A. 475–484, and Hatch, B.L. vii.)

(b) Jurisdiction of bishops over bishops. The fully-developed and organised ‘patriarchal’ system does not meet us in the Nicene age. The bishops of important towns, however, exercise a very real, though not definable authority over their neighbours. This is especially true of Imperial residences. The migration of Eusebius to Nicomedia and afterwards to Constantinople broke through the time-honoured rule of the Church, but set the precedent commonly followed ever afterwards. In Egypt, although the name ‘patriarch’ was as yet unheard, the authority of the Bishop of Alexandria was almost absolute. The name ‘archbishop’ is here used for the first time. It is first applied apparently to Meletius (Apol. Ar. 71) in his list of clergy, but at a later date (about 358) to Athanasius in a contemporary inscription (see p. 564 a, note At the beginning of his episcopate (supra, p. xxxvii.) we find him requested to ordain in a diocese of Upper Egypt by its bishop. He sends bishops on deputations (Fest. Ind. xxv., &c.), and exercises ordinary jurisdiction over bishops and people of Libya and Pentapolis (cf. reference to Synesius, supr., p. lxii.). This was a condition of things dating at least from the time of Dionysius (p. 178, note 2). In particular he had practically the appointment of bishops for all Egypt, so that in the course of his long episcopate all the Egyptian sees were manned by his faithful adherents (cf. p. 493). The mention of Dionysius suggests the question of the relation of the see of Alexandria to that of Rome, and of the latter to the Church generally. On the former point, what is necessary will be said in the Introd. to the de Sent. Dion. With regard to the wider question, Athanasius expresses reverence for that bishopric ‘because it is an Apostolic throne,’ and ‘for Rome, because it is the metropolis of Romania’ (p. 282). That is his only utterance on the subject. Such reverence ought, he says, to have secured Liberius from the treatment to which he had been subjected. The language cited excludes the idea of any divinely-given headship of the Church vested in the Roman bishop, for his object is to magnify the outrageous conduct of Constantius and the Arians. Still less can anything be elicited from the account given by Ath. of the case of the Dionysii, or of his own relations to successive Roman bishops. He speaks of them as his beloved brothers and fellow-ministers (e.g., p. 489) and cordially. welcomes their sympathy and powerful support, without any thought of jurisdiction. But he furnishes us with materials, in the letter of Julius, for estimating not his own view of the Roman see, but that held by its occupant. The origin of the proceedings was the endeavour of the Easterns to procure recognition at Rome and in the West for their own nominee to the bishopric of Alexandria. They had requested Julius to hold a Council, ‘and to be himself the judge if he so pleased’ (Apol. c. Ar. 20). This was intended to frighten Athanasius, but not in the least, as the sequel shews, to submit the decisions of a Council to revision by a single bishop. Julius summoned a Council as described above (p. xliii.), and at the end of a long period of delay and controversy sent a letter expressing his view of the case to the Orientals. This document has been already discussed (p. xliv.). It forms an important landmark in the history of papal claims, standing at least as significantly in contrast with those of the successors of Julius, as with those of his predecessors.

(g) Bishops and Councils. The superiority of councils to single bishops (including those of Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch) was questioned by no one in this age. Julius claims the support, not of authority inherent in his see, but of canons, and on the basis of them claims a voice in matters affecting the Church at large, not in his own name, but in that of ‘us all, that so a just sentence might proceed from all’ (Apol. c. Ar. 35). Again, just as the judgment of his predecessor Melchiades and his council was revised at Aries in 314 (Augustin. Ep. 105. 8), so the case of Athanasius and Marcellus was reheard at the Council of Sardica three years after the decision of Julius and his council. The council was the supreme organ of the Church for legislative, judicial, and doctrinal purposes; had any other of superior or even equal rank been recognised, or had the authority of councils themselves been defined a priori by a system of Church law, the confusion of the fourth century would not have arisen. Whether or no the age would have gained, we at least should have been the losers.

§5. Content of Revelation. God Three in One and the Incarnation.

To dwell at length on the theology of Athanasius under this head is unnecessary here, not because there is little to say, but partly because what there is to say has been to some extent anticipated above, §§2, 3, and ch. ii. pp. xxxii., xxxvi., partly because the history of his life and work is the best exposition of what he believed and taught. That his theology on these central subjects was profoundly moulded by the Nicene formula is (to the present writer at least) the primary fact (see ch. ii. §3 (1), and (2) b). This of course presupposes that the Nicene faith found in him a character and mind prepared to become its interpreter and embodiment; and that this was so his pre-Nicene writings sufficiently shew.

For instance, his progressive stress on the Unity of the Godhead in Father, Son, and Spirit is but the following up of the thought expressed de Incarn. 17. 1 en monw tw eautou Patri olo" wn kata panta. It may be noted that he argues also from the idea of the Trinity to the coessential Godhead of the Spirit, ad Serap. i. 28, sq., Tria" estin ouc ew" onomato" monon …alla alhqeia kai uparx ei tria" <`85Ÿeipatwsan palin <`85Ÿteia" estin h dua"; and that he meets the difficulty (see infra, p. 438, ten lines from end, also Petav. Trin. VII. xiv.) of differentiating the relation of the Spirit to the Father from the gennhsi" of the Son by a confession of ignorance and a censure upon those who assume that they can search out the deep things of God (ib. 17–19). The principle might be applied to this point which is laid down de Decr. 11, that ‘an act’ belonging to the essence of God, cannot, by virtue of the simplicity of the Divine Nature, be more than one: the ‘act’ therefore of divine gennhsi" (the nature of which we do not know) cannot apply to the Spirit but only to the Son. But I do not recollect any passage in which Athanasius draws this conclusion from his own premises. The language of Athanasius on the procession of the Spirit is unstudied. In Exp Fid. 4, he appears to adopt the ‘procession’ of the Spirit from the Father through the Son (after Dionysius, see Sent. Dion. 17). In Serap. i. 2, 20, 32, iii. 1, he speaks of the Spirit as idion tou Logou, just as the Word is idio" tou Patro". His language on the subject, expressing the idea common to East and West (under the cloud of logomachies which envelop the subject) might possibly furnish the basis of an ‘eirenicon’ between the two separated portions of Christendom. In explaining the ‘theophanies’ of the Old Testament, Athanasius takes a position intermediate between that of the Apologists, &c. (supr., p. xxiii.) who referred them to the Word, and that of Augustine who referred them to Angels only. According to Athanasius the ‘Angel’ was and was not the Word: regarded as visible he was an Angel simply, but the Voice was the Divine utterance through the Word (see Orat. iii. 12, 14; de Syn 27, Anath 15, note; also Serap. i. 14).

Lastly, it must again be insisted that in his polemic against Arianism Athanasius is centrally soteriological. It is unnecessary to collect passages in support of what will be fully appreciated only after a thorough study of the controversial treatises. The essence of his position is comprised in his paraphrase of St. Peter’s address to the Jews, Orat. ii. 16, sq., or in the argument, ib. 67, sqq., i. 43, and iii. 13. With regard to the Incarnation, it may be admitted that Athanasius uses language which might have been modified had he had later controversies in view. His common use of anqrwpo" for the Manhood of Christ (see below, p. 83) might be alleged by the Nestorian, his comparison of it to the vesture of the High Priest (Orat. i. 47, ii. 8, see note there) by the Apollinarian or Monophysite partisan. But at least his use of either class of expressions shews that he did not hold the doctrine associated in later times with the other. Moreover, while from first to last he is explicitly clear as to the seat of personality in Christ, which is uniformly assigned to the Divine Logos (p. 40, note 2 and reff.), the integrity of the manhood of Christ is no less distinctly asserted (cf. de Incarn. 18. 1, 21. 7). He uses sqmua and anqrwpo" indifferently during the earlier stages of the conflict, ignoring or failing to notice the peculiarity of the Luciano-Arian Christology. But from 362 onward the full integrity of the Saviour’s humanity, sarx and yuxh logikh or rneuma, is energetically asserted against the theory of Apollinarius and those akin to it (cf. Letters 59 and 60, and c. Apoll.). Some corollaries of this doctrine must now be mentioned.

The question of the sinlessness of Christ is not discussed by Athanasius ex professo until the controversy with Apollinarianism. In the earlier Arian controversy the question was in reality involved, partly by the Arian theory of the treptoth" of the Word, partly by the correlated theory of prokoph (cf. Oral. ii. 6, sqq.), and Athanasius instinctively falls back on the consideration that the Personality of the Son, if Divine, is necessarily sinless. In c. Apoll. i. 7, 17, ii. 10 the question is more thoroughly analysed. The complete psychological identity of Christ’s human nature with our own is maintained along with the absolute moral identity of His will (qelhsi", the determination of will, not the qelhma ousiqde" or volitional faculty) with the Divine will.

With regard to the human knowledge of Christ, the texts Mark xiii. 32, Luke ii. 52, lie at the foundation of his discussion Orat. iii. 42–53. The Arians appealed to these passages to support the contention that the Word, or Son of God in His Divine nature, was ignorant of ‘the Day,’ and advanced in knowledge. The whole argument of Athan. in reply is directed to shewing that these passages apply not to the Word or Son in Himself, but to the Son Incarnate. He knows as God, is ignorant as man. Omniscience is the attribute of Godhead, ignorance is proper to man. The Incarnation was not the sphere of advancement to the Word, but of humiliation and condescension; but the Manhood advanced in wisdom as it did in stature also, for advance belongs to man. That is the decisive and clear-cut position of Athanasius on this subject (which the notes there vainly seek to accommodate to the rash dogmatism of the schools). Athanasius appeals to the utterances of Christ which imply knowledge transcending human limitations in order to shew that such knowledge, or rather all knowledge, was possessed by the Word; in other words such utterances belong to the class of ‘divine’ not to that of ‘human’ phenomena in the life of Christ. So far as His human nature was concerned, He assumed its limitations of knowledge equally with all else that belongs to the physical and mental endowments of man. Why then was not Divine Omniscience exerted by Him at all times? This question is answered as all questions must be which arise out of any limitation of the Omnipotence of God in the Manhood of Christ. It was ‘for our profit, as I at least think’ (ib. 48). The very idea of the Incarnation is that of a limiting of the Divine under human conditions, the Divine being manifested in Christ only so far as the Wisdom of God has judged it necessary in order to carry out the purpose of His coming. In other words, Athanasius regarded the ignorance of Christ as ‘economical’ only in so far as the Incarnation is itself an oikonomia, a measured revelation, at once a veiling and a manifestation, of all that is in God. That the divine Omniscience wielded in the man Christ Jesus an adequate instrument for its own manifestation Athanasius firmly holds: the exact extent to which such manifestation was carried, the reserve of miraculous power or knowledge with which that Instrument was used, must be explained not by reference to the human mind, will, or character of Christ, but to the Divine Will and Wisdom which alone has both effected our redemption and knows the secrets of its bringing about. With Athanasius, we may quote St. Paul, ti" egnw noun Kuriou.

It may be observed before leaving this point that Athanasius takes occasion (§43, fin., cf. 45) to distinguish two senses of the words ‘the Son,’ as referring on the one hand to the eternal, on the other to the human existence of Christ. To the latter he limits Mark xiii. 32: the point is of importance in view of his relation to Marcellus (supra, p. xxxvi.).

As a further corollary of the Incarnation we may notice his frequent use (Orat. iii. 14, 29, 33, iv. 32, c. Apoll. i. 4, 12, 21) of the word qeotoko" as an epithet or as a name for the Virgin Mary. The translation ‘Mother of God’ is of course erroneous. ‘God-bearer’ (Gottes-barerin), the literal equivalent, is scarcely idiomatic English. The perpetual virginity of Mary is maintained incidentally (c. Apoll. i. 4), but there is an entire absence in his writings not only of worship of the Virgin, but of ‘Mariology,’ i.e., of the tendency to assign to her a personal agency, or any peculiar place, in the work of Redemption (Gen. iii. 15, Vulg.). Further, the argument of Orat. i. 51 fin., that the sending of Christ in the flesh for the first time (loipon) liberated human nature from sin, and enabled the requirement of God’s law to be fulfilled in man (an argument strictly within the lines of Rom. viii. 3), would be absolutely wrecked by the doctrine of the freedom of Mary from original sin (‘immaculate conception’). If that doctrine be held, sin was ‘condemned in the flesh’ (i.e., first deposed from its place in human nature, see Gifford or Meyer-Weiss in loc.), not by the sending of Christ, but by the congenital sinlessness of Mary. If the Arians had only known of the latter doctrine, they would have had an easy reply to that powerful passage.

§6. Derivative Doctrines. Grace and the Means of Grace; The Christian Life; The Last Things.

The idea of Grace is important to the theological system of Athanasius, in view of the central place occupied in that system by the idea of restoration and new creation as the specific work of Christ upon His fellow-men (supra, §2, cf. Orat. ii. 56, Exp. in Pss. xxxiii. 2, cxviii.5, LXX.). But, in common with the Greek Fathers generally, he does not analyse its operation, nor endeavour to fix its relation to free will (cf. Orat. i. 37 fin., iii. 25 sub fin.). The divine predestination relates (for anything that Ath. says) not to individuals so much as to the Purpose of God, before all ages, to repair the foreseen evil of man’s fall by the Incarnation (Orat. ii. 75, sq.). On the general subject of Sacraments and their efficacy, he says little or nothing. The initiatory rite of Baptism makes us sons of God (de Decr. 31, cf. Orat. i. 37 ut supra), and is the only complete renewal to be looked for in this life, Serap. iv. 13). It is accompanied (de Trin. et Sp. S. 7) by confession of faith in the Trinity, and the baptism administered by Arians who do not really hold this faith is therefore in peril of losing its value (Oral. ii. 42, fin.). The grace of the Spirit conferred at baptism will be finally withdrawn from the wicked at the last judgment (Exp. in Ps. lxxv. 13, LXX.). In the de Trin. et Sp. S. 21 baptism is coupled with the imposition of hands as one rite. On the Eucharist there is an important passage (ad Serap. iv. 19), which must be given in full. He has been speaking of sin against the Holy Spirit, which latter name he applies [see above, ch. iii. §1 (22)] to the Saviour’s Divine Personality. He proceeds to illustrate this by John vi. 62—64.

‘For here also He has used both terms of Himself, flesh and spirit; and He distinguished the spirit from what is of the flesh in order that they might believe not only in what was visible in Him, but in what was invisible, and so understand that what He says is not fleshly, but spiritual. For for how many would the body suffice as food, for it to become meat even for the whole world? But this is why He mentioned the ascending of the Son of Man into heaven; namely, to draw them off from their corporeal idea, and that from thenceforth they might understand that the aforesaid flesh was heavenly from above, and spiritual meat, to be given at His hands. For ‘what I have said unto you,’ says He, ‘is spirit and life;’ as much as to say, ‘what is manifested, and to be given for the salvation of the world, is the flesh which I wear. But this, and the blood from it, shall be given to you spiritually at My hands as meat, so as to be imparted spiritually in each one, and to become for all a preservative to resurrection of life eternal.’

Beyond this he does not define the relation of the outward and visible in the Eucharist to the spiritual and inward. The reality of the Eucharistic gift is insisted on as strongly as its spirituality in such passages as ad Max. (Letter 61) 2 sub fin., and the comment on Matt. vii. 6 (Migne xxvii. 1380), ‘See to it, therefore, Deacon, that thou do not administer to the unworthy the purple of the sinless body,’’ and the protest of the Egyptian bishops (Apol. c. Ar. 5) that their churches ‘are adorned only by the blood of Christ and by the pious worship of Him.’ The Holy Table is expressly stated to have been made of wood (Hist. Ar. 56), and was situated (Apol. Fug.) in a space called the ierareion. The Eucharist was celebrated in most places every Sunday, but not on week-days (Apol. c. Ar. 11). But in Alexandria we hear of it being celebrated on a Friday on one occasion, and this was apparently a normal one (Apol Fug. 24, Apol. Const. 25). To celebrate the Eucharist was the office of the bishop or presbyter (Apol. c. Ar. 11). Ischyras (supr. p. xxxviii.) was held by Athanasius to be a layman only, and therefore incapable of offering the Eucharist. The sacrificial aspect of the Eucharist is not touched upon, except in the somewhat strange fragment (Migne xxvi. 1259) from an Oratio de defunctis, which contains the words h de ge anaimakto" qusia exilaamo". He insists on the finality * of the sacrifice of the Cross, Orat. ii. 9, ai men gar kata nomon …ouk eicon to piston, kaq hmeran parercomenai: h de tou Swthro" quaia apax genomenh teteleiwke to pan. On repentance and the confession of sins there is little to quote. He strongly asserts the efficacy of repentance, and explains Heb. vi. 4, of the unique cleansing and restoring power of baptism (Serap. iv. 13, as cited above.) A catena on Jeremiah preserves a fragment [supra, ch. iii. §1 (38)], which compares the ministry of the priest in baptism to that in confession: outw" kai o<pg lxxxŸexomologoumeno" en metanoia dia tou ierew" lambanei thn afesin cariti Xristou. Of compulsory confession, or even of this ordinance as an ordinary element of the Christian life, we read nothing.

On the Christian ministry again there is little direct teaching. The ordinations by the presbyter Colluthus (Apol. Ar. 11, 12) are treated as null. The letter (49) to Dracontius contains vigorous and beautiful passages on the responsibility of the Ministry. On the principles of Christian conduct there is much to be gathered from obiter dicta in the writings of Athanasius. His description (cf. supra, p. xlviii.) of the revival of religious life at Alexandria in 346, and the exhortations in the Easter letters, are the most conspicuous passages for this purpose. In particular, he insists (e.g., p. 67) on the necessity of a holy life and pure mind for the apprehension of divine things, and especially for the study of the Scriptures. He strongly recommends the discipline of fasting, in which, as compared with other churches (Rome especially), the Alexandrian Christians were lax (Letter 12), but he warns them in his first Easter letter to fast not only with the body, but also with the soul. He also dwells (Letter 6) on the essential difference of spirit between Christian festivals and Jewish observance of days. Christ is the true Festival, embracing the whole of the Christian life (Letters 5, 14). He lays stress on love to our neighbour, and especially on kindness to the poor (Letter. i. 11, Hist. Ar. 61, Vit. Ant. 17, 30). On one important practical point he is very emphatic: ‘Persecution is a device of the devil’ (Hist. Ar. 33). This summary judgment was unfortunately less in accordance with the spirit of the times than with the Spirit of Christ.

The ascetic teaching of Athanasius must be reserved for the introduction to the Vita Antoni (cf. Letters 48, 49, also above, p. xlviii.). His eschatology calls for discussion in connection with the language of the de Incarnatione, and will be briefly noticed in the introduction to that tract. With regard to prayers for the departed, he distinguishes (on Luke xiii. 21, &c., Migne xxvii. 1404) the careless, whose friends God will move to assist them with their prayers, from the utterly wicked who are beyond the help of prayer.

Chapter V. Chronology and Tables.

§1. Sources.

(1) The Festal Letters of Athanasius with their Index and the Historia Acephala constitute our primary source for chronological details (see below, §2). (2) Along with these come the chronological notices scattered up and down the other writings of Athanasius. These are of course of the utmost importance, but too often lack definiteness. (3) The chronological data in the fifth-century historians, headed by Socrates, are a mass of confusion, and have been a source of confusion ever since, until the discovery of the primary sources, No. (1) mentioned above. They must, therefore, be used only in strict subordination to the latter. (4) More valuable but less abundant secondary notices are to be derived from the Life of Pachomius, from the letter of Ammon (infra, p. 487), and from other writers of the day. (5) For the movements of the Emperors the laws in the Codex Theodosianus (ed. Hanel in Corpus Juris Ante-Justiniani) give many dates, but the text is not in a satisfactory condition.

(6) Modern discussions. The conflicting attempts at an Athanasian chronology prior to the discovery of the Festal Letters are tabulated in the Appendix to Newman’s Arians, and discussed by him in his introduction to the Historical Tracts (Oxf. Lib. Fathers). The notes to Dr. Bright’s article Athanasius in D.C.B., and his introduction to the Hist. Writings of S. Ath., may be profitably consulted, as also may Larsow’s Fest-briefe (Leipz., 1852), with useful calendar information by Dr. J. G. Galle, the veteran professor of Astronomy at Breslau, and Sievers on the Hist. Aceph. (Supr. ch. i. §3.)

But by far the most valuable chronological discussions are those of Prof. Gwatkin in his Studies of Arianism. He has been the first to make full use of the best data, and moreover gives very useful lists of the great officials of the Empire and of the movements of the Eastern Emperors. Mr. Gwatkin’s results were criticised in the Church Quarterly Review, vol. xvi. pp. 392—398, 1883, by an evidently highly-qualified hand . The criticisms of the Reviewer have been most carefully weighed by the present writer, although they quite fail to shake him in his general agreement with Mr. Gwatkin’s results.

For the general chronology of the period we may mention Weingarten’s Zeit-tafeln (ed. 3, 1888) as useful, though not especially so for our purpose, and above all Clinton’s Fasti Romani, which, however, were drawn up in the dark ages before the discovery of the Festal Letters, and are therefore antiquated so far as the life of Athanasius is concerned.

§2. Principles and Method.

The determination of the leading Athanasian dates depends mainly on the value to be assigned to the primary sources, §1 (1). Reserving the fuller discussion of these texts for the Introduction to the Letters (pp. 495 sq., 500 sq.), it will suffice to state here what seem to be the results of an investigation of their value. (1) The Historia Ace-phala and Festal Index are independent of each other (cf. Sievers, p. 95, misunderstood, I think, by Mr. Gwatkin, p. 221). (2) They both belong to the generation after the death of Athanasius, the H.A. being apparently the earlier. (3) The data as to which they agree must, therefore, come from a source prior to either, i.e., contemporary with Athanasius. (4) In several important particulars they are confirmed by our secondary Egyptian sources, such as the Letter of Ammon and Life of Pachomius. (5) They verify most of the best results arrived at independently of them (of this below), and (6) In no case do they agree in fixing a date which can be proved to be wrong, or which there are sound reasons for distrusting. On these grounds I have classed the Historia and Index as primary sources, and maintain that the dates as to which the two documents agree must be accepted as certain. This principle at once brings the doubtful points in the chronology within very moderate limits. The general chronological table, in which the dates fixed by the agreement of these sources are printed in black type, will make this plain enough. It remains to shew that the principle adopted works out well in detail, or in other words, that the old Alexandrian chronology, transmitted to us through the twofold channel of the Historia and the Index, harmonises the apparent discrepancies, and solves the difficulties, of the chronological statements of Athanasius, and tallies with the most trustworthy information derived from other sources. In some cases it has been found desirable to discuss points of chronology where they occur in the Life of Athanasius; what will be attempted here is to complete what is there passed over without thorough discussion, in justification of the scheme adopted in our general chronological table.

§3. Applications. (a) Death of Alexander and Election of Athanasius. That the latter took place on June 8, 328, is established by the agreement of our sources, together with the numbering of the Festal Letters. Theodoret (H.E. i. 26) and others, misled by some words of Athanasius (Apol. c. Ar. 59), handed down to later ages the statement that Alexander died five months after the Council of Nicaea. It had long been seen that this must be a mistake (Tillemont, vi. 736, Montfaucon, Monit. in Vit. S. Athan.) and various suggestions were made as to the terminus a quo for the ‘five months’ mentioned by Athanasius; that of Montfaucon remains the most probable (see ch. ii. §3 (1), p. xxi.). But the field was left absolutely clear for the precise and concordant statement of our chroniclers, which, therefore, takes undisputed possession. (Further details, supr. p. xx. sq.; Introd. to Letters, pp. 495, 303).

(b) The first exile of Athanasius. The duration is fixed by the Hist. Aceph. (see Introd. p. 495, sq.) as two years, four months, and eleven days, and this exactly coincides with the dates given by the Index for his departure for Tyre, July 11, 335, and his return from exile Nov. 23, 337 (not 338; for the Diocletian year began at the end of August). Although, therefore, the Hist. Aceph. is not available for the date, the constructive agreement between it and the Index is complete. But it has been contended that the year of the return from this exile must still be placed in 338, in spite of the new evidence to the contrary. The reasons alleged are very weak. (1) The letter of Constantine II., dated Treveri, June 17, so far from making against the year 337, clinches the argument in its favour. Constantine is still only ‘Caesar’ when he writes it (pp. 146, 272); he was proclaimed Augustus on Sep. 9, 337 (Montf. in ann. 338 tries in vain to parry this decisive objection to the later date. He appeals to Maximin in Eus. H.E. ix. 10, but overlooks the word sebasto" there. Is it conceivable that a disappointed eldest son, as sensitive about his claims as Constantine was, would within so short a time of becoming ‘Augustus’ be content to call himself merely ‘Caesar’?) The objection as to the distance of Treveri from Nicomedia has no weight, as we show elsewhere (p. xli., note 4); Constantine might have heard of his father’s death a fortnight before the date of this letter. (2) The law (Cod. Th. X. x. 4) dated Viminacium, June 12, 338, if correctly ascribed to Constantius, would certainly lend plausibility to the view that it was at that time that Athanasius met Constantius at Viminacium (p. 240). But the names are so often confused in mss., and the text of the Theodosian Code requires such frequent correction, that there is no solid objection to set against the extremely cogent proofs (Gwatkin, p. 138) that the law belongs to Constantine, who in that case cannot have been at Trier on June 17, 338. As to Constantius, there is no reason against his having been in Pannonia at some time in the summer of 337. (3) The statement of Theodoret (H.E. ii. 1) that Ath. ‘stayed at Treveri two years and four months’ seems to reproduce that of the Hist. Aceph. as to the length of the exile, and is only verbally inexact in applying it to the period actually spent in Trier. (4) The language of Letter 10, the Festal letter for 338, is not absolutely decisive, but §§3, 11 certainly imply that when it was written, whether at Alexandria or elsewhere, the durance of Athanasius was at an end. There can, we submit, be no reasonable doubt that the first exile of Athanasius began with his departure from Alexandria on July 11, 335, and ended with his return thither on Nov. 23, 337.

(c) Commencement of the second exile. Here again the agreement of our chronicles is constructive only, owing to the loss of the earlier part of the Hist. Aceph.; but it is none the less certain. The exile ended, as everyone now admits and as both chronicles tell us, on Paoph. 24 (Oct. 21), 346: it lasted, according to the H.A., seven years, six months, and three days. This carries us back to Phar. 21 (April 16), 339. Now we learn from the Index that he left the Church of Theonas on the night of Mar. 18–19, and from the Encyclical, 4, 5, that he took refuge first in another church, then in some secret place till over Easter Sunday (Apr. 15). This fits exactly with Apr. 16 as the date of his flight to Rome. To this there is only one serious objection, viz., that Ath. was summoned (p. 239) to Milan by Constantius after the end of three years from his leaving Alexandria. It has been assumed (without any proof) that this took place ‘just before’ the council of Sardica. As a matter of fact, Constans left Athan. in Milan, and (apparently after his summer campaign) ordered him to follow him to Trier, in order to travel thence to the Council. Athanasius does not state either how long he remained at Milan, or when he was ordered to Trier; for a chronological inference, in opposition to explicit evidence, he furnishes no basis whatever. I agree with Mr. Gwatkin (whom his Reviewer quite misunderstands) in placing the Milan interview about May, 342, and the journey from Trier to Sardica after Easter (probably later still) in 343 (Constans was in Britain in the spring of 343, and had returned to Trier before June 30, Cod. Th. XII. i. 36, see also supr. p. xlv.). A more reasonable objection to the statement of the Index is that of Dr. Bright (p. xv. note 5), who sets against its information that Athan. fled from ‘Theonas’ four days before Gregory’s arrival, the statement of the Encyclical that he left a certain church after Gregory’s outrages at Eastertide. But clearly Athan. first escaped from the church of Theonas, afterwards (between Good Friday and Easter) from some other church (allh ekklhsia), not named by him (‘Quirinus,’ cf. p. 95, note 1), and finally from the City itself. (Dr. Bright’s arguments in favour of 340 are vitiated in part by his placing Easter on April 9, i.e. on a Wednesday, instead of the proper day, Sunday, Mar. 30). The date, April 16, 339, is, therefore, well established as the beginning of the second exile, and there is no tangible evidence against it. It is, moreover, supported by the subscription to the letter to Serapion, which stands in the stead of the Easter letter for 340, and which states that the letter was written from Rome.

(d) Council of Sardica and death of Gregory. The confusion into which the whole chronology of the surrounding events was thrown by the supposition (which was naturally taken without question upon the authority of Socrates and Sozomen) that the Sardican council met in 347, is reflected in the careful digest of opinions made by Newman (Arians, Appendix, or better, Introduction to Hist. Treatises of S. Ath. p. xxvi.; cf. also Hefele, Eng. Tra., vol. 2, p. 188, sq., notes), and especially in the difficulties caused by the necessity of placing the Council of Milan in 345 before Sardica, and the mission of Euphrates of Cologne to Antioch as late as 348. Now the Hist. Aceph., by giving October, 346, as the date of the return of Athanasius from his second exile, at once challenged the received date for Sardica, and J. D. Mansi, the learned editor of the ‘Collectio Amplissima’ of the Councils, used this fact as the key to unlock the chronological tangle of the period. He argued that the Council of Sardica must be put back at least as early as 344; but the natural conservatism of learning resisted his conclusions until the year 1852, when the Festal Letters, discovered ten years earlier, were made available for the theological public of Europe. The date 347 was then finally condemned. Not only did Letter 18, written at Easter, 345, refer to the Council’s decision about Easter, and Letter 19 refer to his restoration as an accomplished fact; the Index most positively dated the synod in the year 343, which year has now taken its place as the accepted date, although the month and duration of the assembly are still open to doubt (Supr. p. xlv., note 6). In any case it is certain that the Easter at which the deputies from Constans and the Council reached Antioch was Easter, 344. This brings us to the question of the date of Gregory’s death. Mr. Gwatkin rightly connects the Council which deposed Stephen for his behaviour to the Western deputies, and elected Leontius, with the issue of the ‘Macrostich’ creed ‘three years’ (de Syn. 26) after the Council of the Dedication, i.e., in the summer of 344. This is our only notice of time for the Council in question, and it is not very precise; but the Council may fairly be placed in the early summer, which would allow time for the necessary preliminaries after Easter, and for the meeting of the fathers at reasonable notice. (Perhaps Stephen was promptly and informally deposed (Thdt.) after Easter, but a regular council would be required to ratify this act and to elect his successor.) After the Council (we are again not told how long after) Constantius writes a public letter to Alexandria forbidding further persecution of the orthodox (277, note 3). This may well have been in the later summer of 344. Then ‘about ten months later’ (ib.) Gregory dies. This would bring us ‘about’ to the early summer of 345; and this rough calculation is curiously confirmed by the precise statement of the Index xviii., that Gregory died on June 26 (345, although the Index, in accordance with its principle of arrangement, which will be explained in the proper place, puts the notice under the following year). Of course the date of the letter of Constantius, which Athanasius gives as the terminus a quo of the ‘ten months,’ cannot be fixed except by conjecture, and the date given by the Index is (1) the only precise statement we have, (2) is likely enough in itself, and (3) agrees perfectly with the datum of de Synod 26. That is to say, as far as our evidence goes it appears to be correct.

(e) Return of Athanasius in 346. Here the precise statements of the Index and Hist. Aceph. agree, and are confirmed by Letter 19, which was written after his return. The date therefore requires no discussion. But it is important as a signal example of the high value to be assigned to the united witness of our two chronicles. For this is the pivot date which, in the face of all previously accepted calculations, has taken its place as unassailably correct, and has been the centre from which the recovery of the true chronology of the period has proceeded, The difficulty in dating the interview with Constantius at Antioch is briefly discussed p. xlvii. note 10.

(f) Irruption of Syrianus and Intrusion of George. The former event is dated without any room for doubt on the night of Thursday, Feb. 8 (Mechir 13), 356 (see p. 301, also Index and Hist. Aceph.). Here again the accuracy of our chronicles on points where they agree comes out strongly. It should be noted that an ill-informed writer could hardly have avoided a blunder here; for 356 was a leap-year: and in consequence of this (1) all the months from Thoth to Phamenoth, inclusive, began a day later, owing to the additional Epagomenon before the first day of Thoth: the 13th Mechir would, therefore, in these years correspond to Feb. 8, not as usual to Feb. 7. (2) Owing to the Roman calendar inserting its intercalary day at the end of February, Feb. 8 would fall on the Thursday, not on the Friday (reckoning back from Easter on Apr. 7: see Tables C, D., pp. 501 sq.). This date, then, may rank as one of the absolutely fixed points of our chronology. After the above examples of the value of the concordant testimony of the two chronicles, we must demand positive and circumstantial proof to the contrary before rejecting their united testimony that George made his entry into Alexandria in the Lent of 357, not 356. As a matter of fact all the positive evidence (supr., p. lii., note 11) is the other way, and when weighed against it, the feather-weight of an inference from a priori probability, and from the assumed silence of Athanasins (Ap. Fug. 6), kicks the beam.

(g) Athanasius in 362. The difficulty here is that Athanasius clearly returned after the murder of George, which, according to Amm. Marc. XXII. xi., took place upon the receipt at Alexandria of the news of the execution of Artemius at Antioch, which latter event must be placed in July. Therefore Athanasius would not have returned till August, 362. On the other hand the Hist. Aceph. makes George arrested four days after his return to Alexandria, and immediately upon the proclamation of the new Emperor, Nov. 30, 361. On Dec. 24 George is murdered, on Feb. 9 the edict for the return of the exiles is promulged, and on Feb. 21 Athanasius returns, to take flight again ‘eight months’ later, on Oct. 24. The difficulty is so admirably sifted by Mr. Gwatkin (pp. 220, 221) that I refer to his discussion instead of giving one here. His conclusion is clearly right, viz., that Ammianus here, as occasionally elsewhere, has missed the right order of events, and that George was really murdered at the time stated in Hist. Aceph. The only addition to be made to Mr. Gwatkin’s decisive argument is that Ammianus is inconsistent with himself, and in agreement with the Hist. Aceph., in dating the arrest of George shortly after his return from court. As George would not have been at Julian’s court, this notice implies that the arrest took place only shortly after the death of Constantius. Moreover, George, who even under Constantius was not over-ready to visit his see, and who knew well enough the state of heathen feeling against him, would not be likely to return to Alexandria after Julian had been six months on the throne. We have then not so much to balance Ammianus against the Hist. Aceph., as to balance one of his statements, not otherwise confirmed, against another which is supported by the Hist. Aceph., and by other authorities as well, especially Epiph. Haer. 76. 1. (The Festal Index gives no precise date here, except Oct. 24, for the flight of Athanasius, which so far as it goes confirms the Hist. Aceph.) Moreover, “on the side of Ammianus there is at worst an oversight; whereas the Hist. Aceph. would need to be re-written.” The murder of George, Dec. 24, 361, return of Athanasius, Feb. and his flight, Oct. 24, 362, may therefore be taken as firmly-established dates.

(h) Supposed Council at Alexandria in 363. This Synod assumed by Baronius, Montfaucon (Vit. in Ann. 363. 3) and others, after Theodoret (H. E. iv. 2) must be pronounced fictitious (so already Vales. in Thdt. l.c.). (1) The letter of Ammon (extract printed in this volume, p. 487) tells us on the authority of Athanasius that when Pammon and Theodore miraculously announced the death of Julian, they informed Athan. that the new Emperor was to be a Christian, but that his reign would be short; that Athanasius must go at once and secretly to the Emperor, whom he would meet on his journey before the army reached Antioch, that he would be favourably received by him, and that he would obtain an order for his restoration. Now (apart from the possibility of a grain of truth in the fhmh of the death of Julian) all these details bear the unmistakeable character of a vaticinium post eventum, in other words, we have the story as it was current when Ammon drew up the document in question at the request of Archbishop Theophilus (see also p. 567, note 1). At that time, then, the received account was that Athan. hastened secretly to meet Jovian as soon as he knew of his accession, and that he met him between Antioch and Nisibis. Now this native Egyptian account is transmitted independently by two other channels. (2) The Hist. Aceph. viii. tells us that the bishop entered Alexandria secretly ‘adventu eius non pluribus cognito,’ went by ship to Jovian, and returned with letters from him. (3) The Festal Index tells us that eight months (i.e., Oct. 24md;June 26) after the flight of Ath. Julian died. On his death being published, Athan. returned secretly by night to Alexandria. Then on Sept. 6 he crossed the Euphrates (this seems to be the meaning of ‘embarked at the Eastern, Hierapolis,’ the celebrated city, perhaps the ancient Karkhemish, which commanded the passage of the river, though some miles from its W. bank) and met the Emperor Jovian, by whom he was eventually dismissed with honour, returning to Alexandria Feb. 20, 364. Jovian was at Edessa Sept. 27, at Antioch Oct. 23.

The agreement of the three documents is most striking, and the more so since the chronicles are clearly independent both of one another and especially of the letter of Ammon, as is clear from the fact that neither mentions the fhmh, while the Festal Index implicitly contradicts it. This appears to be a crucial case in many ways. Firstly, the three narratives are all consistent in excluding the possibility of any such council as is supposed to have been summoned (see above, p. lx.). Against this there is nothing but the hasty inference of Thdt. (corrected by Valois, see above, ib.); the valueless testimony of the Libellus Synodicus (9th cent.); the marvellous tale of Sozom. v. 7 (referred to this time by Tillem. viii. 219, but by Soz. to the death of George: probably an amplification of Hist. Aceph. ‘visus est’) that Athanasius suddenly to the delight of his people was found enthroned in his Church; and the more vague statement of Socr. (iii. 24) that he regained his church ‘at once after Julian’s death.’ As the three fifth-century writers are implicitly contradicted by three writers of Alexandria at the end of the previous century, the latter must be believed against the former. Secondly, the Index, the later as it appears, of the two chronicles, would seem to represent a form of the story less marvellous and therefore earlier than that of the Narratio. Now the latter certainly belongs to the Episcopate of Theophilus. The Index therefore can scarcely be placed later, and the Hist. Aceph. would fall, as Sievers, Einl. 2, had independently placed it at the beginning of the Episcopate of Theophilus. Thirdly, we have here an excellent example not only of the value of the combined evidence of the two chronicles, but also of their character as representing in many important respects the Alexandrian tradition of the last third of the fourth century. Before leaving this question it will be well to consider the dates a little more closely. Hierapolis was counted eight days’ journey from Antioch. From Alexandria to Antioch by sea was about 500 miles, i.e. with a fair wind scarcely more than four days’ sail (it might be less, cf. Conybeare and Howson, St. Paul, vol. 2, p. 376, sq. ed. 1877). This allows about twelve days for Athan. to reach the Euphrates from Alexandria, remembering that southerly winds prevail in the Eastern Mediterranean at this season (Sievers, Einl. 28). Now Athan. reached Hierapolis on Sept. 6 (Thoth 8, Egyptian leap-year). But according to the Index, he reached Alex. after Julian’s death was published, and this according to Hist. Aceph. was on Mesori 26, i.e. Aug. 19. From that day to Sept. 6 are eighteen days, leaving about a week’s margin for Ath. to hear the news, reach Alexandria, and perhaps for delay in finding a vessel, &c. But a far wider margin is really available, for the official announcement must have been preceded by many rumours, and was probably not despatched till more than a fortnight after Julian’s death (as is observed by Mr. Gwatkin, p. 221). If we remember that Athanasius, according to the Letter of Ammon, was making all possible haste (supra, §9) we shall again realise the subtle cohesion of these three sources, and the impossibility of the ‘large Synod’ imagined by some historians for the year 363.

(k) Exile under Valens. The date of this is discussed by Tillem. (note 96) and Montf. Vit. who, on the unstable basis of a computation of Theophanes (about 800 a.d.) and of the vague and loose sequences of events in Socr. and Sozom., tentatively refer the exile to the year 367. The only show of solid support for this date was that Tatianus (of later and unfortunate celebrity), whom the Photian Life and that by the Metaphrast connected with the expulsion, was known from Cod. Theod. to have been Prefect of Egypt in 367. But this airy fabric now gives place to the precise and accurate data of the Theophilan chronicles. Both Index and Hist. Aceph. place the occurrence not under Tatian but under Flavian, governor of Egypt 364nd;366. Both fix the year 365. The Hist. Aceph. (used by Soz.vi.12, who however makes no use of the dates) gives May 5, 365, for the Imperial order against bishops restored by Julian, June 8 for the reference to the Emperor (supra, ch. ii. §9), Oct. 5 for the retreat of Athan. and search for him by Flavian and Duke Victorinus, Feb. 1 for the return of Athanasius. This detailed chronology is corroborated in two ways; first by a letter of Libanius (Ep. 569) to Flavian, thanking him for a present of [Egyptian] doves, and congratulating him on his ‘victory’ (a play on the name Victorinus is added), but with a satirical hint that if only Victorinus had any prisoners to shew for his pains (a clear allusion to the escape of Ath.) he (Libanius) would think him a finer fellow even than Cleon (Siev. Einl. 31). Secondly, the restoration of Ath. by Valens becomes historically intelligible, in view of the danger from Procopius, as pointed out supr. p. lxi., fin. We cannot then doubt that the chronicles are here once more the channels of the genuine chronological tradition.

(1) Death of Athanasius. It is superfluous to discuss this date at the present day, but it may be worth while to point out for the last time how admirably the combined testimony of our chronicles confirms the judgment of the best critics (Montfaucon, Tillemont, &c.) antecedent to their discovery, and how clearly the secondary value to be assigned to the chronological statements of Socrates and Sozomen once more comes out (Socr. iv. 21 puts the date at 371, and was followed by Papebroke, Petavius and others (fuller details and discussion of the question on its ancient footing in Newman’s preface to Hist. Tracts of St. Athan., pp. xx., sqq.). But no one any longer questions the date of May 2–3, 373. The fact that the Hist. Aceph. gives May 3 and the Index May 2 (the date observed in the later calendars) vouches for the independence of the two documents and for the very early date of the former: probably, as Sievers and others suggest, the true date is the night between May 2 and May 3.

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