A Source Book for Ancient Church History Part 21

(_h_) Basil the Great, _Epistula_, 210:3. (MSG, 32:772, 776.)

Basil the Great, Bishop of Csarea in Cappadocia, was one of the more important ecclesiastics of the fourth century, and the leader of the New-Nicene party in the Arian controversy. _V. infra_, 66, _c_.

Sabellianism is Judaism imported into the preaching of the Gospel under the guise of Christianity. For if a man calls Father, Son, and Holy Spirit one, but manifold as to person [prosopon], and makes one hypostasis of the three, what else does he do than deny the everlasting pre-existence of the Only begotten?

Now Sabellius did not even deprecate the formation of the persons without the hypostasis, saying, as he did, that the same G.o.d, being one in substance,(62) was metamorphosed as the need of the moment required and spoken of now as Father, now as the Son, and now as Holy Spirit.

41. Later Montanism and the Consequences of its Exclusion from the Church

In the West Montanism rapidly discarded the extravagant chiliasm of Monta.n.u.s and his immediate followers; it laid nearly all the stress upon the continued work of the Holy Spirit in the Church and the need of a stricter moral discipline among Christians. This rigoristic discipline or morality was not acceptable to the bulk of Christians, and along with the Montanists was driven out of the Church, except in the case of the clergy, to whom a stricter morality was regarded as applicable. In this way a distinctive morality and mode of life came to be a.s.signed to the clergy, and the separation between clergy and laity, or _ordo_ and _plebs_, which was becoming established about the time of Tertullian, at least in the West, was permanently fixed. (See 42, _d_.)

Tertullian, _De Exhortatione Cast.i.tatis_, 7. (MSL, 2:971.)

As a Montanist, Tertullian rejected second marriage, and in this treatise, addressed to a friend who had recently lost his wife, he treated it as the foulest adultery. This work belongs to the later years of Tertullians life and incidentally reveals that a sharp distinction between clergy and laity was becoming fixed in the main body of the Church.

We should be foolish if we thought that what is unlawful for priests(63) is lawful for laics. Are not even we laics priests? It is written: He has made us kings also, and priests to G.o.d and his Father. The authority of the Church has made the difference between order [_ordinem_] and the laity [_plebem_], and the honor has been sanctified by the bestowal of the order. Therefore, where there has been no bestowal of ecclesiastical order, you both offer and baptize and are a priest to yourself alone. But where there are three, there is the Church, though they are laics.

Therefore, if, when there is necessity, you have the right of a priest in yourself, you ought also to have the discipline of a priest where there is necessity that you have the right of a priest. As a digamist,(64) do you baptize? As a digamist, do you offer? How much more capital a crime it is for a digamist laic to act as a priest, when the priest, if he turn digamist, is deprived of the power of acting as a priest? G.o.d wills that at all times we be so conditioned as to be fitted at all times and in all places to undertake His sacraments. There is one G.o.d, one faith, one discipline as well. So truly is this the case that unless the laics well observe the rules which are to guide the choice of presbyters, how will there be presbyters at all who are chosen from among the laics?

42. The Penitential Discipline

In baptism the convert received remission of all former sins, and, what was equivalent, admission to the Church. If he sinned gravely after baptism, could he again obtain remission? In the first age of the Church the practice as to this question inclined toward rigorism, and the man who sinned after baptism was in many places permanently excluded from the Church (_cf._ Heb. 10:26, 27), or the community of those whose sins had been forgiven and were certain of heaven. By the middle of the second century the practice at Rome tended toward permitting one readmission after suitable penance (_a_). After this the penitential discipline developed rapidly and became an important part of the business of the local congregation (_b_). The sinner, by a long course of self-mortification and prayer, obtained the desired readmission (_c_). The Montanists, however, in accord with their general rigorism, would make it extremely hard, if not impossible, to obtain readmission or forgiveness.

The body of the Church, and certainly the Roman church under the lead of its bishop, who relied upon Matt. 16:18, adopted a more liberal policy and granted forgiveness on relatively easy terms to even the worst offenders (_d_). The discipline grew less severe, because martyrs or confessors, according to Matt. 10:20, were regarded as having the Spirit, and therefore competent to speak for G.o.d and announce the divine forgiveness.

These were accustomed to give letters of peace, which were commonly regarded as sufficient to procure the immediate readmission of the offender (_e_), a practice which led to great abuse. One of the effects of the development of the penitential discipline was the establishment of a distinction between mortal and venial sins (_f_), the former of which were, in general, acts involving unchast.i.ty, shedding of blood, and apostasy, according to the current interpretation of Acts 15:29.

(_a_) Hermas, _Pastor_, Man. IV, 3:1.

For Hermas and the _Pastor_, _v. supra_, 15.

I heard some teachers maintain, sir, that there is no other repentance than that which takes place when we descend into the waters and receive remission of our former sins. He said to me, That was sound doctrine which you heard; for that is really the case. For he who has received remission of his sins ought not to sin any more, but to live in purity. The Lord, therefore, being merciful, has had mercy on the work of His hands, and has set repentance for them; and He has intrusted to me the power over this repentance. And therefore I say unto you that if any one is tempted by the devil, and sins after that great and holy calling in which the Lord has called His people to everlasting life, he has opportunity to repent but once. But if he should sin frequently after this, and then repent, to such a man his repentance will be of no avail, for with difficulty will he live.

(_b_) Tertullian. _Apology_, 39. (MSL, 1:532.)

We meet together as an a.s.sembly and congregation that, offering up prayer to G.o.d, with united force we may wrestle with Him in our prayers. In the same place, also, exhortations are made, rebukes and sacred censures are administered. For with a great gravity is the work of judging carried on among us, as befits those who feel a.s.sured that they are in the sight of G.o.d; and you have the most notable example of judgment to come when any one has so sinned as to be severed from common union with us in prayer, in the congregation, and in all sacred intercourse.

(_c_) Tertullian, _De Pnitentia_, 4, 9. (MSL, 2:1343, 1354.)

According to Bardenhewer, 50:5, this work belongs to the Catholic period of Tertullians literary activity. Text in part in Kirch, nn. 175 _ff._

Ch. 4. As I live, saith the Lord, I prefer penance rather than death [_cf._ Ezek. 33:11]. Repentance, then, is life, since it is preferred to death. That repentance, O sinner like myself (nay, rather, less a sinner than myself, for I acknowledge my pre-eminence in sins), do you hasten to embrace as a s.h.i.+pwrecked man embraces the protection of some plank. This will draw you forth when sunk in the waves of sin, and it will bear you forward into the port of divine clemency.

Ch. 9. The narrower the sphere of action of this, the second and only remaining repentance, the more laborious is its probation; that it may not be exhibited in the conscience alone, but may likewise be performed in some act. This act, which is more usually expressed and commonly spoken of under the Greek name, exomologesis, whereby we confess our sins to the Lord, not indeed to Him as ignorant of them, but inasmuch as by confession a satisfaction is made; of confession repentance is born; by repentance G.o.d is appeased. And thus exomologesis is a discipline for mans prostration and humiliation, enjoining a demeanor calculated to move mercy. With regard, also, to the very dress and food, it commands one to lie in sackcloth and ashes, to cover the body as in mourning, to lay the spirit low in sorrow, to exchange for severe treatment the sins which he has committed; furthermore, to permit as food and drink only what is plainnot for the stomachs sake, but for the souls; for the most part, however, to feed prayers on fastings, to groan, to weep, and make outcries unto the Lord our G.o.d; to fall prostrate before the presbyters and to kneel to G.o.ds dear ones; to enjoin on all the brethren to be amba.s.sadors to bear his deprecatory supplication before G.o.d. All this exomologesis does, that it may enhance repentance, that it may honor the Lord by fear of danger, may, by itself, in p.r.o.nouncing against the sinner stand in place of G.o.ds indignation, and by temporal mortification (I will not say frustrate, but rather) expunge eternal punishments.

(_d_) Tertullian, _De Pudicitia_, 1, 21, 22. (MSL, 2:1032, 1078.)

Callistus, to whom reference is made in the first chapter, was bishop of Rome 217 to 222. The work, therefore, belongs to the latest period of Tertullians life.

Ch. 1. I hear that there has been an edict set forth, and, indeed, a peremptory one; namely, that the Pontifex Maximus, the bishop of bishops, issues an edict: I remit to such as have performed penance, the sins both of adultery and fornication.

Ch. 21. But, you say, the Church has the power of forgiving sins. This I acknowledge and adjudge more, I, who have the Paraclete himself in the person of the new prophets, saying: The Church has the power to forgive sins, but I will not do it, lest they commit still others. I now inquire into your opinion, to discover from what source you usurp this power to the Church.

If, because the Lord said to Peter, Upon this rock I will build My Church [Matt. 16:18]. To Thee I have given the keys of the kingdom of heaven, or Whatsoever thou shalt bind or loose on earth, shall be bound or loosed in heaven, you therefore presume that the power of binding and loosing has descended to you, that is, to every church akin to Peter; what sort of man, then, are you, subverting and wholly changing the manifest intention of the Lord, who conferred the gift personally upon Peter? On Thee, He says, I will build my Church, and I will give thee the keys, not to the Church; and whatsoever thou shalt have loosed or bound, not what they shall have loosed or bound. For so the result actually teaches. In him (Peter) the Church was reared, that is, through him (Peter) himself; he himself tried the key; you see what key: Men of Israel, let what I say sink into your ears; Jesus, the Nazarene, a man appointed of G.o.d for you,(65) and so forth. Peter himself, therefore, was the first to unbar, in Christs baptism, the entrance to the kingdom of heaven, in which are loosed the sins that aforetime were bound.

What, now, has this to do with the Church and your Church, indeed, O Psychic? For in accordance with the person of Peter, it is to spiritual men that this power will correspondingly belong, either to an Apostle or else to a prophet. And accordingly the Church, it is true, will forgive sins; but it will be the Church of the Spirit, by a spiritual man; not the Church which consists of a number of bishops.

Ch. 22. But you go so far as to lavish this power upon martyrs indeed; so that no sooner has any one, acting on a preconceived arrangement, put on soft bonds in the nominal custody now in vogue, than adulterers beset him, fornicators gain access to him; instantly prayers resound about him; instantly pools of tears of the polluted surround him; nor are there any who are more diligent in purchasing entrance to the prison than they who have lost the fellows.h.i.+p of the Church. Whatever authority, whatever reason, restores ecclesiastical peace to the adulterer and the fornicator, the same will be bound to come to the aid of the murderer and the idolater in their repentance.

(_e_) Tertullian, _Ad Martyres_, 1. (MSL, 1:693.)

The following extract from Tertullians little work addressed to martyrs in prison, written about 197, shows that in his earlier life as a Catholic Christian he did not disapprove of the practice of giving _libelli pacis_ by the confessors, a custom which in his more rigoristic period under the influence of Montanism he denounced most vehemently; see preceding extract from _De Pudicitia_, ch. 22. The reference to some discord among the martyrs is not elsewhere explained. For _libelli pacis_, see Cyprian, _Ep. 10_ (=_Ep. 15_), 22 (=21).

O blessed ones, grieve not the Holy Spirit, who has entered with you into the prison; for if He had not gone with you there, you would not be there to-day. Therefore endeavor to cause Him to remain with you there; so that He may lead you thence to the Lord. The prison, truly, is the devils house as well, wherein he keeps his family. Let him not be successful in his own kingdom by setting you at variance with one another, but let him find you armed and fortified with concord; for your peace is war with him.

Some, not able to find peace in the Church, have been accustomed to seek it from the imprisoned martyrs. Therefore you ought to have it dwelling with you, and to cherish it and guard it, that you may be able, perchance, to bestow it upon others.

(_f_) Tertullian, _De Pudicitia_, 19. (MSL, 2:1073.)

The distinction between mortal and venial sins became of great importance in the administration of penance and remained as a feature of ecclesiastical discipline from the time of Tertullian.

The origin of the distinction was still earlier. See above, an extract from the same work.

We ourselves do not forget the distinction between sins, which was the starting-point of our discussion. And this, too, for John has sanctioned it [_cf._ I John 5:16], because there are some sins of daily committal to which we are all liable; for who is free from the accident of being angry unjustly and after sunset; or even of using bodily violence; or easily speaking evil; or rashly swearing; or forfeiting his plighted word; or lying from bashfulness or necessity? In business, in official duties, in trade, in food, in sight, in hearing, by how great temptations are we a.s.sailed! So that if there were no pardon for such simple sins as these, salvation would be unattainable by any. Of these, then, there will be pardon through the successful Intercessor with the Father, Christ. But there are other sins wholly different from these, graver and more destructive, such as are incapable of pardonmurder, idolatry, fraud, apostasy, blasphemy, and, of course, adultery and fornication and whatever other violation of the temple of G.o.d there may be. For these Christ will no more be the successful Intercessor; these will not at all be committed by any one who has been born of G.o.d, for he will cease to be the son of G.o.d if he commit them.

43. The Catechetical School of Alexandria: Clement and Origen