Adolf Harnack · 17 of 21

Chapter IV. Presuppositions and Conceptions Regarding God, the Creator, as Dispenser of Salvation.

A.—PRESUPPOSITION OF DOCTRINE OF REDEMPTION OR NATURAL THEOLOGY.

§ 1. The Doctrine of God. Its Method.

The main features of the doctrine of God were those familiar from the theology of the Apologists, as they were partly fixed and partly supplemented by the fight with Gnosticism. Speculations on the Deity as a Trinity (τριάς) modified but little the general doctrine of God (yet see attempts in Augustine, De trinitate); for the unity, simplicity, indivisibility, and unchangeableness of God were at the same time maintained most definitely: in other words, the Father alone was almost always. regarded as ‘root of the Deity” (ῥίζα τῆς θεότητος), where the Deity, in its essential being, was described in comparison with the world. The ultimate reason of this was that theology counted on a general intelligence for its general doctrine of God, and therefore had recourse to natural religion and theology, i.e., to the results of Greek philosophy. It was, indeed admitted by many Fathers (see esp. Athanasius, De incarn.) that men could know the Deity from creation only dimly, if at all; and that therefore the manifestation of God in Christ alone made it possible to recognise the nature of God as the undivided, spiritual and good Lord of the World. But, in fact, it was only a question of more or less as regards the natural knowledge of the spiritual and good God, the Creator. Other Fathers, especially those influenced by Aristotle, declared the knowledge of God in its whole extent to be innate (see Arnobius), or, a knowledge to be constantly tested by the observation of nature. No difference is here caused by the fact that some Fathers have described the existence of God and his distinctive nature as capable of proof, others, as incapable; for the latter only rejected the proof in so far as God could not be discovered by means of deduction from a prius. The psychological, cosmological, and natural theological proofs were not despised by them in meeting Atheism, Polytheism, Manichæism, etc. We already find in Augustine suggestions of an ontological proof. All these evidences were, indeed, given subject to the proviso, that all knowledge of God must be traced back to God himself, that it became indistinct in proportion to man’s alienation from God, and that the revelation of Scripture first rendered everything clear and certain.

Further, it was expressly contended that God, as the infinite one, was, strictly speaking, incapable of being known, because his nature could not be described by any predicate. But this inscrutability, so far as represented in the avowal “whatever the creature is, that God is not,” was held—and with this the Neoplatonists were agreed—to be the valuable and true knowledge (Athan. ad monach. 2: “even if it is not possible to comprehend what God is, it is possible to say what he is not:” καὶ εἰ μὴ δυνατὸν καταλαβέσθαι τί ἐστι Θεός, ἀλλὰ δυνατὸν εἰπεῖν, τί οὔκ ἐστιν. The revelation through the Logos only went beyond this in that it established this knowledge regarding the infinite Spirit and his inexpressible nature, and made it possible to perceive him in his likeness. The Fathers influenced by Neoplatonism, however, assumed further that the contemplative ascetic, who was on the way to deification, could gain a direct vision of God in all his splendour, a conception which the Areopagite has combined with a scholastic theory of the knowableness of God by negation, eminence, causality.

§ 2. The Doctrine of God’s Nature and Attributes.

The Being of God was immortal substance and was primarily defined—as already results from the method of knowing God—by affirming that he was without beginning or end, that he was a spirit and the supreme First Cause, all which predicates were proved in connection with the proofs of his existence. The deity is the pneumatic Ὄν which, because it is not the world, is supramundane, simply governing the world, the one, indivisible, imperishable, unchangeable, supremely good and impassive being, to which, in the strict sense, a real existence alone belongs: the Fathers influenced by Aristotelianism emphasised especially the spiritual power which determined its own aims and the causality of the deity. God is the intelligible reality and infinite reason. So far as it is maintained of this being (secundum hominem) that he is good, the predicate affirms nothing but that he is perfect, i.e., is completely self-sufficient and possesses blessedness in himself and therefore is not envious—see esp. Athanasius adv. pagan., also the Catechisms of Cyril. But the goodness of the Deity was also established from the fact of the revelation of God, first from creation, and here meant that God, since he is the gracious one, willed that creatures should participate in his blessedness, and carried out his intention under all circumstances.

Augustine broke through this natural conception of the goodness of God; for he understands by the Deity as summum bonum the power of love which takes hold of man, and leads him from worldliness and selfishness to peace and felicity. But even in Augustine this idea is intimately connected with the natural view.

As regards the divine attributes, the Fathers sought, while speaking of such, to keep clear of the idea of a plurality in God, or conceptions of anything accidental. It is only for human thought that the absolute, perfect, homogeneous Being has attributes assigned to him, as varied representations of him in relation to the finite. The elevation above time and space presented itself as eternity and omnipresence; the latter attribute at the same time was the root of omniscience and omnipotence. Omnipotence was limited by the Fathers by two thoughts: it was circumscribed by the good will of God, and it left scope for human liberty. Origen’s thesis of the limitation of omniscience found no supporters in later times.

From the goodness (perfection) of God all conceivable ethical qualities were deduced. But they did not obtain their due significance, because the abstract idea that God was the requiter, i.e., rewarded the good and punished the wicked, formed, in spite of all Neoplatonic philosophy, the foundation of the whole conceptions of God, in so far as ethics were taken into account at all. This view, however, which was considered the “natural” one, readily became indifferent to the thought that men as God’s creatures are dependent on him, that they are meant to form an inner unity, and that their life is conducted to a definite goal; in other words, it endangered the religious view of Christianity. It gave man complete independence in presence of God, and broke mankind up into a group of disconnected individuals. It descended from Judaism and the ancient world—the gods are just, because they reward and punish, the two facts being conceived in coördination. This view, further, was entitled to its place within the narrow horizon of the citizens of ancient communities, but while it could not be omitted from Christianity, it required to be subordinated to a higher thought. Accordingly, significant tendencies to correct the prevalent system of thought were not wanting on the part of the Fathers. Origen had already tried to regard the righteousness of God as a form of his loving discipline; the conception that suffering is always bound up with penal justice, had undoubtedly something to do with this attempt. The continued fight with dualism—Manichæism—constantly made it necessary to demonstrate that power, goodness, wisdom, and justice were combined in the Deity. But in almost all the Fathers the attributes of goodness and justice stood asunder. We can see the reason of this in the fact that up to Augustine no serious effort was made to understand the goodness of God as moral holiness, and this failure was in turn due to the characteristic method of obtaining a knowledge of God, the attempt to rise to the Deity from the notion of the finite by means of sublimations. The theory of God was beset at this most important point with uncertainties, nay, inconsistencies. He was at once the impassive Being (Ὄν) and the judge who requited actions—the latter conception, further, not only including the coördination of goodness and justice, but also the superiority of the former to the latter. The Alexandrians had grasped at the expedient, following Philo, of representing God as absolutely benevolent, but the Logos as the Just; this, however, was to confess despair of solving the problem, showing once more very clearly that men could not think without compunction (affectiones humanæ) of the (penal) justice of which at most the Logos was capable; and it is interesting as a counterpart to the opposite idea adopted in later times. But we see even here, why the doctrine of redemption could not become one of atonement in the ancient Church. If the distinctive form in which redemption was accomplished was to be justified, and its intrinsic necessity to be proved, then there must not only exist, but speculation must be founded on, the conviction that God’s saving purpose transcended the thought of requital, and that he was morally holy. But that is out of the question where the Fathers are concerned.

§ 3. The Cosmology.

The Cosmological and allied anthropological problems were treated by the Fathers—who formally used Gen. I.-III. as their text—with the whole apparatus of contemporary philosophy, in this way satisfying their scientific craving for a rational conception of the world. The systems are therefore very different in details; but on the whole they existed peaceably side by side, showing that the differences presupposed a measure of agreement, sufficient for the solidarity of the doctrinal structure.

These differences were slightest in the Cosmology proper. The task set the theologians of the fourth century was to bring Origen’s cosmology more into harmony with the demands of the rule of faith, to adapt it more closely to the account given in Gen. I., and to defeat the Manichæan Cosmology. After the last decades of the fourth century, the slow course of development was hastened by violent opposition to Origen’s cosmology, and the view of the Church, held before Origen, was substantially restored, though now as a scientific theory. Yet the conception of an upper world of spirits, related to the present world as its ideal and type, continued to exist, and ever threw its shadow on the latter. On the other hand, the Trinitarian conflicts led to a precise distinction being drawn between creating, making, begetting, and emanating, and thus the notion of creation out of nothing now first received its strict impress. But Neoplatonic ideas of the origin of the world lasted till after the beginning of the fifth century, even in the case of some Bishops, and side by side with it the Manichæan conception of the world spread secretly and found adherents among the clergy themselves up to the middle of it. The following proposition may be regarded as containing the quintessence of the orthodox Fathers from the fifth century, and at the same time as the presupposition that gave scope to all their further speculations. It can be stated thus: God from eternity bore in his own mind the idea of the world. In free self-determination he, in order to prove his goodness, created by the Logos, who embraces all ideas, this world, which has had a beginning and will have an end, in six days out of nothing, in accordance with the pattern of an upper world created by him.

The justification of divine providence and the production of Theodicies were called for by Manichæism and fatalism on the one hand, and the great political catastrophes and calamities on the other. It was taught that God constantly remained close to his creation, preserving and governing it. With this, rational beings were looked upon in their numerical sum total as the peculiar objects of divine providence. Providence was also defended in opposition to the loose and unstable form in which earlier and contemporary monotheistic philosophers had avowed it; it was recognised in principle to be a power protecting also the individual creature. Yet here Christian theologians themselves did not arrive at complete certainty. It was admitted that providence was above human freedom in so far as it was maintained that neither that freedom nor the evil proceeding from it could hinder the divine intentions. But the belief in providence was not definitely connected with redemption by Christ or with the Church, for it was considered a selfevident presupposition of redemption and a piece of Natural Theology. Therefore it was also destitute of any strict object. The uncertainty of the ancient world as to the extent and method of providence had left its influence, and empirical reflections on the objectlessness of certain institutions, or phenomena in the world—e.g., of vermin—could not be defeated by a view which had itself a naturalistic basis. Yet in proportion as the sure and real knowledge of God was only derived from the Christian religion, it was also recognised that faith in providence was first made certain through Christ, and that Christians were under the particular providence of God. The problem of the theodicy was solved (1) by proving that the freedom of the creature was something appropriate and good, the possibility of wickedness and evil, however, being necessarily combined with it; (2) by denying to wickedness any reality in the higher sense of the term, since wickedness as it was separated from God, the principle of all being, was held to be not—being; (3) by defending the mala pœnæ or evil’s fitting means of purification; and finally, (4) by representing temporal sufferings as indifferent to the soul. Some older Fathers, e.g., Lactantius, emphasised, besides, even the necessity of wickedness in the interest of moralism: without it virtue would be impossible. But such opinions died out in the fight with Manichæism.

In reference to the heavenly spirits which belonged to, and indeed formed, the upper world, the recognised Fathers were convinced of the following points. (1) They were created by God (see the Symb. Nic.). (2) They were endowed with freedom, but had no material bodies (ἐγγύτατα τοῦ ἀσωμάτου). (3) They had passed through a crisis after which a section had remained true to the good, while another had revolted. (4) The good spirits were instruments of the divine government of the world, their activity being useful and beneficial to men, even entering into the sacramental system by which grace was imparted. (5) The reality of wickedness in the world was to be attributed to the bad spirits, and especially to their head, the devil; they exercised an almost unbounded power on earth, not being able indeed to compel man, but only to induce him, to sin; they could also be scared away without fail by the name of Christ, the sign of the cross, and the Sacraments. As regards the relation of the good angels to men, their superiority to men—in the present condition of the latter—was emphasised, but it was also taught on the other hand, that man after he was made perfect would be at least equal to them. The former position gave rise to a sort of angel-worship, which nevertheless in earlier times was no proper part of religion. The Synod of Laodicea, about A.D. 360, declared it in its thirty-fifth Canon to be idolatry. And it was kept in check by the idea that Christ’s work possessed also a mysterious significance for the upper world. But the polytheistic cravings of man constantly influenced religious ideas, and as the Deity was farther and farther removed from ordinary Christian people by speculation, there gradually arose, along with the thought of the intercession of the angels, a worshipping of them, which was indeed only settled ecclesiastically at the seventh Œcumenical Synod (A.D. 787). There it was defined as adoration (προσκύνησις) in distinction from service (λατρεία). Even Gregory I. had assigned the service of angels to the pre-christian stage of religion. The points of doctrine which we have above grouped together became the bases of a great number of very different conceptions, which grew up in opposition to Origen’s doctrine, or under its influence, or in dependence on exegesis (esp. of Gen. VI.), or, lastly, as a result of reminiscences of Greek folk-lore and philosophy. Men speculated on the date of the creation of angels, and the method by which they were created, on their spirituality or higher corporeality, their functions—as guardian angels and genii, the manner in which the wicked angels fell, the orders and divisions of angels, and much else. Here also the doctrine of Origen, which culminated in the restoration of the revolted spirits, was in the end expressly disowned. On the other hand, the Neoplatonic conception of spirits and their orders, or the Gnostic idea of the Æons as interpreters of the divine, was more and more legitimised in the Church doctrine of angels, and was combined by the Areopagite with the mystic system of the illumination of the world, and the communication of the divine to the creaturely. It was a very old idea—see Hebrews and First Clement—that Christ was in Heaven the High Priest and head (προστάτης) of believers in the presence of God. Clement of Alex. had already worked out this conception, following Philo’s model, to the effect that Christ, in conjunction with the angelic powers subject to him, conveyed to men the energies of the heavenly sphere; that he ever offered himself for men to the Father as a sacrifice without fire (θῦμα ἄπυρον); that the Holy Spirit along with the angels kept the heavenly and the earthly Church in constant contact. In short, the thought of a graded hierarchy in heaven, with heavenly sacrifices, intercessions, etc., as it also occurs among the Valentinians, lay on the confines of the Alexandrian’s speculation. These thoughts are more fully matured in Origen: the sacrifice of Christ applied also to the celestials, and the upper world, brought into harmony, contributed to the redemption of the lower. They were confirmed by the Neoplatonic philosophy of religion. On the other hand, Ignatius conceived the governing body of the Church on earth as a hierarchy which represented the heavenly order, and put it in operation. The two ideas—the Son, the Holy Ghost and the angelic hosts on the one hand, and the earthly priesthood, on the other—only needed to be combined, and a new stage of ecclesiastical theosophy was reached. The Pseudo-areopagite was the first to gain it—after, indeed, it had been already suggested clearly enough by Clement of Alex.; see Strom. VI. 13, 107, and other passages. Clement makes three dwellings in heaven correspond on one side to the divisions of angels, and, again, to the threefold hierarchy on earth. On the spread of this form of theosophy among the Syrian Monophysite monks, see Frothingham, Stephen bar Sudaili, 1886.

This whole conception was after all, indeed, nothing but a timid expression of the thought that the plan of creation itself, extending down from the deity to man, included the means of redemption, and that, as alienation from the deity was due to the existence of graduated creations, so, at the same time was the restoration to God. This conception, which contrasts abruptly with that of the Old Testament and Christianity, was compatible in principle neither with the idea of the creation, nor with the one historical redemption that took place once for all. It was Gnostic and Neoplatonic, i.e., pagan. This its character was simply disguised by the retention of the creation so far as words went, and by the substitution for the Æons of Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, and angelic powers with Biblical names; and, further, of sacraments, sacrifices, and priests, whose existence and operations were derived from the work of Christ.

The root of this whole conception is ultimately found in the notion that the Logos, who was identified with the Son of God, continued to be conceived as the abode and bearer of all the ideas from which the world was evolved. Even Athanasius was not in a position thoroughly to correct this view,—see Atzberger, Die Logoslehre des heiligen Athanasius, 1880, p. 138 ff. Consequently, even the most clear-sighted of the Fathers were helpless against speculations which deduced redemption from the Cosmology. And thus a new Church Theosophy arose. A fantastic pantheism was introduced which had been created by the barbarous theosophy of expiring antiquity. It harmonised excellently with the religious barbarism which satisfied itself in the crudest and most daring myths and legends; nay, it kindled into fresh life with it. The living God, apart from whom the Soul possesses nothing, and the fervour of the saint threatened meanwhile to disappear. And side by side, nay, in cordial agreement, with these fantastic speculations, there existed a prosaic worship of the letter.

Literature.—See Nitzsch account, here especially thorough, Dogmengesch. I. pp. 268-287, 328-347, and Schwane, Vol. II. pp. 15-108, 272-328.