With Christianity two elements came into fusion, the Jewish and the
Greco-Roman. To trace this fusion and its results it is necessary to
describe the Jewish system of charity, and to compare it with that of
the early Christian church, to note the theory of love or friendship in
Aristotle as representing Greek thought, and of charity in St Paul as
representing Christian thought, and to mark the Roman influences which
moulded the administration of Ambrose and Gregory and Western
Christianity generally.
Hebrew charity.
In the early history of the Hebrews we find the family, clan-family and
tribe. With the Exodus (probably about 1390 B.C.) comes the law of Moses
(cf. Kittel, _Hist. of the Hebrews_, Eng. trans. i. 244), the central
and permanent element of Jewish thought. We may compare it to the
"commandments" of Hesiod. There is the recognition of the family and its
obligations: "Honour thy father and mother"; and honour included help
and support. There is also the law essential to family unity: "Thou
shalt not commit adultery"; and as to property there is imposed the
regulation of desire: "Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house."
Maimonides (A.D. 1135), true to the old conception of the family (x.
16), calls the support of adult children, "after one is exempt from
supporting them," and the support of a father or mother by a child,
"great acts of charity; since kindred are entitled to the first
consideration." To relief of the stranger the Decalogue makes no
reference, but in the Hebraic laws it is constantly pressed; and the
Levitical law (xix. 18) goes further. It first applies a new standard to
social life: "Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself." This thought is
the outcome of a deep ethical fervour--the element which the Jews
brought into the work of charity. In Judges and Joshua, the "Homeric"
books of the Old Testament, the Hebrews appear as a passionately fierce
and cruel people. Subsequently against their oppression of the poor the
prophets protested with a vehemence as great as the evil was intense;
and their denunciations remained part of the national literature, a
standing argument that life without charity is nothing worth. Thus
schooled and afterwards tutored into discipline by the tribulation of
the exile (587 B.C.), they turned their fierceness into a zeal, which,
as their literature shows, was as fervent in ethics as it was in
religion and ceremonial. In the services at the synagogues, which
supplemented and afterwards took the place of the Temple, the
Commandments were constantly repeated and the Law and the Prophets read;
and as the Jews of the Dispersion increased in number, and especially
after the destruction of Jerusalem, the synagogues became centres of
social and charitable co-operation. Thus rightly would a Jewish rabbi
say, "On three things the world is stayed: on the Thorah (or the law),
and on worship, and on the bestowal of kindness." Also there was on the
charitable side an indefinite power of expansion. Rigid in its
ceremonial, there it was free. Within the nation, as the Prophets, and
after the exile, as the Psalms show, there was the hope of a universal
religion, and with it of a universally recognized charity. St Paul
accentuated the prohibitive side of the law and protested against it;
but, even while he was so doing, stimulated by the Jewish discipline, he
was moving unfettered towards new conceptions of charity and
life--charity as the central word of the Christian life, and life as a
participation in a higher existence--the "body of Christ."
To mark the line of development, we could compare--1. The family among
the Jews and in the early Christian church; 2. The sources of relief and
the tithe, the treatment of the poor and their aid, and the assistance
of special classes of poor; 3. The care of strangers; and, lastly, we
would consider the theory of almsgiving, friendship or love, and
charity.
1. As elsewhere, property is the basis of the family. Wife and children
are the property of the father. But the wife is held in high respect. In
the post-exilian period the virtuous wife is represented as laborious as
a Roman matron, a "lady bountiful" to the poor, and to her husband wife
and friend alike. Monogamy without concubinage is now the rule--is taken
for granted as right. There is no "exposure of children." The slaves are
kindly treated, as servants rather than slaves--though in Roman times
and afterwards the Jews were great slave-traders. The household is not
allowed to eat the bread of idleness. "Six days," it was said, "_must_
[not _mayest_] thou work." "Labour, if poor; but find work, if rich."
"Whoever does not teach his son business or work, teaches him robbery."
In Job xxxi., a chapter which has been called "an inventory of late Old
Testament morality," we find the family life developed side by side with
the life of charity. In turn are mentioned the relief of the widow, the
fatherless and the stranger--the classification of dependents in the
Christian church; and the whole chapter is a justification of the homely
charities of a good family. "The Jewish religion, more especially in the
old and orthodox form, is essentially a family religion" (C.G.
Montefiore, _Religion of Ancient Hebrews_).
In the early documents of the Church the fifth commandment is made the
basis of family life (cf. Eph. vi. 1; _Apost. Const._ ii. 32, iv. 11--if
we take the first six books of the _Apost. Const._ as a composite
production before A.D. 300, representing Judaeo-Christian or Eastern
church thought). But two points are prominent. Duties are insisted on as
reciprocal (cf. especially St Paul's Epistles), as, e.g. between husband
and wife, parent and child, master and servant. Charity is mutual; the
family is a circle of reciprocal duties and charities. This implies a
principle of the greatest importance in relation to the social utility
of charity. Further reference will be made to it later. Next the "thou
shalt love thy neighbour" is translated from its position as one among
many sayings to the chief place as a rule of life. In the _Didache_ or
_Teaching of the Twelve Apostles_ (Jewish-Christian, c. 90-120 A.D.) the
first commandment in "the way of life" is adapted from St Matthew's
Gospel thus: "First, thou shalt love God who made thee; secondly, thy
neighbour as thyself; and all things whatsoever thou wouldst not have
done to thee, neither do thou to another." A principle is thus applied
which touches all social relations in which the "self" can be made the
standard of judgment. Of this also later. To touch on other points of
comparison: the earlier documents seem to ring with a reiterated cry for
a purer family life (cf. the second, the negative, group of commandments
in the _Didache_, and the judgment of the apocalyptic writings, such as
the Revelations of Peter, &c.); and, sharing the Jewish feeling, the
riper conscience of the Christian community formulates and accepts the
injunction to preserve infant life at every stage. It advocates, indeed,
the Jewish purity of family life with a missionary fervour, and it makes
of it a condition of church membership. The Jewish rule of labour is
enforced (_Ap. Const._ ii. 63). If a stranger settle (_Didache_, xii. 3)
among the brotherhood, "let him work and eat." And the father
(_Constit._ iv. 11) is to teach the children "such trades as are
agreeable and suitable to their need." And the charities to the widow,
the fatherless, are organized on Jewish lines.
2. The sources of relief among the Jews were the three gifts of corn:
(1) the corners of the field (cf. Lev. xix. &c.), amounting to a
sixtieth part of it; (2) the gleanings, a definite minimum dropped in
the process of reaping (Maimonides, _Laws of the Hebrews relating to the
Poor_, iv. 1); (3) corn overlooked and left behind. So it was with the
grapes and with all crops that were harvested, as opposed, e.g. to
figs, that were gathered from time to time. These gifts were divisible
three times in the day, so as to suit the convenience of the poor (Maim.
ii. 17), and the poor had a right to them. They are indeed a poor-rate
paid in kind such as in early times would naturally spring up among an
agricultural people. Another gift "out of the seed of the earth," is the
tithe. In the post-exilian period the septenniad was in force. Each year
a fiftieth part of the produce (Maim. vi. 2, and Deut. xviii. 4) was
given to the priest (the class which in the Jewish state was supported
by the community). Of the remainder one-tenth went to the Levite, and
one-tenth in three years of the septennium was retained for pilgrimage
to Jerusalem, in two given to the poor. In the seventh year "all things
were in common." Supplementing these gifts were alms to all who asked;
"and he who gave less than a tenth of his means was a man of evil eye"
(Maim. vii. 5). All were to give alms, even the poor themselves who were
in receipt of relief. Refusal might be punished with stripes at the hand
of the Sanhedrim. At the Temple alms for distribution to the worthy poor
were placed by worshippers in the cell of silence; and it is said that
in Palestine at meal times the table was open to all comers. As the
synagogues extended, and possibly after the fall of Jerusalem (A.D. 70),
the collections of alms was further systematized. There were two
collections. In each city alms of the box or chest (_kupha_) were
collected for the poor of the city on each Sabbath eve (later, monthly
or thrice a year), and distributed in money or food for seven days. Two
collected, three distributed. Three others gathered and distributed
daily alms of the basket (_tamchui_). These were for strangers and
wayfarers--casual relief "for the poor of the whole world." In the
Jewish synagogue community from early times the president (_parnass_)
and treasurer were elected annually with seven heads of the congregation
(see Abraham's _Jewish Life in the Middle Ages_, p. 54), and sometimes
special officers for the care of the poor. A staff of almoners was thus
forthcoming. In addition to these collections were the _pruta_ given to
the poor before prayers (Maim. x. 15), and moneys gathered to help
particular cases (cf. _Jewish Life_, p. 322) by circular letter. There
were also gifts at marriages and funerals; and fines imposed for breach
of the communal ordinances were reserved for the poor. The distinctive
feature of the Jewish charity was the belief that "the poor would not
cease out of the land," and that therefore on charitable grounds a
permanent provision should be made for them--a poor-rate, in fact,
subject to stripes and distraint, if necessary (Maim. vii. 10; and
generally cf. articles on "Alms" and "Charity" in the _Jewish
Encyclopaedia_).
If we compare this with the early church we find the following sources
of relief: (1) The Eucharistic offerings, some consumed at the time,
some carried home, some reserved for the absent (see Hatch, _Early
Church_, p. 40). The ministration, like the Eucharist, was connected
with the love feast, and was at first daily (Acts ii. 42, vi. 1, and
the _Didache_). (2) Freewill offerings and first-fruits and voluntary
tithes (_Ap. Con._ ii. 25) brought to the bishop and used for the
poor--orphans, widows, the afflicted and strangers in distress, and
for the clergy, deaconesses, &c. (3) Collections in churches on
Sundays and week-days, alms-boxes and gifts to the poor by worshippers
as they entered church; also collections for special purposes (cf. for
Christians at Jerusalem). Apart from "the corners," &c., the sources
of relief in the Christian and Jewish churches are the same. The
separate Jewish tithe for the poor, which (Maim. vi. II, 13) might be
used in part by the donor as personal charity, disappears. A voluntary
tithe remains, in part used for the poor. We do not hear of stripes
and distraint, but in both bodies there is a penitential system and
excommunication (cf. _Jewish Life_, p. 52), and in both a settlement
of disputes within the body (Clem. _Hov_. iii. 67). In both, too,
there is the abundant alms provided in the belief of the permanence of
poverty and the duty of giving to all who ask. As to administration in
the early church (Acts vi. 3), we find seven deacons, the number of
the local Jewish council; and later there were in Rome seven
ecclesiastical relief districts, each in charge of a deacon. The
deacon acted as the minister of the bishop (_Ep._ Clem, to Jam. xii.),
reporting to him and giving as he dictated (_Ap. Con._ ii. 30, 31). He
at first combined disciplinary powers with charitable. The presbyters
also (Polycarp, _Ad Phil._ 6, A.D. 69-155), forming (Hatch, p. 69) a
kind of bishop's council, visited the sick, &c. The bishop was
president and treasurer. The bishop was thus the trustee of the poor.
By reason of the churches' care of orphans, responsibilities of
trusteeship also devolved on him. The temples were in pagan times
depositories of money. Probably the churches were also.
3. Great stress is laid by the Jews on the duty of gentleness to the
poor (Maim. x. 5). The woman was to have first attention (Maim. vi. 13).
If the applicant was hungry he was to be fed, and then examined to learn
whether he was a deceiver (Maim. vii. 6). Assistance was to be given
according to the want--clothes, household things, a wife or a
husband--and according to the poor man's station in life. For widows and
orphans the "gleanings" were left. Both are the recognized objects of
charity (Maim. x. 16,17). "The poor and the orphan were to be employed
in domestic affairs in preference to servants." The dower was a constant
form of help. The ransoming of slaves took precedence of relief to the
poor. The highest degree of alms-deed (Maim. x. 7) was "to yield support
to him who is cast down, either by means of gifts, or by loan, or by
commerce, or by procuring for him traffic with others. Thus his hand
becometh strengthened, exempt from the necessity of soliciting succour
from any created being."
If we compare the Christian methods we find but slight difference. The
absoluteness of "Give to him that asketh" is in the _Didache_ checked by
the "Woe to him that receives: for if any receives having need, he shall
be guiltless, but he that has no need shall give account, ... and coming
into distress ... he shall not come out thence till he hath paid the
last farthing." It is the duty of the bishop to know who is most worthy
of assistance (_Ap. Con._ ii. 3, 4); and "if any one is in want by
gluttony, drunkenness, or idleness, he does not deserve assistance, or
to be esteemed a member of the church." The widow assumes the position
not only of a recipient of alms, but a church worker. Some were a
private charge, some were maintained by the church. The recognized
"widow" was maintained: she was to be sixty years of age (cf. 1 Tim, v.
9 and _Ap. Con._ iii. 1), and was sometimes tempted to become a
bedes-woman and gossipy pauper, if one may judge from the texts.
Remarriage was not approved. Orphans were provided for by members of the
churches. The virgins formed another class, as, contrary to the earlier
feeling, marriage came to be held a state of lesser sanctity. They too
seem to have been also, in part at least, church workers. Thus round the
churches grew up new groups of recognized dependents; but the older
theory of charity was broad and practical--akin to that of Maimonides.
"Love all your brethren, performing to orphans the part of parents, to
widows that of husbands, affording them sustenance with all kindliness,
arranging marriages for those who are in their prime, and for those who
are without a profession the means of necessary support through
employment: giving work to the artificer and alms to the incapable"
(_Ep._ Clem, to James viii.).
4. The Jews in pre-Christian and Talmudic times supported the stranger
or wayfarer by the distribution of food (_tamchui_); the strangers were
lodged in private houses, and there were inns provided at which no money
was taken (cf. _Jewish Life_, p. 314). Subsequently, besides these
methods, special societies were formed "for the entertainment of the
resident poor and of strangers." There were commendatory letters also.
These conditions prevailed in the Christian church also. The
_Xenodocheion_, coming by direct succession alike from Jewish and Greek
precedents, was the first form of Christian hospital both for strangers
and for members of the Christian churches. In the Christian community
the endowment charity comes into existence in the 4th century, among the
Jews not till the 13th. The charities of the synagogue without separate
societies sufficed.
Greek, Jewish and Christian thought.
We may now compare the conceptions of Jews and Christians on charity
with those of the Greeks. There are two chief exponents of the diverse
views--Aristotle and St Paul; for to simplify the issues we refer to
them only. Thoughts such as Aristotle's, recast by the Stoic Panaetius
(185-112 B.C.), and used by Cicero in his _De Officiis_, became in the
hands of St Ambrose arguments for the direction of the clergy in the
founding of the medieval church; and in the 13th century Aristotle
reasserts his influence through such leaders of medieval thought as St
Thomas Aquinas. St Paul's chapters on charity, not fully appreciated
and understood, one is inclined to think, have perhaps more than any
other words prevented an absolute lapse into the materialism of
almsgiving. After him we think of St Francis, the greatest of a group of
men who, seeking reality in life, revived charity; but to the theory of
charity it might almost be said that since Aristotle and St Paul nothing
has been added until we come to the economic and moral issues which Dr
Chalmers explained and illustrated.
The problem turns on the conception (1) of purpose, (2) of the self, and
(3) of charity, love or friendship as an active force in social life. To
the Greek, or at least to Greek philosophic thought, purpose was the
measure of goodness. To have no purpose was, so far as the particular
act was concerned, to be simply irrational; and the less definite the
purpose the more irrational the act. This conception of purpose was the
touchstone of family and social life, and of the civic life also. In no
sphere could goodness be irrational. To say that it was without purpose
was to say that it was without reality. So far as the actor was
concerned, the main purpose of right action was the good of the soul
([Greek: psyche]); and by the soul was meant the better self, "the
ruling part" acting in harmony with every faculty and function of the
man. With faculties constantly trained and developed, a higher life was
gradually developed in the soul. We are thus, it might be said, what we
become. The gates of the higher life are within us. The issue is whether
we will open them and pass in.
Consistent with this is the social purpose. Love or friendship is not
conceived by Aristotle except in relation to social life. Society is
based on an interchange of services. This interchange in one series of
acts we call justice; in another friendship or love. A man cannot be
just unless he has acquired a certain character or habit of mind; and
hence no just man will act without knowledge, previous deliberation and
definite purpose. So also will a friend fulfil these conditions in his
acts of love or friendship. In the love existing between good men there
is continuance and equality of service; but in the case of benefactor
and benefited, in deeds of charity, in fact, there is no such equality.
The satisfaction is on one side but often not on the other. (The dilemma
is one that is pressed, though not satisfactorily, in Cicero and
Seneca.) The reason for this will be found, Aristotle suggests, in the
feeling of satisfaction which men experience in action. We realize
ourselves in our deeds--throw ourselves into them, as people say; and
this is happiness. What we make we like: it is part of us. On the other
hand, in the person benefited there may be no corresponding action, and
in so far as there is not, there is no exchange of service or the
contentment that arises from it. The "self" of the recipient is not
drawn out. On the contrary, he may be made worse, and feel the
uneasiness and discontent that result from this. In truth, to complete
Aristotle's argument, the good deed on one side, as it represents the
best self of the benefactor, should on the other side draw out the best
self of the person benefited. And where there is not ultimately this
result, there is not effective friendship or charity, and consequently
there is no personal or social satisfaction. The point may be pushed
somewhat further. In recent developments of charitable work the term
"friendly visitor" is applied to persons who endeavour to help families
in distress on the lines of associated charity. It represents the work
of charity in one definite light. So far as the relation is mutual, it
cannot at the outset be said to exist. The charitable friend wishes to
befriend another; but at first there may be no reciprocal feeling of
friendship on the other's part--indeed, such a feeling may never be
created. The effort to reciprocate kindness by becoming what the friend
desires may be too painful to make. Or the two may be on different
planes, one not really befriending, but giving without intelligence, the
other not really endeavouring to change his nature, but receiving help
solely with a view to immediate advantage. The would-be befriender may
begin "despairing of no man," expecting nothing in return; but if, in
fact, there is never any kind of return, the friendship actually fails
of its purpose, and the "friend's" satisfaction is lost, except in that
he may "have loved much." In any case, according to this theory
friendship, love and charity represent the mood from which spring social
acts, the value of which will depend on the knowledge, deliberation and
purpose with which they are done, and accordingly as they acquire value
on this account will they give lasting satisfaction to both parties.
St Paul's position is different. He seems at first sight to ignore the
state and social life. He lays stress on motive force rather than on
purpose. He speaks as an outsider to the state, though technically a
citizen. His mind assumes towards it the external Judaic position, as
though he belonged to a society of settlers ([Greek: paroikoi]). Also,
as he expects the millennium, social life and its needs are not
uppermost in his thoughts. He considers charity in relation to a
community of fellow-believers--drawn together in congregations. His
theory springs from this social base, though it over-arches life itself.
He is intent on creating a spiritual association. He conceives of the
spirit ([Greek: pneuma]) as "an immaterial personality." It transcends
the soul ([Greek: psyche]), and is the Christ life, the ideal and
spiritual life. Christians participate in it, and they thus become part
of "the body of Christ," which exists by virtue of love--love akin to
the ideal life, [Greek: agape]. The word represents the love that is
instinct with reverence, and not love [Greek: philia] which may have in
it some quality of passion. This love is the life of "the body of
Christ." Therefore no act done without it is a living act--but, on the
contrary, must be dead--an act in which no part of the ideal life is
blended. On the individual act or the purpose no stress is laid. It is
assumed that love, because it is of this intense and exalted type, will
find the true purpose in the particular act. And, when the expectation
of the millennium passed away, the theory of this ideal charity remained
as a motive force available for whatever new conditions, spiritual or
social, might arise. Nevertheless, no sooner does this charity touch
social conditions, than the necessity asserts itself of submitting to
the limitations which knowledge, deliberation and purpose impose. This
view had been depreciated or ignored by Christians, who have been
content to rely upon the strength of their motives, or perhaps have not
realized what the Greeks understood, that society was a natural organism
(Arist. _Pol._ 1253A), which develops, fails or prospers in accordance
with definite laws. Hence endless failure in spite of some success. For
love, whether we idealize it as [Greek: agape] or consider it a social
instinct as [Greek: philia], cannot be love at all unless it quickens
the intelligence as much as it animates the will. It cannot, except by
some confusion of thought, be held to justify the indulgence of emotion
irrespective of moral and social results. Yet, though this fatal error
may have dominated thought for a long time, it is hardly possible to
attribute it to St Paul's theory of charity when the very practical
nature of Judaism and early Christianity is considered. In his view the
misunderstanding could not arise. And to create a world or "body" of men
and women linked together by love, even though it be outside the normal
life of the community, was to create a new form of religious
organization, and to achieve for it (so far as it was achieved) what,
_mutatis mutandis_, Aristotle held to be the indispensable condition of
social life, friendship ([Greek: philia]), "the greatest good of
states," for "Socrates and all the world declare," he wrote, that "the
unity of the state" is "created by friendship" (Arist. _Pol._ ii. 1262
b).
It should, however, be considered to what extent charity in the
Christian church was devoid of social purpose, (1) The Jewish
conceptions of charity passed, one might almost say, in their
completeness into the Christian church. Prayer, the petition and the
purging of the mind, fasting, the humiliation of the body, and alms,
as part of the same discipline, the submissive renunciation of
possessions--all these formed part of the discipline that was to
create the religious mood. Alms henceforth become a definite part of
the religious discipline and service. Humility and poverty hereafter
appear as yoked virtues, and many problems of charity are raised in
regard to them. The non-Christian no less than the Christian world
appreciated more and more the need of self-discipline ([Greek:
askesis]); and it seems as though in the first two centuries A.D.
those who may have thought of reinvigorating society searched for the
remedy rather in the preaching and practice of temperance than in the
application of ideas that were the outcome of the observation of
social or economic conditions. Having no object of this kind as its
mark, almsgiving took the place of charity, and, as Christianity
triumphed, the family life, instead of reviving, continued to decay,
while the virtues of the discipline of the body, considered apart from
social life, became an end in themselves, and it was desired rather to
annihilate instinct than to control it. Possibly this was a necessary
phase in a movement of progress, but however that be, charity, as St
Paul understood it, had in it no part. (2) But the evil went farther.
Jewish religious philosophy is not elaborated as a consistent whole by
any one writer. It is rather a miscellany of maxims; and again and
again, as in much religious thought, side issues assume the principal
place. The direct effect of the charitable act, or almsgiving, is
ignored. Many thoughts and motives are blended. The Jews spoke of the
poor as the means of the rich man's salvation. St Chrysostom
emphasizes this: "If there were no poor, the greater part of your sins
would not be removed: they are the healers of your wounds" (_Hom._
xiv., Timothy, &c., St Cyprian on works and alms). Alms are the
medicine of sin. And the same thought is worked into the penitential
system. Augustine speaks of "penance such as fasting, almsgiving and
prayer for breaches of the Decalogue" (Reichel, _Manual of Canon Law_,
p. 23); and many other references might be cited. "Pecuniary penances
(Ib. 154), in so far as they were relaxations of, or substitutes for,
bodily penances, were permitted because of the greater good thereby
accruing to others" (and in this case they were--A.D. 1284--legally
enforceable under English statute law). The penitential system takes
for granted that the almsgiving is good for others and puts a premium
on it, even though in fact it were done, not with any definite object,
but really for the good of the penitent. Thus almsgiving becomes
detached from charity on the one side and from social good on the
other. Still further is it vulgarized by another confusion of thought.
It is considered that the alms are paid to the credit of the giver,
and are realized as such by him in the after-world; or even that by
alms present prosperity may be obtained, or at least evil accident
avoided. Thus motives were blended, as indeed they now are, with the
result that the gift assumed a greater importance than the charity, by
which alone the gift should have been sanctified, and its actual
effect was habitually overlooked or treated as only partially
relevant.
(3) The Christian maxim of "loving ([Greek: agape]) one's neighbour as
one's self" sets a standard of charity. Its relations are idealized
according as the "self" is understood; and thus the good self becomes
the measure of charity. In this sense, the nobler the self the
completer the charity; and the charity of the best men, men who love
and understand their neighbours best, having regard to their chief
good, is the best, the most effectual charity. Further, if in what we
consider "best" we give but a lesser place to social purpose or even
allow it no place at all, our "self" will have no sufficient social
aim and our charity little or no social result. For this "self,"
however, religion has substituted not St Paul's conception of the
spirit ([Greek: pneuma]), but a soul, conceived as endowed with a
substantial nature, able to enjoy and suffer quasi-material rewards
and punishments in the after-life; and in so far as the safeguard of
this soul by good deeds or almsgiving has become a paramount object,
the purpose of charitable action has been translated from the actual
world to another sphere. Thus, as we have seen, the aid of the poor
has been considered not an object in itself, but as a means by which
the almsgiver effects his own ulterior purpose and "makes God his
debtor." The problem thus handled raises the question of reward and
also of punishment. Properly, from the point of view of charity, both
are excluded. We may indeed act from a complexity of motives and
expect a complexity of rewards, and undoubtedly a good act does
refresh the "self," and may as a result, though not as a reward, win
approval. But in reality reward, if the word be used at all, is
according to purpose; and the only reward of a deed lies in the
fulfilment of its purpose. In the theory of almsgiving which we are
discussing, however, act and reward are on different planes. The
reward is on that of a future life; the act related to a distressed
person here and now. The interest in the act on the doer's part lies
in its post-mortal consequences to himself, and not either wholly or
chiefly in the act itself. Nor, as the interest ends with the act--the
giving--can the intelligence be quickened by it. The questions "How?
by whom? with what object? on what plan? with what result?" receive no
detailed consideration at all. Two general results follow. In so far
as it is thus practised, almsgiving is out of sympathy with social
progress. It is indeed alien to it. Next also the self-contained,
self-sustained poverty that will have no relief and does without it,
is outside the range of its thought and understanding. On the other
hand, this almsgiving is equally incapable of influencing the weak and
the vicious; and those who are suffering from illness or trouble it
has not the width of vision to understand nor the moral energy to
support so that they shall not fall out of the ranks of the
self-supporting. It believes that "the poor" will not cease out of the
land. And indeed, however great might be the economic progress of the
people, it is not likely that the poor will cease, if the alms given
in this spirit be large enough in amount to affect social conditions
seriously one way or the other. When we measure the effects of
charity, this inheritance of divided thought and inconsistent counsels
must be given its full weight.
The organization of the parish and endowed charities.
The sub-apostolic church was a congregation, like a synagogue, the
centre of a system of voluntary and personal relief, connected with the
congregational meals (or [Greek: agapai]) and the Eucharist, and under
the supervision of no single officer or bishop. Out of this was
developed a system of relief controlled by a bishop, who was assisted
chiefly by deacons or presbyters, while the [Greek: agapai], consisting
of offerings laid before the altar, still remained. Subsequently the
meal was separated from the sacrament, and became a dole of food, or
poor people's meal--e.g. in St Augustine's time in western Africa--and
it was not allowed to be served in churches (A.D. 391). As religious
asceticism became dominant, the sacrament was taken fasting; it appeared
unseemly that men and women should meet together for such purposes, and
the [Greek: agapai] fell out of repute. Simultaneously it would seem
that the parish [Greek: paroikia] became from a congregational
settlement a geographical area.
The organization of relief at Rome illustrates both a type of
administration and a transition. St Gregory's reforms (A.D. 590) largely
developed it. The first factor in the transition was the church fund of
the second period of Christianity, about A.D. 150 to after 208
(Tertullian, _Apol_. 39). It served as a friendly fund, was supported by
voluntary gifts, and was used to succour and to bury the poor, to help
destitute and orphaned children, old household slaves and those who
suffered for the faith. This fund is quite different from the _collegia
tenuiorum_ or _funeratica_ of the Romans, which were societies to which
the members paid stipulated sums at stated periods, for funeral benefits
or for common meals (J.P. Waltzing, _Corporations professionnelles chez
les Romains_, i. 313). It represents the charitable centre round which
the parochial system developed. That system was adopted probably about
the middle of the 3rd century, but in Rome the diaconate probably
remained centralized. At the end of the 4th century Pope Anastasius had
founded deaconries in Rome, and endowed them largely "to meet the
frequent demands of the diaconate." Gregory two hundred years later
reorganized the system. He divided the fourteen old "regions" into seven
ecclesiastical districts and thirty "titles" (or parishes). The parishes
were under the charge of sixty-six priests; the districts were
eleemosynary divisions. Each was placed under the charge of a deacon,
not (Greg. _Ep_. xi. and xxviii.) under the priests (_presbyteri
titularii_). Over the deacons was an archdeacon. It was the duty of the
deacons to care for the poor, widows, orphans, wards, and old people of
their several districts. They inquired in regard to those who were
relieved, and drew up under the guidance of the bishop the register of
poor (_matricula_). Only these received regular relief. In each district
was an hospital or office for alms, of which the deacon had charge,
assisted by a steward (or _oeconomus_). Here food was given and meals
were taken, the sick and poor were maintained, and orphan or foundling
children lodged. The churches of Rome and of other large towns possessed
considerable estates, "the patrimony of the patron saints," and to Rome
belonged estates in Sicily which had not been ravaged by the invaders,
and they continued to pay to it their tenth of corn, as they had done
since Sicily was conquered. Four times a year (Milman, _Lat. Christ_,
ii. 117) the shares of the (1) clergy and papal officers, (2) churches
and monasteries, and (3) "hospitals, deaconries and ecclesiastical wards
for the poor," were calculated in money and distributed; and the first
day in every month St Gregory distributed to the poor in kind corn,
wine, cheese, vegetables, bacon, meal, fish and oil. The sick and infirm
were superintended by persons appointed to inspect every street. Before
the pope sat down to his own meal a portion was separated and sent out
to the hungry at his door. The Roman _plebs_ had thus become the poor of
Christ (_pauperes Christi_), and under that title were being fed by
_civica annona_ and _sportula_ as their ancestors had been; and the
deaconries had superseded the "regions" and the "steps" from which the
corn had been distributed. The _hospitium_ was now part of a common
organization of relief, and the sick were visited according to Jewish
and early Christian precedent. How far kindly Romans visited the sick of
their day we do not know. Alms and the _annona_ were now, it would seem,
administered concurrently; and there was a system of poor relief
independent of the churches and their alms (unless these, organized, as
in Scottish towns, on the ancient ecclesiastical lines, were paid wholly
or in part to a central diaconate fund). Much had changed, but in much
Roman thought still prevailed.
On lines similar to these the organization of poor relief in the middle
ages was developed. In the provinces in the later empire the senate or
_ordo decurionum_ were responsible for the public provisioning of the
towns (Fustel de Coulanges, _La Gaule romaine_, p. 251), and no doubt
the care of the poor would thus in some measure devolve on them in times
of scarcity or distress. On the religious side, on the other hand, the
churches would probably be constant centres of almsgiving and relief;
and then, further, when the Roman municipal system had decayed, each
citizen (as in Charlemagne's time, 742-814) was required to support his
own dependants--a step suggestive of much after-history.
The change in sentiment and method could hardly be more strongly
marked than by a comparison of "the _Teaching_" with St Ambrose's
(334-397) "Duties of the Clergy" (_De Officiis Ministrorum_). For the
old instinctive obedience to a command there is now an endeavour to
find a reasoned basis for charitable action. Pauperism is recognized.
"Never was the greed of beggars greater than it is now.... They want
to empty the purses of the poor, to deprive them of the means of
support. Not content with a little, they ask for more.... With lies
about their lives they ask for further sums of money." "A method in
giving is necessary." But in the suggestions made there is little
consistency. Liberality is urged as a means of gaining the love of the
people; a new and a false issue is thus raised. The relief is neither
to be "too freely given to those who are unsuitable, nor too sparingly
bestowed upon the needy." Everywhere there is a doctrine of the mean
reflected through Cicero's _De Officiis_, the doctrine insufficiently
stated, as though it were a mean of quantity, and not that rightly
tempered mean which is the harmony of opposing moods. The poor are not
to be sent away empty. Those rejected by the church are not to be left
to the "outer darkness" of an earlier Christianity. They must be
supplied if they are in want. The methodic giver is "hard towards
none, but is free towards all." Consequently none are refused, and no
account is taken of the regeneration that may spring up in a man from
the effort towards self-help which refusal may originate. Thus after
all it appears that method means no more than this--to give sometimes
more, sometimes less, to all needy people. In the small congregational
church of early Christianity, each member of which was admitted on the
conditions of strictest discipline, the common alms of the faithful
could hardly have done much harm within the body, even though outside
they created and kept alive a horde of vagrant alms-seekers and
pretenders. Now in this department at least the church had become the
state, and discipline and a close knowledge of one's fellow-Christians
no longer safeguarded the alms. From Cicero is borrowed the thought of
"active help," which "is often grander and more noble," but the
thought is not worked out. From the social side the problem is not
understood or even stated, and hence no principle of charity or of
charitable administration is brought to light in the investigation.
Still there are rudiments of the economics of charity in the praise of
Joseph, who made the people _buy_ the corn, for otherwise "they would
have given up cultivating the soil; for he who has the use of what is
another's often neglects his own." Perhaps, as St Augustine inspired
the theology of the middle ages, we may say that St Ambrose, in the
mingled motives, indefiniteness, and kindliness of this book, stands
for the charity of the middle ages, except in so far as the movement
which culminated in the brotherhood of St Francis awakened the
intelligence of the world to wider issues.
In Constantinople the pauperism seems to have been extreme. The corn
supplies of Africa were diverted there in great part when it became the
capital of the empire. This must have left to Rome a larger scope for
the development of the civic-religious administration of relief. St
Chrysostom's sermons give no impression of the rise of any new
administrative force, alike sagacious and dominant. The appeal to give
alms is constant, but the positive counsel on charitable work is _nil_.
The people had the _annona civica_, and imperial gifts, corn, allowances
(_salaria_) from the treasury granted for the poor and needy, and an
annual gift of 50 gold pounds (rather more than L1400) for funerals.
Besides these there were many institutions, and the begging and the
almsgiving at the church doors. "The land could not support the lazy and
valiant beggars." There were public works provided for them; if they
refused to work on them they were to be driven away. The sick might
visit the capital, but must be registered and sent back (A.D. 382); the
sturdy beggar was condemned to slavery. So little did alms effect. And
in the East monasticism seems to have produced no firmness of purpose
such as led to the organization of the church and of charitable relief
under St Gregory.
Another movement of the Byzantine period was the establishment of the
endowed charity. The Jewish synagogue long served as a place for the
reception of strangers--a religious [Greek: xenodocheion]. Probably the
strangers referred to in "the _Teaching_" were so entertained. The table
of the bishop and a room in his house served as the guest-chamber, for
which afterwards a separate building was instituted. In the East the
Jewish charitable inn first appears, and there took place the earliest
extension of institutions. There was probably a demand for an
elaboration of institutions as social changes made themselves felt in
the churches. We have seen this in the case of the [Greek: agape].
Similar changes would affect other branches of charitable work. The
hospital (_hospitalium_, [Greek: xenodocheion]) is defined as a "house
of God in which strangers who lack hospitality are received" (Suicerus,
_Thesaur._), a home separated from the church; and round the church, out
of the primitive [Greek: xenodocheion] of early Christian times and the
entertainment of strangers at the houses of members of the community,
would grow up other similar charities. In A.D. 321 licence was given by
Constantine to leave property to the Church. The churches were thus
placed in the same position as pagan temples, and though subsequently
Valentinian (A.D. 379) withdrew the permission on account of the
shameless legacy-hunting of the clergy, in that period much must have
been done to endow church and charitable institutions. In the same
period grew to its height the passion for monasticism. This affected the
parish and the endowed charity alike. Under its influence the deacon as
an almoner tends to disappear, except where, as in Rome, there is an
elaborate system of relief. Nor does it seem that deaconesses, widows,
and virgins continued to occupy their old position as church workers and
alms-receivers. Naturally when marriage was considered "in itself an
evil, perhaps to be tolerated, but still degrading to human nature," and
(A.D. 385) the marriage of the clergy was prohibited, men, except those
in charge of parishes, and women would join regular monastic bodies; the
deacon, as almoner, would disappear, and the "widows" and virgins would
become nuns. Thus there would grow up a large body of men and women
living segregated in institutions, and forming a leisured class able to
superintend institutional charities. And now two new officers appear,
the _eleemosynarius_ or almoner and the _oeconomus_ or steward (already
an assistant treasurer to the bishop), who superintend and distribute
the alms and manage the property of the institution. (In the first six
books of the _Apost. Constit._, A.D. 300, these officers are not
mentioned.) In these circumstances the _hospitium_ or hospital ([Greek:
xenon], [Greek: katagogion]) assumes a new character. It becomes in St
Basil's hands (A.D. 330-379) a resort not only for those who "visit it
from time to time as they pass by, but also for those who need some
treatment in illness." And round St Basil at Caesarea there springs up a
colony of institutions. Four kinds principally are mentioned in the
Theodosian code: (i) the guest-houses ([Greek: xenodocheia]); (2) the
poor-houses ([Greek: ptocheia]), where the poor (_mendici_) were housed
and maintained (the [Greek: ptocheion] was a general term also applied
to all houses for the poor, the aged, orphans and sick); (3) there were
orphanages ([Greek: orphanotropheia]) for orphans and wards; and (4)
there were houses for infant children ([Greek: brephotropheia]). Thus a
large number of endowed charities had grown up. This new movement it is
necessary to consider in connexion with the law relating to religious
property and bequests, in its bearing on the rule of the monasteries,
and in its effect on the family.
The sacred property (_res sacra_) of Roman law consisted of things
dedicated to the gods by the pontiff with the approval of the civil
authority, in turn, the people, the senate and the emperor. Things so
consecrated were inalienable. Apart from this in the empire, the
municipalities as they grew up were considered "juristic persons" who
were entitled to receive and hold property. In a similar position were
authorized _collegia_, amongst which were the mutual aid societies
referred to above. Christians associated in these societies would
leave legacies to them. Thus (W.M. Ramsay, _Cities and Bishoprics of
Phrygia_, I. i. 119) an inscription mentions a bequest (possibly by a
Christian) to the council ([Greek: synhedrion]) of the presidents of
the dyers in purple for a ceremonial, on the condition that, if the
ceremony be neglected, the legacy shall become the property of the
gild for the care of nurslings; and in the same way a bequest is left
in Rome (Orelli 4420) for a memorial sacrifice, on the condition that,
if it be not performed, double the cost be paid to the treasury of the
corn-supply (_fisco stationis annonae_). No unauthorized _collegia_
could receive a legacy. "The law recognized no freedom of
association." Nor could any private individual create a foundation
with separate property of its own. Property could only be left to an
authorized juristic person, being a municipality or a _collegium_. But
as the problem of poverty was considered from a broader standpoint,
there was a desire to deal with it in a more permanent manner than by
the _annona civica_. The _pueri alimentarii_ (see above) were
considered to hold their property as part of the _fiscus_ or property
of the state. Pliny (_Ep._ vii. 18), seeking a method of endowment,
transferred property in land to the steward of public property, and
then took it back again subject to a permanent charge for the aid of
children of freemen. By the law of Constantine and subsequent laws no
such devices were necessary. Widows or deaconesses, or virgins
dedicated to God, or nuns (A.D. 455), could leave bequests to a church
or memorial church (_martyrum_), or to a priest or a monk, or to the
poor in any shape or form, in writing or without it. Later (A.D. 475)
donations of every kind, "to the person of any martyr, or apostle, or
prophet, or the holy angels," for building an oratory were made valid,
even if the building were promised only and not begun; and the same
rule applied to infirmaries ([Greek: nosokomoeia]) and poor-houses
([Greek: ptocheia])--the bishop or steward being competent to appear
as plaintiff in such cases. Later, again (A.D. 528), contributions of
50 solidi (say about L19, 10s.) to a church, hostel ([Greek:
xenodocheion]), &c., were made legal, though not registered; while
larger sums, if registered, were also legalized. So (A.D. 529)
property might be given for "churches, hostels, poor-houses, infant
and orphan homes, and homes for the aged, or any such community"
(_consortium_), even though not registered, and such property was free
from taxation. The next year (530) it was enacted that prescription
even for 100 years did not alienate church and charitable property.
The broadest interpretation was allowed. If by will a share of an
estate was left "to Christ our Lord," the church of the city or other
locality might receive it as heir; "let these, the law says, belong to
the holy churches, so that they may become the alimony of the poor."
It was sufficient to leave property to the poor (_Corpus Juris
Civilis_, ed. Krueger, 1877, ii. 25). The bequest was legal. It went
to the legal representative of the poor--the church. Charitable
property was thus church property. The word "alms" covered both. It
was given to pious uses, and as a kind of public institution "shared
that corporate capacity which belonged to all ecclesiastical
institutions by virtue of a general rule of law." On a _pia causa_ it
was not necessary to confer a juristic personality. Other laws
preserved or regulated alienation (A.D. 477, A.D. 530), and checked
negligence or fraud in management. The clergy had thus become the
owners of large properties, with the _coloni_ and slaves upon the
estates and the allowances of civic corn (_annona civica_); and (A.D.
357) it was stipulated that whatever they acquired by thrift or
trading should be used for the service of the poor and needy, though
what they acquired from the labour of their slaves in the labour
houses (_ergastula_) or inns (_tabernae_) might be considered a profit
of religion (_religionis lucrum_).
Thus grew up the system of endowed charities, which with certain
modifications continued throughout the middle ages, and, though it
assumed different forms in connexion with gilds and municipalities, in
England it still retains, partially at least, its relation to the
church. It remained the system of institutional relief parallel to the
more personal almsgiving of the parish.
Monasticism, in acting on men of strong character, endowed them with a
double strength of will, and to men like St Gregory it seemed to give
back with administrative power the relentless firmness of the Roman. In
the East it produced the turbulent soldiery of the church, in the West
its missionaries; and each mission-monastery was a centre of relief. But
whatever the services monasticism rendered, it can hardly be said to
have furthered true charity from the social standpoint, though out of
regard to some of its institutional work we may to a certain degree
qualify this judgment. The movement was almost of necessity in large
measure anti-parochial, and thus out of sympathy with the charities of
the parish, where personal relations with the poor at their homes count
for most.
The good and evil of it may be weighed. Monasticism working through St
Augustine helped the world to realize the mood of love as the real or
eternal life. Of the natural life of the world and its
responsibilities, through which that mood would have borne its
completest fruit, it took but little heed, except in so far as, by
creating a class possessed of leisure, it created able scholars,
lawyers and administrators, and disciplined the will of strong men.
It had no power to stay the social evils of the day. Unlike the
friars, at their best the monks were a class apart, not a class mixed
up with the people. So were their charities. The belief in poverty as
a fixed condition--irretrievable and ever to be alleviated without any
regard to science or observation, subjected charity to a perpetual
stagnation. Charity requires belief in growth, in the sharing of life,
in the utility and nobility of what is done here and now for the
hereafter of this present world. Monasticism had no thought of this.
It was based on a belief in the evil of matter; and from that root
could spring no social charity. Economic difficulties also fostered
monasticism. Gold was appreciated in value, and necessaries were
expensive, and the cost of maintaining a family was great. It was an
economy to force a son or a brother into the church. The population
was decreasing; and in spite of church feeling Marjorian (A.D. 461)
had to forbid women from taking the veil before forty, and to require
the remarriage of widows, subject to a large forfeit of property
(Hodgkin, _Italy and her Invaders_, ii. 420). Monasticism was
inconsistent with the social good. As to the family--like the moderns
who depreciate thrift and are careless of the life of the family, the
monks, believing that marriage was a lower form of morality, if not
indeed, as would at times appear, hardly moral at all, could feel but
little enthusiasm for what is socially a chief source of health to the
community and a well-spring of spontaneous charitable feeling. By the
sacerdotal-monastic movement the moralizing force of Christianity was
denaturalized. Among the secular clergy the falsity of the position as
between men and women revealed itself in relations which being
unhallowed and unrecognized became also degrading. But worse than all,
it pushed charity from its pivot. For this no monasteries or
institutions, no domination of religious belief, could atone. The
church that with so fine an intensity of purpose had fostered chastity
and marriage was betraying its trust. It was out of touch with the
primal unit of social life, the child-school of dawning habits and the
loving economy of the home. It produced no treatise on economy in the
older Greek sense of the word. The home and its associations no longer
retained their pre-eminence. In the extreme advocacy of the celibate
state, the honourable development of the married life and its duties
were depreciated and sometimes, one would think, quite forgotten.
We may ask, then, What were the results of charity at the close of the
period which ends with St Gregory and the founding of the medieval
church?--for if the charity is reflected in the social good the results
should be manifest. Economic and social conditions were adverse. With
lessened trade the middle class was decaying (Dill, _Roman Society in
the Last Century of the Western Empire_, p. 204) and a selfish
aristocracy rising up. Municipal responsibility had been taxed to
extinction. The public service was corrupt. The rich evaded taxation,
the poor were oppressed by it. There were laws upon laws, endeavours to
underpin the framework of a decaying society. Society was bankrupt of
skill--and the skill of a generation has a close bearing on its
charitable administration. While hospitals increased, medicine was
unprogressive. There were miserable years of famine and pestilence, and
constant wars. The care of the poorer classes, and ultimately of the
people, was the charge of the church. The church strengthened the
feeling of kindness for those in want, widows, orphans and the sick. It
lessened the degradation of the "actresses," and, co-operating with
Stoic opinion, abolished the slaughter of the gladiatorial shows. It
created a popular "dogmatic system and moral discipline," which paganism
failed to do; but it produced no prophet of charity, such as enlarged
the moral imagination of the Jews. It ransomed slaves, as did paganism
also, but it did not abolish slavery. Large economic causes produced
that great reform. The serf attached to the soil took the place of the
slave. The almsgiving of the church by degrees took the place of
_annona_ and _sportula_, and it may have created pauperism. But
dependence on almsgiving was at least an advance on dependence founded
on a civic and hereditary right to relief. As the _colonus_ stood higher
than the slave, so did the pauper, socially at any rate, free to support
himself, exceed the _colonus_. Bad economic conditions and traditions,
and a bad system of almsgiving, might enthral him. But the way, at
least, was open; and thus it became possible that charity, working in
alliance with good economic traditions, should in the end accomplish the
self-support of society, the independence of the whole people.