+1077+. On another side they did good work; they were to some extent the

guardians of morals. In ancient popular life ethics was not separated

from religion--religion adopted in general the best moral ideas of its

time and place and undertook to enforce obedience to the moral law by

divine sanctions. Priests announced, interpreted, and administered the

law, which was at once religious and ethical; they were teachers and

judges, and this function of theirs was of prime importance,

particularly where good systems of popular education did not exist.

Further, as a leisured class they often turned to literary occupations;

examples of their literary work are found in India (poetry and

philosophy), Babylonia (the history of Berossus), Palestine (Old

Testament Psalter, the works of Josephus). They offered a place of rest

in the midst of the continual warfare of ancient times.

+1078+. On the other hand, the priesthood has been generally

conservative of the bad as well as of the good. It has maintained

customs and ideas that had ceased to be effective and true, and in order

to preserve them it has resorted to forced interpretations and has

invented accounts of their origin. It has thus in many cases been

obscurantive and mendacious. It has tended to make the essence of

religion consist in outward observances, and has not infrequently

degraded the placation of the deity to a matter of bargaining--it has

sold salvation for money. Priests have not always escaped the danger

that threatens all such corporations--that of sacrificing public

interests to the interests of the order. They have drifted naturally

toward tyranny--the enormous power put into their hands of regulating

men's relations with the deity has led to the attempt to regulate men's

general thought, though in most of the great religions their power in

this regard has been partly controlled by the civil authority and by the

general intelligence of the community. When they have not been

controlled, they have often succumbed to the temptations that beset

wealth; they have fallen into habits of luxury and debauchery.

+1079+. In a word the history of the priesthood has been like that of

all bodies of men invested with more or less arbitrary power. Its rôle

has varied greatly in different places and at different times. It has

numbered in its ranks good men and bad, and has favored sometimes

righteous, sometimes unrighteous, causes. It is not possible to define

its influence on religion further than to say that it has been a

natural element of the organization of religion, taking its form and

coloring from the various communities in which it has existed, embodying

current ideas and thus acting as a uniting and guiding force at a time

when higher forces were lacking. It has formed a transitional stage in

the advance of religious thought toward better conceptions of the

relation of man to the deity.

+1080+. Islam has no priesthood, as it has no provision for atonement

for sin except by the righteous conduct of the individual; its cultic

officials are preachers or leaders of prayer (imams) in the mosque

worship, and jurists or scholars (ulamas) who interpret the Koran.

Judaism has had no priests since the destruction of the Second Temple

(70 A.D.); its synagogue services are conducted by men trained in the

study of the Bible or the Talmud (rabbis). In Christianity the

conception of a sacrificial ministrant has been retained in those

churches (the Greek and the Roman) which regard the eucharistic ceremony

as a sacrifice. In the West the "presbyter" (such is the New Testament

term), the head of the congregation, took over the function of the old

priest as conductor of religious worship, and the word assumed the form

"priest" in the Latin and Teutonic languages. Among Protestants it is

employed only in the Church of England, in which, however, for the most

part it has not the signification of 'sacrificer.'

WORSHIP

+1081+. _Places of worship._ The simplest form of early worship is the

presentation of an offering to the dead or to some extrahuman object of

reverence. Such objects were held to exist in all the world, in the sky,

in rocks, streams, woods, caves, hills and mountains, and beneath the

surface of the earth; but it was chiefly in places of human resort that

their presence was expected. On some natural object or at some spot

regarded as sacred, particularly where, it was believed, a spirit or

deity had manifested himself (in some remarkable natural phenomenon, or

in some piece of good fortune or ill fortune), the worshiper would place

his offering. Sometimes it was left to be disposed of by the deity or

spirit or dead person at his pleasure. When the offering was an animal,

the blood, as food, was often applied to the grave or to the stone or

other object connected with a superhuman Power. In the course of time,

it may be supposed, it would be found convenient to erect a table or

some other structure on which an animal could be slain. Such a structure

would be an altar. At first simple, a heap of stones, a pile of dirt, a

rough slab, it was gradually enlarged and ornamented,[1980] and itself,

by association, became sacred.

+1082+. Places where the presence of the divine was recognized were

sacred. In them worship was paid to the deity, and in the course of time

they were marked off and guarded against profane use. At first, however,

they were merely spots on hills or in groves, by streams or in the open

country, needing no marks or watches, for they were known to all and

were protected by the reverence of the people.[1981] When the land came

to be more thickly populated and religion was better organized, such

places were inclosed and committed to the care of official persons.

Well-known examples are the Greek _temenos_ and the Arabian

_haram_.[1982] Taboos and privileges attached themselves to such

inclosures. Precautions had to be taken on entering them; the shoes, for

example, were removed, lest they should absorb the odor of sanctity and

thus become unfit for everyday use. The spaces thus set apart were

sometimes of considerable extent (as was and is the case at Mecca);

within them no war could be waged and no fugitive seized. Sometimes they

owed their sacredness to the buildings to which they were attached.

+1083+. The necessity for a house of worship arose very early.[1983]

Where there was an image or a symbol of a god, or where the apparatus

of sacrifice or of other ritual practice was considerable, buildings

were required for the protection of these objects and perhaps for the

convenience of the ministrants. The development of buildings followed

the course of all such arrangements--at first rude, they became

gradually elaborate and costly. In many savage tribes and in the

earliest period of civilized peoples (Egyptians, Hebrews, al.) a hut,

constructed like those of the people and therefore of a very simple

character, houses the image or other representative of the god. With the

progress of artistic feeling and skill abodes of men grow into palaces

and abodes of deities into temples. It is on the temples that the

greatest labor has been expended, partly because they are the work of

the whole community, partly because it has been believed that the favor

of the deity would be gained by making his dwelling-place

magnificent.[1984] The essential fact in a temple--its definition--is

(in the lower cults) and was (in the great ancient cults) that it is or

was the home of a god, the specific place of approach to him, with the

possibility of face-to-face intercourse and a greater probability of

gaining the blessings desired. This local conception of the deity

continued after larger ideas had arisen,[1985] and is to be found at the

present day in some Christian circles.

+1084+. Temples have tended to grow not only in beauty and magnificence

but also in elaborateness of interior arrangements and of connected

structures. Anciently they were specifically places of sacrifice--the

abodes of gods to whom sacrifice was offered--and this function

generally determined their interior form. Sometimes they contained a

single room in which stood an image and an altar; this was the simplest

architectural embodiment of the idea of divine sacredness. But the

progress of ritual forms was accompanied by the notion of grades of

sanctity, and a special sanctity was indicated by a special room, an

adytum, an inner or most holy shrine;[1986] where, as was often the

case, gradations in priestly rank existed, only the highest priest could

enter the adytum. For the implements of service and for the priests

there were buildings attached to the temple. The people gathered in

courts adjoining the sacred structure; where ritual exactness was

carried very far (as in Ezekiel's plan and in Herod's temple), there

were gradations in the courts also.[1987] Usually an altar stood in one

of the courts. The sacredness of the sanctuary communicated itself to

the vessels and other implements of the sacrificial service.

+1085+. Temples, like sacred inclosures and altars, were often asylums,

and doubtless in many cases served to protect innocent persons. The

privilege, however, was often abused, and it became necessary in Greece

and Rome to restrain it.[1988]

+1086+. As a factor in the development of art the temple has been

important. It has called forth the best architectural skill of man, and

the statues that often adorned sacred buildings have stimulated

sculpture. It does not appear that symbolism entered into the idea of

ancient temples.[1989] The Babylonian and Assyrian zikkurat (or

ziggurat) was a staged structure (resembling in this regard the Egyptian

pyramid), supposed by many scholars to be an imitation of the mountains

whence the predecessors of the Semites in Babylonia came, and on which

they worshiped;[1990] if this be so, there is no attempt at pointing

upward to the abode of the gods. Nor is there any trace elsewhere in the

ancient world of a symbolic significance attached to temples beyond the

distinction of place, referred to above, between the sacred and the

profane and between different degrees of sacredness. The form of temples

appears to have been determined by imitation of early nonreligious usage

or by considerations of convenience;[1991] the ziggurat may have been

suggested by a high place, the adytum by a cave, but most temples were

probably copies of ordinary human dwellings or civic buildings (as in

late Latin, basilica is used in the sense of 'cathedral').

As abodes of priests temples were the centers of all priestly activities

in the development of ritual and literature. Being strong and well

guarded they were often used by kings as treasure-houses; but they were

stripped of their wealth by native kings in times of need, and were

freely plundered by conquerors.

+1087+. _Forms of worship._ The ancient forms of divine worship, as is

remarked above,[1992] follow in a general way the modes of approaching

human potentates. Ceremonies of worship reached a high degree of

elaboration in the great religions, Egyptian, Babylonian-Assyrian,

Hebrew, Hindu, Greek, Roman.[1993] The central fact was the presentation

of the offering, and with this came to be connected prayers and hymns,

ceremonies of purification, vows, imprecations, exorcisms, oracles; the

festivals also were religious functions. Prayer is spoken of

below.[1994] Hymns sometimes consisted of or contained petitions, more

generally were laudations of the power and benefactions of a deity. For

poetical charm the first place is to be assigned to the Egyptian,

Hebrew, and Hindu hymns. The religious ideas expressed in such

compositions varied with time and place, but they show a general

tendency toward a monolatrous or henotheistic point of view and toward

higher ethical and spiritual feeling. Many of the Egyptian hymns seem to

be substantially monotheistic, and the same thing is true of the

Babylonian, the Assyrian, and the Vedic. The Babylonian hymns so far

recovered (belonging in their present form mostly to the seventh century

B.C.) are chiefly penitential[1995] and show a close resemblance to some

Hebrew psalms. In the Veda traces of philosophical thought, pantheistic

and other, are not lacking. The poems of the Old Testament Psalter vary

greatly in breadth and elevation of thought--some, dealing generally

with national affairs (occasionally with individual experiences), are

narrow and ethically low; others show exalted conceptions of the deity

and fine moral feeling. The Avestan ritual is concerned largely with

physical details, but is not lacking in a good ethical standard; the

Gathas, particularly, though not free from national coloring, give a

noteworthy picture of the government of the world according to moral

law. Of Greek ritual hymns we have few remains, and these are of no

great interest.

+1088+. Everywhere the temple-hymns, as is natural, deal chiefly with

the desires and hopes of the worshiper, and often do not rise above mere

egoism. Their object is to secure blessing, and the blessing is often,

perhaps generally, of a nonmoral character--wealth, children, triumph

over enemies. Desire for moral purity appears in some Hebrew hymns, and

perhaps in some Babylonian. Of the modes of presenting liturgical poems

to the deity we have few details. In the Second Temple at Jerusalem

there were choruses of ministrants (Levites), and some of the titles of

the psalms contain what seem to be names of musical instruments and

melodies; but of this temple-music nothing further is known than that it

was sometimes sung antiphonally, but without harmony.[1996] In some

parts of Greece boys were trained to render hymns musically in the daily

service and on special occasions. The general character of old Greek

music is indicated in the Delphian hymn to Apollo discovered in

1893;[1997] the melody is simple but impressive--there is no harmony.

+1089+. The temple-music doubtless tended to heighten devotional feeling

among the worshipers, and possibly a similar popular effect was produced

by the festivals that were common in the ancient world. Here the whole

population took part, there were religious ceremonies, and the

consciousness of the presence of the deity was made more distinct not

only by visible and tangible representations, but often also by the fact

that these occasions were connected in current myths and legends with

histories of gods and ancient national experiences. Processions and

pilgrimages brought the people to sacred places to which stories were

attached, and the religious life became a series of object lessons. The

Greek and Roman calendars contain a great number of feast days, each

assigned to some god.[1998] The Hebrews at a comparatively early date

(eighth or ninth century B.C.) connected their great festivals with

remote national events;[1999] examples of festivals attached to recent

historical events are Purim,[2000] the Feast of Dedication established

in commemoration of the rededication of the temple by Judas Maccabæus

(December, 165 B.C.) after the Syrian profanation,[2001] and the "Day of

Nicanor" commemorating the victory of Judas over that general (March,

161 B.C.).[2002] In the Hindu festivals (New Year's Day and during the

spring months) stories of gods formed a prominent feature.[2003] The

Greek Genesia, the season of mourning for the dead, came to be connected

with the victory of Marathon.[2004]

All such celebrations tend to become seasons of merrymaking, and the

religious element in them then receives less and less attention.[2005]

This remark holds of the festivals that Christianity took over from the

old religions, adapting them to the new conditions.[2006] Such occasions

lose their distinctive religious significance in proportion as the

events they commemorate recede into the past and become less and less

distinct. It is in very early times, when they are thought of as

representing realities, that they are religiously effective; in later

times they give way to more reflective forms of devotion.

+1090+. Vows, blessings, and curses may be considered to belong to

worship in the regard that they contain petitions to the deity; the

curse or the blessing, however, sometimes rested on a baldly objective

conception of the power of words, sometimes was held to be magical: once

uttered, the word, beneficent or maleficent, went to its object, person

or thing, did its work, and could not be recalled; its effect could be

set aside only by an utterance in the opposite direction.[2007] A

magician, by the power resident in him, could fix a curse or a blessing

on man or thing. An exorcism, also, might be effected by magic or by

invoking the aid of a deity; an evil spirit is a supernatural Power and

has to be considered--one does not worship such a being, but one may

employ religious means to circumvent him. Bad magic may be overcome by

good magic, and a deity, hostile and maleficent under certain

circumstances, may be placated by offerings. It is not always easy to

draw the line between worship proper and modes of defense against

injurious Powers. But in general true worship implies friendly relations

between human and superhuman persons.

+1091+. _Idols._ From an early time men have desired to have visible

representatives of the supernatural. So long as natural objects, trees,

stones, mountains, were regarded as themselves divine or as the abodes

of spirits, so long as a loose social organization and the absence of

definite family life led men to spend their lives in the open air, there

was no need of artificial forms of the Powers. Such a need arose

inevitably, however, under more advanced social conditions. Exactly at

what stage men began to make images it is hardly possible to say,--the

process was begun at different stages in different regions,--but it

appears that in general it was synchronous with some fairly good form of

social organization. Yet, where such forms exist, there are differences

in the use of images. These are found--to take the lower peoples--in

Melanesia and the Northern Pacific Ocean, in the northern part of South

America, in North America apparently only among the Eastern Redmen (as

the Lenâpé or Delawares),[2008] and on the western coast of Africa

(Ashanti, Dahomi, Yoruba). Where the cult of beasts (whether totemic or

not) is a living one, idolatry does not find a place; it is only when

communities have begun to be agricultural that they have artificial

forms of gods; that is, idolatry comes in with the stage of culture

connected with the agricultural life.[2009]

The development in the form of images is familiar. The rude and, to

modern eyes, grotesque idols of the lower peoples gradually pass into

the more finished forms of the civilized nations.[2010] Really artistic

forms, however, were produced only by some Semites (Babylonians and

Assyrians) and in the Hellenic and Græco-Roman worlds. In Central

America, Mexico, and Peru images are anthropomorphic but lacking in

symmetry and grace. Hindu idols are often composite and grotesque,

sometimes (especially images of Buddha) highly impressive.

+1092+. The Hebrews appear to have had no anthropomorphic images of

their national deity. Down to a late period there was a cult of

household gods,[2011] and of these, probably, there were images in

private houses and in shrines, whether anthropomorphic or not is

uncertain. In Solomon's temple (and in Ezekiel's proposed plan) figures

of cherubs (originally divine beings) stood on the walls of the main

room and guarded the ark in the adytum; they were winged creatures, the

forms derived immediately from Phoenicia, ultimately from Babylonia;

they appear only in the great public cult, probably did not enter into

the religious life of the people at large, and there is no evidence that

they ever received divine worship.[2012] The Hebrews had no plastic art

of their own, seem to have had small disposition in their earlier

history to make images, and later such forms were excluded by the

antagonism of the prophets to foreign cults and by refined ideas of the

deity.[2013] The absence of images in the Zoroastrian cult may be

accounted for in a similar way--from early lack of artistic impulse and

later elevated conceptions. In China there are images in household

worship, but none in the great imperial religious ceremonies.[2014]

Though the Koran does not expressly forbid the cult of images, yet, as

the old Arabian cults denounced by the prophet were all idolatrous,

images were identified with false religion (polytheism) and have been

avoided by the Moslems, whose strict monotheism left no place for them.

+1093+. Images were credited in half-civilized times with a certain

personality, were flogged or destroyed when they failed to do what was

expected of them, or were bound in order to prevent their going

away.[2015] In such cases the conception of the power of these objects

was probably a confused one; though they were known to be inanimate

pieces of wood or stone or other material, it was believed that they

were inhabited by spirits or deities, and it was held that in some

undefined way the power of the divine agent was transferred to its

physical incasement--the two were practically identified. This sort of

conception soon passed away and was succeeded by a symbolical

interpretation. Whatever the ultimate origin of the Egyptian,

Babylonian, and Hindu divine and semi-divine forms (which are sometimes

monstrous),[2016] it is probable that for the more thoughtful worshipers

they represented divine powers and functions. Uncouth shapes may be

softened or transformed by familiarity, and by association with higher

ideas--things in themselves repulsive may become vehicles of

devotion.[2017] In all religious worship objects associated with pious

acts acquire sanctity and beauty.

+1094+. That idolatry in ancient times was not a wholly bad feature of

worship is shown by the excellence of the great religions in which it

was practiced. Its general function was to make the deity more real to

the worshiper, to make the latter more sharply conscious of the divine

presence, to fix the attention, and so far to further a real communion.

On the other hand, it tended to produce a low physical conception of the

divine person, and to distract the mind of the worshiper from the

ethical side of worship. Its moral effect was dependent on the man's

character and thought. When the image was regarded as the symbol of an

ethically good Power, it was a reënforcement of pure religious feeling;

when it was regarded as in itself a source of physical benefit, it was a

degrading influence. This difference of effect exists in those Christian

bodies that include images and pictures of the deity and of saints in

their apparatus of worship.

CHURCHES

+1095+. The history of the social organization of religion is the

history of the growth of churches--voluntary associations for worship;

it is toward the Church that society has hitherto moved.[2018] Every

ancient community may be said to be an incipient church in the sense

that it contains the germs of the later ecclesiastical development. But

this later form exists in such communities only in germ--the most

ancient worship was communal, an affair of clan, tribe, or State. Men

were born into their religious faith and could no more change it, or

think of changing it, than they could change, or think of changing,

their language or any other inheritance. It was inevitable, however,

that there should be a growth of individualism--instinct impelled men to

think for themselves in religion as in all other things. Religion was a

part of the general social movement, affected by all other parts of that

movement. Independence of thought led to social aggregations, the

members of which were drawn together by similarity of ideas and

aspirations. This is the familiar history of social movements, and that

in religion such movements have been continuous will be evident from a

brief statement of the historical facts.

+1096+. _Savage secret societies._ These societies are referred to

above;[2019] here we have only to notice their germinal ecclesiastical

character. They represent a partial break-up of tribal communal worship

by assigning special duties and granting special privileges to certain

initiated persons. Totemic groups are sometimes (as in Central

Australia) charged with specific functions in the tribal life; but

membership in such groups is a matter of birth, and they everywhere tend

to give way to secret societies. These latter often have charge of

certain religious rites, and from their secret proceedings and from a

knowledge of their secret lore the rest of the tribe are excluded.

The extent to which religious organization and influence have been

carried is illustrated by the history of the Polynesian Areoi, the most

remarkable of such fraternities.[2020] The Areoi created 'mysteries,'

with an elaborate ritual whose effectiveness was dependent on absolute

accuracy in words; its members were chosen without regard to tribal

position and entered of their own free will; it was a voluntary

association and made its own religious laws. It was restricted (as all

such associations are) by the necessity of paying regard to existing

customs, but within such limits it was independent of the tribe, and its

members were held to be entitled to special honors and enjoyments in

this life and the next (a crude conception of salvation). It was

essentially a church, and other societies, in Polynesia, Africa, and

North America, approached this position more or less nearly. They all

tended to become tyrannical--their social influence enabled them to

impose their authority on the tribe, and they did not hesitate to employ

violence in asserting their rights.[2021] To foreign influence they were

naturally hostile, since this generally diminished their power. Founded

as they are on savage ideas they have disappeared, or are disappearing,

before foreign civilizations. In their best form they doubtless gave a

certain unity to communities and were thus an element of order.

+1097+. _Greek mysteries._ In Greece dissatisfaction with the current

cults expressed itself in various ways, largely through poets and

philosophers, who asserted themselves, indeed, individually, but showed

no power of organization. The task of organizing religious opinion fell

to that new direction of thought (vaguely called "Orphic"[2022]) which,

while it gave prominence to spiritual ideas and moral ideals, introduced

a lively emotional element into worship. In the Eleusinian and other

mysteries this element was both external (dramatic representations,

songs, processions, ceremonies of initiation) and internal (the hope of

salvation). Without breaking with the popular religious forms the

mysteries constructed their own forms, chose their members, and created

a religious _imperium in imperio_. They were voluntary associations for

worship, ignored distinctions of social rank, had great ideas and

impressive rituals--apparently all the elements necessary to the

establishment of churches or of a national church. Yet they faded

gradually away, and perished finally without leaving any definite

impression, as it seemed, on Greece or the world without.[2023]

+1098+. The reasons of their failure are not far to seek. They did not

reach the Hellenic mind for the reason that they were of foreign origin

and much in them was opposed to the genius of the Hellenic religion.

Even the Pythagorean reform movement of Southern Italy, with its

strenuous moral culture of the individual, seems to have had a foreign

(Asiatic) coloring. It was, indeed, at one with the better Greek thought

of the time (sixth century B.C. and later) in its elevated conception of

the deity and of worship, but with this it combined ascetic observances

and, apparently, mystical ideas; it established what may be called a

church, which had a great vogue in Southern Italy for several centuries

but did not, as an organization, penetrate into Greece. It attracted

some thoughtful men, but was too calm and restrained for the

masses.[2024]

+1099+. It was different with the Dionysiac cult, whose wildness made

it popular; of foreign origin, it was in time partly Hellenized and in

Athens took its place in the regular national worship; some of its

foreign features were taken up in the mysteries. These latter, with

their enthusiasm and their half-barbaric ceremonies, excited the

contempt of most of the educated class.[2025] These cults were

Asiatic--not Semitic--but probably a product of a non-Hellenic

population of Asia Minor (Phrygia and other regions), developed during a

period the history of which is obscure.

+1100+. The Semites seem to have produced no mysteries--there is no

record of such cults in Babylonia, Syria, Phoenicia, the Hebrew

territory, or Arabia; Semitic religion was objective, simple,

nonmystical.[2026] The Syrian cult of Tammuz (Adonis), which was adopted

by Hebrews in the sixth century B.C. (Ezek. viii, 14), was an old

folk-ceremony, not a mystery; it is allied to the Attis ceremonies of

Asia Minor and to the mourning ceremony mentioned in Judges xi, 40

(mourning for a dead deity, but there referred to Jephthah's daughter).

+1101+. The Greek mysteries, then, derived their orgiastic side partly

from Thrace, partly from Asia Minor. They chiefly attracted the lower

classes and particularly slaves, for they offered individual

independence in religion, freedom from the sense of social inferiority,

and hope for the life to come. Thus they did not appeal to the Hellenic

spirit, and did not, as organizations, survive the political decadence

of the Greek States. But it is probable that their effects survived in

the recognition of the possibility of religious worship apart from the

traditional cults, and, more generally, in contributing to the

establishment of the principle of individualism in religion. An

historical connection between the Greek mysteries and the later

individualistic cults is, indeed, not probable. Cumont believes that

Mithraism did not imitate the organization of the Greek secret

societies.[2027] The New Testament use of the term 'mystery' in the

sense of 'esoteric doctrine'[2028] may have come from the Asian cult;

the Mithraic worship was practiced in Tarsus, the native city of the

Apostle Paul, in the first century of our era. However this may be, it

seems probable that the conception of a church existed in the

Græco-Roman world before the beginning of our era, and that its

existence was due in part to the Greek mysteries, whose members were

scattered throughout the empire of Alexander.

+1102+. The _philosophical systems_ that arose in Asia and Europe

concurrently with the Greek mysteries did not found ecclesiastical

organizations. The disciples of philosophers formed schools, and the

adherents of each school constituted a group the members of which were

united one with another by the bond of a common intellectual aim and a

common conception of life and of the world; and there was also a

scientific union between the various groups, the fundamental methods of

investigation and lines of thought being the same everywhere. But the

object of thought was the discovery of truth by human reason, not the

quest of salvation by worship of the divine. The emotional element

essential to the formation of a church was wanting, and where

philosophical systems adopted devotional forms these were not the

creation of philosophy but were borrowed from current cults. They sought

happiness, but not through religious ritual. They did not always

formally discard or condemn existing cults, but they ignored them as

means of salvation; they sometimes recognized traditional gods and forms

of worship, but interpreted them in accordance with their own ideas.

+1103+. In India the Upanishads practically abolished the national

pantheon and the old Brahmanic ritual--knowledge, they taught, was the

key to bliss, and the knowledge was not that of the Veda, it came by

reflection; emancipation from earthly bonds, absorption into the

Infinite, was the goal of effort, but the effort was individualistic and

led to no devotional organization. Ascetic observances, as a means of

attaining perfection, were an inheritance from popular Brahmanism.[2029]

In China Taoism, originally a system of thought (based on the conception

of all-controlling order) that appealed only to a certain class of

philosophic minds, became a religion by borrowing crude ideas and

sensational methods from a debased form of Buddhism and other

sources.[2030] Confucius steadily declined to teach anything about

divine worship; Confucianism remained merely an ethical system, dealing

only with the present life, until its founder, with disregard of his

teaching, was divinized.

+1104+. Many of the Greek philosophers, from Socrates and Plato on, were

definitely (some of them warmly) religious, but their religion was

chiefly valued as an aid to ethical life, and it did not respond to the

demand for communal worship. The Platonic and Stoic conceptions of the

deity were pure, but they remained individualistic--salvation was the

creation of the man himself. The noble hymn of Cleanthes to Zeus[2031]

and the fine religious morality of Marcus Aurelius led to no church

organization. The attempted combination of Platonism and Judaism by

Philo was equally resultless. Neo-Platonism also, though it had

enthusiasm and some sense of brotherhood, showed itself unable to

produce a church. Plotinus, indeed, proposed to the Emperor Gallienus

the establishment in Campania of a city of philosophers, a Platonopolis,

in which the ideal life should be lived, but the proposal came to

nothing.[2032] The Neo-Platonic union with the deity was too vague a

conception to bring about communal worship, and the deity had no

definite rôle in securing the salvation of men.

+1105+. Thus, in the period beginning about the sixth century B.C. and

extending into the Christian era, all over the civilized world attempts

were being made to reconstruct life by ethical and philosophical

systems, by ascetic observances, and by mysteries. These attempts bear

witness to the prevailing sense of the insufficiency of current schemes

of life. They differ according to differences of place and time, but

agree in the search after something better; this better thing was always

ethical and in most cases religious. Their failure to construct

effective organizations was due to the deficiencies pointed out above.

+1106+. _Buddhism and Jainism._ The first churches produced by civilized

men arose in India in the sixth century B.C. out of the bosom of

Brahmanism, whose failure to establish a church was due in part to its

dependence on philosophical speculation. Of the protests against the

Brahmanic orthodoxy the most important were Buddhism and Jainism.[2033]

Buddhism discarded philosophy and asceticism, and came forward with a

plan of salvation that was intelligible to all.[2034] Disciples gathered

about the Master and he became the object of enthusiastic devotion. All

complete churches have owed their origin each to a single founder; this

is due to the fact that the insight and constructive genius of the

founder have chosen out of the mass of the existing thought those broad

principles that the times demanded and have presented them in incisive

form and with freshness and enthusiasm.[2035] Buddha's followers quickly

formed themselves into associations, the entrance into which was by free

choice. As his doctrine of salvation was nontheistic, so his church was

nontheistic, but not therefore nonreligious. The ecclesiastical

organization was simple, but effective. The original Buddhism has been

degraded, especially in Tibet, China, and Korea, but the church form

remains everywhere more or less recognizable.[2036]

+1107+. Jainism, while differing from its contemporary, Buddhism, in

its metaphysical dualism and its asceticism, agreed with it practically

in its method of salvation from the ills of life. It established a

nontheistic church which has had experiences (polytheistic and other)

like those of Buddhism. Historically it is less important than the

latter; it still has a considerable following, but it has never passed

out of India. Apparently its local features, metaphysical and ascetic,

have impeded its progress--it lacks the simplicity of Buddhism.

+1108+. _Judaism._ Judaism stands on the border line--it was a cult that

approached the position of a church, yet failed to reach it. Its line of

movement differed _in toto_ from those described above. It had no

philosophy, no asceticism, no secret societies, and it did not rely on

its ethical code. It was essentially religious, in theory a theocracy,

in form a national cult. The steps by which the old polytheistic

Israelite nation passed into the monotheistic Judaism can be traced

historically, but the impulse to the movement was a part of the genius

of the people and cannot be further explained. The leaders of the small

body of people that gathered at Jerusalem in the sixth century, after

the break-up of the year 586, were animated by a patriotic devotion to

the national deity; without political autonomy, merely a province of the

Persian empire, the sole interests possible for the people were racial

and religious, and these isolated them from the neighboring peoples.

Those who remained in Babylonia (where they were prosperous and

comfortable) were similarly isolated, devoted themselves to their own

development, and their religious attitude was the same as that of the

Palestinian community. Distance from the temple led to gatherings in

various places for worship (synagogues).

The Jews thus became a nation organized under religious law, with an

institution devoted to voluntary communal worship, and offering

salvation, at first for this life only, but later (from the second

century B.C. onward) for the future life also--these were elements of a

church. But in two points this cult fell short of the complete church

idea: the business of a church is wholly and solely religious, and the

Jewish nation was organized not only for religion, but also for

commerce, politics, and war;[2037] and the synagogue and the

temple-service were not free to all the world--only Jews and

proselytes[2038] might take part in them. Any religious body, it is

true, may properly define the conditions of entrance into it; but here

the restriction was national--the synagogal cult, individualistic and

simply devotional as it purported to be, was a part of the national

system, and its membership depended almost exclusively on the accident

of birth. Proselytes, indeed, formed an exception--they came in of their

own choice--but they were numerically not important and did not affect

the general character of the cult.[2039] The Jews came as near the ideal

of a voluntary religious association as was then possible under the

hampering conditions of a racial organization and peculiar national

customs. Their genius for the organization of public religion appears in

the fact that the form of communal worship devised by them was adopted

by Christianity and Islam, and in its general outline still exists in

the Christian and Moslem worlds.

+1109+. _Zoroastrianism_ resembled Judaism in its later practical

monotheism and its elaborate ritual, but was more isolated and less

advanced in the formation of assemblies for voluntary worship. Its

pre-Sassanian period produced no church, only a national cult, which was

adopted by the Parthians and others in debased form, but otherwise did

not attract outsiders. On a sect that arose in Persia in Sassanian times

see below.[2040]

+1110+. _Christianity._ The teaching of Jesus was directed toward a

purification of the existing cult, the elimination of mechanical views,

and the emphasizing of spiritual and ethical ideals.[2041] There is no

indication that he purposed founding a separate organization.[2042] But,

after his death, his disciples were drawn together by their relation to

him, particularly when the new congregation became predominantly

Græco-Roman. For its administration the synagogue was the model--from it

were taken the titles and functions of some of its officers and the

method of conducting public service.[2043] But the new ekklesia, the

church, followed its own lines and speedily created a new cult. Its

fundamental conception was salvation in the future through Jesus of

Nazareth, the Christ. In the beginning it was thoroughly individualistic

and voluntary. It had no connection with the State, was not a _religio

licita_; its adherents joined it solely out of preference for its

doctrines; its activity was wholly religious. But this ideal

constitution of a church was not long maintained. The introduction of

infant baptism (toward the end of the second century) and the adoption

of Christianity as the religion of the State by Constantine went far to

make membership in the Church an accident of birth or of political

position; in this regard Imperial and Medieval Christianity did not

differ from the old national religions--it was a religion but not a

church. At the present day in the greater part of Christendom one's

ecclesiastical position is inherited precisely as the ancient clansman

inherited his special cult.[2044] The word "church" has largely lost its

early signification of voluntary religious association, and has come to

mean any Christian organization, or, by further extension, any religious

body.

+1111+. The secularization of the Church, the failure to discriminate

between its function and that of the State, is an inheritance from

Roman Imperialism, which in its turn was derived from the primitive

clan constitution of society in which the individual had no standing

apart from the community. From the Roman Empire it passed to Medieval

Europe, and it has survived in the Christian world by force of inertia.

It is, however, not universal in Christendom (there are religious bodies

in which individual freedom of choice is fully recognized), and in some

cases where it exists formally or theoretically it is practically

ignored. Notwithstanding departures from the ideal the services of the

Church often represent voluntary worship; such worship, however, has

been the rule in all religions from the earliest times to the present

day and does not in itself distinguish Christianity from any other

religion.

+1112+. The word "church" meant at first a local Christian congregation,

but was enlarged so as to designate the whole body of Christians. In

this body various tendencies of thought showed themselves from time to

time, and new organizations were formed that constituted new churches in

the sense that they had their own theological dogmas, ritual, and

conditions of membership. Most of them had brief careers and offer

nothing of interest for the history of the development of the

church-idea. Gnosticism was a serious and noteworthy attempt to bridge

over the gap between a good supreme God and an evil world, and was in

form a church, but its philosophical and mystical sides had so much that

was fanciful and grotesque or ethically dangerous that it did not

commend itself to the mass, and soon ceased to exist as a separate

organization, though its echoes long continued to be heard in certain

Christian groups.[2045]

+1113+. _Cults of Mithra and Isis._ The Mithraic communities were wholly

voluntary associations, without distinctions of birth or social

position, were recognized by the State, but received no pecuniary aid

from it and had no official connection with it. Perhaps this

independence helped to nourish the enthusiasm that carried Mithraism

from one end of the Roman Empire to the other; a church appears to

flourish most on the religious side when it confines itself to

religion. A more important fact was that Mithraism was a religion of

redemption. It does not appear that there was any general organization

of the Mithraic associations; each of these was local, probably small,

had its own set of officers, and managed its own affairs.[2046] It was

thus free from some of the perils that beset Christianity. It is not

improbable that some of its liturgical forms were adopted by the

Christian Church, but it seems itself not to have borrowed from the

latter. Its weakness was its semibarbarous ritual and its polytheism; it

yielded of necessity to the simpler and loftier forms of Christianity.

+1114+. The cult of Isis, in spite of its ethically high character and

its impressive ceremonies of initiation (as described by

Apuleius[2047]), did not give rise to associations like the Mithraic. It

belongs to the mysteries, but had not their organization of meetings and

ritual, had no brotherhoods (except those whose bond of union was

devotion to this cult) and no general organization embracing the Empire.

The reason for its failure in this regard appears to lie in its lack of

definiteness in certain important points: it was in a sense

monotheistic, since the goddess was called the supreme controller of the

world of external nature and of men, but its monotheism was clouded by

its connection with the old national cults and by current theological

speculations--for Apuleius, it would seem, Isis was rather a name for a

vague Power in nature than for a well-defined divine person, and

particularly it offered no clear picture of the future and no clear hope

of moral redemption, two things that were then necessary to the success

of any system that aspired to supplant the popular faiths.[2048] Such

lacks as these appear in the cult of Sarapis also, which never developed

the characteristics of a church.

+1115+. _Manichæism._ Of the religious movements that sprang from the

contact of Christianity with the East Manichæism was the most important

on account of its great vitality. It possessed all the elements of a

church, voluntary membership, independence of the State (it was always

persecuted by the State), and the claim to a divine revelation of

salvation. Like Buddhism, Jainism, and Christianity, it owed its origin

to a single founder. Its plan of organization and its ethical standards

were good. Like Mithraism its basis was Persian (its rise was

synchronous with the Sassanian revival of Mazdaism), but the two went

different ways: the former laid stress on mystical ceremonies, the

latter on moral and theological conceptions. The vogue that Manichæism

enjoyed was due, apparently, to its eclectic character: adopting the

Persian dualism, it modified and expounded this by a Gnostic doctrine of

æons, which was intended to harmonize the goodness of God and the

existence of evil, and it added the figure of the highest æon, Christ,

the savior of men. On the other hand, its involved and fantastic

machinery led to its downfall.

+1116+. Two theocratic bodies that failed to reach the full church form

are _Islam_ and the _Peruvian cult of the sun_. The Islamic constitution

is based on a sacred book, its theology and its form of public worship

are borrowed from Christianity and Judaism, its private worship is

individualistic, and it offers paradise to the faithful. But Islam is in

essence a State religion rather than a church. Its populations belong to

it by descent; its head is the Calif (now the Sultan of Turkey). Its

diffusion, though due in certain cases to the superiority of its ideas

and the simplicity of its customs,[2049] has yet come largely (as in

Egypt, Syria and Palestine, Persia, and North Africa) from social and

political pressure--in some cases it has been adopted by whole nations

at a blow; Mohammed forced all the people of Arabia to accept it.

Individual choice recedes into the background, except (as in Judaism) in

the case of proselytes. Its conception of sin and salvation are largely

external. It bears a great resemblance to the Judaism of the Hasmonean

dynasty, a national cult with a priest-sovereign at its head.

Within Islam there have arisen organizations that imitate the form of a

church in certain respects; such were the Morabits (Almoravides) and the

Mohads (Almohades),[2050] whose bond of union was in part theological,

and such are the great fraternities in Africa and Asia, which are

devoted, among other things, to religious work, and have elaborate

organizations and ceremonies of reception.[2051] But these are all

largely political and military. The Ismalic movement (from ca. 900 A.D.

on), the central doctrine of which was the incarnation of God in certain

men and finally in the Mahdi, was not Islamic and not Semitic; with a

nominal acceptance of the Koran, it was in fact a mixture of Persian and

Buddhistic ideas; from it came the Fatimide califate of Egypt, and from

this (ca. 1000 A.D.) the Druse sect, which began as a church, but has

become merely a local religion.[2052]

+1117+. It was in Peru that the most thoroughgoing identification of

religion with the State was effected.[2053] In the old national

religions the individual followed the custom of his country; in Peru the

State, in the person of the Inca, determined every person's religious

position and duties. If Islam resembles Maccabean Judaism, the Peruvian

organization resembled some forms of Medieval Christianity. The Inca was

a Pope, only with more power than the Christian Pope, since he acted on

every individual. The general ethical standard was good, in spite of

some survivals of savagery, but there was a complete negation of

individual freedom in religion.[2054]

+1118+. _Modern Hindu sects._ The vast multiplication of sects in India

is an indication of activity of religious thought;[2055] the movement

has been in general toward the formation of voluntary associations,

though with many variations and modifications. The reform sects, while

they may be considered as developments out of the old systems, Vedic,

Çivaic, Vishnuic (Krishnaic), have been affected by foreign influence,

Mohammedan or Christian. Of the organizations influenced by Islam

(followers of Kabir and Dadu) several have produced societies that for a

time had the form of a church, with voluntary membership and a plan of

salvation; but it has been hard for them to overcome the national

tendencies to idolatry and to deification of founder or teacher. The

Sikhs, beginning (in the fifteenth century) as a purely religious body,

became, by the eighteenth century, a powerful political and military

organization. Along with theological reform these sects have been

constantly in danger of reverting more or less closely to the old

national type, and their church form has been only feebly effective.

+1119+. The case has been different with the movements induced by

contact with Christian forms of belief. The organizations founded or

carried on by Rammohun Roy[2056] (early part of the eighteenth century)

and later by Chunder Sen,[2057] Mozoomdar, and others are churches in

the full sense of the word, and, notwithstanding occasional individual

lapses into old Hindu ideas, have so far maintained this character; but

they are not wholly native creations, and it remains to be seen what

their outcome will be.[2058]

+1120+. _Babism and Bahaism_,[2059] the transformation of Babism

effected by Baháu'llah, is a church in all essential points, though its

organization consists merely in the devotion of its adherents to the

teaching and the person of its founder; it has no clergy, no religious

ceremonial, no public prayers, no connection with any civil government,

but its dogma is well-defined and it offers eternal salvation to its

adherents. Its chief source of inspiration is the belief that its

founder was an incarnation of God, the Manifestation of God announced

by his forerunner, the Bab (the "Gate" to God and truth). That its lack

of official ministers and public communal religious services is no bar

to its effectiveness is shown by the favor it has met with not only in

Persia and other parts of Asia but also in Europe and America. Possibly

its success is due in part to its eclectic character and its claim to

universality (it seeks to embrace and unite Buddhism, Hinduism,

Zoroastrianism, Judaism, and Christianity) as well as to the simplicity

of its dogma (theism and immortality) and its admirable humanitarian

spirit.[2060]

MONACHISM

+1121+. An effective outgrowth from the church is the monastic system,

which is an _ecclesia in ecclesia_, emphasizing and extending certain

features of the parent organization.[2061] It sprang from a dualistic

conception, the assumption of a relation of incompatibility or

antagonism between God and the world--a feeling whose germ appears in

savage life (in taboos and other forms). It has assumed definite shape

only in the higher religions and not in all of these--it is foreign to

Semitic, Persian, Chinese, and Greek[2062] peoples. Austerity there has

been and abstention from certain things but not with the aim of

ministering to spiritual life.[2063]

+1122+. The birthplace of monachism proper was India. In the Brahmanic

scheme the highest sanctity and the most brilliant prospects attached to

the man who forsook the life of men and devoted himself to solitary

meditation in the forest.[2064] The seclusion was individual--the man

was an eremite. The organization into communities was made by

Buddha[2065] and, apparently contemporaneously, by Mahavira, the founder

of Jainism. It is this organization that has made the institution a

power in religious history. Buddha's associations were open to all,

without distinction of social position or sex. From India monachism

passed into all the lands that were occupied by Buddhism.

+1123+. In Egypt under the Ptolemies there arose a sort of monastic

life: after the cult of Sarapis was established men wishing to devote

themselves to religious meditation would go to the Sarapeum and shut

themselves up in cells.[2066] It is, however, not clear that there was

an organization or any sort of communal life in connection with these

gatherings. There is no evidence of foreign influence beyond a possible

suggestion from the fact that Sarapis was a foreign deity and his cult

may have imported foreign ideas into Egypt; but he was completely

domiciled in his new abode, was identified by the Greeks with their Zeus

and by the Egyptians (by a popular etymology) with their Osir-Apis;

there was nothing foreign in his cult, and the claim, sometimes made,

for Buddhistic influence (through embassies sent by Asoka to Greek

kings) has no definite historical foundation.[2067] Possibly Greek

(Pythagorean) influence is to be recognized,[2068] but it cannot be

considered strange that a practice of this sort should arise

independently in Egypt at a time when a practical monolatry with a good

ethical conception of the deity might dispose some men to solitary

reflection.

+1124+. The Egyptian Therapeutae, the "Servants" of God, described by

Philo,[2069] resemble these Sarapis monks in certain respects,

particularly in their habit of contemplation. Their kernel, however, was

Jewish--they had the Jewish Scriptures and observed the seventh day of

the week. On this Jewish substratum was imposed Greek thought; they

adopted the Alexandrian allegorizing interpretation of the Scriptures,

and Philo includes them in that group of persons who found it desirable

to withdraw from the common life of men in order to cultivate

philosophical and ethical thought. Six days they lived each by himself;

on the seventh day they came together for a religious service. Women as

well as men were admitted into the association, but the place of general

meeting had two divisions, one for men, the other for women. The date of

the rise of the sect is uncertain, but it must probably be put in the

Ptolemaic period. Their monastic organization must be referred to some

current practice, Greek or Egyptian, or to a blending of various lines;

the details of their history are too sparse to build on with

definiteness.

+1125+. The similar sect of the Essenes, or Essaei, which was confined

to Palestine, is better known.[2070] The Jewish features in their system

are: acceptance of the Jewish Scriptures, observance of the Sabbath,

recognition of the temple by sending unbloody offerings, regard for

ceremonial purity. Non-Jewish features are: rejection of marriage, trade

and (according to Philo) animal sacrifice, turning to the sun in prayer

(or, according to Josephus, praying to the sun), the teaching that the

soul, when set free from the body, passes, if good, to a delightful

region across the ocean, and, if bad, to a dark den of ceaseless

punishment. Foreign influence in these latter practices and beliefs is

obvious, but its precise source is uncertain. There are suggestions of

Pythagoreanism and possibly of Zoroastrianism;[2071] it can only be said

that various ideas were in the air of Palestine, and that the Essene

formulation was effected under conditions and at a time not known to

us.[2072] The monastic constitution was clearly of foreign (non-Jewish)

origin. Essenism seems not to have affected the Jewish religious ideas

of the time. Jesus, though he may have taken from it the prohibition of

swearing and possibly one or two other points, was in the main and on

all important points (except ethical teaching, which was largely common

property) the reverse of what Essenism stood for.

+1126+. Christian monachism, which appeared first in eremitic form

(second century) and later in organized communal form, may have been an

independent creation of Christian piety; but it is also possible that it

was suggested by the traditions of its birthplace, Egypt;[2073] definite

data on this point are lacking. Whatever its origin, it speedily overran

the Christian world, in which it has maintained itself up to the present

day.[2074]

+1127+. Monachism has rendered valuable aid to Buddhism and Christianity

by training men and women, laity and clergy, who were devoted to the

forms of religion represented by these organizations. It has done a

higher service by establishing communities that have often been beacon

lights, representing, particularly in times of popular ignorance, ideals

of conduct. Such communities have often been homes of beneficence and

learning. They have, on the other hand, injured religion by severing it

from ordinary life. By assuming that the secluded life was holier than

that of the world they have tended to put a stigma of unholiness on the

latter. Buddhism taught that only the monk could attain the highest

sanctity and receive the highest reward, and such has generally been the

teaching in those forms of Christianity in which monachism exists.

Monasteries and convents, further, have in many cases become rich in

this world's goods--a favorite form of devotion has been to build and

endow or aid such communities (often with the belief that this atoned

for sin); with wealth has come worldlymindedness and corruption of

morals. Numerous examples of such decadence occur in Buddhistic and

Christian history. There are, however, many examples of holy monastic

living. It is true in general of these institutions, as of all others,

that when moral supervision of them is exercised by society the

possibilities of moral decline are greatly diminished; in an enlightened

age they may be assumed to be generally exemplary. Their specifically

useful rôle in the development of religion, as refuges in times of

turbulence and centers of charity and thought, belongs to an imperfectly

organized form of society; with the growth of enlightenment they tend to

disappear.

SACRED BOOKS

+1128+. All churches and all bodies approaching nearly the church-form

have writings that embody their beliefs and are regarded as sacred. Such

sacred Scriptures necessarily grow up with the organizations to which

they belong, since these latter originate in literary periods and claim

divine authorship. Great religious communities naturally produce a large

number of such books, and at some time it becomes necessary (from the

growth of heresies or rivals) to sift the whole mass and decide which

works are to be considered to have permanent divine authority; the

process of sifting is performed in each case by its community under the

guidance of leading men, and the result is a canon of sacred Scriptures.

Such canons are found in Buddhism, Judaism, Zoroastrianism,

Christianity, and Islam, and in minor bodies like the Essenes, Mormons,

and others, but not among the Chinese, Greeks, and Romans; Brahmanism

occupies a middle ground--it regards the Veda and the accessory books as

entitled to great reverence, but has never drawn the line between sacred

and nonsacred writings so sharply as has been done in the group named

above.

+1129+. While the general method of fixing the canons has been the same

everywhere, the details of the process have differed in different lands.

In India the canon of Southern Buddhism (acknowledged formerly in India

and now in Ceylon, Burma, and Siam) was settled in a series of councils

coming down to the middle of the third century B.C. or later (several

centuries after the death of Buddha), the object being to define the

faith against heresies; probably the reports of the Master's discourses

(he left no writings) were examined, and those declared authentic were

brought together, but the date of the final settlement of the canon is

not certain, and the sacred books were not reduced to writing till the

first century B.C. The canon of Northern Buddhism (accepted in Tibet,

Mongolia, Manchuria, China, Japan) is less definite and was fixed

later.[2075]

+1130+. The development of the Jewish canon extended over a long period,

and its history in outline is well known. While the discourses of the

prophets were regarded with respect as giving divine revelations, there

is no record of the recognition of an authoritative book before the

fifth century B.C., when a sacred law was proclaimed by Nehemiah and

Ezra.[2076] Even then there seems to have been no definite collection of

writings. The Law was the national religious constitution, and in

process of time prophetic books and others came to be regarded with

reverence. The translator of Ben-Sira (Ecclesiasticus) into Greek (132

B.C.) mentions three groups of national books (the law, the prophets,

and "other writings"), but does not speak of them as divinely inspired.

But the intimate contact with the Greek world, and especially the

Maccabean struggle, deepened the Palestinian Jewish reverence for the

national literature. A process of sifting and defining, at first

unofficial, began, and this work naturally passed, with the growth of

legal learning, into the hands of leading doctors of law. Early in the

first century of our era public opinion in Palestine had taken shape;

the standard established was a local national one--books illustrating

the national history and teachings, and written in Hebrew, were accepted

(so, for example, the book of Esther, which is nonreligious but

national), others (as the Wisdom of Solomon) were rejected. For various

reasons certain books (Ezekiel, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs)

remained doubtful. After the destruction of Jerusalem the increasing

literary feeling, the establishment of rabbinical schools, and the

necessity of defining the Jewish position against growing Christianity

and other heresies led to definite action[2077]--in the Synod of Jamnia

(about 100 A.D.) the Palestinian canon, after hot debates, was finally

settled in the form in which the Hebrew Old Testament now appears.

Alexandrian Judaism had a different standard and accepted, in addition

to the Palestinian collection, a group of books (the Apocrypha) that the

Palestinians rejected. Certain other books (as the various Enoch

apocalypses) were not accepted by either Jewish body, though they were

highly esteemed. Both canons were slow growths of national

feeling--books were chosen that accorded with prevailing ideas; but it

is now impossible to recover all the critical views that determined the

results.[2078]

+1131+. Young Christianity, at first a Jewish body, naturally adopted

the Jewish canons, but in the course of a century produced a

considerable normative literature of its own. The Christian canon was

settled much in the same way as the Jewish. There was doubt about

certain books, there were differences of opinion in different quarters,

the growth of heresies called for the establishment of a definite

standard, and a final decision was reached in the West and announced

toward the end of the fifth century by Pope Gelasius; in the East the

action was less definite, but the conclusion was about the same. The

books of the Alexandrian canon that were rejected by the Palestinians

were largely used by early Christian writers, by whom some of them are

constantly cited as sacred Scripture, for they were found in the Greek

translation of the Old Testament (the Septuagint), which was the Old

Testament text used by Christians. So great was their popularity that

Jerome was led, against his judgment, to include them in his translation

(the Latin Vulgate), and by the Council of Trent (1546) they were

indorsed as deuterocanonical, and are still so regarded in the Roman

Church. In the Greek Church they were accepted as canonical in the

beginning and up to the early part of the nineteenth century, but are

now, it would seem, looked on only as useful for the instruction of

catechumens.[2079] By Protestants their canonical authority is generally

denied, though up to the early part of the nineteenth century they were

commonly printed in editions of the Bible; the Articles of the Church of

England characterize them as instructive but not of authority for

doctrine, and lessons from them now appear in the Lectionary of the

Church.[2080]

+1132+. The history of the collection of the Zoroastrian sacred books

is involved in obscurity. A late tradition was that many such writings

were destroyed by Alexander. This points to a belief that the existing

writings were later than the fall of the old Persian empire. When a

beginning was made of committing Zoroastrian material to writing is

uncertain. In the first century of our era Pliny had heard of verses

ascribed to Zoroaster,[2081] and, as Mazdean books were in existence at

the rise of the Sassanian dynasty, the probability seems to be that the

reduction to writing had then been going on for a considerable time--how

long it is impossible to say. The material grew with the development of

the people and was ascribed to Zoroaster[2082] (as the Jews ascribed

their legal material to Moses). An official collection of sacred

writings was made in the fourth century of our era--the exact extent of

this collection and the principle that governed its formation are not

clear. It may be surmised that the appearance of strange teachings, such

as that of Mani, and the spread of Christianity eastward, forced on the

leaders the task of defining the orthodox faith.[2083] In making their

collection they would naturally take only such writings as were in

accord with the spirit of the religion of their time. Thus they

established (in the fourth century) a body of sacred writings; it does

not follow that no additions were later made to the canon--how far it is

represented in the present Avesta it may be difficult to say.

+1133+. The history of the Islamic canon is simple. The Koran enjoys the

distinction of being the only sacred canon produced by one man. There

never was any question of its sacredness, and there has been hardly any

question of its content. Mohammed's discourses were taken down by his

followers in his lifetime, were put into shape just after his death, the

collection was revised a few years later (under the Calif Othman), has

since been universally accepted in the Moslem world as the authoritative

divinely given standard of religious truth, and there is no reason to

doubt that it contains substantially all the teaching of the Prophet

and only his teaching. The scribe Zayd, who acted as editor, may have

altered or inserted a word here and there, but he would not have dared

to change the thought. The traditions of extra-Koranic sayings ascribed

to Mohammed (the _hadith_), so far as they may be supposed to be genuine

utterances of his (most of them are spurious), do not add anything to

his doctrine.[2084]

+1134+. As to the influence of sacred books on religion, it is obvious,

in the first place, that they are always formulations of the ideas of

the places and times in which they originate, and that they vary in tone

and in importance accordingly. It is true, however, that the canonical

collections of the great religions, having arisen in enlightened

circles, all have, along with local (social, mythological,

eschatological) features, generally high ethical and spiritually

religious standards. For this reason they have always been, as religious

and ethical guides and sources of inspiration, important factors in the

development of civilization as well as in the life of the churches.

Their teachings, generally representing the ideas of gifted men

formulated under the pressure of great religious enthusiasm, have

perpetuated high standards, holding them up in times of decadence and

corruption and clouded moral vision.

+1135+. A specially noteworthy point in their influence is their rôle of

household monitors and comforters. As religious manuals, invested with

divine authority, they have found their way into families and other

small and intimate circles, have been children's textbooks and parents'

guides, and thus have entered in an extraordinary way into individual

life. They have reached wider circles through expositions and discourses

held in connection with stated religious services. They have been used

as textbooks in schools, and in general have been the most widely read

books in the world. They have thus been unifying forces, each in its

special community.

Their influence, further, has not been confined to purely religious

life. Being regarded as containing the final truth, they have been

objects of study and occasions of the development of learning. The

necessity of explaining their use of words and grammatical

constructions, their historical and geographical statements and views,

their pictures and theories of social life, their psychology and

philosophy, their theistic and eschatological ideas, have led to

investigations of all these subjects. Early Moslem science sprang from

the study of the Koran, and the later Moslem discussions of free-will,

immortality and other points were called forth by Koranic statements.

The philosophical writings of Maimonides, produced under Greek influence

(through Moslem translations of Aristotle), were directed to the

elucidation of Old Testament ideas. The contributions of modern

Christians, Jews, Moslems, and Parsis to knowledge, sacred books being

the occasions, are numerous and important.

+1136+. Along with these beneficent influences there have been others

less praiseworthy. As any sacred book belongs to a particular age, it

inevitably, in the course of time, falls into disaccord with later ideas

on certain points. When this happens there are always some persons who,

failing to discriminate between the local and transitory and the

permanent, unjustly reject the book _in toto_; others, making a

distinction, take it as a literary product, accept what they think

valuable, and treat the rest as an imperfect product of the past. Those

who accept the book as divinely inspired and therefore, as they think,

infallible either maintain literally all its statements (cosmological,

historical, eschatological, and other) or else undertake to interpret

certain of them in accordance with current views. When such

interpretation is forced, it becomes intellectually and morally an

evil--it accustoms the religious public to logical distortions, and it

nourishes a disingenuousness that easily becomes immoral. The belief

that a sacred book is final authority often results in limitation of

freedom of thought--certain things are excluded from discussion. The

instinctive demand for freedom asserts itself, however, in various ways:

sometimes, as described above, a desired sense is obtained by violence;

sometimes a religious body that is regarded by its adherents as

authoritative interpreter changes its decision, in accord with the

spirit of a new age, and grants liberty where it had previously refused

it The treatment of sacred books follows the phases of general culture.

The dogmatic statements of these books are condensed into creeds, which

become organic law.[2085] They express each the interpretation put by a

given church on the words of its sacred Scriptures. The interpretations

are the outcome of historical processes, the final result of which is a

formulation of the ideas of its time; where the same sacred book is

accepted by several churches, there may be several different creeds

based on the one book--that is, churches and creeds alike are subject to

the variations of human opinion that result from differences of

temperament, social surroundings, and general culture. Creeds are

convenient and effective manuals. They may be made to change their

meaning by processes of interpretation; elasticity in a creed is

favorable to permanence--it is thereby able to adapt itself to changing

conditions--and the degree of elasticity depends largely on the persons

who are its authorized expounders, that is, on the area of public

opinion that these persons represent.

+1137+. _General influence of churches._ All organized religion has been

a potent factor in human life. In savage and half-civilized communities

it enters into every detail of life, since, in the absence of knowledge

of natural law, everything that happens is ascribed to supernatural

agency. In the old national cults, in which other departments of thought

(art, commerce, science, philosophy) became prominent, religion was

somewhat isolated--it received a particular representation in

sacrifices, festivals, and other observances; but such ceremonies were

so numerous, and so many ancient customs survived, that it still played

a conspicuous part in daily life.[2086] In the period in which churches

arose there was a still greater specialization of the activities of

life, and this specialization has become more pronounced in modern

times, in which from various causes the tendency is to mass religious

observances in certain days and seasons and leave the rest of the time

free. This apparent banishment of religion from everyday affairs does

not, however, signify diminution of interest in religion itself--partly

it is an economic arrangement, the assignment of a definite time to

every particular duty, but mainly it is the result of a better

conception of what religion means, the feeling that, being an inward

experience, it is less dependent on external occasions.

+1138+. Churches, as is remarked above, differ from the old national

religions mainly in the emphasis they lay on individualism and on the

idea of redemption. They represent a profounder conception of the

ethical relation between man and God, or, as in Buddhism, between man

and the ideal of perfection in the universe. They foster religion by

holding public services and by the production of devotional works; they

advance learning by supplying men of leisure; socially they are in

general a conservative force, with the good and bad effects of

conservatism. But their special function is to treat man as a spiritual

being having immediate personal relations with the deity. Charitable and

educational work (ethical and other) and social gatherings they share

with other organizations, and they are incompetent in themselves to deal

with economic and other scientific questions. That wherein they stand

apart from other organizations is the emotional element they introduce

into man's attitude toward the universe. According to this point of view

man regards himself not merely as a part of the world but as bound to

its author by ties of gratitude and affection. This sentiment may be

independent of all scientific theories, may be shared by the learned and

the unlearned; it is thus a great unifying force, and gives to life the

glow of enthusiasm with the repose of trust.

+1139+. The temptations to which churches are exposed are those that are

touched on above, and they may be briefly summed up here. There is the

tendency to an excessive elaboration of the externals of religion,

ritual, and dogma. Something of these is doubtless necessary in churches

as in all human organizations, but they may easily be carried so far as

to obscure the essential things. The history of all churches exhibits

this tendency. There are protests from time to time, revolts against

formalities and speculations, and then frequently in the new

organizations the old movement is resumed. For our own times a

distinction may perhaps be made: while there seems to be a steady

general increase of ritual, there is in many quarters a disposition to

minimize or curtail dogma.

+1140+. However this may be, a more important tendency in churches is

toward the claim to absolute authority in religious matters. This

tendency is universal in bodies that hold to the infallibility of

certain sacred books. It is obvious that absolute authority in an

organized body and individual freedom are mutually incompatible,[2087]

and that all that makes for freedom makes against the church influence

in this direction. Finally, when churches enter into administrative

alliance with the civil authorities, or assume civil and political

power, they to that extent abdicate their spiritual rights and abandon

their true function.

UNIVERSAL RELIGIONS

+1141+. So far only particular religions, belonging to particular

peoples or regions, have been considered. In recent years the question

has been much discussed whether any of these may be called universal. A

universal religion may be defined either as one that has been accepted

by all peoples, or as one whose doctrines are such that it may be so

accepted. The term is frequently used loosely to describe a religion

that has passed definitely beyond its birthplace and has been adopted by

different nations or districts. Obviously, if we take the stricter

definition, the question at issue can be decided only by an appeal to

facts. Whether or not a given religion has actually been universally

accepted can be determined from statistics, and the question whether it

is fitted to be generally adopted must be answered by a similar appeal.

It may be held, and is held, of various religions that their standards

are so high and their schemes of worship and conceptions of salvation so

obviously suited to human nature that they cannot fail to be adopted

when they are known; but such are the diversities of human thought that

this consideration cannot be regarded as decisive--a religious system

that seems to one set of men to be perfect may appear to others to be

unsatisfactory,[2088] and it is only by trial that it can be determined

how far it is capable of conquering new territory. The test of actual

diffusion, then, must be applied to those religions for which the claim

to universality has been made--these are Buddhism, Judaism,

Christianity, Zoroastrianism, and Islam.[2089]

+1142+. Buddhism has had a history full of vicissitudes.[2090] Beginning

in Northern India as an Aryan faith, in the course of a few centuries it

overran a great part of the peninsula, then began to decline, gradually

lost its hold on the people, partly, it is said, by reason of the

corruption of its morals, chiefly, doubtless, because it was not suited

to the character of the Hindu people, and finally, in the twelfth

century of our era, left its native land, to which it has never

returned. Meantime it had established itself firmly in Ceylon and later

in Burma and Siam and had been carried to China (not long after the

beginning of our era), whence it passed to Korea, Central Asia, Japan,

and adjacent islands, and as early as the sixth century gained a footing

in Tibet. It has maintained its conquests outside of India to the

present day, except that it has been driven out of a considerable part

of Central Asia by Mohammedanism; in China and Japan it exists alongside

of the native cults, its relations with which are friendly. It presents

the curious spectacle of a religion, originally Hindu Aryan, that now

finds a home exclusively (with one exception, Ceylon) among non-Aryan

peoples; but among these peoples it has generally been degraded by the

infusion of low native elements, and has discarded its original essence.

By reason of its negative attitude toward life it has found no favor as

a system with Western Indo-Europeans, Persians, and Semites, except that

it gave a coloring to certain Persian sects (the Ismailic) and has

perhaps influenced Bahaism.[2091] As far as present appearances go there

is no probability of its gaining general acceptance.

+1143+. Judaism is too much encumbered with peculiar national usages to

commend itself to non-Jews. There was a time just before and just after

the beginning of our era when a considerable number of persons resorted

to it for escape from the confusion of current religious systems, and

since that time there have been conversions here and there; but these

have been too few to affect the general character of religion in any

community. Even to Reform Judaism, which has discarded Talmudic usages

and does not differ doctrinally from certain forms of Christianity,

there clings a racial tone that tends to isolate it, and it does not

seem that this isolation is likely to cease soon.

+1144+. Christianity, beginning as a Jewish movement, speedily became

Græco-Roman, and in this form took possession of the whole of Western

Asia (except Jewish districts and parts of Arabia), Greece, Italy,

Egypt, and the northern coast of Africa, and was adopted, under

Byzantine and Roman influence, by the Celtic, Slavonic, and Teutonic

tribes. Most of its Asiatic and all of its African territory except

Abessinia was taken from it by Mohammedanism in the seventh century, but

small bodies of Christians remained in Armenia, Mesopotamia, Syria, and

Egypt. With this exception it has since been the religion only of the

Western Indo-Europeans and of a few half-civilized peoples who have been

Christianized either by missionaries (the Karens of Burma, a part of the

Telugus of Southeastern India and others) or by contact with Westerners

(Philippine Islands, tribes of North America and South America) or by

both these agencies (the Hawaiian Islands). Local peculiarities have

been largely banished from its usages but not from its dogma. It is,

apparently, its dogma (in the orthodox form) that has prevented its

acceptance by most Semites, by the peoples of Central and Eastern Asia,

and by many undeveloped tribes of Africa and Oceania.

+1145+. Zoroastrianism has never advanced to any important extent beyond

the boundaries of its native land. It has never recovered from the

crushing blow dealt it by Mohammedanism in the seventh century, and is

now professed by hardly more than 100,000 persons (mostly in Bombay).

+1146+. Islam is now the religion of the Turkish empire (except the

Christian groups in Europe, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Armenia), Persia,

Egypt (except the Copts), and the North African coast, and has a large

following in Central Asia, China, India, the Malay peninsula, the Malay

Archipelago, the Sudan, and a considerable representation on the east

and west coasts of Africa. Its spread, as is remarked above, has been

effected sometimes by force, but oftener by social pressure and through

traders and missionaries. Decadent Christianity in Palestine, Syria, and

Egypt readily yielded to it; Persian Zoroastrianism made some effort to

maintain itself but succumbed to the combination of military pressure

and the prospect of civil advancement and peace; after the fall of

Constantinople conversions of Christians in Europe were numerous, and

the Moslem conquests in India were followed by a considerable accession

of Hindus to the Islamic faith. At the present time it appears to be

advancing only among the half-civilized tribes of Central Africa, but it

maintains its position against Buddhism and Christianity.[2092]

+1147+. There is, thus, now no religion that, so far as extent of

diffusion is concerned, can be called universal. Omitting the Jewish and

Parsi groups, the Brahmanic and other religions of India, and the

Chinese Confucian cult, three great religions have divided the world

among them, Buddhism taking Eastern Asia, Islam Western Asia and

Northern Africa, and Christianity Europe and America. It is sometimes

suggested that the religion of the leaders of civilization, the

Christian nations, must become the faith of the world. But, even if we

may look forward to a time when social fusion, under the control of the

present Christian nations, shall have brought about substantial unity of

religious thought in the world, it is impossible now to predict what

the nature of that thought will be, since Christianity has undergone and

is now undergoing change, and may in the far future assume a different

form from that of to-day; fundamentals may remain, but opinions differ

even now as to what are fundamentals.

+1148+. _Classification of religions._ A word may be added on proposed

classifications of religions.[2093] Certain resemblances and differences

between religions are obvious, and groups may be made, geographical,

ritualistic, theologic, or soteriological, but it is difficult to find a

principle of classification that shall bring out the essential

characteristic or characteristics of every religion and yet distinctly

mark every one off from all others. All have much in common, and the

elements in all are so mixed that divisions necessarily cross one

another. Every religion is the product of some one community and

represents its peculiar view of human life in its relation to the

supernatural; there may be borrowings and fusions, but the final outcome

is shaped by the thought of the people to whom the religion specifically

belongs.[2094] The differences between various religions are the

differences of thought between the communities involved, and the

differences and the resemblances are often curious and sometimes defy

explanation.

+1149+. Leaving aside ritual, which, so far as it is a merely external

form of approach to the deity, does not touch the essence of religion,

the following points may be said to be common to all religions: (1) The

sense of a supernatural control of life, and the conviction that the

supernatural Power must be placated or obeyed.[2095] (2) The belief that

religion deals with and controls the whole of life; this belief is

pronounced among savages, who know nothing of natural law, and is

regarded as essential in more advanced communities, in which, from the

religious point of view, law, physical or mental, is taken to be an

expression of the will of the deity. (3) The creation of divine

personalities[2096] (representing popular ideals), and movements toward

a unitary view of the divine control of the world. (4) An ethical

element in the conception of the character of the supernatural Power and

the modes of pleasing this Power. The ethical side of religion

corresponds to the general ethical standard of the people--in savages it

is low, but it exists. (5) The conception of salvation as the goal of

religious faith and service; the salvation looked for is at first

physical, is gradually moralized, and ultimately takes the form of

spiritual union with the deity. These are the essential elements of

religion; they all exist in crude form in the lowest strata of society,

and are purified in the course of social growth.

+1150+. A classification naturally suggested by this enumeration of

fundamentals would be one based on grades of general culture, savage,

half-civilized, and civilized; but such a classification would not take

account of the differences of character in the members of the higher

grades. These differ from one another in the conception of the ultimate

Power of the world and of the nature of salvation and the mode of

attaining it, and in other less important points. They are so highly

composite in structure that their interrelations are complicated, and

those that are brought together by one critical canon may be separated

by another. Buddhism is allied on one side (the ignoring of deity) to

Confucianism and Epicureanism, on another side (the hope of moral

salvation) to Christianity. Zoroastrianism touches the Veda in its

theistic construction, and is remarkably like Judaism in its

organization. Christianity is Jewish on one side and Græco-Roman on

another. Islam has Christian and Jewish conceptions attached to the

old-Semitic view of life.

+1151+. A distinction of importance is that between national religions

and those founded each by a single man (Buddhism, Christianity,

Islam).[2097] This distinction may be pressed too far--all religions

have great men who have given new directions to thought, and no

religion can be said to be wholly the creation of an individual man,

since all, as is pointed out above, are outcomes of the ideas of

communities.[2098] The distinction in question is not a satisfactory

basis for a general classification since it fails to note the

theological differences between the various religions. Nevertheless, it

embodies a significant fact: in the course of the history of the world

the three religions above-named have come to divide the civilized world

among them, that is, they have been selected as best responding to the

religious needs of men. No one of them is universal, but the three

together practically include the civilized world.[2099] They are

modified in various ways by their adherents, but they have not been

superseded. They have grown beyond the ideas of their founders, but

these latter nevertheless occupy a unique position. Moses and Zoroaster

are dim figures whose work it is impossible to define, but the teachings

of Buddha and Jesus, though they left no writings, are known with

substantial accuracy, and Mohammed has expressed himself in a book. The

persons of the three founders are the objects of a devotion not given to

other leaders. These things justify us in putting Buddhism,

Christianity, and Mohammedanism in a class by themselves, of which the

distinguishing note is the discarding of local national ideas and

usages. These last are not wholly given up, but they are less prominent

than in Judaism and Zoroastrianism. It is to the insight of the

individual founders that this relative freedom from local features is

due. This characteristic does not necessarily carry with it superiority

in ethical and general religious conceptions.

A different line of cleavage is indicated by the designation "religions

of redemption." In one sense all religions come under this head,[2100]

for all have for their object the freeing man from the ills of life. In

a higher sense the term 'redemption' means deliverance from the power

of sin and from its punishment, particularly in the world to come. This

meaning appears in definite form in Buddhism and Christianity, and

somewhat less distinctly in Mithraism and the later Judaism; in the Old

Testament religion and Islam it is not clearly stated. As it appears in

germinal form in the lower cults, its development may be traced up to

its culmination in the systems in which man is freed from moral taint

through the agency of an individual savior or in accordance with a

cosmic ethical law.

+1152+. Unity exists among the lowest and among the highest religious

systems. Among savage and half-civilized cults there are no important

differences--they all have the same ideas respecting the nature and

functions of supernatural Powers and the ways of approaching them.[2101]

In the higher cults a process of differentiation goes on for a certain

time while each is developing its special characteristics, and then a

counter-movement sets in--they all tend to come together by suppressing

local features and emphasizing general ideas.[2102] Thus at the present

day there are groups of Buddhists, Zoroastrians, Jews, Christians, and

Moslems that, without abandoning their several faiths, find themselves

in substantial accord on some essential points. The unity of savages is

the uniformity of undeveloped thought; the later unity rests on

discrimination between fundamentals and accessories.

+1153+. Tabulated classifications of religions, it would seem, must be

arbitrary and misleading--they give undue prominence to some one

religious fact, they maim the individuality of cults, and they obscure

the relations between certain cults by putting these into different

divisions. The true relations between the various religious systems may

be brought out by comparisons. In this way individuality and unitary

character may be preserved in every case, while the agreements and

disagreements may be made clear by referring them to general principles

of religious development.