As religion thus becomes thoroughly ethical, so is the notion of the

Messianic kingdom transformed. Its essential characteristic is the doing

of the Father's will on earth as in heaven. Jesus uses parable after

parable to establish its meaning. It is a seed cast into the ground

which grows and prospers (Matt. xiii. 31-32). It is a seed sown in good

ground and bringing forth fruit, or in bad ground and fruitless (Luke

viii. 5-8; Mark iv. 1-32). It is a pearl of great price for which a man

should sell all that he possesses (Matt. xiii. 44-46). It is not come

"with observation," so that men shall say "lo here and lo there" (Luke

xvii. 20-21). It is not of this world, and does not possess the

characteristics or the glory of the kingdom of the earth (Luke xxii.

24-26; Mark x. 13-16). It is already present among men (Luke xvii. 21).

Together with these statements in our sources are still mingled

fragments of the more ordinary cataclysmic, apocalyptic conceptions,

which in spite of much ingenious exegesis, cannot be brought into

harmony with Christ's predominant teaching, but remain as foreign

elements in the words of the Master, possibly brought back through his

disciples, or, more probably, used by Jesus uncritically--a part of the

current religious imagery in which he shared.

His originality.

It is often declared that in these teachings there is nothing new, and

indeed analogies can be found for many sayings; yet nowhere else do we

gain so strong an impression of originality. The net result is not only

new but revolutionary; so was it understood by the Pharisees. They and

Jesus spoke indeed the same words and appealed to the same authorities,

but they rightly saw in him a revolutionist who threatened the existence

of their most cherished hopes. The Messianic kingdom which they sought

was opposed point by point to the kingdom of which he spoke, and their

God and his Father--though called by the same sacred name--were

different. Hence almost from the beginning of his public ministry they

constantly opposed him, the conflict deepening into complete antagonism.

Jesus has already been termed unique, one of the common people yet

separated from them, and this description applies to the breadth, depth

and reality of his sympathy. In the meagre records of his life there is

evidence that he deemed no form of suffering humanity foreign to

himself. This was not a mere sentiment, nor was his sympathy

superficial, for it constituted the essential characteristic of his

personality--"He went about doing good." In him the will of the Father

for the redemption of the race was incarnate. This led him into the

society of those outcasts who were condemned and rejected by the

respectable and righteous classes. In contemptuous condemnation he was

called the friend of the outcasts (Matt. xi. 19; Mark ii. 16-17), and on

his part he proclaimed that these sinners would enter into the Kingdom

of Heaven before the self-righteous saints (Matt. xxi. 31). Even the

most repulsive forms of disease and sin drew from him only loving aid,

while he recognized in all other men who laboured for the welfare of

their fellows the most intimate relationship to himself. These

constituted his family, and these were they whom his Father will bless.

Jesus recognized his unique position; he could not be ignorant of his

powers. Even the prophets had spoken in the name of God; they accepted

neither book nor priesthood as authoritative, but uttered their truth as

they were inspired to speak, and commanded men to listen and obey. As in

Jesus the whole prophetic line culminates, so does its consciousness.

Reverent toward the Holy Scriptures, he spoke not as their expositor but

with a divine power which invests his words with immediate and full

authority. The prophets use the formula, "Thus saith the Lord," but he

goes beyond them and speaks in his own name, "Amen, I say unto you." He

knew himself as greater than the prophets, indeed as him of whom the

prophets spoke--the Messiah. Only through this self-consciousness can we

explain his mission and the career of his disciples. The prophets up to

John foretold the coming of the kingdom (Matt. xi. 11-13; Luke xvi. 16),

but Jesus opened its doors and made possible entrance into it. Where he

is there it is, and hence those who follow him are God's children, and

those who refuse his message are left outside in darkness. He is to sit

as enthroned, judge and king, and by him is men's future to be

determined (Matt. xxv. 31 f.; Mark xiii. 26). Indeed it was his presence

more than his teaching which created his church. Great as were his

words, greater was his personality. His disciples misunderstood what he

said, but they trusted and followed him. By him they felt themselves

freed from sin and fear--and under the influence of a divine power.

His Messianic claims.

Though his claims to authoritative pre-eminence thus took him out of the

class of prophets and put him even above Elijah and Moses (Mark ix. 2-7;

Luke vii. 28; Luke x. 23-24), and though naturally this self-assertion

seemed blasphemous to those who did not accept him, yet as he had

transformed the traditional notion of the kingdom, so did he the current

thought of the Messiah. The pre-eminence was not to be of rank and glory

but of service and self-sacrifice. In his kingdom there can be no

strife for precedence, since its King comes not to be ministered unto

but to minister and to give his life in the service of others (Mark ix.

33 f., x. 42-45). The formal acknowledgment of the Messiah's worth and

position matters little, for to call him Lord does not ensure entrance

into his kingdom (Matt. vii. 21-23). It is those who fail to recognize

the spirit of sympathy and self-sacrificing service as divine and

blaspheme redeeming love, who are in danger of eternal sin (Mark iii.

28-29). All who do the will of the Father, i.e. who serve their fellows,

are the brethren of Christ, even though they do not call him Lord (Mark

iii. 31-35; Matt. vii. 21): and those are blessed who minister to the

needy even though ignorant of any relation to himself (Matt. xxv.

37-40). Finally, membership in his own selected company, or a place in

the chosen people, is not of prime importance (Mark ix. 38-40; Luke

xiii. 24-30).

Jesus also refuses to conform to the current ideas as to the

establishment of the kingdom. He wrought miracles, it is true, because

of his divine sympathy and compassion, but he refused to show miraculous

signs as a proof of his Messianic character (Mark viii. 12). The

tradition of the people implied a sudden appearance of the Messiah, but

Jesus made no claims to a supernatural origin and was content to be

known as the son of Joseph and Mary (Mark vi. 3-4). His kingdom is not

to be set up by wonders and miraculous powers, nor is it to be

established by force (Matt. xxvi. 52). Such means would contradict its

fundamental character, for as the kingdom of loving service it can be

established only by loving service. And as God is love, he can be

revealed not by prodigies of power but only by a love which is faithful

unto death.

Even the disciples of Jesus could not grasp the simplicity and

profundity of his message; still less could his opponents. When the

crisis came, he alone remained unshaken in his faith. He was accused of

blasphemy to the ecclesiastical authorities and of insurrection to the

civil rulers. He was condemned and crucified. His followers were

scattered every man to his own place as sheep without a shepherd. Of his

work nothing remained, not a written word, nor more than the rudiments

of an organization. The decisive event, which turned defeat into victory

and re-established courage and faith, was the resurrection of Jesus from

the dead and his reappearance to his disciples. Our sources will not

permit the precise determination of the order or the nature of these

appearances, but in any case from them arose the faith which was the

basis of the Christian Church and the starting-point of its theology.

The death of Jesus as a criminal, and his resurrection, profoundly

aroused the belief and hopes of the little group of Jews who were his

followers. His person and mission assumed the first place in their

affections and their thinking. He had been to them a prophet, mighty in

word and deed, but he now becomes to them the Messiah, Christ. It is not

his word but his person which assumes first place, and faith is

acceptance of him--crucified and risen--as Messiah. Hence his followers

early acquire the name Christians from the Greek form of the word. With

this emphasis upon the Messiah the Jewish element would seem to be

predominant, but as a matter of fact it was not so. The earlier group of

disciples, it is true, did not appreciate the universality of the

teaching of Jesus, and they continued zealous for the older forms, but

St Paul through his prophetic consciousness grasped the fundamental fact

and became Jesus' true interpreter. As a result Christianity was

rejected by the Jews and became the conquering religion of the Roman

empire. In this it underwent another modification of far-reaching

consequence.

Christianity and Greek thought.

In our earliest sources--the epistles of St Paul--Christ is the

pre-existent man from heaven, who had there existed in the form of God,

and had come to earth by a voluntary act of self-humiliation. He is

before and above all things. By him all things exist. In the Johannine

writings he is the Son of God--the Logos who in the beginning was with

God--of whom are all things--who lightens every man--and who was

incarnate in Jesus. Here the cosmological element is again made

prominent though not yet supreme, and the metaphysical problems are so

close at hand that their discussion is imperative. Even in Paul the term

Messiah thus had lost its definite meaning and became almost a proper

name. Among the Greek Christians this process was complete. Jesus is the

"Son of God"; and the great problem of theology becomes explicit.

Religion is in our emotions of reverence and dependence, and theology is

the intellectual attempt to describe the object of worship. Doubtless

the two do not exactly coincide, not only because accuracy is difficult

or even impossible, but also because elements are admitted into the

definition of God which are derived from various sources quite distinct

from the religious experience. Like all concepts the meaning of

religious terms is changed with a changing experience and a changing

world-view. Transplanted into the Greek world-view, inevitably the

Christian teaching was modified--indeed transformed. Questions which had

never been asked came into the foreground, and the Jewish

presuppositions tended to disappear. Especially were the Messianic hopes

forgotten or transferred to a transcendent sphere beyond death. When the

empire became Christian in the 4th century, the notion of a kingdom of

Christ on earth to be introduced by a great struggle all but

disappeared, remaining only as the faith of obscure groups.

Immortality--the philosophical conception--took the place of the

resurrection of the body. Nevertheless the latter continues because of

its presence in the primary sources, but it is no longer a determining

factor, since its presupposition--the Messianic kingdom on earth--has

been obscured. As thus the background is changed from Jewish to Greek,

so are the fundamental religious conceptions.

The Semitic peoples were essentially theocratic in their religion; they

used the forms of the sensuous imagination in setting forth the

realities of the unseen world. They were not given to metaphysical

speculation, nor long insistent in their inquiries as to the meaning and

origin of things. With the Greeks it was far otherwise. For them ideas

and not images set forth fundamental reality, and their restless

intellectual activity would be content with nothing else than the

ultimate truth. Their speculation as to the nature of God had led them

gradually to separate him by an infinite distance from all creation, and

to feel keenly the opposition of the finite and the infinite, the

perfect and the imperfect, the eternal and the temporal. To them,

therefore, Christianity presented itself not primarily as the religion

of a redemption through the indwelling power of a risen saviour, as with

Paul, nor even as the solution of the problem how the sins of men could

be forgiven, but as the reconciliation of the antinomy of the intellect,

indicated above. The incarnation became the great truth: God is no

longer separated by a measureless distance from the human race, but by

his entering into humanity he redeems it and makes possible its ultimate

unity with himself. Such lines of thought provoke discussion as to the

relationship of Jesus to God the Father, and, at a later period, of the

nature of the Holy Spirit who enters into and transforms believers.

Greek philosophy in the second century A.D. had sunk for the most part

into scepticism and impotence; its original impulse had been lost, and

no new intellectual power took its place; only in Alexandria was there a

genuine effort made to solve the fundamental problems of God and the

world. Plato had made God accessible to the highest knowledge as the

transcendent idea, remote from the world. For Aristotle, too, God in his

essence is far above the world and at most its first mover. The stoics,

on the other hand, taught his immanence, while the eclectics sought

truth by the mingling of the two ideas. They accomplished their purpose

in various ways, by distinguishing between God and his power--or by the

notion of a hierarchy of super-sensible beings, or in a doctrine which

taught that the operations of nature are the movement of pure spirit; or

by the use of the "Word" of "Wisdom," half personified as intermediate

between God and the world. While these monotheistic, pantheistic

doctrines were taught in the schools, the people were left to a debased

polytheism and to new superstitions imported from the Orient; the

philosophers themselves were by no means unaffected by the popular

beliefs. Mingled with all these were the ancient legends of gods and

heroes, accepted as inspired scripture by the people, and by

philosophers in part explained away by an allegorical exegesis and in

part felt increasingly as a burden to the intelligence. In this period

of degeneracy there were none the less an awakening to religious needs

and a profound longing for a new revelation of truth, which should

satisfy at once the intellect and the religious emotions.

Christianity came as supplying a new power; it freed philosophy from

scepticism by giving a definite object to its efforts and a renewed

confidence in its mission. Monotheism henceforth was to be the belief

not of philosophers only but even of the ignorant, and in Jesus Christ

the union of the divine and the human was effected. The Old Testament,

allegorically explained, became the substitute for the outgrown

mythology; intellectual activity revived; the new facts gained

predominant influence in philosophy, and in turn were shaped according

to its canons. In theology the fundamental problems of ontological

philosophy were faced; the relationship of unity to multiplicity, of

noumenon to phenomena, of God to man. The new element is the historical

Jesus, at once the representative of humanity and of God. As in

philosophy, so now in theology, the easiest solution of the problem was

the denial of one of its factors: and successively these efforts were

made, until a solution was found in the doctrine of the Trinity, which

satisfied both terms of the equation and became the fundamental creed of

the church. Its moulds of thought are those of Greek philosophy, and

into these were run the Jewish teachings. We have thus a peculiar

combination--the religious doctrines of the Bible, as culminating in the

person of Jesus, run through the forms of an alien philosophy.

The doctrine of the Trinity.

The Jewish sources furnished the terms Father, Messiah, Son and Spirit.

Jesus seldom employed the last term and St Paul's use of it is not

altogether clear. Already in Jewish literature it had been all but

personified (cf. the Wisdom of Solomon). Thus the material is Jewish,

though already modified doubtless by Greek influence. But the problem is

Greek. It is not primarily ethical nor even religious, but it is

metaphysical. What is the ontological relationship between these three

factors? The answer is given in the Nicene formula, which is

characteristically Greek. By it we perceive how God, the infinite, the

absolute, the eternal, is yet not separated from the finite, the

temporal, the relative, but, through the incarnation, enters into

humanity. We further see how this entering into humanity is not an

isolated act but continues in all the children of God by the indwelling

spirit. Thus, according to the canons of the ancient philosophy, justice

is done to all the factors of our problem--God remains as Father, the

infinitely remote and absolute source of all; as Son, the Word who is

revealed to man and incarnate in him; as Spirit, who dwells even in our

own souls and by his substance unites us to God.

While thus the Greek philosophy furnished the dialectic and the mould

for the characteristic Christian teaching, the doctrine of the Trinity

preserved religious values. By Jesus the disciples had been led to God,

and he was the central fact of faith. After the resurrection he was the

object of praise, and soon prayers were offered in his name and to him.

Already to the apostle Paul he dominates the world and is above all

created things, visible and invisible, so that he has the religious

value of God. It is not God as abstract, infinite and eternal, as the

far-away creator of the universe, or even as the ruler of the world,

which Paul worships, but it is God revealed in Jesus Christ, the Father

of Jesus Christ, the grace and mercy in Jesus Christ which deliver from

evil. Metaphysics and speculative theories were valueless for Paul; he

was conscious of a mighty power transforming his own life and filling

him with joy, and that this power was identical with Jesus of Nazareth

he knew. In all this Paul is the representative of that which is highest

and best in early Christianity. Speculation and hyperspiritualization

were ever tending to obscure this fundamental religious fact: in the

interest of a higher doctrine of God his true presence in Jesus was

denied, and by exaggeration of Paul's doctrine of "Christ in us" the

significance of the historic Jesus was given up. The Johannine writings,

which presupposed the Pauline movement, are a protest against the

hyperspiritualizing tendency. They insist that the Son of God has been

incarnate in Jesus of Nazareth, and that our hands have handled and our

eyes have seen the word of life. This same purpose, namely, to hold fast

to the historic Jesus, triumphed in the doctrine of the Trinity; Jesus

was not to be resolved into an aeon or into some mysterious _tertium

quid_, neither God nor man, but to be recognized as very God who

redeemed the soul. Through him men were to understand the Father and to

understand themselves as God's children. Thus the doctrine of the

Trinity satisfied at once the philosophic intelligence of scholars and

the religious needs of Christians. Only thus can its adoption and

ultimate acceptance be explained. Its doctrinal form is the philosophic

statement of beliefs held by the common people, who had little interest

in theology, but whose faith centred in Jesus. It marks the

naturalization of Christianity in the Greek world for the common people

who believed in Christ, and for the philosophers who justified the faith

to reason.

The historic and religious values of the doctrine of the Trinity may be

illustrated by way of contrast. The Mah[=a]y[=a]na systems are the union

of Buddha's teaching with the forms of the Brahman philosophy. The

historic Buddha--the man Gautama--is taught as only one of a limitless

series of incarnations or (better) appearances. For his life on earth

with his material body was only an appearance, a seeming, a phenomenon,

and simultaneously with its activities the true Buddha existed unmoved

and eternal. Thus the way was opened for other apparitional Buddhas, and

different sects take different ones as the objects of faith and worship.

Moreover, our true nature is also Buddha. The conscious life of all men

is apparitional and illusive. Salvation is the comprehension of this

fact, and in the apprehension of our essential oneness with the

absolute. Hence the way of salvation is by knowledge. In the

Mah[=a]y[=a]na gnosticism was triumphant, and the historic values of

Gautama's teaching and personality are lost. The Mahãyãna illustrates in

part what would have followed the triumph of gnosticism in Christianity,

for not only would the historic value of the life and teaching of Jesus

have been lost, but with it the significance of humanity.

It is apparent that such a doctrine as the Trinity is itself susceptible

of many explanations, and minds differently constituted lay emphasis

upon its different elements. Especially is this true as its Greek

terminology was translated into Latin, and from Latin came into modern

languages--the original meaning being obscured or disguised, and the

original issues forgotten. For some the first thought of God, the

infinite and ultimate reality lying beyond and behind all phenomena,

predominates. With these the historic manifestation of Jesus becomes

only a guide to lead us to that immediate apprehension of God which is

the end of theology, and to that immediate union with God which is the

end of religion. Such an end is accomplished either by means of pure

thought or by a oneness of pure feeling, giving as results the

theological or philosophical construction of the concept God, or a

mystical ecstasy which is itself at once immediate, inexplicable and

indescribable. On the other hand, minds of a different and more concrete

character so emphasize the distinctions God, Son and Holy Spirit, that a

tritheistic construction appears--three individuals in the one Godhead:

these individuals appearing, as for example in the Father and the Son,

even in opposition to each other. In general we may say then that the

Trinity takes on four differing aspects in the Christian church: in its

more common and easily apprehended form as three Gods, in its

ecclesiastical form as a mystery which is above reason to be accepted by

faith, in its philosophic form as the highest reason which solves the

ultimate problems of the universe, and finally, as a mode by which the

spirit through an emotional content enters into communion with God

himself.

To some Christians the doctrine of the Trinity appeared inconsistent

with the unity of God which is emphasized in the Scriptures. They

therefore denied it, and accepted Jesus Christ, not as incarnate God,

but as God's highest creature by whom all else was created, or as the

perfect man who taught the true doctrine of God. The first view in the

early Church long contended with the orthodox doctrine, but finally

disappeared, and the second doctrine in the modern Church was set forth

as easily intelligible, but has remained only as the faith of sects

relatively small in number.

The doctrine of the cross.

Allied with the doctrine of God which seeks the solution of the ultimate

problem of all philosophy, the doctrine of salvation has taken the most

prominent place in the Christian faith: so prominent, indeed, that to a

large portion of believers it has been the supreme doctrine, and the

doctrine of the deity of Jesus has been valued only because of its

necessity on the effect of the atonement. Jesus alone of the great

founders of religion suffered an early and violent death, even the death

of a criminal. It became therefore the immediate task of his followers

to explain this fact. This explanation was the more urgent because under

the influence of Jewish monotheism the rule of God was accepted as an

undoubted presupposition, so that the death of Jesus must be in

accordance with his will. The early Church naturally used the terms and

phrases of the prophets. He died the death of a criminal, not for his

sins, but for ours. Isaiah liii. was suggested at once and became the

central explanation: Christ is the suffering servant who is numbered

with the transgressors and who bears the sins of many.

Jesus faced this problem perhaps before the opening of his ministry,

certainly from his break with the ecclesiastical authorities. As his

violent death drew near, his words indicated how he preserved his deep

faith unshaken while yet recognizing the seeming failure of his mission.

He devotes himself more exclusively to the little body of his faithful

friends and commits his mission to them. As his work is sealed by his

death his body is broken and his blood is shed for them. Through this is

to come the victory which is denied to his life, as the seed cast into

the ground and dead brings forth fruit. Our hints are few of Jesus'

teaching, but this much, at least, we cannot doubt unless we suppose

that death took him unawares, or that his explanation of the impending

fact took on some un-Jewish form; and further, that the earliest

tradition misrepresents him. But these hypotheses do not commend

themselves, and we accept the tradition that Jesus taught that his death

was an atonement for others.

Beyond this the gospel does not go. Why vicarious suffering is needed,

or why the God who is the loving Father does not simply forgive, as in

the parable of the prodigal son, is not asked. For after all it is not

theory which is central, but the fact of the death, and the reason

assigned is simply "for others."

In St Paul we find the beginnings of explanation, indeed of two

explanations, and in the Epistle to the Hebrews the whole sacrificial

system is found to culminate in Christ, of whom all priests and

sacrifices are symbols, so that they are abolished with the coming of

the great reality.

In the Greek world further questions are raised and the thought of the

death as a ransom is prominent. To whom was the ransom paid? For a

thousand years the answer was "to the devil." He had gained control of

man by man's sin, and Christ set man free. God then, who is love,

delivers us from evil through Christ, who pays the penalty of our

transgression to the enemy of God and man. There were other theories

also, indeed the germs of all later theories existed even in the second

century, but this one prevailed. The heretic Marcion taught a variant,

namely, the existence of two Gods, one of the Old Testament of law, the

other of the New Testament of grace. Christ, unjustly condemned by the

God of law, is given as reparation for all men who put their trust in

him. From Anselm's time (12th century A.D.) this theory of Marcion's is

held as orthodox in substance but is made monotheistic in form. St

Anselm denied that any penalty was due to the devil, and in terms of

feudal honour restated the problem. The conflict here is in God himself,

so to speak, between his immutable righteousness and his limitless

grace. In the sacrifice of Jesus these are reconciled. This doctrine of

St Anselm's attaches itself readily to texts of St Paul, for his

teachings contain undeniably the vicarious propitiatory element.

These theories have to do with the being to whom the ransom is paid or

the sacrifice offered. Another group of theories deals with the effect

of the death of Christ upon the sinner. One of these is the so-called

governmental theory, wherein the death of Christ is set forth as for the

sake of good government, so that the forgiveness of sins shall not be

thought a sign of laxity. Again, by other theologians the death of Jesus

is extolled because of the moral influence it exerts, since Christ's

devotion unto death incites a like devotion in us.

Excepting in relatively narrow circles these theories have been

seriously studied only by professed theologians. That Christ died for

us, and that we are saved by him, is indeed the living truth of the

Church in all ages, and a false impression of the fact is given by

dwelling upon theories as if they were central. At best they bear only

the relationship of philosophy to life.

Another explanation, or (better) system of beliefs, has been far more

influential in the Church. Belief in mysterious powers attached to food,

feasts, ceremonial rites and sacred things is all but universal.

Primitive man seldom connects sacrifice with notions of propitiation,

indeed only in highly ethicized religions is the consciousness of sin or

of guilt pre-eminent. Sacrifice was believed to exert an influence on

the deity which is quasi-physical, and in sacrificial feasts God and

worshipper are in mysterious union. Sometimes, indeed, such contact with

deity is thought to be dangerous, and the rites indicate avoidance

(tabu), and sometimes it is thought desirable.

So universal are such ideas that the problem in particular religions is

not their origin but their form. In the Old Testament repeatedly they

are found in conflict with the prophetic ideals. Sometimes the prophets

denounce them, sometimes ignore them, sometimes attempt to reform and

control them. Jesus ignores them, his emphasis being so strong upon the

ethical and spiritual that the rest is passed by. In the early Church,

still Jewish, the belief was in the coming of a mysterious power from

God which produced ecstasy and worked wonders. St Paul also believes in

this, but insists that it is subordinate to the peaceable fruits of

righteousness. With the naturalization of the Church in the Gentile

world ethical ideas became less prominent, and the sacramental system

prevailed. By baptism and the Lord's Supper grace is given (_ex opere

operato_), so that man is renewed and made capable of salvation. Already

in the 2nd century baptism was described as a bath in which the health

of the soul is restored, and the Lord's Supper as the potion of

immortality. Similar notions present in the ethnic faiths take the

Christian facts into their service, the belief of the multitude without

essential change remaining vague and undefined. While the theologians

discussed doctrine the people longed for mystery, as it satisfied their

religious natures. By sacraments they felt themselves brought into the

presence of God, and to sacraments they looked for aid. Many sacraments

were adopted by portions of the Church, until at last the sacred number

seven was agreed upon.

The concepts of salvation.

As the way of salvation was modified, so too was the idea of salvation:

the dream of a Messianic kingdom on earth, with its corollary the

resurrection of the physical body, faded away, especially after the

Roman empire adopted Christianity; It was no longer the Jewish nation

against the heathen empire, for the Jewish nation had ceased to be, and

the empire and the Church were one. Salvation henceforth is not the

descent of the New Jerusalem out of heaven, but the ascent of the saints

to heaven; for the individual it is not the resurrection of the body but

the immortality of the soul. So Jesus is no longer Christ or Messiah,

but the Son of God. These terms again are variously interpreted: heaven

is still thought of by many under the imagery of the book of Revelation,

and by others it is conceived as a mystical union of the soul with God

through the intelligence or of feelings. Yet the older conceptions still

continue, Christianity not becoming purely and simply Greek. Again and

again individuals and groups turn back to the Semitic cycle of hopes and

ideas, while the reconciliation of the two systems, Jewish and

Graeco-Roman, becomes the task of exegetes and theologians.

These hopes and theories of salvation, however, do not explain the power

of Christianity. Jesus wearied himself with the healing of man's

physical ailments, and he was remembered as the great physician. Early

Christian literature is filled with medical terms, applied (it is true)

for the greater part to the cure of souls. The records of the Church are

also filled with the efforts of Jesus' followers to heal the diseases

and satisfy the wants of men. A vast activity animated the early Church:

to heal the sick, to feed the hungry, to succour the diseased, to rescue

the fallen, to visit the prisoners, to forgive the erring, to teach the

ignorant, were ministries of salvation. A mighty power impelled men to

deny themselves in the service of others, and to find in this service

their own true life. None the less the first place is given to the

salvation of the soul, since, created for an unending existence, it is

of transcendent importance. While man is fallen and by nature vile,

nevertheless his possibilities are so vast that in comparison the

affairs of earth are insignificant. The word, "What shall it profit a

man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul?" comes to mean

that the individual soul outvalues the whole world. With emphasis upon

God as creator and ruler, and upon man as made in God's image, endowed

with an unending existence, and subject to eternal torture if not

redeemed, the concept of personality has been exalted at the expense of

that of nature, and the future has been magnified at the expense of the

present. Thus a future heaven is man's true home, and theology instead

of philosophy or natural science is his proper study.

Indeed, intellectual interest centred in religion. Natural science was

forsaken, except in so far as it ministered to theology. Because the Old

Testament contained references to the origin and the objects of the

universe, a certain amount of natural science was necessary, but it was

only in this connexion that it had any value. By Augustine's time this

process is complete. His writings contain most of the knowledge of his

age, but it is strictly subordinate to his theological purpose. Hence,

when the barbarians submerged southern Europe, theology alone survived.

The Church entered upon a new task. In the beginning Christianity had

been the teacher of religion to highly civilized peoples--now it became

the civilizing agent to the barbarians, the teacher of better customs,

the upholder of law and the source of knowledge. The learned men were

monks and priests, the universities were Church institutions, and

theology was the queen of the sciences.

Theology and worship.

The relation of cult to creed is still undetermined. Theoretically the

first depends on the second, for its purpose is twofold: the excitation

of worthy religious emotions and the attaining of our desires; and how

shall these objects be attained unless we know him whom we worship and

to whom we pray? But it is plausibly maintained that the reverse is

true, namely, that theology rests on cult. In the beginnings of

consciousness instinctive reactions precede definite thoughts, and even

in mature life thoughts often follow acts instead of preceding them. Our

religious consciousness is simply our ordinary consciousness obeying its

laws. So unpurposed does cult grow up that it combines many elements of

diverse origin, and is seldom precisely and wholly in accordance with

the creed. No doubt the two interact, cult influencing creed and creed

modifying cult--cult, perhaps, being most powerful in forming the actual

religious faith of the multitude. Cult divides into two unequal parts,

the stimulation of the religious emotions and the control of piety. In

the Church service it came early to centre in the sacrament of the

Eucharist (q.v.). In the earliest period the services were characterized

by extreme freedom, and by manifestations of ecstasy which were believed

to indicate the presence of the spirit of God; but as the years went by

the original enthusiasm faded away, the cult became more and more

controlled, until ultimately it was completely subject to the

priesthood, and through the priesthood to the Church. In the Roman

communion the structure of the sacred edifice, the positions and

attitudes of the priest and the congregation, the order of service,

emphasize the mystery and the divine efficacy of the sacrament. The

worshipper feels himself in the immediate presence of God, and enters

into physical relations with him. Participation in the mass also

releases from guilt, as the Lamb of God offered up atones for sin and

intercedes with the Father in our behalf. Thus in this single act of

devotion both objects of all cults are attained.

Pollty.

As the teaching and person of Jesus were fitted into the framework of

the Greek philosophy, and the sacraments into the deeper and broader

forms of popular belief, so was the organization shaped by the polity of

the Roman empire. Jesus gathered his group of followers and committed to

it his mission, and after his resurrection the necessities of the

situation brought about the choice of quasi-officials. Later the

familiar polity of the synagogue was loosely followed. A completer

organization was retarded by two factors, the presence of the apostles

and the inspiration of the prophets. But when the apostles died and the

early enthusiasm disappeared, a stricter order arose. Practical

difficulties called for the enforcement of discipline, and differences

of opinion for authority in doctrine; and, finally, the sacramentarian

system required a priesthood. In the 2nd century the conception of a

Catholic Church was widely held and a loose embodiment was given it;

after the conversion of the empire the organization took on the official

forms of the empire. Later it was modified by the rise of the feudal

system and the re-establishment of the modern European nationalities

(see CHURCH HISTORY).

Penance.

The polity of the Church was more than a formal organization; it touched

the life of each believer. Very early, Christianity was conceived to be

a new system of law, and faith was interpreted as obedience. Legalism

was joined with sacramentarianism, doubling the power of the priest.

Through him Church discipline was administered, a complete system of

ecclesiastical penalties, i.e. penance, growing up. It culminated in the

doctrine of purgatory, a place of discipline, of purifying suffering

after death. The Roman genius for law strengthened and systematized this

tendency.

The hierarchy which centres in the pope constitutes the Church of which

the sacramental system is the inner life and penance is the sanction. It

is thus a divine-human organization. It teaches that the divine-human

Son of God established it, and returning to heaven committed to the

apostles, especially to St Peter, his authority, which has descended in

an unbroken line through the popes. This is the charter of the Church,

and its acceptance is the first requisite for salvation; for the Church

determines doctrine, exercises discipline and administers sacraments.

Its authority is accompanied by the spirit of God, who guides it into

truth and gives it miraculous power. Outside the Church there are only

the "broken lights" of man's philosophy and the vain efforts of weak

human nature after virtue.

The completed doctrine of the Roman Church.

Christianity in its complete Roman development is thus the coming of the

supernatural into the natural. The universe falls into these orders, the

second for the sake of the first, as nature is of and for God. Without

him nature at its highest is like a beautiful statue, devoid of life; it

is of secondary moment compared even to men, for while it passes away he

continues for ever. He is dependent, therefore, not upon nature, but

upon God's grace for salvation, and this comes through the Church. In

the book of Revelation the New Jerusalem descending from heaven to the

earth may be taken as a symbol of a continuing process: the human

receives the divine, as the Virgin Mary received the Holy Spirit and

brought forth Jesus, perfect man and perfect God. Thus the Church ever

receives God and has a twofold nature; its sacraments through material

and earthly elements impart a divine power; its teachings agree with the

highest truths of philosophy and science, yet add to these the knowledge

of mysteries which eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it

entered into the heart of man to conceive; it sanctifies human

relationships, but the happiness of earth at purest and best is only a

shadow of the divine bliss which belongs to the redeemed soul. Hence man

should deny the world for the sake of the other world, and the title

"religious" belongs distinctly to the monastic and priestly life.

Theology is the queen of the sciences, and nothing should be taught in

school or university which contradicts its conclusions. Moreover,

nothing should be done by the state which interferes with the

transcendent interest committed to the Church. Thus the Church touches

and controls all realms of life, and the cycle is complete. It began as

separate from the world and proscribed by it; next it adapted itself to

the learning, the customs and the polity of the world. Finally it

asserted its mastery and assumed sovereign power over all. The Church in

its completed form was the outcome of a long development; if the seed

was Jewish the environment was Gentile. Into the full tree were gathered

the effects, not only of the initial energy, but of the forces of earth,

air, water and sun. The Roman Church expressed the beliefs and answered

the needs of the people, and this explains in part both its forms and

its power, its long continuance and wide supremacy.

The Eastern Church.

The Church was never completely successful in unifying its organization.

In part it shared the destiny of the Roman empire, and with it fell into

two parts, East separating from West. Indeed the East never really

acknowledged the Roman primacy nor shared in its development, and it

still remains apart. With characteristic oriental conservatism it claims

the title of "Orthodox," and retains the creed and organization of the

early Church. In general its conception of the relation of the world to

the super-world is identical with that of the Roman Church, though

somewhat less defined, as its organization is less complete. It has

remained in the second stage mentioned above; established, as in Russia,

by the empire, it is dependent upon it and in alliance with it. In the

Mahommedan dominions it has been recognized as a state within the state,

and in these communities faith and patriotism are one.

The Reformation.

The idea of the Roman Church was imperfectly embodied at the best; the

divine gift was in earthen vessels. The world was never completely cast

out; indeed the Church became the scene for ambition and the home of

luxury and pleasure. It was entangled also in the political strife of

the feudal ages and of the beginning of modern empires. Its control of

the sciences embroiled it with its own philosophers and scholars, while

saints and pure-minded ecclesiastics attempted, without success, its

reform from within. Finally, through Luther, the explosion came, and

western Christendom broke into two parts--Catholic and Protestant.

Protestantism in its primary principle is the return to primitive

Christianity. The whole development which we have traced, culminating in

the ecclesiastical-doctrinal system of the Roman Church, is regarded as

a corruption, since foreign and even heathen elements have been brought

in, so that the religion established by Christ is obscured or lost. For

Protestants the Bible only now becomes the infallible, inspired

authority in faith and morals. Interpretations by the Fathers or by the

councils are to be taken only as aids to its understanding. With this

principle is associated a second, the liberty of the individual; he

reads the sacred Scriptures and interprets them for himself without the

intervention of priests or church; and he enters by faith in Christ into

communion with God, so that all believers are priests. Here may be noted

a fundamental difference in the psychology of religion, since in the

Roman Church the chief appeal is to the emotions, while in the Reformed

it is to the intelligence. Yet this appeal to the intelligence is not

rationalism: the latter makes reason the supreme authority, rejecting

all which does not conform to it; the Bible is treated like any other

book, to be accepted or rejected in part or in whole as it agrees with

our canons of logic and our general science, while religion submits to

the same process as do other departments of knowledge. But in

Protestantism reason and the light of nature are in themselves as

impotent as in the Roman Church. The Bible interpreted by man's unaided

intelligence is as valueless as other writings, but it has a sacramental

value when the Holy Spirit accompanies its teaching, and the power of

God uses it and makes the soul capable of holiness. In all this the

supernatural is as vividly realized as in the Roman Church; it is only

its mediation which is different.

Protestantism.

These principles are variously worked out in the different churches and

variously expressed. In part because of historical circumstances, the

divergence from the older systems is more marked in some Protestant

churches than in others, yet on the whole these two principles

determine cult and in part organization. As in the Roman Church cult

centres in the mass, so in the Reformed Church it centres in the sermon.

The Holy Spirit, the determining factor in the religious life, uses the

Bible as his means, and calls the intelligence into action. The

clergyman is primarily the preacher, renewed by God's power and

enlightened by the Spirit, so that he speaks with divine authority. The

ancient Jewish prophetic office is revived, yet with a difference: the

ancient prophets acknowledged no external authority, but the Protestant

preacher is strictly subordinate to the Scriptures of which he is the

interpreter. Beside the sermon the sacraments are observed as

established by Christ--two in number, baptism and the Lord's Supper. But

these do not exert a quasi-physical or magical influence, _ex opere

operato_. Unless there be faith in the recipient, an understanding of

the meaning of the sacrament and an acceptance of it, it is valueless or

harmful. Prayer and praise also are effective only as the congregation

intelligently join in them; hence they are not to be solely by a priest

nor in a strange tongue, as the clergyman is simply the leader of the

devotions of the people. In large portions of the Church also

opportunity for the free expression of the religious experience of the

laity is found.

The emphasis upon the believer and his freedom from all external

authority do not result in a thoroughgoing individualism. Luther clearly

held to the unity of all Christians, and Protestants are agreed in this.

For them, as for the Roman Church, there is a belief in a catholic or

all-embracing Church, but the unity is not that of an organization;

Christians are one through an indwelling spirit; they hold the same

faith, undergo the same experience and follow the same purpose. This

inner life constitutes the oneness of believers and forms the true

Church which is invisible. It expresses itself in outward forms, yet

there are not two Churches visible and invisible, but only one. The

spiritual experience of the individual utters itself in words, and

desires association with others who know the same grace. There is formed

a body of teaching in which all agree, and an organization in which the

common experience finds expression and aid. While then membership in

this organization is not primary, it assumes a higher and even a vital

importance, since a true experience recognizes the common faith and the

common fellowship. Were it to refuse assent to these, doubt would be

thrown upon its own trustworthiness.

Historically these principles were only in part embodied, for the

Reformation was involved in political strife. The Reformers turned to

the government for aid and protection, and throughout Europe turmoil and

war ensued. In consequence, in the Protestant nations the state assumed

the ultimate authority over the Church. Moreover, in the early days of

the Reformation the Catholic Church charged it with a lawless

individualism, a charge which was seemingly made good by an extreme

divergence in theological opinion and by riots in various parts of the

Protestant world. The age was indeed one of ferment, so that the

foundations of society and of religion seemed threatened. The Reformers

turned to the state for protection against the Roman Church, and

ultimately as a refuge from anarchy, and they also returned to the

theology of the Fathers as their safeguard against heresy. Instead of

the simplicity of Luther's earlier writings, a dogmatic theology was

formed, and a Protestant ecclesiasticism established, indistinguishable

from the Roman Church in principle. The main difference was in the

attitude to the Roman allegiance and to the sacramentarian system. There

was thus by no means a complete return to the Bible as the sole

authority, but the Bible was taken as interpreted by the earlier creeds

and as worked into a doctrinal system by the scholastic philosophy. Thus

Protestantism also came to identify theology with the whole range of

human knowledge, and in its official forms it was as hostile to the

progress of science as was the Roman Church itself.

Many Protestants rebelled against this radical departure from the

principles of the Reformation and of Biblical Christianity. To them it

seemed the substitution of the authority of the Church for the authority

of a living experience and of intellectual adherence to theological

propositions for faith. The freedom of the individual was denied when

the state enforced religious conformity. Thus a struggle within

Protestantism arose, with persecutions of Protestants by Protestants.

Moreover, many failed to find the expression of their faith in the

official creed or in the established organization, and Protestantism

divided into many sects and denominations, founded upon special types of

religious experience or upon particular points in doctrine or in cult.

Thus Protestantism presents a wide diversity in comparison with the

regularity of the Roman Church. This we should expect indeed from its

insistence upon individual freedom; yet, notwithstanding certain notable

exceptions, amid the diversity there is a substantial unity, a unity

which in our day finds expression in common organizations for great

practical ends, for example in the "Bible Societies," "Tract Societies,"

the "Young Men's Christian Associations," "Societies of Christian

Endeavour," &c., which disregard denominational lines.

Christianity and the modern world.

The coming of the northern peoples into the Roman world profoundly

modified Christianity. It shared indeed in the dreariness and corruption

of the times commonly called the "dark ages," but when at last a

productive period began the Church was the first to profit by it. Since

all educated men were priests, it assimilated the new learning--the

revived Aristotelianism--and continued its control of the universities.

In the 13th century it was supreme, and Christianity was identified with

world systems of knowledge and politics. Both were deemed alike divine

in origin, and to question their validity was an offence against God.

Christianity thus had passed through three stages in politics as in

science. At first it was persecuted by the state, then established by

it, and finally dominated over it; so its teaching was at first alien to

philosophy and despised by it, next was accepted by it and given form

and rights through it, and finally became queen of the sciences as

theology and ruled over the whole world of human knowledge. But the

triumph by its completeness ensured new conflicts; from the disorder of

the middle ages arose states which ultimately asserted complete

autonomy, and in like fashion new intellectual powers came forth which

ultimately established the independence of the sciences.

In the broadest sense the underlying principle of the struggle is the

reassertion of interest in the world. It is no longer merely the scene

for the drama of the soul and God, nor is man independent of it, but man

and nature constitute an organism, humanity being a part of the vaster

whole. Man's place is not even central, as he appears a temporary

inhabitant of a minor planet in one of the lesser stellar systems. Every

science is involved, and theology has come into conflict with

metaphysics, logic, astronomy, physics, chemistry, geology, zoology,

biology, history and even economics and medicine. From the modern point

of view this is unavoidable and even desirable, since "theology" here

represents the science of the 13th century. As in the political world

the states gained first the undisputed control of matters secular,

rejecting even the proffered counsel of the Church, and then proceeded

to establish their sovereignty over the Church itself, so was it in the

empire of the mind. The rights gained for independent research were

extended over the realm of religion also; the two indeed cannot remain

separate, and man must subordinate knowledge to the authority of

religion--or make science supreme, submitting religion to its scrutiny

and judging it like other phenomena. Under this investigation

Christianity does not appear altogether exceptional. Its early logic,

ontology and cosmology, with many of its distinctive doctrines, are

shown to be the natural offspring of the races and ages which gave them

birth. Put into their historical environment they are freed from adverse

criticism, and indeed valued as steps in the intellectual development of

man's mind. Advanced seriously, however, as truths to-day, they are put

aside as anachronisms not worthy of dispute. The Bible is studied like

other works, its origins discovered and its place in comparative

religion assigned. It does not appear as altogether unique, but it is

put among the other sacred books. For the great religions of the world

show similar cycles of development, similar appropriations of prevalent

science and philosophy, similar conservative insistence upon ancient

truth, and similar claims to an exclusive authority.

With this interest is involved an attitude of mind toward the

supernatural. As already pointed out, nature and super-nature were taken

as physically and spatially distinct. The latter could descend upon the

former and be imparted to it, neither subject to nature nor intelligible

by reason. In science the process has been reversed; nature ascends, so

to speak, into the region of the supernatural and subdues it to itself;

the marvellous or miraculous is brought under the domain of natural law,

the canons of physics extend over metaphysics, and religion takes its

place as one element in the natural relationship of man to his

environment. Hence the new world-view threatens the foundations of the

ecclesiastical edifice. This revolution in the world-view is no longer

the possession of philosophers and scholars, but the multitude accepts

it in part. Education in general has rendered many familiar with the

teachings of science, and, moreover, its practical benefits have given

authority to its maxims and theories. The world's problem is not only

therefore acute, but the demand for its solution is wider than ever

before.

The attitude of the Roman Church.

The Roman Catholic Church uncompromisingly reasserts its ancient

propositions, political and theological. The cause is lost indeed in the

political realm, where the Church is obliged to submit, but it protests

and does not waive or modify its claims (see the Syllabus of 1864,

paragraphs 19 ff., 27, 54 and 55). In the Greek and Protestant churches

this situation cannot arise, as they make no claims to governmental

sovereignty. In the intellectual domain the situation is more complex.

Again the Roman Church unhesitatingly reaffirms the ancient principles

in their extreme form (Syllabus, paragraphs 8-9-13; Decrees of the

Vatican Council, chapter 4, note especially canon 4-2). The works of St

Thomas Aquinas are recommended as the standard authority in theology

(Encyc. of Leo XIII., _Aeterni Patris_, Aug. 4, 1879). In details also

the conclusions of modern science are rejected, as for example the

origin of man from lower species, and, in a different sphere, the

conclusions of experts as to the origins of the Bible. Faith is defined

as "assent upon authority," and the authority is the Church, which

maintains its right to supremacy over the whole domain of science and

philosophy.

The Greek and Protestant Churches.

The Greek Church remains untouched by the modern spirit, and the

Protestant Churches also are bound officially to the scholastic

philosophy of the 17th century; their confessions of faith still assert

the formation of the world in six days, and require assent to

propositions which can be true only if the old cosmology be correct.

Officially then the Church identifies Christianity with the position

outlined above, and hostile critics agree to this identification,

rejecting the faith in the name of philosophic and scientific truth.

Compromises.

On the other hand there are not wanting individuals and even large

bodies of Christians who are intent upon a reinterpretation. Even in the

official circles of the Church, not excepting the Roman Church, there

are many scholars who find no difficulty in remaining Christian while

accepting the modern scientific view of the world. This is possible to

some because the situation in its sharp antithesis is not present to

their minds: by making certain compromises on the one side and on the

other, and by framing private interpretations of important dogmas, they

can retain their faith in both and yet preserve their mental integrity.

A large literature is produced, reconciling science and theology by

softening and compromising and adapting; a procedure in accordance with

general historical development, for men do not love sharp antagonisms,

nor are they prepared to carry principles to their logical conclusions.

By a fortunate power of mind they are able to believe as truths mutually

inconsistent propositions.

Thus the crisis is in fact not so acute as it might seem. No great

institution lives or dies by logic. Christianity rests on great

religious needs which it meets and gratifies, so that its life (like all

other lives) is in unrationalized emotions. Reason seeks ever to

rationalize these, an attempt which seems to destroy yet really

fulfils. As thus the restless reason tests the emotions of the soul,

criticizes the traditions to which they cling, rejects the ancient

dogmas in which they have been defined, the Church slowly participates

in the process: silently this position and that are forsaken, legends

and beliefs once of prime importance are forgotten, or when forced into

controversy many ways are found by which the old and the new are

reconciled: the sharpness of distinctions can be rubbed off, expressions

may be softened, definitions can be modified and half-way resting-places

afforded, until the momentous transition has been made and the

continuity of tradition is maintained. Finally, as the last step, even

the official documents may be revised. Such a process in Christianity is

everywhere in evidence, for even the Roman Church admits the modern

astronomy. So too it accepts the changes in the world of politics with

qualified approval. In the Syllabus of 1864 the separation of state and

church was anathematized, yet in 1906 this separation in the United

States was held up as an example to be followed by the French

government. In the Protestant Churches the process is precisely similar.

No great church has yet modified its articles of religion so as to

admit, for example, that the Garden of Eden was not a definite place

where Eve was tempted, yet the doctrine is contradicted with approval by

individuals, and the results of modern science are accepted and taught

without rebuke. In all this the Church shows its essential oneness with

other organizations of society, the government, the family, which are at

once deeply rooted in the past, and yet subject to the influences of the

present. For Christianity is by no means wholly intellectual, nor

chiefly so. It would be fully as true to facts to describe this religion

as a vast scheme for the amelioration of the condition of humanity. In

education, in care for the sick, the poor, the outcast, it has retained

the spirit of its Lord. Though it has at times denied this spirit, been

guilty of crimes, persecutions, wars and greed--still the Church has

never quite forgotten him who went about doing good, nor freed itself

from the contagion of his example. No age has been so responsive to the

needs of man as our own; whatever doubts men have as to the doctrines or

the cults there is an agreement wider than in the past in the good works

whose inspiration is a divine love.

Theories of development.

Yet the intellectual crisis cannot be ignored in the interest of the

practical life. Men must rationalize the universe. On the one hand there

are churchmen who attempt to repeat the historical process which has

naturalized the Church in alien soils by appropriating the forces of the

new environment, and who hold that the entire process is inspired and

guided by the spirit of God. Hence Christianity is the absolute

religion, because it does not preclude development but necessitates it,

so that the Christianity that is to come shall not only retain all that

is important in the Christianity of the past and present but shall

assimilate new truth. On the other hand some seek the essential

Christianity in a life beneath and separable from the historic forms. In

part under the influence of the Hegelian philosophy, and in part because

of the prevalent evolutionary scientific world-view, God is represented

under the form of pure thought, and the world process as the unfolding

of himself. Such truth can be apprehended by the multitude only in

symbols which guide the will through the imagination, and through

historic facts which are embodiment of ideas. The Trinity is the

essential Christian doctrine, the historic facts of the Christian

religion being the embodiment of religious ideas. The chief critical

difficulty felt by this school is in identifying any concrete historic

fact with the unchanging idea, that is, in making Jesus of Nazareth the

incarnation of God. God is reinterpreted, and in place of an

extra-mundane creator is an omnipresent life and power. The Christian

attainment is nothing else than the thorough intellectual grasp of the

absolute idea and the identification of our essential selves with God.

With a less thorough-going intellectualism other scholars reinterpret

Christianity in terms of current scientific phraseology. Christianity is

dependent upon the understanding of the universe; hence it is the duty

of believers to put it into the new setting, so that it adopts and

adapts astronomy, geology, biology and psychology. With this

accomplished, Christianity will resume its ancient place. Consciously

and of purpose the attempt is made to do once more what has been done

repeatedly before, to restate Christianity in the terms of current

science.

From all these efforts to reconstruct systematic theology with its

appropriations of philosophy and science, groups of Christians turn to

the inner life and seek in its realities to find the confirmation of

their faith. They also claim oneness with a long line of Christians, for

in every age there have been men who have ignored the dogma and the

ritual of the Church, and in contemplation and retirement have sought to

know God immediately in their own experience. To them at best theology

with its cosmology and its logic is only a shadow of shadows, for God

reveals himself to the pure in heart, and it matters not what science

may say of the material and fleeting world. This spirit manifests itself

in wide circles in our day. The Gordian knot is cut, for philosophy and

religion no longer touch each other but abide in separate realms.

In quite a different way a still more influential school seeks essential

Christianity in the sphere of the ethical life. It also would

disentangle religion from cosmology and formal philosophy. It studies

the historic development of the Church, noting how element after element

has been introduced into the simplicity of the gospel, and from all

these it would turn back to the Bible itself. In a thorough-going

fashion it would accomplish what Luther and the Reformation attempted.

It regards even the earliest creeds as only more or less satisfactory

attempts to translate the Christian facts into the current language of

the heathen world. But the process does not stop with this rejection of

the ancient and the scholastic theology. It recognizes the scientific

results attained in the study of the Bible itself, and therefore it does

not seek the entire Bible as its rule of truth. To it Jesus Christ, and

he alone, is supreme, but this supremacy does not carry with it

infallibility in the realm of cosmology or of history. In these too

Jesus participated in the views of his own time; even his teaching of

God and of the future life is not lacking in Jewish elements, yet none

the less he is the essential element in Christianity, and to his

life-purpose must all that claims to be Christianity be brought to be

judged. To this school Christianity is the culmination of the ethical

monotheism of the Old Testament, which finds its highest ideal in

self-sacrificing love. Jesus Christ is the complete embodiment of this

ideal, in life and in death. This ideal he sets before men under the

traditional forms of the kingdom of God as the object to be attained, a

kingdom which takes upon itself the forms of the family, and realizes

itself in a new relationship of universal brotherhood. Such a religion

appeals for its self-verification not to its agreement with cosmological

conceptions, either ancient or modern, or with theories of philosophy,

however true these may be, but to the moral sense of man. On the one

hand, in its ethical development, it is nothing less than the outworking

of that principle of Jesus Christ which led him not only to

self-sacrificing labour but to the death upon the cross. On the other

hand, it finds its religious solution in the trust in a power not

ourselves which makes for the same righteousness which was incarnate in

Jesus Christ.

Thus Christianity, as religion, is on the one hand the adoration of God,

that is, of the highest and noblest, and this highest and noblest as

conceived not under forms of power or knowledge but in the form of

ethical self-devotion as embodied in Jesus Christ, and on the other hand

it meets the requirements of all religion in its dependence, not indeed

upon some absolute idea or omnipotent power, but in the belief that that

which appeals to the soul as worthy of supreme worship is also that in

which the soul may trust, and which shall deliver it from sin and fear

and death. Such a conception of Christianity can recognize many

embodiments in ritual, organization and dogma, but its test in all ages

and in all lands is conformity to the purpose of the life of Christ. The

Lord's Prayer in its oldest and simplest form is the expression of its

faith, and Christ's separation of mankind on the right hand and on the

left in accordance with their service or refusal of service to their

fellow-men is its own judgment of the right of any age or church to the

name Christian. This school also represents historic Christianity, and

maintains the continuity of its life through all the ages past with

Christ himself. But this continuity is not then in theological systems

or creeds, nor in sacraments and cult, nor in organization, but in the

noble company of all who have lived in simple trust in God and love to

humanity. It is this true Church of the spirit and purpose of Jesus

which has been the supreme force for the uplifting of humanity.

Christianity has passed through too many changes, and it has found too

many interpretations possible, to fear the time to come. Thoroughgoing

reconstruction in every item of theology and in every detail of polity

there may be, yet shall the Christian life go on--the life which finds

its deepest utterance in the words of Christ, "Thou shalt love the Lord

thy God with all thy heart and thy neighbour as thyself"; the life which

expresses its profoundest faith in the words Christ taught it to pray,

"Our Father"; the life which finds its highest rule of conduct in the

words of its first and greatest interpreter, "Let this mind be in you

which was also in Christ Jesus our Lord."

BIBLIOGRAPHY.--Detailed bibliographies accompany the separate articles

on subjects connected with the Christian religion and Church. In the

following list a selection is given of books on the wider and general

subject:--

_Extent and Growth._--D. Dorchester, _The Problem of Religious

Progress_ (revised ed., 1894); S. Gulick, _The Growth of the Kingdom

of God_ (1895); James S. Dennis, _Christian Missions and Social

Progress_ (1906).

_Prophets of Israel._--Rudolf Smend, _Lehrbuch der alttestamentlichen

Religionsgeschichte_ (2nd ed., 1899); A.B. Davidson, _Old Testament

Prophecy_ (1903); Karl Budde, _Religion of Israel to the Exile_

(1899); W. Robertson Smith, _The Prophets of Israel and their Place in

History_ (1899); A.F. Kirkpatrick, _Doctrine of the Prophets_ (3rd

ed., 1901); Beruk Duhm, _Die Theologie der Propheten_ (1875).

_Judaism._--Emil Schürer, _History of the Jewish People in the Time of

Jesus Christ_ (Eng. trans., Edinburgh, 1890); C.G. Montefiore,

_Lectures on the Origin and Growth of Religion as illustrated by the

Religion of the Ancient Hebrews_ (2nd ed., 1893); W. Bousset, _Die

Religion des Judentums im neutestamentlichen Zeitalter_ (2nd ed.,

1906).

_The Life and Teaching of Jesus._--Hans Heinrich Wendt, _The Teaching

of Jesus_ (1892), 2 vols.; Oskar Holtzmann, _The Life of Jesus_ (Eng.

trans., 1904); Paul Wernle, _Beginnings of Christianity_, 2 vols.

(1903-1904); T. Crawford Burkitt, _The Gospel History and its

Transmission_ (1906).

_The Beginnings of Christianity._--Ernst von Dobschütz, _Christian

Life in the Primitive Church_ (Eng. trans., 1904); A.C. McGiffert,

_The Apostolic Age_ (1900); Carl Weizsäcker, _The Apostolic Age_ (Eng.

trans., 1897); Otto Pfleiderer, _Das Urchristentum_ (1902).

_The Expansion of Christianity._--Edwin Hatch, "The Influence of Greek

Ideas and Usages upon the Christian Church," the _Hibbert Lectures,

1888_ (1890); Adolf Harnack, _The Expansion of Christianity in the

First Three Centuries_ (Eng. trans., 1904); Sir W.M. Ramsay, _The

Church in the Roman Empire_ (1893).

_The History of Church and of Dogma._--Adolf Harnack, _History of

Dogma_ (Eng. trans., 1895); Reinhold Seeberg, _Lehrbuch der

Dogmengeschichte_ (1895, 2 vols.); Philip Schaff, _The Creeds of

Christendom_ (3 vols., 1881, 3rd ed.).

_The Roman Church._--Joseph Wilhelm and Thomas B. Scannell, _Manual of

Catholic Theology_ (1906); J.A. Moehler, _Symbolism_ (trans. 1844);

Thomas Aquinas, _The Summa_ (Eng. trans., 1907); William Ward, _The

Ideal of a Christian Church_ (1844).

_The Greek Church._--"The Creeds of the Greek and Russian Churches,"

in Schaff, _Creeds_, vol. ii. pp. 275-542; and J. Michalcesu, _Die

Bekenntnisse und die wichtigsten Glaubenszeugnisse der

griechisch-orientalischen Kirche_ (Leipzig, 1904).

_Protestantism._--John Calvin, _Institutio Religionis Christianae_,

(1536; Eng. trans., 1816); Charles Hodge, _Systematic Theology_ (3

vols., 1872); Ernst Troeltsch, _Die Absolutheit des Christentums und

die Religionsgeschichte_ (1902); _First Principles of the Reformation,

or the Ninety-five Theses and the Three Primary Works_, trans. by

Henry Wace and C.A. Buchheinz (1883).

_Christianity in the Modern World._--Andrew D. White, _Conflict of

Science with Theology_ (2 vols., 1896); D.F. Strauss, _Der alte und

der neue Glaube_ (1872; Eng. trans., 1873); A.J. Balfour, _The

Foundations of Belief_ (1897); J. Ward, _Naturalism and Agnosticism_

(1899).

_Modern Adaptations of Christianity._--William Adams Brown, _Christian

Theology in Outline_ (1906); Augustus Sabatier, _Religions of

Authority and the Religion of the Spirit_ (1904); J.A. Zahm,

_Evolution and Dogma_ (1896); John Henry Newman, _An Essay on the

Development of Christian Doctrine_ (1845); Edward Caird, _The

Evolution of Religion_ (1893); Otto Pfleiderer, _Philosophy of

Religion_ (Eng. trans., 1888, especially volumes 3 and 4); Newman

Smyth, _Old Faiths in New Lights_ (1879), _Through Science to Faith_

(1902); Henry Drummond, _The Ascent of Man_ (1894); William Ralph

Inge, _Christian Mysticism_ (Bampton Lectures, 1894); Wilhelm

Herrmann, _The Communion of the Christian with God_ (1895); George

William Knox, _Direct and Fundamental Proofs of the Christian

Religion_ (1903); Albrecht Ritschl, _Die christliche Lehre von der

Rechtfertigung und Versöhnung_ (1900).

_Modern Definitions of Christianity._--Alfred Loisy, _The Gospel and

the Church_ (1904); Adolf Harnack, _What is Christianity?_ (1901);

William Adams Brown, _The Essence of Christianity_ (1902); Ernest

Troeltsch, _Das Wesen des Christentums_; J. Kaftan, _Das Wesen der

christlichen Religion_ (2nd ed., 1888); J. Caird, _The Fundamental

Ideas of Christianity_ (1899). (G. W. KN.)

CHRISTIANSAND (KRISTIANSAND), a fortified seaport of Norway, the chief

town of a diocese (_stift_), on a fjord of the Skagerrack, 175 m. S.W.

of Christiania by sea. Pop. (1900) 14,701. It stands on a square

peninsula flanked by the western and eastern harbours and by the Otter

river. The situation, with its wooded hills and neighbouring islands, is

no less beautiful than that of other south-coast towns, but the

substitution of brick for wood as building material after a fire in 1892

made against the picturesqueness of the town. There is a fine cathedral,

rebuilt in Gothic style after a fire in 1880. Christiansand is an

important fishing centre (salmon, mackerel, lobsters), and sawmills,

wood-pulp factories, shipbuilding yards and mechanical workshops are the

principal industrial works. The port is the largest on the south coast,

and all the coast steamers, and those serving Christiania from London,

Hull, Grangemouth, Hamburg, &c., touch here. The Saetersdal railway

follows that valley north to Byglandsfiord (48 m.), whence a good road

continues to Viken i Valle at the head of the valley. Flekkerö, a

neighbouring island, is a favourite pleasure resort. The town was

founded in 1641 by Christian IV., after whom it was named.

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE, a system of theosophic and therapeutic doctrine,

which was originated in America about 1866 by Mrs Mary Baker Glover

Eddy, and has in recent years obtained a number of adherents both in the

United States and in European countries. Mrs. Eddy (1821-1910; _née_

Baker) was born near Concord, New Hampshire; in 1843 she married Colonel

G.W. Glover (d. 1844), in 1853 she married Daniel Patterson (divorced

1873), and in 1877 Dr Asa Gilbert Eddy (d. 1883). About the year 1867

she came forward as a healer by mind-cure. She based her teaching on the

Bible, and on the principles that man's essential nature is spiritual,

and that, the Spirit of God being Love and Good, moral and physical evil

are contrary to that Spirit, and represent an absence of the True Spirit

which was in Jesus Christ. There is but one Mind, one God, one Christ,

and nothing real but Mind. Matter and sickness are subjective states of

error, delusions which can be dispelled by the mental process of a true

knowledge of God and Christ, or Christian science. Ordinary _medical_

science--using drugs, &c.--is therefore irrelevant; spiritual treatment

is the only cure of what is really mental error. Jesus himself healed by

those means, which were therefore natural and not miraculous, and

promised that those who believed should do curative works like his. In

1876 a Christian Scientist Association was organized. Mrs Eddy had

published in the preceding year a book entitled _Science and Health,

with Key to the Scriptures_, which has gone through countless editions

and is the gospel of Christian Science. In 1879 she became the pastor of

a "Church of Christ, Scientist," in Boston, and also founded there the

"Massachusetts Metaphysical College" (1881; closed 1889) for the

furtherance of her tenets. The first denominational chapel outside

Boston was built at Oconto, Wisconsin, in 1886; and in 1894 (enlarged

and reconstructed in 1906) a great memorial church was erected in

Boston. Mrs Eddy's publications also include _Retrospection and

Introspection_ (1891), _Unity of Good and Unreality of Evil_ (1887),

_Rudimental Divine Science_ (1891), _Christian Healing_ (1886), &c. The

progress of the cult of Christian Science has been remarkable, and by

the beginning of the 20th century many hundreds of Christian Science

churches had been established; and the new religion found many adherents

also in England. A purely local and congregational form of government

was adopted, but Christian Scientists naturally looked to the mother

church in Boston, with Mrs Eddy as its guiding influence, as their

centre. A monthly magazine, _The Christian Science Journal_ (founded in

1883), and the weekly _Christian Science Sentinel_ are published

officially in Boston.

The profession of the paid Christian Science "healer" has been very

prominent in recent years both in America and in England; and very

remarkable successes have been claimed for the treatment. In some

serious cases of death after illness, where a coroner's inquest has

shown that the only medical attendance was that of a Christian Science

"healer," the question of criminal responsibility has been prominently

canvassed; but an indictment in England against a healer for

manslaughter in 1906 resulted in an acquittal. The theosophic and the

medical aspects of Christian Science may perhaps be distinguished; the

latter at all events is open to grave abuse. But the modern reaction in

medical practice against drugs, and the increased study of the subject

of "suggestion," have done much to encourage a belief in faith-healing

and in "psychotherapy" generally. In 1908, indeed, a separate movement

(Emmanuel), inspired by the success of Christian Science, and also

emanating from America, was started within the Anglican Communion, its

object being to bring prayer to work on the curing of disease; and this

movement obtained the approval of many leaders of the church in England.

An "authorized" _Life_ of Mrs Eddy, by Sibyl Wilbur (1908), deals with

the subject acceptably to her disciples. "Georgine Milmine's" _Life of

M.B.G. Eddy, and History of Christian Science_ (1909), though not so

acceptable, is a judicious critical account. A detailed indictment

against the whole system, by a competent English doctor (Stephen

Paget), will be found in _The Faith and Works of Christian Science_

(1909).

CHRISTIANSUND (KRISTIANSUND), a seaport on the west coast of Norway, in

Romsdal _amt_ (county), 259 m. N.E. by N. of Bergen, in the latitude of

the Faeroe Islands. Pop. (1901) 11,982. It is built on four small

islands, by which its harbour is enclosed. The chief exports are wood,

cod, herrings and fish products, and butter to Great Britain. The town

is served by the principal steamers between the south Norwegian ports,

Hull, Hamburg, &c, and Trondhjem, and it is the chief port of the

district of Nordmöre. Local steamers serve the neighbouring fjords,

including the Sundalsfjord, from which at Sundalsören a driving road

past the fine Dovrefjeld connects with the Gudbrandsdal route. Till

1742, when it received town privileges from Christian VI., Christiansund

was called Lille-Fosen.

CHRISTIE, RICHARD COPLEY (1830-1901), English scholar and bibliophile,

was born on the 22nd of July 1830 at Lenton in Nottinghamshire, the son

of a millowner. He was educated at Lincoln College, Oxford, and was

called to the bar at Lincoln's Inn in 1857, and in 1872 became

chancellor of the diocese of Manchester. This he resigned in 1893. He

held numerous appointments, notably the professorships of history (from

1854 to 1856) and of political economy (from 1855 to 1866) at Owens

College, Manchester. He always took an active interest in this college,

of which he was one of the governors; in 1893 he gave the Christie

library building designed by Alfred Waterhouse, and in 1897 he devoted

£50,000 of the funds at his disposal as a trustee of Sir Joseph

Whitworth's estate for the building of Whitworth Hall, which completed

the front quadrangle of the college. He was an enthusiastic book

collector, and bequeathed to Owens College his library of about 75,000

volumes, rich in a very complete set of the books printed by Dolet, a

wonderful series of Aldines, and of volumes printed by Sebastian

Gryphius. His _Étienne Dolet, the Martyr of the Renaissance_ (1880), is

the most exhaustive work on the subject. He died at Ribsden on the 9th

of January 1901.

CHRISTINA (1626-1689), queen of Sweden, daughter of Gustavus Adolphus

and Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg, was born at Stockholm on the 8th of

December 1626. Her father died when she was only six years old. She was

educated, principally, by the learned Johannes Matthiae, in as masculine

a way as possible, while the great Oxenstjerna himself instructed her in

politics. Christina assumed the sceptre in her eighteenth year (Dec. 8,

1644). From the moment when she took her seat at the head of the council

board she impressed her veteran counsellors with the conviction of her

superior genius. Axel Oxenstjerna himself said of her, when she was only

fifteen: "Her majesty is not like women-folk, but is stout-hearted and

of a good understanding, so that, if she be not corrupted, we have good

hopes of her." Unfortunately her brilliant and commanding qualities were

vitiated by an inordinate pride and egoism, which exhibited themselves

in an utter contempt for public opinion, and a prodigality utterly

regardless of the necessities of the state. She seemed to consider

Swedish affairs as far too petty to occupy her full attention; while her

unworthy treatment of the great chancellor was mainly due to her

jealousy of his extraordinary reputation and to the uneasy conviction

that, so long as he was alive, his influence must at least be equal to

her own. Recognizing that he would be indispensable so long as the

Thirty Years' War lasted, she used every effort to bring it to an end;

and her impulsive interference seriously hampered the diplomacy of the

chancellor, and materially reduced the ultimate gains of Sweden. The

general peace congress was not opened till April 1645. The Swedish

plenipotentiaries were Johan Oxenstjerna, the chancellor's son, and

Adler Salvius. From the first the relations between them were strained.

Young Oxenstjerna, haughty and violent, claimed, by right of birth and

rank, to be _caput legationis_. The chancellor, at home, took his son's

part, while Salvius was warmly supported by Christina, who privately

assured him of her exclusive favour and encouraged him to hold his own.

So acute did the quarrel become that there was a violent scene in full

senate between the queen and the chancellor; and she urged Salvius to

accelerate the negotiations, against the better judgment of the

chancellor, who hoped to get more by holding out longer.

The longer Christina ruled, the more anxious for the future fate of her

empire grew the men who had helped to build it up. Yet she gave fresh

privileges to the towns; she encouraged trade and manufactures,

especially the mining industries of the Dales; in 1649 she issued the

first school ordinance for the whole kingdom; she encouraged foreign

scholars to settle in Sweden; and native science and literature, under

her liberal encouragement, flourished as they had never flourished

before. In one respect, too, she showed herself wiser than her wisest

counsellors. The senate and the estates, naturally anxious about the

succession to the throne, had repeatedly urged her majesty to marry, and

had indicated her cousin, Charles Gustavus, as her most befitting

consort. Wearied of their importunities, yet revolting at the idea of

submission to any member of the opposite sex, Christina settled the

difficulty by appointing Charles her successor, and at the _Riksdag_ of

1650 the Swedish crown was declared hereditary in Charles and his heirs

male. In the summer of 1651 Christina was, with difficulty, persuaded to

reconsider her resolution to abdicate, but three years later the nation

had become convinced that her abdication was highly desirable, and the

solemn act took place on the 6th of July 1654 at the castle of Upsala,

in the presence of the estates and the great dignitaries of the realm.

Many were the causes which predisposed her to what was, after all,

anything but an act of self-renunciation. First of all she could not

fail to remark the increasing discontent with her arbitrary and wasteful

ways. Within ten years she had created 17 counts, 46 barons and 428

lesser nobles; and, to provide these new peers with adequate appanages,

she had sold or mortgaged crown property representing an annual income

of 1,200,000 rix-dollars. Signs are also not wanting that Christina was

growing weary of the cares of government; while the importunity of the

senate and _Riksdag_ on the question of her marriage was a constant

source of irritation. In retirement she could devote herself wholly to

art and science, and the opportunity of astonishing the world by the

unique spectacle of a great queen, in the prime of life, voluntarily

resigning her crown, strongly appealed to her vivid imagination. Anyhow,

it is certain that, towards the end of her reign, she behaved as if she

were determined to do everything in her power to make herself as little

missed as possible. From 1651 there was a notable change in her

behaviour. She cast away every regard for the feelings and prejudices of

her people. She ostentatiously exhibited her contempt for the Protestant

religion. Her foreign policy was flighty to the verge of foolishness.

She contemplated an alliance with Spain, a state quite outside the orbit

of Sweden's influence, the firstfruits of which were to have been an

invasion of Portugal. She utterly neglected affairs in order to plunge

into a whirl of dissipation with her foreign favourites. The situation

became impossible, and it was with an intense feeling of relief that the

Swedes saw her depart, in masculine attire, under the name of Count

Dohna. At Innsbruck she openly joined the Catholic Church, and was

rechristened Alexandra. In 1656, and again in 1657, she visited France,

on the second occasion ordering the assassination of her major-domo

Monaldischi, a crime still unexplained. Twice she returned to Sweden

(1660 and 1667) in the vain hope of recovering the succession, finally

settling in Rome, where she died on the 19th of April 1689, poor,

neglected and forgotten.

See Francis William Bain, _Queen Christina of Sweden_ (London, 1890);

Robert Nisbet Bain, _Scandinavia_ (Cambridge, 1905); _Christina de

Suède et le Cardinal Azzolino_ (Paris, 1899); Claretta Gaudenzio, _La

Regina Christina de Suezia in Italia_ (Turin, 1892); Hans Emil Friis,

_Dronning Christina_ (Copenhagen, 1896); C.N.D. Bildt, _Christina de

Suède et le conclave de Clement X_ (Paris, 1906); _Drottning Kristinas

sista dagar_ (Stockholm, 1897); and J.A. Taylor, _Christina of Sweden_

(1909). (R. N. B.)

CHRISTINA [MARIA CHRISTINA HENRIETTA DÉSIRÉE FÉLICITÉ RÉNIÈRE], for some

years queen-regent of Spain (1858- ), widow of Alphonso XII. and mother

of Alphonso XIII., was born at Gross Seelowitz, in Austria, on the 21st

of July 1858, being the daughter of the archduke Charles Ferdinand and

the archduchess Elizabeth of Austria. She was brought up by her mother

as a rigid Catholic, and great care was taken with her education. At

eighteen she was appointed by the emperor Francis Joseph, abbess of the

House of Noble Ladies of Saint Theresa in Prague, where she made herself

very popular and distinguished herself by her intellectual parts. It is

said that at the court of Vienna the archduchess saw the young prince

Alphonso of Spain when he was only a pretender in exile, before the

restoration of the Bourbons. A few years later, when Alphonso XII. had

lost his first wife and cousin, Queen Mercedes, daughter of the duc de

Montpensier, his ministers, especially Señor Canovas, urged him to marry

again. He told them that if he did so it would only be with the young

Austrian archduchess Maria Christina. After some negotiations between

the two courts and governments it was agreed that the archduchess

Elizabeth and her daughter should meet Alphonso XII. at Arcachon, in the

south of France, where a few days' personal acquaintance was sufficient

to make both come to a decision. The duke of Bailen went officially to

Vienna to get the emperor of Austria's authorization, and on the 14th of

November 1879, in the throne-room of the Imperial palace, the

archduchess solemnly abdicated all her rights of succession in Austria,

in accordance with the law obliging all princesses of the imperial house

to do so when they wed a foreign prince. On the 17th of November the

archduchess and her mother, with a numerous suite, started for Spain,

arriving at the royal castle of El Pardo, near Madrid, on the 24th of

November. The wedding took place in the Atocha cathedral, on the 29th of

November, in great state, and was followed by splendid festivities.

Queen Christina bore her husband two daughters before he died in

1885--Dona Mercedes, born on the 11th of September 1880, and Dona Maria

Theresa, born on the 12th of November 1882. During her husband's

lifetime the young queen kept studiously apart from politics, so much so

that her inexperience caused much anxiety in November 1885, when she was

called upon to take the arduous duties of regent. During the long

minority of the posthumous son of Alphonso XII., afterwards King

Alphonso XIII., the Austrian queen-regent acted in a way that obliged

even the adversaries of the throne and the dynasty to respect the mother

and the woman. The people of Spain, and the ever-restless civil and

military politicians, found that the gloved hand of their constitutional

ruler was that of a strong-minded and tenacious regent, who often

asserted herself in a way that surprised them much, but always, somehow,

enforced obedience and respect. More could not be expected by a foreign

ruler from a nation little prone to waste attachment or demonstrative

loyalty upon anybody not Castilian born and bred.

CHRISTISON, SIR ROBERT, Bart. (1797-1882), Scottish toxicologist and

physician, was born in Edinburgh on the 18th of July 1797. After

graduating at the university of that city in 1819, he spent a short time

in London, studying under John Abernethy and Sir William Lawrence, and

in Paris, where he learnt analytical chemistry from P.J. Robiquet and

toxicology from M.J.B. Orfila. In 1822 he returned to Edinburgh as

professor of medical jurisprudence, and set to work to organize the

study of his subject on a sound basis. On poisons in particular he

speedily became a high authority; his well-known treatise on them was

published in 1829, and in the course of his inquiries he did not

hesitate to try such daring experiments on himself as taking large doses

of Calabar bean. His attainments in medical jurisprudence and toxicology

procured him the appointment, in 1829, of medical officer to the crown

in Scotland, and from that time till 1866 he was called as a witness in

many celebrated criminal cases. In 1832 he gave up the chair of medical

jurisprudence and accepted that of medicine and therapeutics, which he

held till 1877; at the same time he became professor of clinical

medicine, and continued in that capacity till 1855. His fame as a

toxicologist and medical jurist, together with his work on the pathology

of the kidneys and on fevers, secured him a large private practice, and

he succeeded to a fair share of the honours that commonly attend the

successful physician, being appointed physician to Queen Victoria in

1848 and receiving a baronetcy in 1871. Among the books which he

published were a treatise on _Granular Degeneration of the Kidneys_

(1839), and a _Commentary on the Pharmacopoeias of Great Britain_

(1842). Sir Robert Christison, who retained remarkable physical vigour

and activity down to extreme old age, died at Edinburgh on the 23rd of

January 1882.

See the _Life_ by his sons (1885-1886).

CHRISTMAS (i.e. the Mass of Christ), in the Christian Church, the

festival of the nativity of Jesus Christ. The history of this feast

coheres so closely with that of Epiphany (q.v.), that what follows must

be read in connexion with the article under that heading.

The earliest body of gospel tradition, represented by Mark no less than

by the primitive non-Marcan document embodied in the first and third

gospels, begins, not with the birth and childhood of Jesus, but with his

baptism; and this order of accretion of gospel matter is faithfully

reflected in the time order of the invention of feasts. The great church

adopted Christmas much later than Epiphany; and before the 5th century

there was no general consensus of opinion as to when it should come in

the calendar, whether on the 6th of January, or the 25th of March, or

the 25th of December.

The earliest identification of the 25th of December with the birthday of

Christ is in a passage, otherwise unknown and probably spurious, of

Theophilus of Antioch (A.D. 171-183), preserved in Latin by the

Magdeburg centuriators (i. 3, 118), to the effect that the Gauls

contended that as they celebrated the birth of the Lord on the 25th of

December, whatever day of the week it might be, so they ought to

celebrate the Pascha on the 25th of March when the resurrection befell.

The next mention of the 25th of December is in Hippolytus' (c. 202)

commentary on Daniel iv. 23. Jesus, he says, was born at Bethlehem on

the 25th of December, a Wednesday, in the forty-second year of Augustus.

This passage also is almost certainly interpolated. In any case he

mentions no feast, nor was such a feast congruous with the orthodox

ideas of that age. As late as 245 Origen, in his eighth homily on

Leviticus, repudiates as sinful the very idea of keeping the birthday of

Christ "as if he were a king Pharaoh." The first certain mention of Dec.

25 is in a Latin chronographer of A.D. 354, first published entire by

Mommsen.[1] It runs thus in English: "Year 1 after Christ, in the

consulate of Caesar and Paulus, the Lord Jesus Christ was born on the

25th of December, a Friday and 15th day of the new moon." Here again no

festal celebration of the day is attested.

There were, however, many speculations in the 2nd century about the date

of Christ's birth. Clement of Alexandria, towards its close, mentions

several such, and condemns them as superstitions. Some chronologists, he

says, alleged the birth to have occurred in the twenty-eighth year of

Augustus, on the 25th of Pachon, the Egyptian month, i.e. the 20th of

May. These were probably the Basilidian gnostics. Others set it on the

24th or 25th of Pharmuthi, i.e. the 19th or 20th of April. Clement

himself sets it on the 17th of November, 3 B.C. The author of a Latin

tract, called the _De Pascha computus_, written in Africa in 243, sets

it by private revelation, _ab ipso deo inspirati_, on the 28th of March.

He argues that the world was created perfect, flowers in bloom, and

trees in leaf, therefore in spring; also at the equinox, and when the

moon just created was full. Now the moon and sun were created on a

Wednesday. The 28th of March suits all these considerations. Christ,

therefore, being the Sun of Righteousness, was born on the 28th of

March. The same symbolical reasoning led Polycarp[2] (before 160) to set

his birth on Sunday, when the world's creation began, but his baptism on

Wednesday, for it was the analogue of the sun's creation. On such

grounds certain Latins as early as 354 may have transferred the human

birthday from the 6th of January to the 25th of December, which was then

a Mithraic feast and is by the chronographer above referred to, but in

another part of his compilation, termed _Natalis invicti solis_, or

birthday of the unconquered Sun. Cyprian (_de orat. dom. 35_) calls

Christ _Sol verus_, Ambrose _Sol novus noster_ (Sermo vii. 13), and such

rhetoric was widespread. The Syrians and Armenians, who clung to the 6th

of January, accused the Romans of sun-worship and idolatry, contending

with great probability that the feast of the 25th of December had been

invented by disciples of Cerinthus and its lections by Artemon to

commemorate the _natural_ birth of Jesus. Chrysostom also testifies the

25th of December to have been from the beginning known in the West, from

Thrace even as far as Gades. Ambrose, _On Virgins_, in. ch. 1, writing

to his sister, implies that as late as the papacy of Liberius 352-356,

the Birth from the Virgin was feasted together with the Marriage of Cana

and the Banquet of the 4000 (Luke ix. 13), which were never feasted on

any other day but Jan. 6.

Chrysostom, in a sermon preached at Antioch on Dec. 20, 386 or 388, says

that some held the feast of Dec. 25 to have been held in the West, from

Thrace as far as Cadiz, from the beginning. It certainly originated in

the West, but spread quickly eastwards. In 353-361 it was observed at

the court of Constantius. Basil of Caesarea (died 379) adopted it.

Honorius, emperor (395-423) in the West, informed his mother and brother

Arcadius (395-408) in Byzantium of how the new feast was kept in Rome,

separate from the 6th of January, with its own _troparia_ and

_sticharia_. They adopted it, and recommended it to Chrysostom, who had

long been in favour of it. Epiphanius of Crete was won over to it, as

were also the other three patriarchs, Theophilus of Alexandria, John of

Jerusalem, Flavian of Antioch. This was under Pope Anastasius, 398-400.

John or Wahan of Nice, in a letter printed by Combefis in his _Historia

monothelitarum_, affords the above details. The new feast was

communicated by Proclus, patriarch of Constantinople (434-446), to

Sahak, Catholicos of Armenia, about 440. The letter was betrayed to the

Persian king, who accused Sahak of Greek intrigues, and deposed him.

However, the Armenians, at least those within the Byzantine pale,

adopted it for about thirty years, but finally abandoned it together

with the decrees of Chalcedon early in the 8th century. Many writers of

the period 375-450, e.g. Epiphanius, Cassian, Asterius, Basil,

Chrysostom and Jerome, contrast the new feast with that of the Baptism

as that of the birth _after the flesh_, from which we infer that the

latter was generally regarded as a birth according to the Spirit.

Instructive as showing that the new feast travelled from West eastwards

is the fact (noticed by Usener) that in 387 the new feast was reckoned

according to the Julian calendar by writers of the province of Asia, who

in referring to other feasts use the reckoning of their local calendars.

As early as 400 in Rome an imperial rescript includes Christmas among

the three feasts (the others are Easter and Epiphany) on which theatres

must be closed. Epiphany and Christmas were not made judicial _non dies_

until 534.

For some years in the West (as late as 353 in Rome) the birth feast was

appended to the baptismal feast on the 6th of January, and in Jerusalem

it altogether supplanted it from about 360 to 440, when Bishop Juvenal

introduced the feast of the 25th of December. The new feast was about

the same time (440) finally established in Alexandria. The

_quadragesima_ of Epiphany (i.e. the feast of the presentation in the

Temple, or _hupapant[=e]_) continued to be celebrated in Jerusalem on

the 14th of February, forty days after the 6th of January, until the

reign of Justinian. In most other places it had long before been put

back to the 2nd of February to suit the new Christmas. Armenian

historians describe the riots, and display of armed force, without which

Justinian was not able in Jerusalem to transfer this feast from the 14th

to the 2nd of February.

The grounds on which the Church introduced so late as 350-440 a

Christmas feast till then unknown, or, if known, precariously linked

with the baptism, seem in the main to have been the following. (1) The

transition from adult to infant baptism was proceeding rapidly in the

East, and in the West was well-nigh completed. Its natural complement

was a festal recognition of the fact that the divine element was present

in Christ from the first, and was no new stage of spiritual promotion

coeval only with the descent of the Spirit upon him at baptism. The

general adoption of child baptism helped to extinguish the old view that

the divine life in Jesus dated from his baptism, a view which led the

Epiphany feast to be regarded as that of Jesus' spiritual rebirth. This

aspect of the feast was therefore forgotten, and its importance in every

way diminished by the new and rival feast of Christmas. (2) The 4th

century witnessed a rapid diffusion of Marcionite, or, as it was now

called, Manichaean propaganda, the chief tenet of which was that Jesus

either was not born at all, was a mere phantasm, or anyhow did not take

flesh of the Virgin Mary. Against this view the new Christmas was a

protest, since it was peculiarly the feast of his birth in the flesh, or

as a man, and is constantly spoken of as such by the fathers who

witnessed its institution.

In Britain the 25th of December was a festival long before the

conversion to Christianity, for Bede (_De temp. rat._ ch. 13) relates

that "the ancient peoples of the Angli began the year on the 25th of

December when we now celebrate the birthday of the Lord; and the very

night which is now so holy to us, they called in their tongue

_modranecht_ (_môdra niht_), that is, the mothers' night, by reason we

suspect of the ceremonies which in that night-long vigil they

performed." With his usual reticence about matters pagan or not

orthodox, Bede abstains from recording who the mothers were and what the

ceremonies. In 1644 the English puritans forbad any merriment or

religious services by act of Parliament, on the ground that it was a

heathen festival, and ordered it to be kept as a fast. Charles II.

revived the feast, but the Scots adhered to the Puritan view.

Outside Teutonic countries Christmas presents are unknown. Their place

is taken in Latin countries by the _strenae_, French _étrennes_, given

on the 1st of January; this was in antiquity a great holiday, wherefore

until late in the 4th century the Christians kept it as a day of fasting

and gloom. The setting up in Latin churches of a Christmas _crèche_ is

said to have been originated by St Francis.

AUTHORITIES.--K.A.H. Kellner, _Heortologie_ (Freiburg im Br., 1906),

with Bibliography; Hospinianus, _De festis Christianorum_ (Genevae,

1574); Edw. Martène, _De Antiquis Ecclesiae Ritibus_, iii. 31

(Bassani, 1788); J.C.W. Augusti, _Christl. Archäologie_, vols. i. and

v. (Leipzig, 1817-1831); A.J. Binterim, _Denkwürdigkeiten_, v. pt. i.

p. 528 (Mainz, 1825, &c.); Ernst Friedrich Wernsdorf, _De originibus

Solemnium Natalis Christi_ (Wittenberg, 1757, and in J.E. Volbeding,

_Thesaurus Commentationum_, Lipsiae, 1847); Anton. Bynaeus, _De Natali

Jesu Christi_ (Amsterdam, 1689); Hermann Usener,

_Religionsgeschichtliche Untersuchungen_ (Bonn, 1889); Nik. Nilles,

S.J., _Kalendarium Manuale_ (Innsbruck, 1896); L. Duchesne, _Origines

du culte chrétien_ (3e éd., Paris, 1889). (F. C. C.)