Primitive Christian Worship Part 3

vi. 24.; Greek: douleuein. Vulg: servire.]

[Footnote 16: It is also remarkable that in all these cases, whether the Septuagint employs the word "dulia," or "latria,"

the word in the Hebrew is precisely the same, [Hebrew: avad].

That in the fifth century the words were synonymous is evident from Theodoret. I. 319. See Edit. Halle.--Index.]

I will only detain you by one more example, drawn from two pa.s.sages, which seems the more striking because each of the two words "dulia" and "latria" is used to imply the true worship of G.o.d in a person, who was changed from a state of alienation to a state of holiness. The first is in St. Paul's 1st Epistle to the Thessalonians, i. 9. "How ye turned to G.o.d from idols, to serve [Greek: douleuein theo zonti] the living and true G.o.d." The second is in Heb. ix. 14. "How much more shall the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself {60} without spot to G.o.d, purge your conscience from dead works to serve[17] the living G.o.d."

[Footnote 17: [Greek: latoeuein theo zonti.] In each of these two cases the Vulgate uses "servire."]

The word "hyperdulia," now used to signify the worship proper to the Virgin Mary, as being a worship of a more exalted character than the worship offered to saints and angels, archangels, and cherubim and seraphim, will not require a similar examination. The word was invented in later times, and has been used chiefly to signify the worship of the Virgin, and is of course found neither in the Scriptures, nor in any ancient cla.s.sical or ecclesiastical author. {61}

CHAPTER III.

SECTION I.--THE EVIDENCE OF PRIMITIVE WRITERS.

Before we enter upon the next branch of our proposed inquiry, allow me to premise that I am induced to examine into the evidence of Christian antiquity not by any misgiving, lest the testimony of Scripture might appear defective or doubtful; far less by any unworthy notion that G.o.d's word needs the additional support of the suffrages of man[18]. On the contrary, the voice of G.o.d in his revealed word is clear, certain, and indisputable, commanding the invocation of Himself alone in acts of religious worship, and condemning any such departure from that singleness of adoration, as they are {62} seduced into, who invoke saints and angels. And it is a fixed principle in our creed, that where G.o.d's written word is clear and certain, human evidence cannot be weighed against it in the balance of the sanctuary. When the Lord hath spoken, well does it become the whole earth to be silent before him; when the eternal Judge Himself hath decided, the witness of man bears on its very face the stamp of incompetency and presumption.

[Footnote 18: While some authors seem to go far towards the subst.i.tution of the fathers for the written word of G.o.d, others in their abhorrence of that excess have run into the opposite, fancying, as it would seem, that they exalt the Divine oracles just in the same proportion as they disparage the uninspired writers of the Church. The great body of the Church of England adhere to a middle course, and adopt that golden mean, which ascribes to the written Word its paramount authority, from which is no appeal, and yet honours Catholic tradition as the handmaid of the truth.]

For myself I can say (what I have good hope these pages will of themselves evince) that no one can value the testimony of Christian tradition within its own legitimate sphere more sincerely, or more highly, than the individual who is now soliciting your attention to the conclusions which he has himself drawn from it. When Scripture is silent, or where its meaning is doubtful, Catholic tradition is to me a guide, which I feel myself bound to follow with watchful care and submissive reverence.

Now let it be for the present supposed, that instead of the oracles of G.o.d having spoken, as we believe them to have spoken, with a voice clear, strong, and uniform against the doctrine and practice of the invocation of saints and angels, their voices had been weak, doubtful, and vague; in other words, suppose in this case the question had been left by the Holy Scriptures an open question, then what evidence would have been deducible from the writings of the primitive Church? What testimony do the first years and the first ages after the canon of Scripture was closed, bear upon this point? And here I would repeat the principle of inquiry, proposed above for our adoption in the more important and solemn examination of the Holy Volume itself.--We ought to endeavour to ascertain what may {63} fairly and honestly be regarded as the real bearing of each author's remains, and not suffer the general tone and spirit of a writer to be counterbalanced by single expressions, which may be so interpreted as to convey an opposite meaning. Rather we should endeavour to reconcile with that general spirit and pervading tendency of a writer's sentiments any casual expressions which may admit of two acceptations. We adopt this principle in our researches into the remains of cla.s.sical antiquity; we adopt the same principle in estimating the testimony of a living witness. In the latter case, indeed, the ingenuity of the adverse advocate is often exercised in magnifying the discrepancies between some minor facts or incidental expressions with the broad and leading a.s.sertions of the witness, with a view to invalidate his testimony altogether, or at least to weaken the impression made by it. But then a wise and upright judge, a.s.sured of the truth of the evidence in the main, and of the integrity of the individual, will not suffer unessential, apparent inconsistencies to stifle and bury the body of testimony at large, but will either extract from the witness what may account for them, or show them to be immaterial. Inviting, therefore, your best thoughts to this branch of our subject, I ask you to ascertain, by a full and candid process of induction, this important and interesting point,--Whether we of the Anglican Church, by religiously abstaining from the presentation, in word or in thought, of any thing approaching prayer or supplication, entreaty, request, or any invocation whatever, to any other being except G.o.d alone, do or do not tread in the steps of the first Christians, and adhere to the very pattern which they set; and whether members of the Church of Rome by addressing angel or saint in any form of invocation seeking {64} their aid, either by their intercession or otherwise, have not unhappily swerved decidedly and far from those same footsteps, and departed widely from that pattern?

In one point of view it might perhaps be preferable to enter at once upon our investigation, without previously stating the conclusions to which my own inquiries have led; but, on the whole, I think it more fair to make that statement, in order, that having the inferences already drawn placed before the mind, the inquirer may in each case weigh the several items of evidence bearing upon them separately, and more justly estimate its whole weight collectively at the last.

After then having examined the pa.s.sages collected by the most celebrated Roman Catholic writers, and after having searched the undisputed original works of the primitive writers of the Greek and Latin Churches, the conclusion to which I came, and in which every day of further inquiry and deliberation confirms me more and more in this:--

In the first place, negatively, that the Christian writers, through the first three centuries and more, never refer to the invocation of saints and angels as a practice with which they were familiar: that they have not recorded or alluded to any forms of invocation of the kind used by themselves or by the Church in their days; and that no services of the earliest times contain hymns, litanies, or collects to angels, or to the spirits of the faithful departed.

In the second place, positively, that the principles which they habitually maintain and advocate are irreconcileable with such a practice.

In tracing the history of the worship of saints and angels, we proceed (gradually, indeed, though by no {65} means at all periods, and through every stage, with equal rapidity,) from the earliest custom established and practised in the Church,--of addressing prayers to Almighty G.o.d alone for the sake of the merits of his blessed Son, the only Mediator and Intercessor between G.o.d and man,--to the lamentable innovation both of praying to G.o.d for the sake of the merits, and through the mediation of departed mortals, and of invoking those mortals themselves as the actual dispensers of the spiritual blessings which the suppliant seeks from above. It is not only a necessary part of our inquiry for ascertaining the very truth of the case; it is also curious and painfully interesting, to trace the several steps, one after another, beginning with the doctrine maintained by various early writers, both Greek and Latin, that the souls of the saints are not yet reigning with Christ in heaven, and ending with the anathema of the Council of Trent, against all who should maintain that doctrine; beginning with prayer and thanksgiving to Almighty G.o.d alone, and ending with daily prayers both to saints and angels; one deviation from the strict line of religious duty, and the pure singleness of Christian worship, successively gliding into another, till at length the whole of Christendom, with a few remarkable exceptions, was seen to acquiesce in public and private devotions, which, if proposed, the whole of Christendom would once with unanimity have rejected.

Before I offer to you the result of my inquiries as to the progressive stages of degeneracy and innovation in the worship of Almighty G.o.d, I would premise two considerations:

First, I would observe, that the soundness of my conclusion on the general points at issue does not depend at all on the accuracy of the arrangement of those stages {66} which I have adopted. Should any one, for example, think there is evidence that two or more of those progressive steps, which I have regarded as consecutive, were simultaneous changes, or that any one which I have ranked as subsequent took rather the lead in order of time, such an opinion would not tend in the least to invalidate my argument; the substantial and essential point at issue being this: Is the invocation of saints and angels, as now practised in the Church of Rome, agreeable to the primitive usage of the earliest Christians?

Secondly, I would observe, that the places and occasions most favourable for witnessing and correctly estimating the changes and gradual innovations in the worship of those early times, are the tombs of the martyrs, and the Churches in which their remains were deposited; and at the periods of the annual celebration of their martyrdom, or in some instances at what was called their translation,--the removal, that is, of their mortal remains from their former resting-place to a church, for the most part dedicated to their memory. On these occasions the most extraordinary enthusiasm prevailed; sometimes the ardour of the worshippers, as St. Chrysostom [St. Chrys. Paris, 1718. Vol. xii. p.

330.] tells us, approaching madness. But even at times of less excitement, by contemplating, immediately after his death, the acts and sufferings of the martyr, and recalling his words, and looks, and stedfast bearing, and exhorting each other to picture to themselves his holy countenance then fixed on them, his tongue addressing them, his sufferings before their eyes, encouraging all to follow his example, they began habitually to consider him as actually himself one of the faithful a.s.sembled round {67} his tomb. Hence they believed that he was praying with them as well as for them; that he heard their eulogy on his merits, and was pleased with the honours paid to his memory: hence they felt sure of his goodwill towards them, and his ability, as when on earth, to promote their welfare. Hence they proceeded, by a fatal step, first, to implore him to give them bodily relief from some present sufferings; then invoking him to plead their cause with G.o.d, and to intercede for the supply of their spiritual wants, and the ultimate salvation of their souls; and, lastly, they prayed to him generally as himself the dispenser of temporal and spiritual blessings.

The following then is the order in which the innovations in Christian worship seem to have taken place, being chiefly introduced at the annual celebrations of the martyrs:--

1st. In the first ages confession and prayer and praise were offered to the Supreme Being alone, and that for the sake of his Son our only Saviour and Advocate: when mention was made of saint or martyr, it was to thank G.o.d for the graces bestowed on his departed holy ones when on earth, and to pray to G.o.d for grace that we might follow their good examples, and attain, through Christ, to the same end and crown of our earthly struggles. This act of worship was usually accompanied by a homily setting forth the Christian excellences of the saint, and encouraging the survivors so to follow him, as he followed Christ.

2nd. The second stage seems to have been a prayer to Almighty G.o.d, that He would suffer the supplications and intercessions[19] of angels and saints to prevail {68} with him, and bring down a blessing on their fellow-pet.i.tioners on earth; the idea having spread among enthusiastic worshippers, as I have already observed, that the spirits of the saints were suffered to be present around their tombs, and to join with the faithful in their addresses to the throne of grace.

[Footnote 19: The Greek word [Greek: presbeia], "emba.s.sy,"

employed on such occasions, is still used in some eastern Churches in the same sense.]

3rd. The third stage seems to have owed its origin to orators constantly dwelling upon the excellences of the saints in the panegyrics delivered over their remains, representing their constancy and Christian virtues as superhuman and divine, and as having conferred lasting benefits on the Church. By these benefits at first was meant the comfort and encouragement of their good example, and the honour procured to the religion of the cross by their bearing witness to its truth even unto death; but in process of time the habit grew of attaching a sort of mysterious efficacy to their merits; hence this third gradation in religious worship, namely, prayers to G.o.d that "He would hear his suppliants, and grant their requests for the sake of his martyred servant, and by the efficacy of that martyr's merits."

4th. Hitherto, unauthorized and objectionable as the two last forms of prayer are, still the pet.i.tions in each case were directed to G.o.d alone.

The next step swerved lamentably from that principle of worship, and the pet.i.tioners addressed their requests to angels and sainted men in heaven; at first, however, confining their pet.i.tions to the asking for their prayers and intercessions with Almighty G.o.d.

5th. The last stage in this progressive degeneracy of Christian worship was to pet.i.tion the saints and angels, directly and immediately themselves, at first for the temporal, and afterwards for the spiritual benefits which the pet.i.tioners desired to obtain from heaven. For it {69} is very curious, but not more curious than evident, that the worshippers seem for some time to have pet.i.tioned their saints for temporal and bodily benefits, before they proceeded to ask for spiritual blessings at their hands, or by their prayers. (See Basil. Oral. in Mamanta Martyrem.)

Of these several gradations and stages we find traces in the records of Christian antiquity, after superst.i.tion and corruption had spread through Christian worship, and leavened the whole. Of all of them we have lamentable instances in the present ritual of the Church of Rome, as we shall see somewhat at large when we reach that division of our inquiry. But from the beginning it was not so. In the earliest ages we find only the first of these forms of worship exemplified, and it is the only form now retained in the Anglican Ritual; of which, among other examples, the following pa.s.sage in the prayer for Christ's Church militant on earth supplies a beautiful specimen: "We bless Thy holy name for all Thy servants departed this life in Thy faith and fear; beseeching Thee to give us grace so to follow their good examples, that with them we may be partakers of Thy heavenly kingdom: Grant this, O Father, for Jesus Christ's sake, our only Mediator and Advocate. Amen."

We now proceed to examine the invaluable remains of Christian antiquity, not for the purpose of testing the accuracy of the above catalogue of gradations _seriatim_ and in order of time; but to satisfy ourselves on the question, whether the invocation of saints and angels prevailed from the first in the Christian Church; or whether it was an innovation introduced after pagan superst.i.tion had begun to mingle its poisonous corruptions with the pure worship of {70} Almighty G.o.d. And here, I conceive, few persons will be disposed to doubt, that if the primitive believers were taught by the Apostles to address the saints reigning in heaven and the holy angels, and the Virgin Mother of our Lord, with adoration and prayers, the earliest Christian records must have contained clear and indisputable references to the fact, and that undesigned allusions to the custom would inevitably be found offering themselves to our notice here and there. I do not mean that we should expect to meet with full and explicit statements either of the doctrine or the practice of the primitive Church in this particular; much less such apologies and elaborate defences of the practice as abound to the overflow in later times. But, what is more satisfactory in proof of the general and established prevalence of any opinions or customs, we should surely find expressions incidentally occurring, which implied an habitual familiarity with such opinions or customs. In every record, for example, of primitive antiquity, from the very earliest of all, expressions are constantly meeting us which involve the doctrine of the ever-blessed Trinity, the atoning sacrifice of Christ's death, the influences of the Holy Spirit; habitual prayer and praise offered to the Saviour of the world, as very and eternal G.o.d; the holy Sacraments of Baptism and the Lord's Supper; with other tenets and practices of the Apostolic Church. It is impossible to study the remains of Christian antiquity without being a.s.sured beyond the reach of doubt, that such were the doctrines and practice of the universal Church from the days of the Apostles. Is the invocation of saints and angels and the blessed Virgin to be made an exception to this rule? Can it stand this test? The great anxiety and labour of Roman Catholic {71} writers to press the authors of every age to bear witness on their side in this behalf, proves that in their judgment no such exception is admissible. It is clearly beyond gainsaying, that if the present doctrine of the Church of Rome, with respect to the worship of angels and saints, as propounded by the Council of Trent; and if her present practice as set forth in her authorized liturgies and devotional services, and professed by her popes, bishops, clergy, and people, had been the doctrine and practice of the primitive Church, we should have found evident and indisputable traces of it in the earliest works of primitive antiquity, in the earliest liturgies, and in the forms of prayer and exhortations to prayer with which those works abound. It by no means follows that if some such allusions were partially discoverable, therefore the doctrines and practice must forthwith be p.r.o.nounced to be apostolical; but if no such traces can be found, their absence bears witness that neither did those doctrines nor that practice exist. If, for example, through the remains of the first three centuries we could have discovered no trace of the doctrine or practice of holy Baptism and the Eucharist, we must have concluded that the doctrine and the practice were the offspring of later years. But when we read every where, in those remains, exhortations to approach those holy mysteries with a pure heart and faith unfeigned; when we find rules prescribed for the more orderly administration of the rites; in a word, when we perceive throughout as familiar references to these ordinances as could be now made by Catholics either of Rome or of England, while this would not of itself necessarily prove their divine origin, we should with equal plausibility question the existence of Jerusalem or Constantinople, or of David or Constantine, as we {72} should doubt the prevalence both of the doctrine and practice of the Church in these particulars, even from the Apostles'

days.

With these principles present to our minds, I now invite you to accompany me in a review of the testimonies of primitive Christian antiquity with regard to supplications and invocations of saints and angels, and of the blessed Virgin Mary.

SECTION II--CENTURY I.--THE EVIDENCE OF THE APOSTOLIC FATHERS.

It will be necessary for the satisfaction of all parties, that we examine, in the first place, those ancient writings which are ascribed to an Apostle, or to fellow-labourers of the Apostles; familiarly known as the writings of the Apostolic Fathers. They are five in number, Barnabas, Clement, Hermas, Ignatius, and Polycarp. Many able writers, as well of the Roman as of the Anglican communion, have discussed at large the genuineness of these writings; and have come to very different results. Some critics are of opposite and extreme opinions, others ranging between them with every degree and shade of variation. Some of these works have been considered spurious; others have been p.r.o.nounced genuine; though, even these have been thought to be, in many parts, interpolated. The question, however, of their genuineness, though deeply interesting in itself, will not affect their testimony with {73} regard to the subject before us[20]. They were all in existence before the Council of Nicaea; and we shall probably not be wrong in a.s.signing to the first two a date at the very lowest computation not less remote than the middle of the second century; somewhere, it may be, at the furthest, about one hundred years after the death of our Lord. (A.D. 130-150.) With all their errors and blemishes and interpolations taken at the worst, after every reasonable deduction for defects in matter, taste, and style, the writings which are ascribed to the Apostolic Fathers are too venerable for their antiquity, too often quoted with reverence and affection by some who have been the brightest ornaments of the Christian Church, and possess too copious a store of genuine evangelical truth, sound principle, primitive simplicity, and pious sentiment, to be pa.s.sed over with neglect by any Catholic Christian. The few extracts {74} made here will, I am a.s.sured, be not unacceptable to any one, who holds dear the religion of Christ[21].

[Footnote 20: I do not think it suitable in this address to enter upon the difficult field of inquiry, whether all or which of these works were the genuine productions of those whose names they bear; and whether the Barnabas, Clement, and Hermas to which three of them are ascribed, were the Barnabas, Clement, and Hermas of whom express mention is made in the pages of Holy Scripture. I have determined, in conducting my argument, to affix to them in each case the lowest proposed antiquity. The edition of Archbishop Wake, (who maintains the highest antiquity for these works, though I have not here adopted his translation,) may be consulted with much profit.

Did the question before us relate to the genuineness and dates of these works, they could not, with any approach to fairness, be all five placed without distinction under the same category.

The evidence for the genuineness of Clement, Ignatius in the shorter copy, and Polycarp, is too valuable to be confounded with that of the others, which are indisputably subject to much greater doubt. But this question has only an incidental bearing on our present inquiry, and will be well spared.]

[Footnote 21: The edition of the works of these Apostolic Fathers used here is that of Cotelerius as revised by Le Clerc, Antwerp, 1698.]

THE EPISTLE OF ST. BARNABAS.

In the work ent.i.tled The Catholic Epistle of Barnabas, which was written probably by a Jew converted to the Christian faith, about the close of the first century, or certainly before the middle of the second[22], I have searched in vain for any thing like the faintest trace of the invocation of saint or angel. The writer gives directions on the subject of prayer; he speaks of angels as the ministers of G.o.d; he speaks of the reward of the righteous at the day of judgment; but he suggests not the shadow of a supposition, that he either held the doctrine himself which the Church of Rome now holds, or was aware of its existence among Christians. In his very beautiful but incomplete summary of Christian duty [Sect. 18, 19. p. 50, 51, 52.], which he calls "The Way of Light,"

we perceive more than one most natural opening for reference to that doctrine, had it been familiar to his mind. In the midst indeed of his brief precepts of religious and moral obligation, he directs the Christian to seek out every day "the persons of the saints," but they are our fellow-believers on earth; those saints or holy ones, for administering to whose necessities, the Scripture a.s.sures us that G.o.d will not forget our work and labour of love [Heb. vi. 10.]: these the author bids the Christians {75} search out daily, for the purposes of religious intercourse, and of encouragement by the word.

[Footnote 22: Archbishop Wake considers this Epistle to have been written by St. Barnabas to the Jews, soon after the destruction of Jerusalem.]

The following interesting extracts shall conclude our reference to this work:--

"There are two ways of doctrine and authority, one of light, the other of darkness; and the difference between the two ways is great. Over the one are appointed angels of G.o.d, conductors of the light; over the other, angels of Satan: and the one (G.o.d) is Lord from everlasting to everlasting; the other (Satan) is ruler of the age of iniquity. The way of light is this ... Thou shalt love Him that made thee; thou shalt glorify Him that redeemed thee from death. Thou shalt be single in heart, and rich in spirit. Thou shalt not join thyself to those who are walking in the path of death. Thou shalt hate to do what is displeasing to G.o.d; thou shalt hate all hypocrisy. Thou shalt entertain no evil counsel against thy neighbour. Thou shalt not take away thy hand from thy son or thy daughter, but shalt teach them the fear of the Lord from their youth. Thou shalt communicate with thy neighbour in all things, and call not things thine own. Thou shalt not be of a froward tongue, for the mouth is the snare of death. To the very utmost of thy power keep thy soul chaste. Do not open thine hand to receive, and close it against giving. Thou shalt love as the apple of thine eye every one who speaketh to thee the word of the Lord. Call to remembrance the day of judgment, night and day. Thou shalt search out every day the persons of the saints [23]; both meditating by the word, {76} and proceeding to exhort them, and anxiously caring to save a soul by the word. Thou shalt preserve what thou hast received, neither adding thereto, nor taking therefrom. Thou shalt not come with a bad conscience to thy prayer."

[Footnote 23: There is much obscurity in the phraseology of this pa.s.sage: [Greek: ekzaetaeseis kath hekastaen haemeran ta prosopa ton hagion kai dia logou skopion kai poreuomenos eis to parakalesai, kai meleton eis sosai psuchaen to logo]. In the corresponding exhortation among the Apostolical Const.i.tutions (book vii. ch. 9), the expression is, "Thou shalt seek the person ([Greek: prosopon]) of the saints, that thou mayest find rest (or find refreshment, or refresh thyself) ([Greek: in epanapanae tois logois auton]) in their words." The author seems evidently to allude to the reciprocal advantage derived by Christians from religious intercourse.]