piled by him. And he says in addition: "Now these things are credible to believers."

(c) Justin Martyr, Dialogus cum Tryphone, 80 f. (MSG, 6:665.)

Ch. 80. Although you have fallen in with some who are called Christians, but who do not admit this truth [the resurrection] and venture to blaspheme the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob,1 and who say that there is no resurrection of the dead and that their souls, when they die, are taken to heaven, be careful not to regard them as Christians. . . . But I and whoever are on all points right-minded Christians know that there will be a resurrection of the dead and a thousand years in Jerusalem, which will then be built, adorned, and enlarged as the prophets Ezekiel and Isaiah and the others declare.

Ch. 81. And, further, a certain man with us, named John, one of the Apostles of Christ, predicted by a revelation that was made to him that those who believed in our Christ would spend a thousand years in Jerusalem, and thereafter the general, or to speak briefly, the eternal resurrection and judgment of all men would likewise take place.

II. THE CHURCH AND THE WORLD

So long as chiliastic expectations were the basis of the Christian's hope and his judgment of the order of this present world, the Christian felt that he was but a stranger and sojourner in the world, and that his real home was the kingdom of Christ, soon to be established here on earth. With such a view the Christian would naturally define his relation to the world as being in it, yet not of it. As time passed, the opinion became more common that the kingdom of Christ was not a future world-order to be set up on His return, but the Church here on earth. This thought, which is the key to

1 Such were evidently Gnostics, as shown by their rejection of the God of the Jews.

the City of God by St. Augustine, was not to be found in the first century and a half of the Church.

Ep. ad Diognetum, 5, 6.

The Epistle to Diognetus is one of the choicest pieces of ante-Nicene literature. Although it is commonly included among the Apostolic Fathers, the date is uncertain, it is anonymous, and the reason for its inclusion is not clear. The weight of opinion is in favor of an early date. It was preserved in but one manuscript, which was unfortunately destroyed in 1870. The main themes of the epistle are the faith and manners of the Christians, and an attempt to explain the late appearance of Christianity in the world. The work, therefore, is of the nature of an apology, and should be compared with The Apology of Aristides. A translation of the epistle may be found in ANF, I, 23.

Ch. 5. The Christians are distinguished from other men neither by country, nor language, nor the customs which they observe. For they neither inhabit cities of their own, nor employ a peculiar form of speech, nor lead a life which is marked out by any singularity. The course of conduct which they follow has not been devised by any speculation or deliberation of inquisitive men; nor do they, like some, proclaim themselves the advocates of any merely human doctrines. But, inhabiting Greek as well as barbarian cities, according as the lot of each of them has been determined, and following the customs of the natives in respect to clothing, food, and the rest of their ordinary conduct, they display to us their wonderful and confessedly striking method of life. They dwell in their own countries, but simply as sojourners. As citizens, they share in all things with others, and yet endure all things as if foreigners. Every foreign country is to them as their native land, and every land of their birth as a land of strangers. They marry as do all; they beget children; but they do not commit abortion. They have a common table, but not a common bed. They are in the flesh, but they do not live after the flesh. They pass their days on earth, but they are the citizens of heaven. They obey the prescribed laws, and at the same time surpass the laws by their lives. They love all men, and are persecuted by all. They are unknown

and condemned; they are put to death and restored to life. They are poor, yet they make many rich; they are in lack of all things, and yet abound in all. They are dishonored, and yet in their very dishonor are glorified. They are evil-spoken of, and yet are justified. They are reviled and bless; they are insulted and repay insult with honor; they do good, yet are punished as evil-doers. When punished they rejoice as if quickened into life; they are assailed by the Jews as foreigners and are persecuted by the Greeks; yet those who hate them are unable to assign a reason for their hatred.

Ch. 6. What the soul is in the body, that the Christians are in the world. The soul is spread through all the members of the body, and Christians through the cities of the world. The soul dwells in the body, but is not of the body; so Christians dwell in the world, but they are not of the world. The invisible soul is guarded in the visible body; so Christians are known as existing in the world, but their religion remains invisible. The flesh hates the soul and wages war on it, though it has received no wrong, because it is forbidden to indulge in pleasures; so the world hates Christians, though it receives no wrong from them, because they are opposed to its pleasures. The soul loves the flesh which hates it, and it loves the members; so Christians love those who hate them. The soul is enclosed in the body, yet itself holds the body together; so the Christians are kept in the world as in a prison-house, yet they themselves hold the world together. The immortal soul dwells in a mortal tabernacle; so Christians sojourn amid corruptible things, looking for the incorruptibility in the heavens. The soul when hardly treated in the matter of meats and drinks is improved; so Christians when punished increase more and more daily. In so great an office has God appointed them, which it is not lawful for them to decline.

12. THEOLOGICAL IDEAS

In the post-apostolic period are to be traced the beginnings of distinctive forms of religious and ethical ideas as distinguished from mere repetition of New Testament phrases. The most influential writer was Ignatius of Antioch, the founder, or earliest representative, of what may be called the Asia Minor theology, which is to be traced through Irenæus, Methodius, and Athanasius to the other great theologians of the Nicene period, becoming the distinctive Eastern type of piety. It probably persisted in Asia Minor after Ignatius. Among its characteristic features was the thought of redemption as the imparting to man of incorruptibility through the incarnation and the sacraments.

(a) Ignatius, Ep. ad Ephesios, 18 ƒƒ.

The Epistle to the Ephesians is doctrinally the most important of the writings of Ignatius. In the passage that follows there is a remarkable anticipation of a part of the Apostles' Creed (cf. Hahn, § 1). The whole passage contains in brief the fundamental point of the writer's teachings.

Ch. 18. My spirit is an offering1 of the cross, which is a stumbling-block to unbelievers, but to us salvation and life eternal. "Where is the wise man? where the disputer?" [I Cor. 1: 20.] Where is the boasting of those called prudent? For our God, Jesus Christ, was, according to the dispensation of God, conceived in the womb of Mary of the seed of David, but of the Holy Ghost. He was born and baptized, that by His passion He might purify the water.

Ch. 19. And the virginity of Mary was hidden from the Prince of this World, and her bringing forth, and likewise the death of the Lord; three mysteries of shouting, which were wrought in silence of God. How, then, was He manifested to the world? A star shone forth from heaven above all other stars, and its light was inexpressible, while its novelty struck

1 Piaculum.

men with astonishment, but all the rest of the stars, with the sun and moon, formed a chorus to this star, and its light was exceedingly great above them all. And there was agitation whence this novelty, so unlike to everything else. Hence every kind of magic was destroyed and every bond of wickedness disappeared; ignorance was removed and the old kingdom abolished, for God had been manifested in human form for the renewal of eternal life. And now that took a beginning which had been prepared by God. Henceforth all things were in a state of tumult because He meditated the abolition of death.

Ch. 20. .. Especially [will I write again] if the Lord make known to me that ye all, man by man, through grace given to each, agree in one faith and in Jesus Christ, who was of the family of David according to the flesh, the Son of Man and the Son of God, so that ye obey the bishop and the presbytery with an undivided mind, breaking one bread, which is the medicine of immortality, and the antidote to prevent dying, but which is life forever in Jesus Christ.

(b) Ignatius, Ep. ad Smyrnæos, 7.

The following passage may be regarded as a parallel to part of the preceding extract from the same writer's Epistle to the Ephesians.

They abstain from the eucharist and from prayer, because they confess not that the eucharist is the flesh of our Saviour Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father, of His goodness, raised up again. Those, therefore, who speak against this gift of God, die while disputing. But it were better for them to love it, that they also may rise again. It is fitting, therefore, that ye should keep aloof from such persons, and not speak of them either in private or public, but to give heed to the prophets and, above all, to the Gospel, in which the passion has been revealed to us and the resurrection fully proved. But avoid all divisions as the beginning of evils.

(c) Ignatius, Ep. ad Trallianos, 9, 10.