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Letter LXIX.
To Oceanus.
Oceanus, a Roman nobleman zealous for the faith, had
asked Jerome to back him in a protest against Carterius a Spanish
bishop who contrary to the apostolic rule that a bishop is to be
“the husband of one wife” had married a second time. Jerome
refuses to take the line suggested on the ground that Carterius’s
first marriage having preceded his baptism cannot be taken into
account. He therefore advises Oceanus to let the matter drop. The date
of the letter is 397 a.d.
1. I never supposed, son Oceanus, that the clemency of
the Emperor would be assailed by criminals, or that persons just
released from prison would after their own experience of its filth and
fetters complain of relaxations allowed to others. In the gospel he who
envies another’s salvation is thus addressed: “Friend, is
thine eye evil because I am good?”2010
“God hath concluded them all in sin2011
that he might have mercy upon all.”2012
“When sin abounded grace did much more abound.”2013
The first born of Egypt are slain and not
even a beast belonging to Israel is left behind in Egypt.2014
The heresy of the Cainites rises before me
and the once slain viper lifts up its shattered head, destroying not
partially as most often hitherto but altogether the mystery of
Christ.2015
| 2015 The Cainites appear to
have denied the efficacy of the atonement. | This heresy declares that there are some sins which
Christ cannot cleanse with His blood, and that the scars left by old
transgressions on the body and the soul are sometimes so deep that they
cannot be effaced by the remedy which He supplies. What else is this
but to say that Christ has died in vain? He has indeed died in vain if
there are any whom He cannot make alive. When John the Baptist points
to Christ and says: “Behold the lamb of God which taketh away the
sins2016
of the world”2017
he utters a falsehood if after all there are persons living whose sins
Christ has not taken away. For either it must be shewn that they are
not of the world whom the grace of Christ thus ignores: or, if it be
admitted that they are of the world, we have to choose between the
horns of a dilemma. Either they have been delivered from their sins, in
which case the power of Christ to save all men is proved; or they
remain undelivered and as it were still under the charge of misdoing,
in which case Christ is proved to be powerless. But far be it from us
to believe of the Almighty that He is powerless in aught. For
“what things soever the Father doeth, these also doeth the Son
likewise.”2018
To ascribe
weakness to the Son is to ascribe it to the Father also. The shepherd
carries the whole sheep and not only this or that part of it: all the
epistles of the apostle2019
speak continually
of the grace of Christ. And, lest a single announcement of this grace
might seem a little thing, Peter says: “Grace unto you and peace
be multiplied.”2020
The Scripture
promises abundance; yet we affirm scarcity.
2. To what does all this tend, you ask. I reply; you
remember the question that you proposed. It was this. A Spanish bishop
named Carterius, old in years and in the priesthood has married two
wives, one before he was baptized, and, she having died, another since
he has passed through the laver; and you are of opinion that he has
violated the precept of the apostle, who in his list of episcopal
qualifications commands that a bishop shall be “the husband of
one wife.”2021
I am surprised
that you have pilloried an individual when the whole world is filled
with persons ordained in similar circumstances; I do not mean
presbyters or clergy of lower rank, but speak only of bishops of whom
if I were to enumerate them all one by one I should gather a sufficient
number to surpass the crowd which attended the synod of Ariminum.2022
| 2022 This synod held in
359 a.d. was attended by about 450 bishops. It
put forth an Arian formula which caused general consternation.
“The whole world,” says Jerome, “groaned and was
astonished to find itself Arian.” | Still it does not become me to defend one
by incriminating many; nor if reason condemns a sin, to make the number
of those who commit it an excuse for it. At Rome an eloquent pleader
caught me, as the phrase goes, between the horns of a dilemma:
whichever way I turned I was held fast. Is it sinful, said he, to marry
a wife, or is it not sinful? I in my simplicity, not being wary enough
to avoid the snare laid for me, replied that it was not sinful. Then he
propounded another question: Is it good deeds which are done away with
in baptism or is it evil? Here again my simplicity induced me to say
that it was sins which were forgiven. At this point, just as I began to
fancy myself secure, the horns of the dilemma commenced to close in on
me from this side and from that and their points hidden before began to
shew themselves. If, said he, to marry a wife is not sinful, and if
baptism forgives sins, all that is not done away with is held over. On
the instant a dark mist rose before my eyes as though I had been struck
by a strong boxer. Yet recalling the sophism attributed to
Chrysippus:2023
| 2023 See note on Letter
LXI. 3. | “Whether you lie or whether
you speak the truth, in either case you lie,” I came to myself
again and turned upon my opponent with a dilemma of my own. Pray tell
me, I said, does baptism make a new man or does it not? He grudgingly
admitted that it did. I pursued my advantage by saying, Does it make
him wholly new or only partially so? He replied, Wholly. Then I asked,
Is there nothing then of the old man held over in baptism? He assented.
Hereupon I propounded the argument; If baptism makes a man new and
creates a wholly new being, and if there is nothing of the old man held
over in the new, that which once was in the old cannot be imputed to
the new. At first my thorny friend held his tongue; afterwards however,
making Piso’s mistake,2024
though he had
nothing to say he could not remain silent. Sweat stood upon his brow,
his cheeks turned pale, his lips trembled, his tongue clove to his
mouth, his throat became dry; and fear (not age) made him cower. At
last he broke out in these words, Have you not read how the apostle
permits none to be ordained priest save the husband of one wife, and
that what he lays stress upon is the fact of the marriage and not the
time at which it is contracted? Now as the fellow had challenged me
with syllogisms, and as I saw that he was feeling his way towards some
intricate and awkward questions, I proceeded to turn his own weapons
against him. I said therefore, Whom did the apostle select for the
episcopate, baptized persons or catechumens? He refused to reply. I however made a fresh onslaught
repeating my question a second time and a third. You would have taken
him for Niobe changed to stone by excessive weeping. I turned to the
audience and said: It is all the same to me, good people, whether I
bind my opponent awake or sleeping; but it is easier to fetter a man
who offers no resistance. If those whom the apostle admits into the
ranks of the clergy are not catechumens but the faithful, and if he who
is ordained bishop is always one of the faithful, being one of the
faithful he cannot have the faults of a catechumen imputed to him. Such
were the darts I hurled at my paralysed opponent. Such the quivering
spears I cast at him. At last his mouth opened and he vomited forth the
contents of his mind. Certainly, he blurted out, that is the doctrine
of the apostle Paul.
3. Accordingly I bring out two epistles of the apostle,
the first to Timothy, and the second to Titus. In the first is the
following passage: “If a man desire the office of a bishop he
desireth a good work. A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of
one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt
to teach, not given to wine, no striker…but patient, not a
brawler, not covetous; one that ruleth well his own house, having his
children in subjection with all gravity. (For if a man know not how to
rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God?) Not a
novice lest being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of
the devil. Moreover he must have a good report of them which are
without; lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the
devil.”2025
While immediately
at the commencement of the epistle to Titus the following behests are
laid down: “For this cause left I thee in Crete that thou
shouldest set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders
in every city, as I had appointed thee: if any be blameless, the
husband of one wife, having faithful children not accused of riot or
unruly. For a bishop must be blameless as the steward of God; not
self-willed, not soon angry, not given to wine, no striker, not given
to filthy lucre; but a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men,
sober, just, holy, temperate; holding fast the faithful word as he hath
been taught, that he may be able by sound doctrine both to exhort and
to convince the gainsayers.”2026
In both
epistles commandment is given that only monogamists should be chosen
for the clerical office whether as bishops or as presbyters.2027
| 2027 Rendered
‘elders’ in A.V. | Indeed with the ancients these names were
synonymous, one alluding to the office, the other to the age of the
clergy. No one at any rate can doubt that the apostle is speaking only
of those who have been baptized. If therefore it in no wise prejudices
the case of one who is to be ordained bishop that before his baptism he
has not possessed all the requisite qualifications (for it is asked
what he is and not what he has been), why should a previous
marriage—the one thing which is in itself not sinful—prove
a hindrance to his ordination? You argue that as his marriage was not a
sin it was not done away with at his baptism. This is news to me
indeed, that what in itself was not a sin is to be reckoned as such.
All fornication and contamination with open vice, impiety towards God,
parricide and incest, the change of the natural use of the sexes into
that which is against nature2028
and all
extraordinary lusts are washed away in the fountain of Christ. Can it
be possible that the stains of marriage are indelible, and that
harlotry is judged more leniently than honourable wedlock? I do not,
Carterius might say, hold you to blame for the hosts of mistresses and
the troops of favourites2029
that you have
kept; I do not charge you with your bloodshedding and sow-like
wallowings in the mire of uncleanness: yet you are ready to drag from
her grave for my confusion my poor wife, who has been dead long years,
and whom I married that I might be kept from those sins into which you
have fallen. Tell this to the heathen who form the church’s
harvest with which she stores her granaries; tell this to the
catechumens who seek admission to the number of the faithful; tell
them, I say, not to contract marriages before their baptism, not to
enter upon honourable wedlock, but like the Scots and the Atacotti2030
| 2030 A Scottish tribe,
cannibals according to Jerome (Against Jov. ii. 7.) | and the people of Plato’s republic2031
to have community of wives and no
discrimination of children, nay more, to beware of any semblance even
of matrimony; lest, after they have come to believe in Christ, He shall
tell them that those whom they have had have not been concubines or
mistresses but wedded wives.
4. Let every man examine his own conscience and let him
deplore the violence he has done to it at every period of his life; and
then when he has brought himself to deliver a true judgment on his own
former misdeeds, let him give ear to the chiding of Jesus: “Thou
hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt
thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother’s
eye.”2032
Truly like the scribes and
pharisees we strain out the gnat and swallow the camel, we pay tithe of
mint and anise, and we omit the just judgment which God requires.2033
What parallel can be drawn between a
wife and a prostitute? Is it fair
to make a marriage now dissolved by death a ground of accusation, while
dissolute living wins for itself a garland of praise? He, had his
former wife lived, would not have married another; but as for you, how
can you defend the bestial unions you indiscriminately make? Perhaps
indeed you will say that you feared to contract marriage lest by so
doing you might disqualify yourself for ordination. He took a wife that
he might have children by her; you by taking a harlot have lost the
hope of children. He withdrew into the privacy of his own chamber when
he sought to obey nature and to win God’s blessing: “Be
fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth.”2034
You on the contrary outraged public
decency in the hot eagerness of your lust. He covered a lawful
indulgence beneath a veil of modesty; you pursued an unlawful one
shamelessly before the eyes of all. For him it is written
“Marriage is honourable and the bed undefiled,” while to
you the words are read, “but whoremongers and adulterers God wilt
judge,”2035
and “if any
man destroyeth the temple of God, him shall God destroy.”2036
All iniquities, we are told, are forgiven
us at our baptism, and when once we have received God’s mercy we
need not afterwards dread from Him the severity of a judge. The apostle
says:—“And such were some of you: but ye are washed, but ye
are sanctified, but ye are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and
by the Spirit of our God.”2037
All sins
then are forgiven; it is an honest and faithful saying. But I ask you,
how comes it that, while your uncleanness is washed away, my cleanness
is made unclean? You reply, “No, it is not made unclean, it
remains just what it was. Had it been uncleanness, it would have been
washed away like mine.” I want to know what you mean by this
shuffling. Your remarks seem to have no more point in them than the
round end of a pestle. Is a thing sin because it is not sin? or is a
thing unclean because it is not unclean? The Lord, you say, has not
forgiven because He had nothing to forgive; yet because He has not
forgiven, that which has not been forgiven still remains.
5. What the true effect of baptism is, and what is the
real grace conveyed by water hallowed in Christ, I will presently tell
you; meantime I will deal with this argument as it deserves. ‘An
ill knot,’ says the common proverb, ‘requires but an ill
wedge to split it.’ The text quoted by the objector, “a
bishop must be the husband of one wife,” admits of quite another
explanation. The apostle came of the Jews and the primitive Christian
church was gathered out of the remnants of Israel. Paul knew that the
Law allowed men to have children by several wives,2038
and was aware that the example of the
patriarchs had made polygamy familiar to the people. Even the very
priests might at their own discretion enjoy the same license.2039
He gave commandment therefore that the
priests of the church should not claim this liberty, that they should
not take two wives or three together, but that they should each have
but one wife at one time. Perhaps you may say that this explanation
which I have given is disputed; in that case listen to another. You
must not have a monopoly of bending the Law to suit your will instead
of bending your will to suit the Law. Some by a strained interpretation
say that wives are in this passage to be taken for churches and
husbands for their bishops. A decree was made by the fathers assembled
at the council of Nicæa2040
that no bishop
should be translated from one church to another, lest scorning the
society of a poor yet virgin see he should seek the embraces of a
wealthy and adulterous one. For as the word λογισμόι, that is,
“disputings,” refers to the fault and misdoing of sons in
the faith,2041
and as the precept concerning the
management of a house refers to the right direction of body and of
soul,2042
so by the wives of the bishops we are to
understand their churches. Concerning whom it is written in Isaiah,
“Make haste ye women and come from the show, for it is a people
of no understanding.”2043
And again
“Rise up, ye women that are wealthy,2044
| 2044 A.V. that are at
ease. |
and hear my voice.”2045
And in the Book of
Proverbs, “Who can find a virtuous woman? for her price is far
above rubies. The heart of her husband doth safely trust in
her.”2046
In the same book too it is written,
“Every wise woman buildeth her house: but the foolish plucketh it
down with her hands.”2047
Nor does this,
say they, derogate from the dignity of the episcopate; for the same
figure is used in relation to God. Jeremiah writes: “As a wife
treacherously departeth from her husband, so have ye dealt
treacherously with me, O house of Israel.”2048
And the apostle employs the same
comparison: “I have espoused you,” he says to his converts,
“to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to
Christ.”2049
The word woman is
in the Greek ambiguous and should in all these places be understood as
meaning wife. You will say that this interpretation is harsh and does
violence to the sense. In that case give back to the scripture its
simple meaning and save me from the
necessity of fighting you on your own ground.2050
| 2050 i.e. that of
strained interpretations. | I
will ask you the following question, Can a man who before his baptism
has kept a concubine, and after her death has received baptism and has
taken a wife, become a clergyman or not? You will answer me that he
can, because his first partner was a concubine and not a wife. What the
apostle condemns then, it would seem, is not mere sexual intercourse
but marriage contracts and conjugal rights. Many persons, we see,
because of narrow circumstances refuse to take upon them the burthen of
matrimony. Instead of taking wives they live with their maid-servants
and bring up as their own the children which these bear to them. Thus,
if through the bounty of the Emperor they gain for their mistresses the
right of wearing a matron’s robes,2051
they will at once come beneath the yoke of the apostle and sorely
against their will will have to receive their partners as their wedded
wives. But, if their poverty prevents them from obtaining an imperial
rescript such as I have mentioned, the decrees of the Church will vary
with the laws of Rome. Be careful therefore not to interpret the words
“the husband of one wife,” that is, of one woman, as
approving indiscriminate intercourse and condemning only contracts of
marriage.
I bring forward all these explanations not for the
purpose of resisting the true and simple sense of the words in question
but to shew you that you must take the holy scriptures as they are
written, and that you must not empty of its efficacy the baptismal rite
ordained by the Saviour, or render vain the whole mystery of the
cross.
6. Let me now fulfil the promise I made a little while
ago and with all the skill of a rhetorician sing the praises of water
and of baptism. In the beginning the earth was without form and void,
there was no dazzling sun or pale moon, there were no glittering stars.
There was nothing but matter inorganic and invisible, and even this was
lost in abysmal depths and shrouded in a distorting gloom. The Spirit
of God above moved, as a charioteer, over the face of the waters,2052
and produced from them the infant world, a
type of the Christian child that is drawn from the laver of baptism. A
firmament is constructed between heaven and earth, and to this is
allotted the name heaven,—in the Hebrew Shamayim or
‘what comes out of the waters,’—2053
| 2053 It is hardly
necessary to remark that this derivation is purely fanciful and has no
foundation in fact. | and the waters which are above the heavens
are parted from the others to the praise of God. Wherefore also in the
vision of the prophet Ezekiel there is seen above the cherubim a
crystal stretched forth,2054
that is, the
compressed and denser waters. The first living beings come out of the
waters; and believers soar out of the laver with wings to heaven. Man
is formed out of clay2055
and God holds the
mystic waters in the hollow of his hand.2056
In Eden a garden2057
is planted, and a
fountain in the midst of it parts into four heads.2058
This is the same fountain which Ezekiel
later on describes as issuing out of the temple and flowing towards the
rising of the sun, until it heals the bitter waters and quickens those
that are dead.2059
When the world
falls into sin nothing but a flood of waters can cleanse it again. But
as soon as the foul bird of wickedness is driven away, the dove of the
Holy Spirit comes to Noah2060
as it came
afterwards to Christ in the Jordan,2061
and, carrying
in its beak a branch betokening restoration and light, brings tidings
of peace to the whole world. Pharaoh and his host, loth to allow
God’s people to leave Egypt, are overwhelmed in the Red Sea
figuring thereby our baptism. His destruction is thus described in the
book of Psalms: “Thou didst endow the sea with virtue through thy
power: thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters: thou
brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces.”2062
For this reason adders and scorpions haunt
dry places2063
and whenever they come near water
behave as if rabid or insane.2064
| 2064 ὑδροφόβους et
lymphaticos faciunt. | As wood sweetens
Marah so that seventy palm-trees are watered by its streams, so the
cross makes the waters of the law lifegiving to the seventy who are
Christ’s apostles.2065
| 2065 Exod. xv. 23–27; Luke x. i. | It is Abraham and
Isaac who dig wells, the Philistines who try to prevent them.2066
Beersheba too, the city of the oath,2067
and [Gihon], the scene of Solomon’s
coronation,2068
derive their names from springs.
It is beside a well that Eliezer finds Rebekah.2069
Rachel too is a drawer of water and wins a kiss thereby2070
from the supplanter2071
Jacob. When the daughters of the priests of Midian are in a strait to
reach the well, Moses opens a way for them and delivers them from
outrage.2072
The Lord’s forerunner at
Salem (a name which means peace or perfection) makes ready the people
for Christ with spring-water.2073
The Saviour
Himself does not preach the kingdom of heaven until by His baptismal
immersion He has cleansed the Jordan.2074
Water is the matter of His first
miracle2075
and it is from a well that the
Samaritan woman is bidden to slake her thirst.2076
To Nicodemus He secretly says:—“Except a man be born of
water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of
God.”2077
As His earthly course began with
water, so it ended with it. His side is pierced by the spear, and blood
and water flow forth, twin emblems of baptism and of martyrdom.2078
After His resurrection also, when
sending His apostles to the Gentiles, He commands them to baptize these
in the mystery of the Trinity.2079
The Jewish
people repenting of their misdoing are sent forthwith by Peter to be
baptized.2080
Before Sion travails she brings
forth children, and a nation is born at once.2081
Paul the persecutor of the church, that ravening wolf out of
Benjamin,2082
bows his head before Ananias one
of Christ’s sheep, and only recovers his sight when he applies
the remedy of baptism.2083
By the reading
of the prophet the eunuch of Candace the queen of Ethiopia is made
ready for the baptism of Christ.2084
Though it
is against nature the Ethiopian does change his skin and the leopard
his spots.2085
Those who have received only
John’s baptism and have no knowledge of the Holy Spirit are
baptized again, lest any should suppose that water unsanctified thereby
could suffice for the salvation of either Jew or Gentile.2086
“The voice of the Lord is upon the
waters…The Lord is upon many waters…the Lord maketh the
flood to inhabit it.”2087
His
“teeth are like a flock of sheep that are even shorn which came
up from the washing; whereof everyone bear twins, and none is barren
among them.”2088
If none is
barren among them, all of them must have udders filled with milk and be
able to say with the apostle: “Ye are my little children, of whom
I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you;”2089
and “I have fed you with milk and
not with meat.”2090
And it is to the
grace of baptism that the prophecy of Micah refers: “He will turn
again, he will have compassion upon us: he will subdue our iniquities,
and will cast all our sins2091
| 2091 A.V. “thou wilt
cast all their sins.” | into the depths of
the sea.”2092
7. How then can you say that all sins are drowned in the
baptismal laver if a man’s wife is still to swim on the surface
as evidence against him? The psalmist says:—“Blessed is he
whose transgression is forgiven, whose sin is covered. Blessed is the
man unto whom the Lord imputeth not iniquity.”2093
It would seem that we must add something
to this song and say “Blessed is the man to whom the Lord
imputeth not a wife.” Let us hear also the declaration which
Ezekiel the so called “son of man”2094
makes concerning the virtue of him who is to be the true son of man,
the Christian: “I will take you,” he says, “from
among the heathen…then will I sprinkle clean water upon you, and
ye shall be clean from all your filthiness…a new heart also will
I give you and a new spirit.”2095
“From
all your filthiness” he says, “will I cleanse you.”
If all is taken away nothing can be left. If filthiness is cleansed,
how much more is cleanness kept from defilement. “A new heart
also will I give you and a new spirit.” Yes, for “in Christ
Jesus neither circumcision availeth anything nor uncircumcision but a
new nature.”2096
Wherefore the
song also which we sing is a new song,2097
and putting off the old man2098
we walk not in
the oldness of the letter but in the newness of the spirit.2099
This is the new stone wherein the new name
is written, “which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth
it.”2100
“Know ye not,” says the
apostle, “that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ
were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by
baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by
the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of
life.”2101
Do we read so often of newness and of
making new and yet can no renewing efface the stain which the word wife
brings with it? We are buried with Christ by baptism and we have risen
again by faith in the working of God who hath called Him from the dead.
And “when we were dead in our sins and in the uncircumcision of
our flesh, God hath quickened us together with Him, having forgiven us
all trespasses; blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was
against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way
nailing it to His cross.”2102
Can it be
that when our whole being is dead with Christ and when all the sins
noted down in the old “handwriting” are blotted out, the
one word “wife” alone lives on? Time would fail me were I
to try to lay before you in order all the passages in the Holy
Scriptures which relate to the efficacy of baptism or to explain the
mysterious doctrine of that second birth which though it is our second
is yet our first in Christ.
8. Before I make an end of dictating (for I perceive that I have already exceeded the just
limits of a letter) I wish to give a brief explanation of the previous
verses of the epistle in which the apostle describes the life of him
that is to be made a bishop. We shall thus recognize him as Doctor of
the Nations2103
not only for his praise of monogamy
but also for all his precepts. At the same time I beg that no one will
suppose that in what I write my design is to blacken the priests of the
present day. My one object is to promote the interest of the church.
Just as orators and philosophers in giving their notions of the perfect
orator and the perfect philosopher do not detract from Demosthenes and
Plato but merely set forth abstract ideals; so, when I describe a
bishop and explain the qualifications laid down for the episcopate, I
am but supplying a mirror for priests. Every man’s conscience
will tell him that it rests with himself what image he will see
reflected there, whether one that will grieve him by its deformity or
one that will gladden him by its beauty. I turn now to the passage in
question.2104
“If a man desire the office of
a bishop, he desireth a good work.” Work, you see, not rank; toil
not pleasure; work that he may increase in lowliness, not grow proud by
reason of elevation. “A bishop then must be blameless.” The
same thing that he says to Titus, “if any be blameless.”2105
All the virtues are comprehended in this one
word; thus he seems to require an impossible perfection. For if every
sin, even every idle word, is deserving of blame, who is there in this
world that is sinless and blameless? Still he who is chosen to be
shepherd of the church must be one compared with whom other men are
rightly regarded as but a flock of sheep. Rhetoricians define an orator
as a good man able to speak. To be worthy of so high an honour he must
be blameless in life and lip. For a teacher loses all his influence
whose words are rendered null by his deeds. “The husband of one
wife.” Concerning this requirement I have spoken above. I will
now only warn you that if monogamy is insisted on before baptism the
other conditions laid down must be insisted on before baptism too. For
it is impossible to regard the remaining obligations as binding only on
the baptized and this alone as binding also on the unbaptized.
“Vigilant (or “temperate” for νηφαλιος means
both), wise,2106
of good behaviour, given to
hospitality, apt to teach.” The priests who minister in
God’s temple are forbidden to drink wine and strong drink,2107
to keep their wits from being stupefied
with drunkenness and to enable their understanding to do its duty in
God’s service. By the word ‘wise’ those are excluded
who plead simplicity as an excuse for a priest’s folly. For if
the brain be not sound, all the members will be amiss. The phrase
“of good behaviour” is an extension of the previous epithet
“blameless.” One who has no faults is called
“blameless;” one who is rich in virtues is said to be
“of good behaviour.” Or the words may be differently
explained in accord with Tully’s maxim,2108
‘the main thing is that what you do you should do
gracefully.’ For some persons are so ignorant of their own
measure2109
and so stupid and foolish that they
make themselves laughing stocks to those who see them because of their
gesture or gait or dress or conversation. Fancying that they knew what
is and what is not good taste they deck themselves out with finery and
bodily adornments and give banquets which profess to be elegant: but
all such attempts at dress and display are nastier than a
beggar’s rags. As regards the obligation of priests to be
teachers we bare have the precepts of the old Law2110
and the fuller instructions given on the
subject to Titus.2111
For an innocent
and unobtrusive conversation does as much harm by its silence as it
does good by its example. If the ravening wolves are to be frightened
away it must be by the barking of dogs and by the staff of the
shepherd. “Not given to wine, no striker.” With the virtues
they are to aim at he contrasts the vices they are to avoid.
9. We have learned what we ought to be: let us now learn
what priests ought not to be. Indulgence in wine is the fault of diners
out and revellers. When the body is heated with drink it soon boils
over with lust. Wine drinking means self-indulgence, self-indulgence
means sensual gratification, sensual gratification means a breach of
chastity. He that lives in pleasure is dead while he lives,2112
and he that drinks himself drunk is not
only dead but buried. One hour’s debauch makes Noah uncover his
nakedness which through sixty years of sobriety he had kept covered.2113
Lot in a fit of intoxication unwittingly
adds incest to incontinence, and wine overcomes the man whom Sodom
failed to conquer.2114
A bishop that is
a striker is condemned by Him who gave His back to the smiters,2115
and when He was reviled reviled not
again.2116
“But moderate”;2117
one good thing is set over against two
evil things. Drunkenness and passion are to be held in check by
moderation. “Not a brawler, not covetous.” Nothing is more
overweening than the assurance of the ignorant who fancy that incessant
chatter will carry conviction with
it and are always ready for a dispute that they may thunder with turgid
eloquence against the flock committed to their charge. That a priest
must avoid covetousness even Samuel teaches when he proves before all
the people that he has taken nothing from any man.2118
And the same lesson is taught by the
poverty of the apostles who used to receive sustenance and refreshment
from their brethren and to boast that they neither had nor wished to
have anything besides food and raiment.2119
What the epistle to Timothy calls covetousness, that to Titus openly
censures as the desire for filthy lucre.2120
“One that ruleth well his own house.” Not by increasing
riches, not by providing regal banquets, not by having a pile of
finely-wrought plates, not by slowly steaming pheasants so that the
heat may reach the bones without melting the flesh upon them; no, but
by first requiring of his own household the conduct which he has to
inculcate in others. “Having his children in subjection with all
gravity.” They must not, that is, follow the example of the sons
of Eli who lay with the women in the vestibule of the Temple and,
supposing religion to consist in plunder, diverted to the gratification
of their own appetites all the best parts of the victims.2121
“Not a novice lest being lifted up
with pride he fall into the condemnation of the devil.” I cannot
sufficiently express my amazement at the great blindness which makes
men discuss such questions as that of marriage before baptism and
causes them to charge people with a transaction which is dead in
baptism, nay even quickened into a new life with Christ, while no one
regards a commandment so clear and unmistakable as this about bishops
not being novices. One who was yesterday a catechumen is to-day a
bishop2122
| 2122 The case of
Ambrose. | ; one who was yesterday in the
amphitheatre is to-day in the church; one who spent the evening in the
circus stands in the morning at the altar: one who a little while ago
was a patron of actors is now a dedicator of virgins. Was the apostle
ignorant of our shifts and subterfuges? did he know nothing of our
foolish arguments? He not only says that a bishop must be the husband
of one wife, but he has given commandment that he must be blameless,
vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach,
moderate,2123
not given to wine, no striker, not
a brawler, not covetous, not a novice. Yet to all these requirements we
shut our eyes and notice nothing but the wives of the aspirants. Who
cannot give instances to shew the need of the warning: “lest
being lifted up with pride he fall into the condemnation of the
devil?” A priest2124
| 2124 Sacerdos: as usual
a bishop is meant. | who is made such
in a moment knows nothing of the lowliness and meekness which mark the
meanest of the faithful, he knows nothing of Christian courtesy, he is
not wise enough to think little of himself. He passes from one dignity
to another, yet he has not fasted, he has not wept, he has not taken
himself to task for his life, he has not striven by constant meditation
to amend it, he has not given his substance to the poor. Yet he is
moved from one see2125
to another, he
passes, that is, from pride to pride. There can be no doubt that
arrogance is what the Apostle means when he speaks of the condemnation
and downfall of the devil. And all men fall into this who are in a
moment made masters, actually before they are disciples.
“Moreover he must have a good report of them which are
without.” The last requirement is like the first. One who is
really “blameless” obtains the unanimous approval not only
of his own household but of outsiders as well. By aliens and persons
outside the church we are to understand Jews, heretics and Gentiles. A
Christian bishop then must be such that they who cavil at his religion
may not venture to cavil at his life. At present however we see but too
many bishops who are willing, like the charioteers in the horse races,
to bid money for the popular applause; while there are some so
universally hated that they can wring no money from their people, a
feat which clowns accomplish by means of a few gestures.
10. Such are the conditions, son Oceanus, which the
master-teachers of the church ought with anxiety and fear to require of
others and to observe themselves. Such too are the canons which they
should follow in the choice of persons for the priesthood; for they
must not interpret the law of Christ to suit private animosities and
feuds or to gratify ill-feeling which is sure to recoil on the man who
cherishes it. Consider how unimpeachable is the character of Carterius
in whose life his ill-wishers can find nothing to censure except a
marriage contracted before baptism. “He that said, Do not commit
adultery, said also, Do not kill. If we commit no adultery yet if we
kill, we are become transgressors of the law.”2126
“Whosoever shall keep the whole law
and yet offend in one point, he is guilty of all.”2127
Accordingly when they cast in our teeth
a marriage entered into before baptism, we must require of them
compliance with all the precepts which are given to the baptized. For
they pass over much that is not allowable while they censure much that
is allowed.E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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