Christian Apologetics Past and Present (Volume 1, To 1500)

A Primary Source Reader

William Edgar, K. Scott Oliphint

• Publisher: Crossway
• Year: 2009
• ISBN:
  9781433519949
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Theology

An unprecedented anthology of apologetics texts with selections from the first century AD through the Middle Ages. Includes introductory material, timelines, maps, footnotes, and discussion questions.

The apostle Peter tells us always to be ready to give a defense to anyone who asks us to account for our hope as Christians (1 Peter 3: 15). While the gospel message remains the same, such arguments will look different from one age to another.

In the midst of a recent revival in the field of apologetics, few things could be more useful than an acquaintance with some of these arguments for the Christian belief through the ages. This first of two proposed volumes features primary source documents from the time of the early church (100-400) and the Middle Ages (400-1500). Featured apologists include Aristides, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Tertullian, Origen, Athanasius, Augustine, Anselm, and Thomas Aquinas.

The authors provide a preface to each major historical section, with a timeline and a map, then an introduction to each apologist. Each primary source text is followed by questions for reflection or discussion purposes.

PART ONE

The Early Church

The Struggle for Vindication

Part 1 Introduction

The Christian church emerged out of a Jewish background and from within the Roman Empire. Theologically, it drew much of its thought from the Old Testament, deepened and fulfilled in the New. Mostly, the church emerged as a people defined by the person and work of Jesus Christ. The foundation of the church was the work of his disciples. Jesus recast covenant life as the kingdom of God, the realm of God’s rule and righteousness. He and his followers ordered this kingdom into a truly global people, who would move out into all parts of the world, making disciples and drawing its inhabitants from all sorts and conditions of men into the one universal church (Matt. 28:16–20).

The Exile as Background to the Church and Its Apologetics

The immediate background for the rise of the church was the Jewish exile. The two book sets, Kings and Chronicles, describe the downfall of Israel after the last days of King David (ca. 970 BC) until the Babylonian exile some four centuries later. The northern kingdom, known as Israel, and the southern kingdom, known as Judah, had parallel though different histories. The northern kingdom, whose capital was Samaria, was invaded by the Assyrians, and its population deported in about 722 BC. The southern kingdom was conquered, Jerusalem sacked, and the Jews deported into Babylon around 586 BC. While the two kingdoms were reunited under Hezekiah (715–686), nevertheless living under foreign rule would be a permanent feature of Jewish life.

The Jews were allowed to return to Jerusalem and to parts of their former land in various episodes. Under Cyrus, the people came back to Judah from 559 to 530 BC. Darius allowed them to rebuild the temple in Jerusalem in 516. Ezra was allowed by Artaxerxes I (645–424) to return with more exiles, while many remained in Babylon. Living successively under the Persians, the Greco-Macedonians, and the Romans, the Jews developed a way of dealing with their oppressors that would carry over into New Testament times. And, of course, this meant that apologetics was woven into the fabric of Christian consciousness.

In the Old Testament, apologetics was practiced in various forms. One of them was the prophetic reminder of God’s sovereignty over creation and his power in delivering the people from Egypt. Over and over, the prophets appealed to the exodus experience not only as proof of God’s power, but also as a reminder of their true identity (Isa. 10:26; Amos 2:10; Mic. 6:4, etc.). Much Old Testament apologetics centers on this argument from God’s power. A striking case in point is Jeremiah’s appeal to the Jews to compare God’s work among the nations to the potter’s handling his clay ( Jer. 18:1–11). Just as the potter is free to throw away any bad clay, so God will judge the nations by his sovereign judgment. At the same time, if the nation repents, then God will relent and spare them disaster (v. 8).

A separate Jewish religion developed in contradistinction to the Christian church, and a distinctive apologetic character grew out of this Judaism. While the Old Testament heritage was still present, important changes emerged among Jewish apologists. Hellenistic Jews in particular developed an argument for the superiority of the Mosaic revelation over against paganism and Greek wisdom, but it was more rationally based than the authoritative appeal to the exodus. Jewish apologetics presented three kinds of answers to Greek philosophers. Their answers are somewhat strange to our ears: (1) they argued that Plato actually depended on Moses; (2) they contended that Mosaic revelation was more ancient than the wisdom of the Greeks; and (3) they sometimes maintained that God revealed his wisdom to the Greeks as a special gift.¹ Some of these arguments would make their way into the earliest Christian apologists, as we will see.

Whereas many of the Jews living in the period, known as the Second Temple, were expecting a political messiah to come and overthrow the Roman rulers, what Jesus did was far more radical. He took an exiled people and formed them into the City of God, a community far more powerful and enduring than the Romans or any other rulers could muster. Within a short time, Gentiles became the principal members of this community and took the message worldwide.

The New Testament Writers as Apologists

The New Testament authors present quite a robust apologetics. The heart of the message of the New Testament is the reality of Christ’s coming to establish the kingdom of God. Accordingly, apologetics in the New Testament era functioned to persuade people of the truth and saving power of this kingdom. The four gospels are, each in its own way, filled with apologetic elements.

Matthew, probably written for converts from Judaism, contains critiques of the Jewish response to Jesus as well as affirmations of the right interpretation of the Old Testament. Mark was written to sum up the salient features of Jesus’ life and message in order to persuade his readers of God’s power in the gospel for all audiences. Thus he focuses on Christ’s ministry both in Gentile territory (Galilee) and in Jewish territory ( Judea and Jerusalem). Luke, together with the Acts, famously begins with his stated purpose: to write an orderly account of eyewitness reports about the good news, so that his readers (named here Theophilus) may “have certainty concerning the things you have been taught” (Luke 1:1–4). And John’s gospel goes even further, written to persuade his readers that Jesus is the Messiah, God’s Son, and that through him they may have life eternal ( John 20:31).

Similarly, the authors of the New Testament Epistles are driven by apologetic purposes. Paul boldly proclaims to the Romans: “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, ‘The righteous shall live by faith’” (Rom. 1:16–17). Paul practiced the art of apologetics everywhere he went. Acts 17:16–34 records an extended speech given to a mixed group in the Athens marketplace. The discourse is both a refutation of idolatry and a commendation of God as Judge through Jesus Christ. The book of Hebrews is an apologetic for Jesus Christ as God’s final revelation. The last book of the Bible, known as the Revelation, is a powerful apology for the sovereignty of God through Christ over all of the conflicts in history, and for the assurance of an outcome in which a new heaven and new earth would replace the fallen world as we know it.

The apologetics found in the New Testament served to convince and then to ground people in the faith. Much of it was developed in the face of opposition. Peter’s famous words in 1 Peter 3:15, which give us the directive to practice apologetics, are clearly pronounced in the context of hostility against believers. The book of Hebrews, the Revelation, and many other documents are a call to persevere in the face of persecution.

Some of the apologetics, too, was developed in order to correct variant teachings spread abroad in the church. Colossians was written to oppose certain Gnostic tendencies in the new church. Gnostics believed in an elitist knowledge of God and favored special spiritual disciplines, ones that freed them from the body or from the creation, rather than honoring the creation as good and the gospel as freely offered to all. Indeed, one of the constant themes defended in the New Testament is the goodness of creation. All foods are good because they come from the earth, which is the Lord’s (1 Cor. 10:25–26). Marriage is to be held in honor everywhere (Heb. 13:4). We belong to Jesus Christ, who is the Mediator of all creation, including powers and authorities (Col. 1:15–23). Thus, even governments are appointed by God, and so we must obey them as they carry out God’s will in the polis (Rom. 13:1–7).

Apologetic Challenges beyond the New Testament

When we move beyond the New Testament period, the church continues to encounter challenges within the complex world of the Roman Empire. The church in Palestine eventually dwindled, and with it much of the early Jewish church, so that the center of gravity moved to the Gentile church, which spread beyond Jerusalem into the heartland of the Roman Empire. On the whole, Christians represented every walk of life. They were farmers, soldiers, highborn, working people, slaves, fathers and mothers, children and adults. Three challenges presented themselves, requiring an apologetic response.

Persecution

First, there was persecution. As in the first century, there continued to be opposition from various quarters. Until the time of Emperor Constantine, Christianity was a religio illicita, an unlawful religion, and so always under threat. There were two major periods that included at times hard persecution and at other times extended periods of peace. The first general period spanned from Nero (ca. AD 64) to Decius (ca. AD 250). The second was from Decius until Constantine, who declared Christianity a religio licita in AD 313 in the West, and in 323 in the eastern part of the empire. In 392 under Theodosius I, Christianity was declared the official religion of the empire, and pagan religions were forbidden. Finally, the Roman Empire fell, which provoked a monumental crisis in the ancient world, one that would generally favor the presence of the Christian church.

Later, as we will see, the church gradually developed two great sections that had differing sensibilities and faced somewhat different challenges, one in the West (using the Latin language) and the other in the East (using Greek). A schism occurred in 1054 after a long and complex estrangement between the two.

The causes for persecution varied, but most often revolved around the refusal of Christians to participate fully in a social system centered in the emperor as a demigod. Although they fully honored the government, believers refused to participate in various ceremonies and games that were endemic to the system. For this they were considered not only atheists but treasonable, provoking the gods to wrath. Other accusations against them included cannibalism, since their central sacrament involved symbolically partaking of the body and blood of Christ, and incest because they met at night and greeted one another with a “holy kiss.”

The most important apologists from these early centuries fully engaged with these attacks. Justin Martyr (d. ca. 165) took the emperor to task for failing to pursue the accusations against Christians with the same integrity he was reputed to bring into other contexts. A similar approach was employed by Athenagoras (d. ca. 185), who centered his arguments on the resurrection of the dead, countering typical opponents who accused Christians of atheism, cannibalism, and licentiousness. A more basic accusation came from people seeking a scapegoat.

The fall of the Roman Empire was gradual, punctuated by dramatic moments. Theodosius I died in 395, the last time the Roman Empire would be politically united. In 410, Alaric and his Visigoth hordes sacked the city of Rome. At the time, many people blamed the disfavor of the gods, particularly their refusal to protect a city where Christians lived and worshiped a unique Creator, who refused to participate in the pantheon. Aurelius Augustine (354–430), the greatest theologian in the late Patristic period, answered in his massive City of God (AD 413–426) that pagan religion cannot sustain human welfare.

Heresy

The second occasion for apologetics was the problem of heresy. The world of the first centuries AD was concerned with redemption. State religion was cold. Philosophy was for the elite. Nature religions seemed unable to attract the increasingly civilized peoples. As a result, the more appealing mystery religions emerged. These were secret societies that practiced various pagan rites that offered communion with the gods. One of the most influential of the mystery religions was Mithraism, which the Roman armies especially favored.

In the second century, a powerful religious movement from the East, and with strong resemblance to Greek thinking, joined the mystery religions and became Gnosticism. These sects claimed to have “knowledge” (gnōsis) of the nature and destiny of mankind. It was a secret knowledge about redemption. A rather complicated mixture, Gnosticism had roots in at least three cultures: Jewish (which gave it a semblance of monotheism), Babylonian (from which it derived its preoccupation with astrology), and Iranian (providing in addition a dualistic superstructure to the whole).

Gnosticism was basically a religion claiming that humans are divine souls trapped in a material world. Release may come from knowledge, which brings direct contact with God. Gnosticism is syncretistic, mixing in elements from the gospel with a largely pagan philosophy. The details are often complex. It had many exponents, including the influential Valentinus (100–160). Interestingly, we know more about Gnosticism from Christian champions of the faith than from its original adherents, not only because the apologists’ documents have been preserved, but also because they were careful to describe it fairly. Irenaeus (120–202/3) was doubtless the most articulate and thorough of those who refuted Gnosticism.

Other heresies included Marcionism, which, like Gnosticism, was dualistic, but which attempted to drive a wedge between Paul’s interpretation of the gospel and the Jewish influences from the Old Testament. We will further explicate some of these heresies when we look at the appropriate apologists. Still another major struggle in the Patristic era was with the heresy of Manichaeism. Mani (ca. 210–276) was a scholar from the Persian Empire whose thinking was enormously influential in the third through the sixth centuries. Though complex, its core idea is dualism. There are two powers, good and evil, and although ultimately goodness will triumph, God is good but not all-powerful. The battleground for the conflict is the human being, whose soul tends toward the good, but whose body is evil.

Challenges from heterodoxy were not only significant for apologetics, but often the occasions for formulating the most significant Christian doctrines. For example, the legacy of the fourth century on the doctrine of the Trinity resulted from long discussion culminating in a settlement at Nicaea in 325, along with Constantinople in 381. One factor causing concern was the teachings of Arianism.

Arius (250/256–336) got into a dispute (ca. 318) with Alexander, the Bishop of Alexandria, over the nature of Christ. Arius believed that before Jesus was begotten by the Father, he did not exist. Nor was he consubstantial or coeternal with the Father. Instead, he had a human body and a divine soul. In the long and involved series of debates that followed, several apologists distinguished themselves. Thus, the line between mainstream theology and apologetics is not a thick one.

For example, Eusebius of Caesarea (263–ca. 339) and Athanasius of Alexandria (ca. 295–373) defended, in an apologetic vein, the full deity of Jesus Christ in the controversies leading up to Nicaea. Then, again, Augustine entered the picture. He wrote on many of the foundational doctrines, including creation, the church, faith and reason, the Trinity, free will, and good works. Himself a former Manichaean, he argued that this worldview did not take sin seriously enough, and it could not really help people in their ethical lives because it did not credit God with the grace and power of the gospel.

Unbelieving Jews

A third issue for early apologetics, one that would manifest itself off and on throughout the first few centuries, was the unbelief of the Jews. The subject is delicate, particularly for us today, on this side of the Holocaust. The charge of anti-Semitism means different things to different people. While there was often forceful pleading with Jews who would not accept the gospel of Christ, some of it expressing frustration, yet there is a world of difference between the early church’s posture toward unbelieving Jews and the systematic and racist kind of anti-Semitism of ideologues inspired in part by the theories of Arthur de Gobineau (1816–1882), who, himself not particularly anti-Semitic, nevertheless set forth the influential idea, later taken up by the Nazis, that racial admixture would stymie cultural development. So, for example, many have thought John Chrysostom (ca. 347–407) to be anti-Semitic, particularly because of his series of eight sermons titled Homilies against the Jews. We will look more closely into Chrysostom’s case later in this volume, and we will discover that things are not so simple.

Jewish opposition to Christian faith in the Patristic period was both political and theological. Politically, having won a degree of privilege under Roman rule, the Jews were anxious not to lose their status. Despite a number of conflicts, including the Roman-Jewish wars in Judea (66–73 and 132–135), by the second part of the first century the Jewish presence in the Roman Empire was fairly well established. The number of Jews in the city of Rome exceeded ten thousand. As the Christian religion became more and more prominent and appeared to the outsider to have much in common with Judaism, there was guilt by association. By the fourth century, despite official toleration, the status of the Jews degenerated and would know many ups and downs there...

Table of contents

• COVER PAGE
• TITLE PAGE
• COPYRIGHT PAGE
• DEDICATION
• CONTENTS PAGE
• INTRODUCTION
• PART ONE
• Part 1 Introduction
• PART TWO