Volume 1

A dictionary of Christian antiquities : being a continuation of the 'Dictionary of the Bible' / edited by William Smith and Samuel Cheetham ; illustrated by engravings on wood.

Date:: [between 1890 and 1899?]

Credit: A dictionary of Christian antiquities : being a continuation of the 'Dictionary of the Bible' / edited by William Smith and Samuel Cheetham ; illustrated by engravings on wood. Source: Wellcome Collection.

1027/1096 (page 1007)

$standing up together in a body, and uttering prayers {evxds TTf/xTrofieu), we can hardly avoid the conclusion that the harmonious utterances of a multitude must have taken some well-known form, perhaps rather of the nature of short “ preces ” than more lengthened “ orationes.” And when he says (Apol. i. c. 13) that Chris- tians thought it right to send “ pomps and hymns ” ^ to the Creator by means of language, rather than as the heathen did, his words suit better the majestic style of Eastern prayers and odes, such as we have them, than the unpre- meditated effusions of a presiding brother. Another objection is found in Tertullian’s assertion (Apol. c. 30), that Christians prayed without a prompter (sine monitore) because they prayed from the heart. We know too little of the functions of the heathen “ monitor ” to be able to say with certainty what kind of contrast is intended. If the monitor dictated the words of the prayer, the passage seems to imply that Christians needed no such aid, but prayed in such words as the heart prompted ; if the monitor, like the deacon in Christian assemblies at a somewhat later date, simply proclaimed the object for which prayer was to be made from time to time, no such in- ference can be drawn. And, as Bingham has re- marked (xiii. V. 5), in public prayer the presiding brother or presbyter must, in any case, have dictated words to the rest, whether with the help of a set form or not, or there could have been no common woi’ship. On the whole, we conclude that Tertullian, in the passage before us, simply means that Christians needed no urging to pray, as some of the heathen did ; they needed no prompting but that of their own hearts. Again, it is contended (e.g. by Le Brun, tom. ii. Diss. i. p. 11 ff.) that certain expressions of St. Basil prove conclusively that liturgies were not committed to writing in his time. The passage in question is the following: to ttjs iiriKhria^cDS ^T]fiara €Trl rg avadei^ei rov &pTov rrjs evxa- piUTias KOI rov Trorgpiov rrjs evXoyias ris rwv ayicav €yypd<pa}S gplv Kara\4\onrev\ (De Spiritu Sancto, c. 27, § 68) ; that is, “ which of the saints left behind for us in writing the words of the invocation at the displaying (or dedicating) of the bread of thanksgiving and the cup of blessing ?” On this passage we have to remark, that St. Basil is here defending apostolic tradi- tion ; if, he says, we were to reject everythin^ which has not direct written [i. e. scriptural] authority as being of no great importance, we should very much endanger the church ; for many well-known practices rest only on tradi- tion ; as the use of the sign of the cross in baptism, the turning towards the East, the use of the words of invocation [Epiclesis]. That he is referring to the want of scriptural authority for certain parts of the church service, not to the absence of written copies, is evident from the words which follow the passage quoted above : “ for we do not by any means content ourselves with those words which are recorded in the Epistles or the Gospels, but we prefix and suffix others, as being of great efficacy in respect b For the application of the word irofjinrj to language, compare Pseudo-Plato, Axiocli. p. 369 d, voixirr} kolL prifxaTwv ayAaitr/ads. of the mystery, receiving them from the un- written discipline (e/c rrjs dypd(f>ov SiSacKaXias TrapoAajSdrTes).” Clearly when St. Basil says that the words of the Epiclesis were not received in a written form from any of the saints, he means that they were not contained in scripture, but formed a part of that mass of non-scriptural tradition which inclu led so many well-known church observances. On the question, whether these formularies were committed to writing in his own time, his words determine nothing; what he says is virtually, that they were not contained in any writing of the apostolic age. In any case, St. Basil’s expressions relate only to the Epiclesis in the liturgy, the exact words of which may perhaps not have been committed to writing until a comparatively late period, from the dread of profanation by the heathen. In another of Le Brun's arguments (tom. ii. Diss. i., art. 5, p. 29-32), that the lathers expressly forbade the Lord’s Prayer or the Creed to be written down on paper or parch- ment, he seems to have forgotten both that the Lord’s Prayer and the Creed were regarded as much more secret and sacred than most other portions of divine service, and that these cautions were addressed to catechumens. On the other hand, it has been supposed that some at least of St. Paul’s quotations, which are not found in canonical scripture, are taken from Christian liturgies. As, for instance, in 1 Cor. ii. 9, the quotation, “ eye hath not seen nor ear heard ...” which is introduced with the words “ Kadws yeypairrai,” is by no means exactly taken from Isaiah Ixiv. 4, and may (it is con- tended) have been taken B-om a liturgy. The expression does in fact occur in the liturgy of St. James (Daniel, Codex, iv. 113), which how- ever is, as a whole, unquestionably of much later date than the apostolic age. With greater probability it has been thought that the expres- sion “ faithful is the word ” (Trio-rbs 6 Ad7os), several times occurring in the pastoral epistles (1 Tim. i. 15 ; iii, 1 ; 2 Tim. ii. 11; Tit. iii. 8) implies the quotation of a saying or yvu>u.ri familiar to the Christians in their assemblies, perhaps one which they w'ere accustomed to repeat “ with one voice; ” the passage 2 Tim. ii. 11 in particular has very much the rhythm of an “ ode ” intended for chanting. Whether we should reckon the books or rolls found in ancient Christian pictures [1. 877] as liturgical books is very doubtful. But we come upon the traces of at least some forms committed to writing in the 2nd century. Ceisiis (Origen c. Cels. vi. 40, p. 302 Spencer) says that he saw in the possession of Christian priests certain “barbaric books, full of names of demons and portentous expressions.” These were in all probability forms of Exorcism [1. 651], though Daniel (Codex, iv. 28 ft.) considers them to have been Diptychs. They were at any rate some kind of formulary used by Christians. And the way in which Origen replies to Celsus, that Christians who duly worship God in the set prayers (irpoa-TaxOeia-ais evxous) are free from the assault of demons, seems at any rate to indicate the existence of forms. Eusebius de- clares (//. E. V. 28, § 5) that written odes (ypaipeia-ai) testified from the very beginning to the divinity of Christ the word of God ; a pass- age which reminds us of the well-known phrase$