Frauds and Follies of the Fathers / A Review of the Worth of Their Testimony to the Four Gospels

or of which contends that the Greek word Eirenaios, meaning "peaceful" is simply the title of a treatise against heresies, the object of which was to allay sectarian discord, and that Iren?us, b

of Primitive Chur

Written

the four Gospels, and Iren?us claims to have been a disciple of Polycarp, who was a hearer of John. This claim can only be made at all plausible by giving each of these holy martyrs an exceedingly long life, for we have the word of Eusebius, that the book against heresies was composed

John as wearing the petalon, the bishops insignia of office. Fancy the retired fisherman, the beloved disciple, who was told by his master to carry neither purse nor scrip, wearing the priestly robes of office! George Reber, in his curious book, "The Christ of Paul," (New York, 1876), says (p. 178):

against heresies is lost, and it exists only in a barbarous Latin version. At whatever time it was written, and it may probably be dated between 182 and 188, it testifies to the existence of numerous heresies in the Church. It contains many statements respecting the Gnostics, particularly the Valentinian heresy. There we may read of their peculiar theories concerning God and Christ. Some thought the Hebrew Jahveh a malignant deity whom Christ had come to destroy. Others were foolish and wicked enough to ask whence God got the matter for his creation. Cerinthus and his followers denied the virgin birth. Carpocrates and his school held that Jesus was the son of Joseph, and just like other men with the exception that inasmuch as his soul was stedfast and pure a power desce

s-it has but one theme. The writer sets out with the Logos idea of this gospel, which is never lost sight of. He finds proof in the traditions of the Church-in every page of the Old Testament-in the Synoptics as well as in the fourth Gospel; and as we read his misapplication of words and sentences, we should conclude that he was a lunatic if we did not

honest historians of any age" and "the great criminal of the second century;" and endeavors to

1880), says "Iren?us was credulous and blundering," and our

was to refute heretics by the allegation of an apostolical succession which rests on his unsupported testimony alone. The author of the work against Heresies was essentially a priest, dwelling much on the authority of the priesthood and priestl

were alleged to have heard the apostles as decisive authorities. Hermes he calls divine Scripture. To be out

e question at considerable length, and quotes John viii., 56-57, as establishing his opinion. For he argues the Jews would not have said to Jesus "Thou art not yet fifty years old," if he had only been thirty. Their object being to remind him of the short perio

pirits] while the Church is scattered throughout all the world, and the pillar and ground of the Church is the gospel and the spirit of life; it is fitting that she should have four pillars, breathing out immortality on every side, and vivifying men afresh" (Book iii., chap, xi, sect 8., p

ect of making the Septuagint version of Divine authority, was because the quotations in the Christians' Scriptures were taken from it, strangely enough, had the writers of those Scriptures been Jews. But despite their boasted accuracy, Iren?us (book iii., chap, xx., sec. 4) quotes Isaiah as saying, "And the holy Lord remembered his dead Israel, who had slept in the land of sepulture; and he came down to preach his salvation

e gives only general statements not particular instances. He allows that the heretics Simon and Carpoerates and their followers also perform miracles, "but not through the power of God but for the sake of destroying and misleading mankind, by means of magical deceptions." None of these Christian miracles were known to the heathen, and, as Dr. Conyers Middle ton pointed out, in his "Free Enquiry into t

typology. He even makes Balaam's ass a type of the Savior. The cohabitation of Lot with his two

icted in the Jewish apocalypses. This portion of his writings, having been utterly discredited, is very often omitted. He believed the end of all things was near at hand. The world would last six thousand years because made in six days. Antichrist would come from the tribe of Dan and reign three y

stles, that Enoch and Elias were translated into that very Paradise from which Adam was expelled, and that this wa

bsurdum est," and who ended by turning heretic. Nor with the learned Clement of Alexandria, whose high speculations led also into contempt of the world and its ways of science, art, and civilisation. Nor with the ascetic and self-emasculated Origen, at

space for the great ec

EBI

t Christian literature of the time preceding the establishment of Christianity by C

t thou, Eusebius?" exclaimed Potamon, Bishop of Heraclea, at the Council of Tyre, where Eusebius violently conducted the "persecution of Athanasius," "to judge the innocent Athana

eir deeds of violence." This, however, did not stand in the way of his sitting beside the Emperor Constantine, at the Council of Nice, to anathematise and put down the Arians. He subscribed the Nicene Creed, apparently with some reservations, as to the word consubstantial. It is noticeable that

racter of the man, and the sincerity of the historian. He makes out Eusebius to have been simply an ambitious and cruel cour

of history has not paid a very strict regard to the observance of the other; and the suspicion will derive additional credit from the character of Eusebius, which was less tinctured with credulity, and more practised in the arts of courts than that of almost any of his contemporaries."* "No one," says Scaliger, "has contributed more to Christian history, and no one has committed mor

his Notes to Gibbo

e loose and, it mus

ous authority

rispus, his nephew Licinius, suffocated his wife Fausta, and who, to revenge a pasquinade, was with difficulty restrained from the massacre of Rome, and who used the altar of the Church, which promised absolution and offered atonement for all sins, as a convenient

great question if his account of his baptism is correct or if he was baptised in Rome by Pope Sylveste

yed by order of Theodosius) a forgery of his own time, called "The Philosophy of Oracles," and then cites it as evidence for Christianity. He gives a forged passage ascribed to Phlegon, where that Pagan is made to speak of the darkness which happened at the death of Jesus. If such a passage had been

ver with a pretended correspondence which passed between Jesus, wh

probably a hundred years after, long did duty among Christian evidences, but is now given

male children in the inland town "Bethlehem, and the coasts thereof," on account of an obscure prophecy. In the 12th chapter of Acts it is stated that Herod, as the people were calling him a god, was smitten by an angel and was eaten by worms. Josephus says: "Agrippa, casting his eyes upward, saw an owl, sitting upo

that after the banishment of Arche-laus, who reigned for nine years after Herod's death. Dr. Lardner's works (vol. i, p. 344) says: "I must confess I ascribe that not to ignorance but to somewhat a great deal worse. It is impossible that a man of Eusebius's acutenes

ntiq. xviii., hi., 3). He at any rate first cited the forgery, which was unknown to Origen, and distinctly asserts that Josephus did not acknowledge C