Note (return) — Chapter II

3. The contradictory notions of the Church, for so they appear to us, in Irenæus and Clement and still more in Tertullian and Origen, need not astonish any one who bears in mind that none of these Fathers made the Church the subject of a theological theory.166 Hence no one as yet thought of questioning the old article: "I believe in a holy Church." But, at the same time, actual circumstances, though they did not at first succeed in altering the Church's belief, forced her to realise her changed position, for she had in point of fact become an association which was founded on a definite law of doctrine and rejected everything that did not conform to it. The identifying of this association with the ideal Church was a matter of course,167 but it was quite as natural to take no immediate theoretical notice of the identification except in cases where it was absolutely necessary, that is, in polemics. In the latter case the unity of faith and hope became the unity of the doctrine of faith, and the Church was, in this instance, legitimised by the possession of the apostolic tradition instead of by the realising of that tradition in heart and life. From the principle that had been set up it necessarily followed that the apostolic inheritance on which the truth and legitimacy of the Church was based, could not but remain an imperfect court of appeal until living authorities could be pointed to in this court, and until every possible cause of strife and separation was settled by reference to it. An empirical community cannot be ruled by a traditional written word, but only by persons; for the written law will always separate and split. If it has such persons, however, it can tolerate within it a great amount of individual differences, provided that the leaders subordinate the interests of the whole to their own ambition. We have seen how Irenæus and Tertullian, though they in all earnestness represented the fides catholica and ecclesia catholica as inseparably connected,168 were already compelled to have recourse to bishops in order to ensure the apostolic doctrine. The conflicts within the sphere of the rule of faith, the struggles with the so-called Montanism, but finally and above all, the existing situation of the Church in the third century with regard to the world within her pale, made the question of organisation the vital one for her. Tertullian and Origen already found themselves face to face with episcopal claims of which they highly disapproved and which, in their own way, they endeavoured to oppose. It was again the Roman bishop169 who first converted the proposition that the bishops are direct successors of the Apostles and have the same "locus magisterii" ("place of government") into a theory which declares that all apostolic powers have devolved on the bishops and that these have therefore peculiar rights and duties in virtue of their office.170 Cyprian added to this the corresponding theory of the Church. In one decisive point, however, he did not assist the secularising process which had been completed by the Roman bishop, in the interest of Catholicity as well as in that of the Church's existence (see the following chapter). In the second half of the third century there were no longer any Churches, except remote communities, where the only requirement was to preserve the Catholic faith; the bishops had to be obeyed. The idea of the one episcopally organised Church became the main one and overshadowed the significance of the doctrine of faith as a bond of unity. The Church based on the bishops, the successors of the Apostles, the vicegerents of God, is herself the legacy of the Apostles in virtue of this her foundation. This idea was never converted into a rigid theory in the East, though the reality to which it corresponded was not the less certain on that account. The fancy that the earthly hierarchy was the image of the heavenly was the only part that began to be taken in real earnest. In the West, on the other hand, circumstances compelled the Carthaginian bishop to set up a finished theory.171 According to Cyprian, the Catholic Church, to which all the lofty predictions and predicates in the Bible apply (see Hartel's index under "ecclesia"), is the one institution of salvation outside of which there is no redemption (ep. 73. 21). She is this, moreover, not only as the community possessing the true apostolic faith, for this definition does not exhaust her conception, but as a harmoniously organised federation.172 This Church therefore rests entirely on the episcopate, which sustains her,173 because it is the continuance of the apostolic office and is equipped with all the power of the Apostles.174 Accordingly, the union of individuals with the Church, and therefore with Christ, is effected only by obedient dependence on the bishop, i.e., such a connection alone makes one a member of the Church. But the unity of the Church, which is an attribute of equal importance with her truth, because this union is only brought about by love,175 primarily appears in the unity of the episcopate. For, according to Cyprian, the episcopate has been from its beginning undivided and has continued to be so in the Church, in so far as the bishops are appointed and guided by God, are on terms of brotherly intercourse and exchange, and each bishop represents the whole significance of the episcopate.176 Hence the individual bishops are no longer to be considered primarily as leaders of their special communities, but as the foundation of the one Church. Each of these prelates, however, provided he keeps within the association of the bishops, preserves the independent right of regulating the circumstances of his own diocese.177 But it also follows that the bishops of those communities founded by the Apostles themselves can raise no claim to any special dignity, since the unity of the episcopate as a continuation of the apostolic office involves the equality of all bishops.178 However, a special importance attaches to the Roman see, because it is the seat of the Apostle to whom Christ first granted apostolic authority in order to show with unmistakable plainness the unity of these powers and the corresponding unity of the Church that rests on them; and further because, from her historical origin, the Church of this see had become the mother and root of the Catholic Church spread over the earth. In a severe crisis which Cyprian had to pass through in his own diocese he appealed to the Roman Church (the Roman bishop) in a manner which made it appear as if communion with that Church was in itself the guarantee of truth. But in the controversy about heretical baptism with the Roman bishop Stephen, he emphatically denied the latter's pretensions to exercise special rights over the Church in consequence of the Petrine succession.179 Finally, although Cyprian exalted the unity of the organisation of the Church above the unity of the doctrine of faith, he preserved the Christian element so far as to assume in all his statements that the bishops display a moral and Christian conduct in keeping with their office, and that otherwise they have ipso facto forfeited it.180 Thus, according to Cyprian, the episcopal office does not confer any indelible character, though Calixtus and other bishops of Rome after him presupposed this attribute. (For more details on this point, as well as with regard to the contradictions that remain unreconciled in Cyprian's conception of the Church, see the following chapter, in which will be shown the ultimate interests that lie at the basis of the new idea of the Church).