The Fusion of Classical Culture and Christianity

(2001 James O. Richards All Rights Reserved.)

     The Fusion of Classical Culture and Christianity:
               Antagonism, Adjustment and Synthesis (200-500)

       Outline of Lecture

       1. Introduction: Christianity Saves Classical Culture, Adapting
       While Adopting It
       2. Frame of Reference: Roman Crisis, Regimentation, and Decline
       (200 - 500)
       3. Christianity and Classical Culture (200 - 500)
       4. St. Augustine's City of God as a Study in the Fusion of
       Christianity and Classical Culture
       5. Summary of the Fusion of Christianity and Classical Culture

                                    Introduction

In 200 Rome seemed destined to last forever. By 500 the empire in the West was gone
and it seemed possible that with it would go all that Rome had created and maintained--
law, government, and the culture stretching back to Greece. The decline of Rome,
however, did not mean the loss of all Roman achievements. Christianity, a new culture
not dependent on Rome, provided direction and purpose as the empire disintegrated in the
West and was replaced by new authorities, and new institutional and social arrangements.
In the centuries from 200-500 Christians preserved what they thought was worth saving,
and what they could save, of the imperial political order and culture as they formed many
of the essential values, beliefs and ideals which would be passed on to Europe as a
culture. While examining this period, we need to remember that what looked like a period
of chaos and disaster to those who held classical values and ideals seemed to be a period
of birth and growth to those who professed Christianity and saw the classical world, not
as the highest and best achievement of mankind, but as a wrecking yard of materials for

salvage. We also need to remember that the period we are considering was a long time
and that often the changes were more gradual than sudden.

?
I have made the comment before that a period of disaster and destruction may also be a
period of creativity. Again, your response to this? Would you prefer to live through such
a period, or a stable one?

The background to the fundamental cultural shift being considered is the severe political
and economic crisis of the third century, the regimentation of political, economic and
social life under Diocletian and Constantine (284-337), and the ever more difficult
struggle to hold the empire together during the fifth century in the face of barbarian
attacks and a weakened will to support a regimented society and economy. The Rome of
this period was far different from the Rome of Augustus and Vergil and, as a result, more
and more Romans of conviction and energy were likely to be Christian rather than
classical in their outlook.

                            Frame of Reference:
             Roman Crisis, Regimentation and Decline (180 - 500)

The stability, prosperity and seeming permanence of Rome at the end of the reign of
Marcus Aurelius (180) concealed some serious conditions and problems. In earlier
centuries Rome had faced and solved challenges of equal complexity and difficulty in
winning her empire. This time, however, she was unable to find, or lacked the will to
find, solutions, and consequently the conditions and problems lurking beneath the surface
in 180 finally overcame the empire. There was a growing lack of confidence and of hope
for the improvement of life in this world, even among the wealthier and leisured classes
whose attitudes are most easily known. Peace was at best precarious; Marcus Aurelius
spent the first part of his reign fighting the Parthians in the east and the last part fighting
the Germans on the Upper Rhine and the Danube. Prosperity was uneven from region to
region and did not extend at all to the masses of the urban and rural poor. All it would
take to upset the apparent tranquility of the Pax Romana was a serious internal crisis or a
severe external threat. Both happened together in the third century.

After the death of Marcus in 180 Rome underwent a century of political crisis as the army
and its commanders fought over the imperial succession. Marcus' predecessors had
chosen men of ability and merit as their successors. He chose his son Commodus (180-

192), who had neither ability nor merit, but only kinship to recommend him. If the
emperor chose unwisely, however, the army's choices generally were no better for Rome.
With the exception of Septimius Severus (193-211), the general who succeeded
Commodus, the army's role in choosing emperors in the next hundred years produced
chaos. After the cruel Caracalla (211-217), almost thirty men wore the purple, some for
only a few months, none for longer than seven years. Most had risen through the ranks,
the ranks being made up largely of provincials from peasant stock. Some were capable,
but lacked the time to prove themselves. As one overthrew another the importance of the
army grew and the strength of the empire declined.

?
Why did the Roman empire never devise a better policy of political succession? Could
they have? How?

With military anarchy came other disasters. While the Roman armies fought each other to
make their generals emperors, the frontiers in the west and east fell open to Rome's
enemies. In the mid-third century the Goths invaded Gaul, Spain, and even Italy itself. In
the east the Sassanian-led Persians took Mesopotamia and Syria. The best that Rome
could do was buy these invaders off with tribute since the weakened and distracted army
could not throw them back. The central government was also powerless to stop provincial
administrators such as Postumus in Gaul from setting up their own rule. At the same time
disease and famine struck large areas of the empire. In the middle of the third century a
plague decimated the population of large cities and the surrounding countryside, leading
to economic breakdown and widespread starvation. As the economy shrank because of
invasion, anarchy and disease, the central government and local warlords increased their
efforts to collect revenues to pay the soldiers and buy off the invaders, often resorting to
extortion and confiscation. Of their expedients to raise money, however, probably the
most damaging was the debasing of the coinage which caused disastrous inflation. The
effect of all these conditions was that city-based life suffered heavily. Cities shrank in
size and influence as they became the most attractive victims for marauders looking for
booty and government agents and officials looking for revenues to pay the armies and
buy off the invaders. The cities which survived were not only smaller and poorer
afterwards, but ringed with walls such as the empire had not known for centuries.

?
Your text and this lecture make some judgments about why Rome fell? What theory (ies)
do you think most convincing?

Reeling from all these simultaneous onslaughts, Rome still managed to stand, but just
barely. The first step in survival was subduing the German tribes and the rebellious local
administrators which was accomplished by the emperors Claudius Gothicus (268-270)
and Aurelian (270-275). Then Diocletian (284-305), a general like almost all the
emperors of the period, initiated major reforms in the administration, military structure,
and the economy of the empire; Constantine (306-337) completed his work. Their
solutions bought the empire another century of unity, but at a high price. The
regimentation they imposed strengthened the empire in the short run but aggravated the
conditions contributing to its decline.

To make the empire more manageable Diocletian divided it into eastern and western
parts, keeping the East and giving the West to a colleague designated, like himself,
Augustus. Each of them adopted a successor called a Caesar. Thus Rome had not one but
four rulers, each with a separate army, capital and administration. Although Constantine
resumed sole power after Diocletian, the division would be attempted again later in the
fourth century and foreshadowed the eventual split of the empire. Diocletian was also
responsible for the elaboration of a court ceremony which admitted few to the ruler's
presence, required that they prostrate themselves before him and kiss the hem of his robe,
displayed the ruler in resplendent wardrobe and diadem, and commanded that they
address him by the special title, "dominus et deus" (lord and god). The purpose was to
exalt the ruler and set him apart from his subjects. Like Diocletian's administrative
reforms, this ceremonial practice lived on, with the exception of the title, "god", to shape
court ceremony in the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire and even the feudal
monarchies in the West. Diocletian also greatly enlarged the army by drawing more
barbarians into the ranks in return for money or land, and by reorganizing it for a mobile
rather than a static defense of the frontiers. He reduced the provinces and combined them
into larger units called dioceses which were allocated to one of the Augusti or Caesars.
From the head of the diocese, called a vicar (from vicarius, "agent"), down into the
smallest province, a multitude of officials were set to organize and regulate the empire
and pay for its defense. The old Roman practice of relying on the cities to govern not
only their own affairs but those of their hinterlands under the loose supervision of the
emperor or the Senate gave way to exclusive rule by the central government. This switch
was significant--the bureaucratically-organized state would be a model for the church's
own organization, the Eastern Roman Empire, the European feudal monarchies and even
the absolutist states of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.

The final part of the reform program was the attempt to insure that the economy produced
the resources needed by the court, army and bureaucracy. The first step was currency
reform to stop rampant inflation, which did not work. Then Diocletian resorted to the
Edict of Diocletian (301) fixing wages and prices, which did not work either, despite its
draconian punishments for violators, but which set the pattern of regimentation which
rulers were to follow. To get the money and manpower he needed Diocletian regulated
economic and social life ever more closely. Land was taxed in kind and individuals were
taxed in labor, as well as money. By law landowners and those who cultivated the land,
tradesmen, craftsmen and specialized workers were fixed in their places lest they escape
the heavier and heavier burdens levied by the government. Constantine made soldiers,

municipal officials and bureaucrats subject to the same law. Work and status became life-
time, and then hereditary, obligations. For example, first coloni or tenant farmers were
tied to the land, then their children; small landowners passed into coloni status as well. So
what we are seeing emerge is serfdom, which would last with variations for a thousand
years in the West. This society was not totalitarian in the modern sense (which required
modern science and technology), but it was the best attempt of which the ancient world
was capable. While arguably saving the empire, the reforms also reduced the autonomy
and initiative of the cities and local authorities on whose wealth and self-reliance the
empire rested, thus destroying the real strength of Rome.

?
1. Rome saved itself by political authoritarianism and regimentation. It froze people in
their occupations and made the emperors ever more powerful, and survived. Is survival
worth such a price?
2. Imagine yourself in late Imperial Rome in the conditions just described. What would
be your response?

Constantine, besides joining Diocletian in these reforms, was responsible for two other
major events: the establishment of an eastern capital at Constantinople, strategic to the
defense and near the wealth of the East; and the official toleration and favoring of
Christianity to which Constantine converted. After his death in 337, the empire again
experienced political turmoil and civil war among his heirs, a disastrous war with the
Persians during the brief reign of Julian (361-363) who also attempted to reverse the tide
favoring Christianity, and war again with the barbarians, this time the German Visigoths
who inflicted a major defeat on the empire in 378 at Adrianople. After this defeat,
Theodosius (378-395) pulled the empire together again for the last time.

Following Theodosius' death, the division between the Eastern and Western Empires was
permanent. In the west the emperors ruled in name only; barbarian generals held real
power. The Western Empire suffered as in the third century as the generals fought each
other, on behalf of and against Rome, making and unmaking emperors until the official
end of the Western Empire in 476, the date when the last emperor with a Roman name
was deposed by the German general Odoacer. This last century in the West was probably
not unrelieved disaster, but contemporaries thought it was. In 410 Rome itself was
attacked and pillaged by Alaric the Visigoth. In 455 the city was sacked again, this time
by the Vandals. The German rulers of the remnants of the Western Empire continued to
seek legitimacy by asking for recognition by the Eastern emperor at Constantinople, but
Rome existed in the West only as an idea and a ruined city.

By 500 if there was going to be order in the West, or the region of the old western
provinces of the empire, it would have to be provided by someone besides Rome. The
rulers of the German peoples were the only apparent possibility. In the next chapter we

shall examine German ascendancy and its effect on the beginnings of Europe. However,
since these leaders took over not only existing institutions, populations and economies,
but a civilization and culture which had undergone changes as Christianity triumphed, we
must first go back to the end of the second century and see what happened as Christians
became the leading force in the Roman Empire and began to transform classical culture
in the light of their own values. It was a Christianized version of imperial culture which
the Germans encountered and adopted.

                   Christianity and Classical Culture 200-500:
                    Antagonism, Adjustment and Synthesis

In 200 Christianity was a minority religion and an obscure counter-culture among many
others in the empire. It had shown its vigor in postulating a new world view, but it had
not yet demonstrated that it was capable of attracting great numbers. Christians then were
fewer than 2 percent of the population. And yet in little more than a hundred years they
would count an emperor among their number. By the end of the fourth century they
would be the official religion of the empire and paganism would be on the run; by 500
Christianity would have outlasted the empire in the West. The important questions to be
answered are these. Why did Christianity triumph? What were the stages by which it
became the dominant view of life in the empire? How did it change as it prevailed and to
what extent did it borrow from classical culture?

Why was Christianity triumphant over other views of life in the ancient world? The
immediate answer is, because Constantine chose it over the others. That is true, of course,
but does not go far enough. And yet the historian has a problem, as a historian, if he goes
too far and gives an answer which is based on a subjective judgment about the intrinsic
worth of Christianity compared to other views of life. Is there some middle ground? Yes,
the historian can explain much by comparing the responses of classical culture and
Christianity to the crisis of the third century and the ensuing regimentation of society and
life which occurred in the third and fourth centuries.

?
Do you buy the argument that one ought to try to be objective about the triumph of
Christianity? Why, or Why not?

What were the two responses in broad terms? The classical outlook failed to foresee or to
understand the fundamental changes of the period. Focusing entirely on an ideal past and

lacking any originality, it sought to teach men how to act, rather than invent or create new
models for behavior. Therefore, it was blind to the possibility of fundamental change
itself. The ideal of Eternal Rome with its claim to finality precluded change or decline
since, with the achievement of that ideal, the aims of mankind for centuries had been
accomplished. The gods had assigned to Rome unending rule. Further change was
unthinkable. Thus, when the unthinkable did happen, and evidence of decline became all
too visible, classical culture had no solutions to offer. It had reached a dead end from
which no further progress was possible and offered nothing to the resolution of the
problems besetting Rome. On the other hand, Christianity was not constrained by the
dead hand of the past or identified with the failures of Rome. Christians were free to
think boldly and to act decisively; they were empowered to do so because they were very
sure of what they believed and the importance of believing it. They looked to the future,
not the past, and offered hope that the troubles which beset Rome were not directed by
Fate but were part of the ultimate purpose of God. It is difficult today, because of
Christianity's eventual success and pervasiveness, to imagine how fresh and invigorating
it was in the late empire, much like a new wind freshening the stale air of the classical
world.

?
Christianity as a fresh new wind blowing away the failures of the ancient world? To
what degree has it kept that freshness and excitement? Does Christianity today identify
with the new or the old in life and society?

As the first of this chapter showed, the inhabitants of the empire who had lost their
political freedom centuries before under the Augustan Principate lost their social and
economic freedom as well in the third and fourth centuries. Rulers took away more and
more of the functions, initiative and resources of the cities. As cities declined, the
wealthier withdrew from public life and retreated to their landed estates which became
the basis for a new social and economic life for the aristocracy and their dependents.
These estates became self-sufficient agricultural units, producing goods as well as food
and offering safety and some economic security while the central government became
more absolute and confiscatory. Even the imperial landed estates began to assume the
new pattern of social and economic arrangements, although the inhabitants did not escape
the stringent regulations so easily there. Thus the late empire came to be based more and
more on the countryside, rather than the cities. That is a sign of the end of the empire, at
least in the West. Rome had made possible an expansion of urban life; the empire had
gained strength because of urban expansion. With the decline of self-governing cities
Rome itself was doomed. On a personal level, these trends had a destructive effect on the
will of the inhabitants of the empire. As the rulers became all-powerful, the class
structure hardened and the economy was ever more tightly regulated, men had less and
less incentive to support Rome and classical culture which was so inextricably tied to the
well being of Rome.

The effect of all this upon the viability of classical culture was devastating. The ideal of
Eternal Rome was the culmination of classical culture's attempt to define the setting in
which man could achieve moral and intellectual excellence. That ideal had begun with
the Greeks who insisted that the polis was necessary for human development. Man could
not be truly human or achieve his potential except by sharing in the full spiritual and
artistic life of the city-state with other men. Aristotle said it best: "he who is unable to
live in society, or who has no need because he is sufficient for himself, must be either a
beast or a god: he is no part of the state.... For man, when perfected, is the best of
animals, but, when separated from law and justice, he is the worst of all." (1) Excellence is
possible; man has the innate capacity. What is required is good will and the right kind of
society, which Greeks thought could be any kind of polis (democratic or not), but could
not be despotism. During and after Alexander the Great's life, Greeks gave some thought
to the possibility that a larger form of union, a cosmopolis, perhaps created by a great
heroic figure possessing superior qualities and good fortune, might be the means through
which men could attain excellence and enjoy peace, freedom and justice. Perhaps men of
superior virtue might create such a cosmopolis; many thought it had been created in
Eternal Rome. This ideal, however, precluded military despotism or any other form of
autocracy. Even the Augustan Principate, which was effectively one-man rule, was not
naked despotism, and thus did not violate the ideal of Eternal Rome. However, during the
third century, the myth that the emperor shared authority with others was exploded. As
power accrued to the emperors and they were raised ever higher by court ceremony, it
became almost impossible to justify the empire as a nurturing medium for the realization
of human virtue and excellence.

?
It has been argued that despotisms of whatever sort do not last long. Is that true? Is
naked force of no long-term value in making society stable? Why? Is it human nature
that we won't accept it?

Other classical values were undermined by the same conditions. For example, if the city
as the natural setting for human excellence was crumbling, and the empire as the greater
union of cities was failing, what could one say about the natural order itself? Indeed, was
there order, or was chaos reasserting itself after all? How could one convincingly argue
the belief that life was worthwhile in itself and worth living well in a period of
regimentation, autocracy and economic decline? Instead, those conditions favored a turn
to the non-material or spiritual realm for answers. Fortune or Fate, the unforeseen which
is to be, loomed ever more in thought as men turned to non-rational ways of explaining
what was happening to Rome and to themselves. Thus the values of classical culture
which had been firmly grounded in earlier Greek and Roman societies lost their footings
in the evolving society of the late empire.

?
React to the judgments in the preceding paragraph. Do people turn to the non-rational in
times of stress and strain? If so, why?

In contrast, Christianity was neither blind to the changes overtaking Rome nor ineffectual
in explaining what was occurring. Christians stood, as it were, outside the stream of
events overtaking Rome, since they had no stake in the perpetuation of the empire and
were not committed to justifying or defending its failures. They alone of the philosophies
and religions of the empire (except for Judaism) valued historical change enough to
attempt to understand it. Others (again, except for Judaism) saw no significance in human
events and recognized no importance in historical time. Thus Christianity offered a
perspective on the problems of the late empire which was grounded both in the historical
process and in the ultimate purpose of an eternal deity, a perspective which was both
sober about the present and hopeful about the future.

Christian answers perfectly suited the times. To those in the empire who had lost
confidence in Rome and its purpose and who no longer believed that new triumphs could
be won, Christianity said that all kingdoms of this world were transitory. The only
permanent rule was that of God whose City alone would endure forever. In this world the
state had a limited purpose as a "remedy for sin"--a means for maintaining order among
sinful men until the end decreed by God (2). However, it was not ultimate or perfect and
had no claim on man's highest loyalty, which was to God alone. To those who had given
up on the peace and security of Eternal Rome, Christianity offered inner peace and
security in Christ. To those who wanted an escape from oppressive rulers, a failing
economy and the barbarian threat, Christianity proposed resignation to this world with its
evil and uncertainty. The world to come is man's ultimate destination; prepare yourself
for it. To those who found the impersonal and formal state cults or philosophies sterile,
Christianity offered a personal faith which gave man direct access to God and the
assurance of his ultimate importance as an individual. To those who felt abandoned in a
collapsing world and did not know what to believe, Christianity proffered membership in
a tightly organized group which was unified in a total way of life and very sure of what it
believed. To those who were oppressed by the weight of Fate or Fortune, Christianity
responded with an assertion of man's freedom. You are saved through your own response
to the grace of God. You are not subject to the demonic powers of this world or the force
of destiny; you are free.

?
1. The state as a "remedy for sin?" Think about that.
2. Ultimate loyalty to God alone? The implications then? Now?
3. Resign yourself to the ills and misery of this life? A good approach?

4. Man is free? Not under the sway of Fortune or Luck? Do you know people who
believe (really believe) in astrology?

By what stages did Christianity become the dominant view of life in the empire? Up to
200 Rome had paid little attention to Christians. If they were noticed by authorities or the
public, as under Nero, they were subjected to hostility or persecution, but they were not
important enough yet to be a problem. For their part, Christians had as little to do with
Roman society as possible. Two considerations changed this. One was the thinking of
Christians themselves. As the Coming Kingdom seemed less immediate, they began to
take a greater interest in this world and its affairs. This change had begun to occur even
before 200, although it occurred subtly and is difficult to trace. The other consideration
was that in the third century the empire forced itself into closer contact with Christianity,
first by attempting to destroy it as a threat and then by embracing it as a potential ally.
Both turns of policy by Rome posed problems for Christians.

Persecution was most intense during the periods when the empire was most threatened by
invasions and disorder, during the 250's and 270's and during the reign of Diocletian,
when the authorities made their most concerted attempt to stamp out the faith as
destructive of the empire and its ideals. In desperation the authorities resolved either to
gain the allegiance of Christians, as well as others whose ultimate loyalty was not to the
state gods, or to destroy them. The test of loyalty was the requirement to take part in the
rites of the imperial cult by burning incense before the emperor's bust. Those who refused
were imprisoned and executed; those who submitted were spared and certified as in
compliance. Church officials and ordinary believers who refused worship were arrested
and executed; many were terrified into renouncing their faith; church property was
confiscated. And yet the hostility of the empire strengthened the church. Martyrs made
converts out of many of those who witnessed their deaths. The weaker believers gave in,
but those who remained were stronger than before.

?
Why did persecution appear to strengthen the Church? Can one stamp out an idea, or a
set of values? Under what circumstances? Will force ever silence belief?

Under Constantine, who converted to the new faith, the empire suddenly reversed itself
and tried to appropriate to itself the strength of Christianity as it fought off internal
problems and the threats on the frontiers. Constantine made this abrupt about face
because Christianity was a more vigorous faith than any other, not because it was
numerically stronger. Christians were a minority until the fifth century. Moreover, they
were concentrated in urban areas, rather than the countryside where rural dwellers were
the last to give up the old religions and traditional values. Thus the word "pagan" meant

not only country-dweller (paganus), but also one who was not a Christian. When these
"pagans" adopted the faith, they often did so by adding their old ways to it.

The victory of Christianity created an even greater challenge. Would Christianity allow
itself to be used by political authorities to justify and save an empire which had claimed
to rule eternally and had demanded man's ultimate loyalty? What would be the purpose of
the state within the context of God's rule, or what would be the relation between state and
church? These questions were not finally answered during the fourth and fifth centuries,
but church leaders and rulers in the West staked out and defended positions they would
hold for centuries afterwards.

In theory, Christianity and the Roman state were irreconcilable. As has been shown
already, Christians held that the state was only temporal--it was an earthly city, but not a
heavenly one. By contrast, Rome laid claim to eternity and finality as the culmination of
the ancient world's efforts to organize human society and to perfect and civilize mankind
by political action. Even Christian emperors, who could not claim divinity and whose
faith contradicted Rome's ultimate claims, continued to speak of the eternity of Rome and
struggled as vigorously as their pagan predecessors to insure the empire's survival. Thus
conflict was inherent between imperial and church authorities.

?
What did the Church lose as it won supremacy? Is Christianity best when dominant, or
when a struggling minority?

Under Constantine there was no open clash between church and state. In their joy at
winning the first Christian emperor's favor, the bishops yielded to him as the "vicar of
God" when he tried to control the church's organization. They also welcomed his aid
against Arianism, the heresy which denied that God and the Son were the same
substance. Under Constantius (353-361), however, there was open conflict when the
emperor tried to make his own Arian beliefs the orthodox position of the church. Many
bishops submitted, but not Athanasius, the bishop of Alexandria who had been the
champion of the orthodox position that God and the Son were of the same substance.
Athanasius rejected the emperor's claim, as vicar of God, to define religious doctrine and,
appealing to God directly, threatened the emperor with the loss of his immortal soul. Late
in the fourth century, Ambrose, bishop of Milan, took a similar attitude toward the
emperor Theodosius who had ordered a massacre of the inhabitants of Thessalonika in
390. Ambrose, taking the side of the victims and treating the ruler like any other man
guilty of murder, denied him the rites of the church until he did penance. Theodosius
obeyed. So bishops often went their own way when it came to the question of spiritual
authority. On the other hand, they seldom challenged the political authority of rulers.
They themselves could be, and often were, autocratic when it came to asserting authority
within the church. They pushed rulers to punish heretics and pagans, remove pagans from

the court, and end pagan rites, particularly the practice of divination which was made an
act of treason against the ruler. After the split in 395 the leaders of the church in the
Eastern Empire generally accepted the political and spiritual authority of the Byzantine
rulers, contributing nothing essential to the theory that spiritual life was independent of
political life. But in the West leaders were independent of Rome, and when it fell they,
and particularly the bishops of Rome, continued to exercise both political and spiritual
leadership. Because the church was never subjected to the rule of a single ruler, western
Christianity was free to maintain and develop the theory of the spiritual independence of
the church from the state and, later, even that of the individual from the church itself.

How did Christianity change as it prevailed and to what extent did it borrow from
classical culture? At first Christians seemed deliberately to ignore the rich storehouse of
ideas and concepts which made up the heritage of classical civilization. Down to the third
century the prevailing opinion might be said to have been that expressed by Paul: Christ
crucified and resurrected is the only truth one needs. Or, as Tertullian (c.160 - c.225)
said, "We have no need for curiosity after possessing Jesus Christ, nor for inquisition
after enjoying the gospel."(3) Yet this stance could not be maintained. Christians were
forced to explain and defend what they believed, first in opposition and then in triumph.
As they did so, they used both the ideas and methodology of those who attacked and
derided their faith, meeting their opponents' attacks concept for concept and argument for
argument. This was natural and inevitable. By the mere fact of its existence and
prevalence, classical culture influenced Christianity. Classical assumptions possessed the
weight of tradition and common acceptance for centuries. Simply by being, classical
culture constituted a backdrop against which perforce Christians projected their own
assumptions. For the most part, Christian thinkers used the ideas and methodology of
classical thought without surrendering the distinctive fundamental tenets of the faith. The
exceptions to this general rule were those who fell into heresy in one of several ways:

 (1) trying to make logical sense of the doctrine of the Incarnation: Arians who,
influenced by Neoplatonism, believed that Jesus, the Son, was not equal to God the
Father because the relationship between the two implied inequality; Nestorians who
believed that Jesus was essentially human, but not divine; and Monophysites who
believed that Jesus was essentially divine but not human;
 (2) claiming to possess a direct, personal, and secret knowledge or gnosis of Jesus the
Christ: the Gnostics.

?
Is heresy the result of trying to make rational sense of matters of faith? Always? Often?

However, Christian thinkers generally thought of themselves as despoiling classical
learning, as it were, imitating its superior techniques and concepts without venerating its
truths.(4) It was they who initiated and controlled the process, not classical thinkers, from
whom they expected to learn nothing except intellectual proficiency. As they explained
and defended their faith they enriched its philosophical capacity without giving up its
first principles. This development of thought led through thinkers and apologists for the
faith such as Origen (c.185-254), Lactantius (c.250-c.317), and Athanasius ( 296?–373)
on to one of the greatest figures of the ancient world in whose work at the end of the
fourth century it became clear just how intellectually powerful Christianity could be
when reason and analysis were joined in service to faith.

 St. Augustine's City of God as a Study in the Fusion of Classical Culture
                             and Christianity

Augustine of Tagaste (354-430) is worth special attention, not only because of the
significance of his thought for later Christian and European thought, but also because he
perfectly symbolizes the search for meaning in the late empire. Representative of the way
Christian thinkers were influenced by classical principles and joined them to their own
beliefs, Augustine sought to reveal a plan of salvation for "a rotting and disintegrating
world." (5) We know much about his life and spiritual search because of his Confessions,
a remarkable autobiography in which he poured out everything about himself. Like other
Christian writers, Augustine believed that God cared about the condition of "interior"
man; it was important that everything be laid bare before Him, private sins and
weaknesses and all.(6) This attitude was novel and strange to the classical spirit which
believed that only thoughts and behavior typifying the ideal for man were worth
remembering. Moral weaknesses and spiritual failings were to be examined privately and
suppressed, not published for the scrutiny of mankind.

The Confessions portray a life in which Christian and classical influences met from the
beginning, although Christianity did not become dominant until later. Augustine's mother
was a devout Christian; his father a minor civic official in Tagaste. He received the
conventional education for his class and time which focused on the major classics and
rhetoric. Finishing his studies, he became a teacher of rhetoric first in Rome and then in
Milan. Later, he judged classical learning vain and empty, so divorced from life that, as
he said, it was thought worse to murder the word "human being" than to commit murder
itself. Yet from an early reading of Cicero's Hortensius he awakened to the call of
wisdom, in pursuit of which he tried Manicheism with its teaching about dual contending
forces of good and evil, skepticism which denied any certain knowledge, and
Neoplatonism which directed his attention to the One transcendent divinity of pure
intelligence with whom he might attain unity through contemplation and purification of
the soul. Of these he found the greatest satisfaction in Neoplatonism which taught him to

think of the spiritual in transcendent terms, but even this philosophy was really only a
resting place on the way to Christianity.

After his famous conversion in the garden at Milan in 386, Augustine devoted the rest of
his forty-four years to explaining how and why his own spiritual search through the alleys
of ancient learning had led him to the true source of knowledge in the Triune God of
Christianity. He was Bishop of Hippo from 395 until his death in 430, but also wrote
numerous works, including the Confessions and the monumental City of God. What
follows is not a summary of his work, but rather an illustration of the ways he linked
certain classical ideas and techniques to Christian principles, without compromising the
latter, in stating his views about reason, human nature, institutions, the world, and
history.

Augustine placed more faith in reason than did earlier Christian writers, but much less
than did classical thinkers. What place did he give to reason and what was its relationship
to faith? All knowledge, he asserted, is based on an act of faith. You assume on faith that
the reasoning mind alone can understand man, the world and the order governing all.
You also accept on faith the principle that the human mind, guided by the truth of the
Triune God as revealed in Christ, can understand man, the world and the order
governing all. In both cases you accept something as true on some authority. In the first
case, your faith leads to error. In the second, your faith leads to Truth itself. He was not
talking about faith as an act of the instinctive will or as an irrational substitute for
thinking. Rather, he meant by faith a way of understanding, or a condition for
understanding. His famous statement summed it up: "believe in order that you may
understand" (crede ut intelligas). In the City of God he wrote that God speaks to those
"prepared to hear with the mind rather than with the body. For He speaks to that part of
man which is better than all else that is in him (the mind)." He went on to speak of the
necessity of healing, renewing and making capable the mind which though "naturally
capable of reason and intelligence is disabled by besotting and inveterate vices" so that
finally the mind is "impregnated with faith and so purified."(7) This occurred as the Holy
Spirit acted within the individual, a process which had not been easy for Augustine
himself. Nonetheless, it was possible for all (not just heroic individuals or supermen).

?
1. Has Christianity changed its position that one must believe in order to understand? Is
this still true?
2. Is all thinking based on an act of faith? Even rational thinking? Justify your answer?

What did Augustine believe about the human personality itself? More explicitly than
New Testament writers, he said that man was a total being, a combination of body and
soul, reason and volition, all aspects having unique value. Truth, he declared, is grasped
not only by the mind, that part of man which is most like God, but by the emotions as

well. The emotional or volitional side is useful, and safe, only when joined to reason; the
reasoning faculty is free from error only when guided by faith. Thus Augustine leaned
toward the classical tradition in emphasizing the importance of reason, but veered away
from that tradition in his emphasis on the worth of the volitional in man. The classical
tradition had valued reason, but feared the will as dangerous to the individual and to
society as well. Augustine also dissented from classical teaching in asserting the validity
and worth of individual experience. Truth, he said, is known in the body rather than by
escaping from it and from the senses, as the Neoplatonists had said. It is within the
individual that the Holy Spirit acts to regenerate and to complete the human personality.
Individual experience, therefore, is good since it is the arena for the Holy Spirit's work.
And man himself is basically good, created by God "upright, and consequently with a
good will."(8) Made evil by human action, the personality can only be restored by God,
not by the human mind correcting itself.

?
The reasoning faculty is free from error only when guided by faith?

These convictions about man led Augustine to reject the classical belief about the
purpose of social institutions. He flatly condemned the idea that man could perfect
himself by any form of creative politics. No society could make man a better being. The
best that institutions could do was to prevent the worst impulses and appetites of man
from destroying society. That purpose was important; order needs to be maintained. But
only God can perfect human beings and bring them into a true community.

In opposition to the ideal of Eternal Rome and its promise of a community of mankind
founded on security, prosperity, and the tradition of classical civilization, he proposed a
new foundation for society: the law of love.
"It is here...that the safety of an admirable state resides; for a society can neither be
ideally founded nor maintained unless upon the basis and by the bond of faith and strong
concord, when the object of love is the universal good which in its highest and truest
character is God Himself, and when men love one another with complete sincerity in
Him, and the ground of their love for one another is the love of Him from whose eyes
they cannot conceal the spirit of their love."(9)

That described heaven on earth, a prospect to be hoped for, but unlikely to be realized
this side of heaven. In the meantime, in an unredeemed world, what was to be expected?
Two realms, the existing social order and the community of Christians, the City of Man
and the City of God, the one transitory, the other eternal, "in this present world,
commingled and as it were entangled together."(10) The City of Man had failed to achieve
the eternal peace and security it proclaimed. Already, however, the City of God had
achieved peace and happiness in a true community united by the law of love. (11) Although
the two societies existed side by side, the City of Man was neither irredeemable nor

incapable of achieving moral ends during its temporary existence. Jesus had prayed "thy
kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven", so society must not be
abandoned by Christians. Even Christian emperors must submit to the aims of the City of
God while they ruled the City of Man. Augustine spoke of a new kind of political and
social leadership--the "episcopate of work" rather than privilege--and the necessity that
all pledge allegiance to the City of God rather than the state or the ruler. (12) In other
words, political and social power meant responsibility for a higher purpose, the achieving
of the aims of the City of God. Thus the truth of the revelation of God in Christ, once
apprehended, became the foundation for all of life, private and social, and the only means
of creating a social order and a personal morality for the here-and-now as well as the
hereafter.

?
1. React to the statements about what society can do and cannot do for human beings.
2. If you agree that society cannot make man better, why spend any time on improving
society? Why worry about social justice? Why try to eradicate evils and inequities?
3. Those holding power have a higher purpose than enjoying power? Doing the work of
God on earth? Your view?

The revealed truth of the Triune God was also fundamental to understanding and
explaining the natural world. Here, Augustine broke radically with the classical view
about the natural order. He rejected the belief that the natural order could be explained by
the resources of the human mind alone. That way had led to the errors of materialism
(Epicureanism) or to the illusions of idealism (Neoplatonism). However, once one
believed the truth of revelation as a condition for understanding, it was possible truly to
understand the world without falling into superstition. Augustine pointed to an approach
which would come to fruition centuries later. If the world is God's creation, on the same
plane as man himself, and like man under divine governance, then natural science and the
arts "which assist God in his operations" (medicine, agriculture, navigation, etc.) no
longer lead to superstition and what he called the "miserable bondage" of fortune.
Science and all knowledge, freed from the delusions of the classical outlook, can become
descriptive rather than prescriptive in explaining the world and God's relationship to the
world. "Let every good and true Christian understand that wherever truth may be found,
it belongs to his Master...."(13) To be sure, all useful knowledge was wanting when
compared to knowledge of the Scripture, but all knowledge pointed to the ultimate source
of intelligence and was worth acquiring. Thus faith was an inducement to know more
about the physical world: God wants us to master his creation; he has made us most like
himself in giving us minds; we please him and we know more about him as we
understand his creation. This attitude had implications for modern science, although
centuries would pass before this became apparent. The confluence of Christian faith and
classical reason, however, was a significant intellectual precondition for the later
development of modern science.

?
1. "Let every good and true Christian understand that wherever truth may be found, it
belongs to his Master...." Do you agree? Why? Why not?
2. The paragraph above makes the point that modern science will grow out of the
Christian conviction that knowing the world is knowing God, and that it is at His behest
that we learn and master the world. Do you agree? Why then do some perceive science
and religion at odds?

Augustine linked the belief that God created and ultimately governed the whole natural
order to a comprehensive view of history. He believed that all creation was moving
inexorably toward the ultimate victory of the City of God over the City of Man. He began
to write the City of God to refute the charge that Christianity had caused the decline of
Rome, but he went on to demolish the claims of Eternal Rome, and to offer a
comprehensive view of history to demonstrate that God alone commanded the endless,
boundless rule claimed by Rome.(14) He rejected the cyclical view of classical historians
that mankind was repeating an endless series of eras, going nowhere, except farther away
from the ideal past. Instead, he maintained that history was a record of God's continuing
revelation of himself and his divine purpose in this world, in time, moving toward an
ideal future, "the life of the world to come" (the Nicene Creed). Even the rise of Rome
was within God's will, as was Rome's decline; Fortune or Fate had nothing to do with
either Rome's rise or fall. The goal toward which history was moving was the peace of
the City of God when mankind would possess spirits healed by wisdom, bodies renewed
by resurrection and the eternal blessedness which had been sought without success in the
City of Man.

The development of Christian thought in St. Augustine is not the whole story of the
change in outlook which occurred as Christianity in the fourth and fifth centuries
triumphed and borrowed from classical culture. Christianity made enormous intellectual
gains during that period, but on a more common plane it also lost its revolutionary
character as a way of life and found itself restating its fundamental tenets in ways quite
different than it did in the beginning. Christianity ceased to be a total way of life after it
became officially recognized as the religion of the empire. The revolutionary implications
of the faith remained in the teachings of Jesus, but they no longer seemed to fit
circumstances. How could the gospel ethic be practiced when Christians were a
privileged group? How could one live in expectation of the Coming Kingdom with its
implied judgment of existing society when a Christian emperor ruled that society?
Christians responded in two ways to the changed situation. Most Christians tried to
accept the new status of the faith and to understand older beliefs in the light of that new
condition. The kingdom of heaven, they decided, would not come in this world but in the
next. The radical ethic embodied in the teachings of Jesus should be regarded as a
preparation for the afterlife, not as a means of regenerating this world. In this life Rome
ruled by divine ordinance to keep order and curb sin. In carrying out their duties Christian

emperors could not be expected to practice the gospel ethic, although they were not
supposed to flout it either. The Church had the task of securing God's favor and blessing
for the empire and of helping believers prepare for the world to come. But Church leaders
in their capacity as administrators could not be expected always to practice the teachings
of Jesus. Even Augustine had seemed to sanction this kind of thinking when he
recognized the persistence of the City of Man in this earthly life.

?
1. React to the statements about Christians coming to the view that the kingdom of
heaven would not come in this world, but the next.
2. Did success spoil Christianity, as stated?
3. Can one be a Christian and hold power over others?

Other Christians responded to the worldly success of the Church in a different way.
Unwilling to give up Christianity as a total way of life, they sought to withdraw to a
solitary life or into communities like those of the early Church in which they might live
the gospel ethic and thus help usher in the awaited kingdom of heaven. They found
encouragement for this thinking in Neo-Platonist mysticism which exercised a strong
influence on Christian theologians by the fourth century. Even Augustine had found it
difficult to resist. Neo-Platonists viewed all nature, including man, as too corrupted to be
regenerated in this life. Salvation lay in escaping the pull of the material world by ascetic
self-denial, leading to mystical union with God. One saved oneself, that is, not by self-
denying love for others, as in the teachings of Jesus, but by purifying the inner being
through ascetic self-denying control. Thus Neo-Platonism gave support for the kind of
austere life some Christians desired. This point of view did not deny the worth of man,
but emphasized rather his spiritual side as the element of his true worth in contrast to
early Christianity which had valued the whole personality and the natural order.

Monasticism as a way of life began in Egypt early in the fourth century. The first monks
simply withdrew to pray and fast alone, which tended to promote extreme asceticism,
such as that of St. Simeon Stylites (early fifth century) who sat atop a pillar several
stories high for thirty years. Since such excesses were a threat to unity (an ever-present
threat), the Church tried to curb and channel the monastic impulse along more stable
lines. Monks were encouraged to live in organized monastic communities according to
rules: the Rule of St. Basil (330-379) in the east; and that of St. Benedict (480-543) in the
west.

What else did Christianity borrow from classical culture besides ideas and concepts?
Were they to create their own art, architecture, law, and administrative structure or adopt
what was at hand? They did both. They borrowed and at the same time gave a new
meaning and purpose and a new vitality to what they borrowed. In art, for example, they
turned to classical forms and techniques in sculpture, painting and mosaic to show the

symbols , the major central figures of the faith, the history of the church, and to teach the
basic stories of Scripture. Clearly classical in origin, these new forms of Christian art still
were infused by the new faith. The same happened in architecture as the church built its
places of worship. The plan Christians chose was not the traditional temple, which was
defiled by its pagan associations and too small anyway for congregational worship, but
the basilica, a large public building used for meetings and court sessions. Originally a
long rectangular building with a large central hall and interior recesses called apses, the
basilica was changed to a cruciform shape by the addition of a transept; side aisles were
also added to the form. Typical of this new structure was the basilica of Old St. Peter's
which was the most important church in Rome from its construction during Constantine's
reign until its demolition in the sixteenth century to make way for the present St. Peter's.
It combined elements of Roman domestic, civic and temple architecture with new
Christian purposes. Believers approached the entrance through a large courtyard, similar
to the atrium found in Roman villas, which centered on a fountain and was surrounded by
roofed arcades set on columns; the congregation used this space for meetings, instruction
and the ceremonial washing of hands before approaching the church proper. Proceeding
through the side of the atrium toward the church (which formed an entryway or narthex),
believers passed into the nave or main body of the church surrounded by two side aisles
formed by lines of columns. From there they were drawn by the length of the nave and
the lines of columns toward the triumphal arch which formed the entrance to the transept
or arms crossing the nave and the apse beyond. The visual procession thus described was
symbolic of the central themes of the faith and the procession of believers in the
sacrament of communion. The cruciform shape of the basilica represented the
crucifixion. The nave (from the Latin navis or ship) represented the conveyance which
carried believers through the triumphal arch (after the Roman arch commemorating
victory). The apse with its altar signified both the sacrifice and the heavenly triumph of
Christ: above the altar on which the sacrifice was ritualized, Christ on his throne waited
to welcome his followers to paradise. Judging from other early churches or chapels which
survive, the exterior of this structure was probably plain. In early churches almost all the
decoration was inside, inviting and drawing the believer away from the outer world and
toward the inner world of the spirit. For the embellishment of the inner walls and ceilings
Christians turned to traditional styles in painting, mosaics, and sculpture. The forms were
clearly classical; the subject matter was Christian. The result was an original and creative
expression of the tenets of the faith and the devotion of its adherents.

?
Neither Jesus nor the early Church leaders prescribed a form of worship or the place
where it would take place. Is it ironic that the Roman empire gave Christianity its places
for worship?

As the church emerged victorious under Constantine it also took from both the
administrative machinery and the law of Rome to meet its needs. As the previous chapter

showed, bishops early emerged as leaders of congregations and held power over other
bishops if their see or seat was in a major metropolitan center. The bishop of Rome
enjoyed the greatest eminence because his see was the capital of the empire and because
of the Petrine theory that Peter had been the first bishop of Rome and had been given
special prominence by Christ. Under Constantine and his successors the church modeled
its organization on that of the empire. Each of the dioceses of the empire became the
dioceses of the church under the authority of the bishop sitting in the major city of the
diocese; this official was responsible for the bishops of the provinces which made up the
diocese, and so on down to the local congregation. The title "metropolitan" or archbishop
was also used of bishops whose see was a major center. When the church found it
necessary to deal with problems across provincial lines, the bishops assembled in the
major city of the diocese under the leadership of the metropolitan. The church also
convened across diocesan lines in regional or general councils at the call of the emperor
or the bishops of the greatest cities of the empire (including Rome and Constantinople),
who were called patriarchs and who enjoyed the greatest authority within the church. Of
these five the patriarch of Rome eventually called the Pope (from papa) or Holy Father
enjoyed the greatest eminence and successfully asserted the claim to primacy among
other bishops.

?
Power struggles began early in the Church. The rise of the Pope, a good thing? Just a
power play? Was strong leadership necessary for the survival of the Church?

All these bishops increasingly administered not only spiritual but civil affairs as well.
After Constantine bishops grew in civil importance because emperors saw them as a
more vigorous and more effective counterbalance to the official bureaucracy. Roman law
also encouraged episcopal authority in that bishops met the requirement of law that all
corporate bodies had to have representatives. Thus bishops became as responsible for the
political and social welfare of their see as for the spiritual: dispensing charity and social
services in the form of food and aid; offering protection against the depredations of the
imperial bureaucrats or the barbarians; providing education which had formerly been
offered by the cities and the empire; and dispensing justice in their courts which offered
simpler procedures and quicker, more moral results than the civil courts.

One of Constantine's most important reforms was the decree (314) that the decisions of
bishops were in effect the decisions of Christ himself. Before toleration, when Christians
had legal matters to settle they usually did so in church courts, appealing to their bishops
for a final decision, rather than take cases to imperial courts. After Constantine, a case
might be taken before either the bishop or an imperial judge with equal validity.

What cases routinely appeared in church courts? Matrimonial cases (particularly
divorce), family relations, property cases involving the church (bequests, acquisitions),