and the birth of Christ, he had no difficulty in concluding that the End would come five hundred years after the latter event. The five hundred years were apparently to be followed by a brief interval of seven years, the first half of which would be occupied by the reign of the ten kings and the witness of Elijah and Enoch, and the second half by the reign of Antichrist, whose downfall would synchronize with the Parousia.1

In describing the anticipated character and doings of Antichrist, the person by whom the downfall of Rome would be effected, Irenæus and Hippolytus travel over pretty much the same ground, the latter however entering into more detail than the former.2 Tertullianus alludes to some of the traditional features, and a few references occur in Origenes also.3 The prelude to the coming of Antichrist is the partition of the Empire among ten kings (Hippolytus calls them also democracies'! 4), who will be of one mind. and will give their strength to the Beast (presumably the imperial system and spirit), will persecute the Christians, and will be defeated by the Lamb. In the midst of these ten 'horns,' will arise the little horn, the Antichrist-a Jew of the tribe of Dan. His first exploits will be to overthrow and slay the three kings of Egypt, Libya, and Ethiopia, to take Tyrus and Berytus by storm, and to subject the remaining seven kings to himself. Edom, Moab,

and Ammon are mentioned as his first adherents. He will aspire to universal rule, and carry on destructive conquests. He will gather together the dispersed Jews, make Jerusalem the capital of his empire, build there a stone temple, and blasphemously claiming Divine honours sit in it and receive the worship due to God alone. He is depicted as "the man of sin," an unjust tyrant, an impious and lawless apostate, a contrast in every way to Christ, a deceitful and lying worker of wonders, the son, agent, and representative of Satan, and so forth. He will contemplate changing "the times and the law." He and his seven vassal kings will take and destroy Rome. He will institute a terrible and world-wide persecution of the Christians, slaying the two witnesses Elijah and Enoch, who testified during the three and a half years preceding his accession, and ordering all, on pain of death, to worship

1 Hipp. Dan. IV. xxiiif, xxxv., 1. 2: cf. Neumann H 29ff, 75 ff.

2 Cf. Neumann H 54-58 (Irenæus' teaching), 31-50 (Hipp. Ant.), and So107 (Hipp. Dan.).

3 For references, see next page. Cf. also Cypr. Test. iii. 118: 'De Antichristo quod in homine veniat.' A brief reference to Antichrist and his deeds occurs in Ps-Cypr. Pasch. 14f.

4 Hipp. Ant. 27, Dan. 11. xii. 7.

the image of the Beast. His reign will last three and a half years, thus forming with the similar period occupied by the two witnesses (and the ten kings?) the final 'week' of seven years which would intervene between the conclusion of the six thousand years from the Creation and the Parousia of Jesus. His name was represented in Scripture by the number 666 (the alternative suggestion of 616, preferred by some, being dismissed), and, while no pretence was made at certainty, 'Lateinos' and 'Teitan' were both suggested as probable equivalents for this figure. The former suggestion preserves in some measure that connection or resemblance between Antichrist and Rome, which appears in another form in the theory of Nero Redivivus. Ultimately Christ will descend from heaven, overthrow and slay Antichrist, casting him into a fiery lake or furnace, and will hand over to the saints a kingdom that will never be destroyed.1

CHRISTIAN CRITICISM OF HUMAN LAWS.-We have so far considered the unfavourable judgment passed by Christians upon rulers in general and the imperial rulers in particular, and the forecasts which they framed of the future downfall of the Empire.

1 These details are derived from the accounts of Irenæus III. vi. 5, vii. 2 (ii. 24, 26), IV. xxix. 1 (ii. 247), V. xxvf (ii. 390–397), xxviii. 2 (ii. 400–402), xxixf (ii. 404-410); Hipp. Ant. 6, 14-18, 25-29, 38-43, 46-58 63-65, Dan. IV. v. 2f, vi. 4, X. 1, 3, xii. 3-5, xiii. 3, xiv. 1-3, xxiv. 7f, xxxv. 3, xlviii.—lvii., Gaius 402 (Hippolytus here, on the strength of Ap ix. 15, makes a rather obscure reference to the unloosing of four nations by their angels at the coming of Antichrist: cf. also the additional extracts given by Achelis 243246); Tert. Praescr. 4, Marc. v. 16, Res. 22, 24f, 27. The passages about the capture of Rome by Antichrist and the seven kings are in Iren. v. xxvi. 1 (ii. 394) (et vastabunt Babylonem, et comburent eam igni, et dabunt regnum suum bestiae); Tert. Res. 22 (ii. 496) (nemo adhuc fugit antichristum : nemo adhuc Babylonis exitium flevit), 25 (ii. 499) (souls of martyrs have learnt to wait ut prius et orbis de pateris angelorum plagas suas ebibat, et prostituta illa civitas a decem regibus dignos exitus referat, etc.); Hipp. Ant. 29 (quoted above, p. 345 n 4), 39-43 (quotation of Ap xvii. 15-xviii., ending with the comment περὶ μὲν οὖν τῶν βασάνων καὶ τῆς ἐπερχομένης αὐτῇ ἐπ ̓ ἐσχάτων ὑπὸ τῶν τότε ἐσομένων τυράννων μερικῆς κρίσεως σαφέστατα ἐν τοῖς ῥητοῖς τούτοις δεδήλωται, KTλ.); cf. Dan. II. xiii. 2, IV. x. 3 (Christ will do away with all the kingdoms of this world), xlix. 5 (Antichrist will be vπèp пávтas ẞaoiλeis. . ἐπαρθείς).

On

The view of Origenes in regard to Antichrist is hard to make out, and cannot be discussed in detail here. The passages are Cels. ii. 50, vi. 45f. the one hand, he believes in Antichrist and accepts what Scripture says about him (quoting 2 Th ii. 1-12 and Dan viii. 23-25, ix. 27b in full): on the other hand, he had his own spiritualizing and allegorical way of interpreting Scripture, and could not easily have found a place in his system for a king of the type described by Irenæus and Hippolytus. He says that Paul speaks of him μετά τινος ἐπικρύψεως (Cels. vi. 45). As the extreme ideal of virtue is given in Jesus, so the opposite extreme is found év TÊ KαTÀ Ởνouajóueror ȧvTiXPLOTOV (l.c.). He speaks elsewhere of a general persecution as due to occur according to the prediction of Christ (Comm. in Mt. Series, 39 (iv. 270): cf. Neumann ŠK 225). But the whole subject of Origenes' eschatology is

obscure.

"2

We must now turn to the kindred question of the Christian criticism of human laws. Christians regard laws as being merely customs authoritatively enjoined by government, entitled, as we shall see later, to their obedience when they are good or indifferent, but, when bad, having in essence no more moral authority than a bad custom. The first fact that struck the Christian mind when it considered human laws as a whole was their immense variety and mutual inconsistency, proving that some of them at least must be bad. The same thing is judged to be right among one people, and wrong among another, and vice versa.1 Some men live under the most approved laws, others under (laws that are) less valuable and harsher, others again live rather under inhuman and savage customs than under laws (at all)." That some laws were bad, e.g. certain Persian, Ethiopian, Libyan, Scythian, and Taurian usages, was indeed sufficiently obvious even to the average pagan.3 Many laws written and enacted by the various states cannot be brought into harmony with the Divine Law, and must therefore be pronounced either not properly laws at all or else the laws of wicked men. Thus far we have quoted Origenes, who puts the matter most clearly. But the same presuppositions lie behind the statements of other writers. Clemens, for instance, remarked that the Scriptural law was more humane to animals than the Hellenes were to human beings, for they cast out their new-born children. Tertullianus pointed out to the pagans that, as a matter of fact, they themselves had long been in the habit of repealing laws and modifying their severity, thus acknowledging that these laws had been unjust. The clear outstanding instance of an obviously iniquitous law was, of course, that which (by implication, so the pagan government held) forbade Christianity.R

6

1 Orig. Cels. v. 27, 28 (if the same act may be both pious and impious apà τὰς διαφόρους σχέσεις καὶ τοὺς νόμους, ὅρα εἰ μὴ καὶ ἡ σωφροσύνη τῶν πρός τι ἀκολούθως ἔσται καὶ ἡ ἀνδρεία καὶ ἡ φρόνησις καὶ ἡ ἐπιστήμη καὶ αἱ λοιπαὶ ἀρεταί· ὢν οὐδὲν ἂν εἴη ατοπώτερον), 40 (οὐ γὰρ ὑπὸ τοῦ αὐτοῦ νόμου πάντες βασιλεύονται), viii. 26. Cf., on the variety of laws, the Bardesanic Book of the Laws of the Countries (ANCL xxiib. 101, 107) (laws are not made under the compulsion of Fate, but by the exercise of man's free will).

2 Orig. Princ. II. ix. 3.

3 Orig. Princ. II. ix. 5, Cels. i. 1 (Zkúlais vóμovs ábéσμovs éxovoi), V. 27.

4 Orig. Cels. v. 37.

6 Cl. Strom. II. xviii. 92.

Orig. Cels. viii. 26.

? Tert. Nat. i. 6 fin. (i. 315) (. . . cum quotidie novis consultis constitutisque duritias nequitiasque earum temperetis), A pol. 4 (i. 128f). He says that even those pagan laws that seemed to lead to virtue had been borrowed from the Mosaic Law (Apol. 45).

8 Cl. Strom. VI. viii. 67 (τὸν ἐπηρτημένον τῷ πιστῷ κατὰ τοὺς πολιτικοὺς νόμους TOû Oavátov Kívôuvov); Tert. Apol. 4 (i. 127) (non licet esse vos !); Orig. Mart.

Human laws also stood condemned as incapable of securing more than a very limited obedience. "The laws of the State," says Clemens, may perhaps be able to restrain bad actions. "How great is the authority of human laws," asks Tertullianus, 'when it is in a man's power both to evade them, and often to lie hid in his crimes, and sometimes to despise them, if he have the wish or the need to offend, especially when one remembers the shortness of any punishment, which does not in any case continue beyond death? " 2 He goes on to argue that it is only the Christians, with their belief in God's final judgment and in eternal punishment, who make a real effort to obtain a blameless life. Origenes says: "In our judgment, no one who does not know that it is wrong to believe that piety is preserved by the laws established according to the prevalent ideas of government, is capable of knowing the origin of evils." 3 Complaints are made of inefficiency and abuse in the administration of the laws. is impossible," says Tertullianus, "to enforce what is good, the laws are so disarmed." Cyprianus contrasts the eloquence proper to a court of law with the simplicity of speech appropriate to religious subjects, and exposes in detail the injustice, strife, cruelty, venality, and fraud, of which men are normally guilty in the forum, the very place where justice is supposed to be administered.5

4

On the strength of these facts the Christians held that the Law of God-by which they meant for practical purposes the Christian ethic-superseded all human laws. Let the Athenian,' said Clemens, "follow the laws of Solon, and the Argeian those of Phoroneus, and the Spartan those of Lycurgus; but if thou enrollest thyself under God, heaven is thy country, God thy lawgiver. And what are the laws? Thou shalt not kill ; thou shalt not commit adultery; thou shalt not corrupt boys; thou shalt not steal; thou shalt not bear false witness; thou shalt love the Lord thy God,'" etc. Origenes says that Jesus "superinduced upon the previously-established polity and ancestral customs and habits according to existing laws the polity according

33 (ἀλλὰ καὶ νῦν ὁ Ναβουχοδονόσορ τὰ αὐτὰ λέγει ἡμῖν τοῖς περατικοῖς καὶ ἀληθινοῖς Εβραίοις), Cels. i. I (ἐπεὶ οὖν τὸν κοινὸν νόμον θρυλεῖ [ὁ Κέλσος] παρὰ τοῦτον λέγων Χριστιανοῖς τὰς συνθήκας).

1 Cl. Strom. VII. iii. 19.

2 Tert. Apol. 45 (i. 279).

3 Orig. Cels. iv. 65: . . . ἐν τοῖς καθεστηκόσι κατὰ τὰς κοινότερον νοουμένας πολιτείας νόμοις, κτλ.

4 Tert. Pudic. 1 (i. 791); cf. Idol. 18 (i. 100) (poenae ad impios paratae ignorantur).

5 Cypr. Donat. 2, 10.

Cl. Protr. x. 108.

to the Gospel."1 Speaking later of Pindarus' phrase, "Law is the king of all men," he denies that this is true of the differing laws of different states. "But if thou meanest that which is really law, (it is) this (Law of God which) is by nature king of all men : though some, like robbers, who have revolted from the Law, deny it(s validity), and live by robbery and injustice. We Christians, then, who know the Law which is by nature king of all men, being the same as the Law of God, try to live according to it, having bidden a long farewell to laws (which are) not (really) laws (at all)." 2

THE DUTY OF DISOBEYING THE STATE IN CERTAIN Cases.— It followed inevitably from such reasoning as we have just quoted that occasions were bound to arise in which obedience to the law of the State would conflict with obedience to God. While in practice persecution was the one circumstance known to us which gave' rise to such occasions of conflict, Christian disobedience under persecution was regularly defended on the broad ground of the superiority of God's Law to man's. How far this sense of the Christian's independence of State-control could go, we see in the words addressed by the Scillitan martyr Speratus to the proconsul of Africa (July, 180 A.D.). He refused to swear by the Emperor's genius he was no thief, he said, and he paid his taxes; but this was owing to his reverence for God; he did not acknowledge the secular government at all. Usually, however, the Christian refusal was put less sweepingly. Thus, when Apollonius was told at his trial that the Senate had decreed that there were to be no Christians, he replied: "But God's decree cannot be overridden by a human decree.” 4 Clemens is on the whole loyal to the laws : but he takes the words of Jesus about having to leave father and

1 Orig. Cels. ii. 52.

2 Orig. Cels. v. 40. On the resemblance of the early Christian treatment of all human laws as subsidiary to the one Law of God (?= the Mosaic Decalogue, or the Christian ethic) to the Stoic theory of a Law of Nature or Reason lying behind the laws of states, cf. Troeltsch 146-149, 158f; Meyer 8-13. The theory is connected with Justinus' doctrine of the spermatic Logos implanted in all men.

3 P. Scill. 6 (Speratus dixit: Ego imperium huius saeculi non cognosco; sed magis illi Deo seruio, quem nemo hominum uidit, etc. etc.). Weinel says that Speratus "verrät damit, wie das Volk damals trotz aller freundlichen Aussagen der Apologeten in Afrika dachte" (SUS 23). We may compare Orig. Comm. in Rom. t. ix. 28 (vii. 331) (Qui autem facit bonum, hoc est, qui non metu legis, sed amore boni facit quod bonum est, iste jam non sub lege litterae, sed sub lege spiritus vivit).

4 Act. Apoll. 23f. Cf. Bardesanic Book, etc., in ANCL xxiib. 110 and DCB i. 258a ("The laws of the countries do not separate them from [ANCL: do not hinder them from obeying] the law[s] of their Christ ").