Chapter LI: GODS AS GUARDIANS OF MORALITY (continued) (2)

The opposition against ritualism which was started by the Prophets reached its height in Christ. Men are defiled not by external uncleanness, but by evil thoughts and evil deeds.[196] "It is lawful to do well on the sabbath days."[197] Those whose righteousness does not exceed that of the scribes and Pharisees shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven.[198] The first and great commandment is that which {719} enjoins love to God, but the second, according to which a man shall love his neighbour as himself, "is like unto it."[199] At the same time there are in the New Testament passages in which God's judgment of men seems to be represented as determined by theological dogma.[200] The only sin which can never be forgiven either in this world or in the world to come, is blasphemy against the Holy Ghost;[201] and the belief in Jesus is laid down as indispensable for salvation.[202] According to St. Paul, a man is justified by faith alone, without the deeds of the law.[203] This doctrine, which makes man's salvation dependent upon his acceptance of the Messiahship of Jesus, has had a lasting influence upon Christian theology, and has, together with certain other dogmas, led to that singular discrepancy between the notions of divine and human justice which has up to the present day characterised the chief branches of the Christian Church.

[Footnote 196: _St. Matthew_, xv. 19 _sq._ _St. Mark_, vii. 6 _sqq._]

[Footnote 197: _St. Matthew_, xii. 12.]

[Footnote 198: _Ibid._ v. 20.]

[Footnote 199: _St. Matthew_, xxii. 37 _sqq._]

[Footnote 200: Toy, _Judaism and Christianity_, p. 82 _sq._]

[Footnote 201: _St. Matthew_, xii. 31 _sq._ _St. Mark_, iii. 28 _sq._]

[Footnote 202: _St. Mark_, xvi. 16. _St. John_, iii. 18, 36; viii. 24.]

[Footnote 203: _Romans_, iii. 28.]

Some of the early Fathers maintained that the interference and suffering of Christ, in itself, unconditionally saved all souls and emptied hell for ever;[204] but this theory never became popular. According to St. Augustine and, subsequently, Calvinian theology, the benefits of the atonement are limited to those whom God, of his sovereign pleasure, has from eternity arbitrarily elected, the effect of faith and conversion being not to save the soul, but simply to convince the soul that it is saved. A third theory--that of Pelagius, Armenius, and Luther--attributes to the sufferings of Christ a conditional efficacy, depending upon personal faith in his vicarious atonement, whereas those who for some reason or other do not possess such faith are excluded from salvation. A fourth doctrine, which early began to be constructed by the Fathers and was adopted by the Roman Catholic and the consistent portion of the Episcopalian Church, declares that by Christ's vicarious {720} suffering power is given to the Church, a priestly hierarchy, to save those who confess her authority and observe her rites, whilst all others are lost. Certain sectarians, like the Unitarians, or those "liberal Christians" who do not feel themselves tied by the dogmas of any special creed, are the only ones among whom we meet with the opinion that a free soul, who by the immutable laws which the Creator has established may choose between good and evil, is saved or lost just so far and so long as it partakes of either the former or the latter.[205]

[Footnote 204: Alger, _History of the Doctrine of a Future Life_, pp. 550-552, 563. Farrar, _Mercy and Judgment_, p. 58 _sq._]

[Footnote 205: Alger, _op. cit._ p. 553 _sqq._]

According to the leading doctrines of Christianity, then, the fates of men beyond the grave are determined by quite other circumstances than what the moral consciousness by itself recognises as virtue or vice. They are all doomed to death and hell in consequence of Adam's sin, and their salvation, if not absolutely predestined, can only be effected by sincere faith in the atonement of Christ or by valid reception of sacramental grace at the hands of a priest. Persons who on intellectual or moral grounds are unable to accept the dogma of atonement or to acknowledge the authority of an exacting hierarchy, are subject to the most awful penalties for a sin committed by their earliest ancestor, and so are the countless millions of heathen who never even had an opportunity to embrace the Christian religion. Luther was considered to have shown an exceptional boldness when he expressed the hope that "our dear God would be merciful to Cicero, and to others like him."[206] In the Westminster Confession of Faith the Divines declared the opinion that men not professing Christianity may be saved to be "very pernicious, and to be detested";[207] and in their Larger Catechism they expressly said that "they who, having never heard the gospel, know not Jesus Christ, and believe not in him, cannot be saved, be they never so diligent to frame their lives according to the light of nature, or the laws of that religion which they profess."[208] This doctrine has had many {721} adherents up to the present time,[209] although a more liberal view in favour of virtuous heathen has obviously been gaining ground.[210] Even in the case of Christians errors in belief on such subjects as church government, the Trinity, transubstantiation, original sin, and predestination, have been declared to expose the guilty to eternal damnation.[211] In the seventeenth century it was a common theme of certain Roman Catholic writers that "Protestancy unrepented destroys salvation,"[212] while the Protestants on their part taxed Du Moulin with culpable laxity for admitting that some Roman Catholics might escape the torments of hell.[213] Nathanael Emmons, the sage of Franklin, tells us that "it is absolutely necessary to approve of the doctrine of reprobation in order to be saved."[214]

[Footnote 206: Farrar, _op. cit._ p. 146.]

[Footnote 207: _Confession of Faith_, x. 4.]

[Footnote 208: _Larger Catechism_, Answer to Question 60.]

[Footnote 209: Farrar, _op. cit._ p. 146 _sq._]

[Footnote 210: Prentiss, 'Infant Salvation,' in _Presbyterian Review_, iv. 576. For earlier instances of this opinion see Abbot, 'Literature of the Doctrine of a Future Life,' forming an Appendix to Alger's _History of the Doctrine of a Future Life_, pp. 859, 863, 865.]

[Footnote 211: Abbot, _loc. cit._ p. 863.]

[Footnote 212: Wilson, _Charity Mistaken, with the Want whereof Catholickes are unjustly charged, for affirming . . . that Protestancy unrepented destroys Salvation_.]

[Footnote 213: Abbot, _loc. cit._ p. 860.]

[Footnote 214: Emmons, _Works_, iv. 336.]

Besides the heathen there is another large class of people whom Christian theology has condemned to hell for no fault of theirs, namely, infants who have died unbaptised. From a very early age the water of baptism was believed by the Christians to possess a magic power to wipe away sin,[215] and since the days of St. Augustine it was deemed so indispensable for salvation that any child dying without "the bath of regeneration" was regarded as lost for ever.[216] St. Augustine admitted that the punishment of such children was of the mildest sort,[217] but other writers were more severe; St. Fulgentius condemned to "everlasting punishment in eternal fire" even infants who died in their mother's womb.[218] However, {722} the notion that unbaptised children will be tormented, gradually gave way to a more humane opinion. In the middle of the twelfth century Peter Lombard determined that the proper punishment of original sin, when no actual sin is added to it, is "the punishment of loss," that is, loss of heaven and the sight of God, but not "the punishment of sense," that is, positive torment. This doctrine was confirmed by Innocentius III. and shared by the large majority of the schoolmen, who assumed the existence of a place called _limbus_, or _infernus puerorum_, where unbaptised infants will dwell without being subject to torture.[219] But the older view was again set up by the Protestants, who generally maintained that the due punishment of original sin is, in strictness, damnation in hell, although many of them were inclined to think that if a child dies by misfortune before it is baptised the parents' sincere intention of baptising it, together with their prayers, will be accepted with God for the deed.[220] In the Confession of Augsburg the Anabaptistic doctrine is emphatically condemned;[221] and although Zwingli rejected the dogma that infants dying without baptism are lost, and Calvin, in harmony with his theory of election, refused to tie the salvation of infants to an outward rite, the necessity of baptism as the ordinary channel of receiving grace appears to have been a general belief in the Reformed churches throughout the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.[222] The damnation of infants was in fact an acknowledged doctrine of Calvinism,[223] though an exception was made for the children of pious parents.[224] But in the latter part of the eighteenth century Toplady, who was a vehement Calvinist, avowed {723} his belief in the universal salvation of all departed infants, whether baptised or unbaptised.[225] And a hundred years later Dr. Hodge thought he was justified in stating that the common opinion of evangelical Protestants was that "all who die in infancy are saved."[226] The accuracy of this statement, however, seems somewhat doubtful. In 1883 Mr. Prentiss wrote of the doctrine of infant salvation independently of baptism:--"My own impression is that, had it been taught as unequivocally in the Presbyterian Church even a third of a century ago, by a theologian less eminent than Dr. Hodge for orthodoxy, piety, and weight of character, it would have called forth an immediate protest from some of the more conservative, old-fashioned Calvinists."[227]

[Footnote 215: Tertullian, _De baptismo_, 1 _sqq._ (Migne, _Patrologiæ cursus_, i. 1197 _sqq._). Harnack, _History of Dogma_, i. 206 _sq._; ii. 227. Stanley, _Christian Institutions_, p. 16. Lewis, _Paganism surviving in Christianity_, pp. 72, 73, 129, 144 _sq._]

[Footnote 216: Bingham, _Works_, iii. 488 _sqq._ Prentiss, _loc. cit._ p. 549.]

[Footnote 217: St. Augustine, _De peccatorum meritis et remissione_, i. 16 (Migne, _op. cit._ xliv. 16).]

[Footnote 218: St. Fulgentius, _De fide_, 27 (Migne, _op. cit._ lxv. 701).]

[Footnote 219: Wall, _History of Infant-Baptism_, i. 460 _sq._]

[Footnote 220: _Ibid._ i. 462, 468. Luther and his followers, however, speak more doubtfully about the efficacy of the parents' unrealised intention, and lay much stress on actual baptism (_ibid._ i. 469).]

[Footnote 221: _Augsburg Confession_, i. 9.]

[Footnote 222: Prentiss, _loc. cit._ p. 550.]

[Footnote 223: Calvin, _Institutio Christiana religionis_, iv. 15. 10, vol. ii. 371. Norton, _Tracts concerning Christianity_, p. 179 _sqq._]

[Footnote 224: Calvin, _op. cit._ iv. 16. 9, vol. ii. 383 _sq._ Wall, _op. cit._ i. 469. Anderson, 'Introductory Essay,' to Logan's _Words of Comfort for Parents bereaved of Little Children_, p. xxi.]

[Footnote 225: Toplady, _Works_, p. 645 _sq._]

[Footnote 226: Hodge, _Systematic Theology_, i. 26 _sq._]

[Footnote 227: Prentiss, _loc. cit._ p. 559. See also Anderson, _loc. cit._ p. xxiii.]

In order fully to realise the true import of the dogma of damnation it is necessary to consider the punishment in store for the condemned. The immense bulk of the Christians have always regarded hell and its agonies as material facts.[228] Origen, who was a Platonist and an heretic on many points, was severely censured for saying that the fire of hell was inward and of the conscience rather than outward and of the body;[229] and in the later Middle Ages Scotus Erigena showed unusual audacity in questioning the locality of hell and the material tortures of the condemned.[230] The punishment is burning--a penalty which even in the most barbaric codes is reserved for the very gravest crimes; and some great divines, like Jeremy Taylor and Jonathan Edwards, have been anxious to point out that the fire of hell is infinitely more painful than any fire on earth, being "fierce enough to melt the very rocks and elements."[231] This awful punishment also exceeds in dreadfulness anything which even the most vivid imagination can conceive, because it will last not for a passing moment, {724} nor for a year or a hundred, thousand, million, or milliard years, but for ever and ever. In case any doubt should arise as regards the physical capacity of the damned to withstand the heat, we are assured by some modern theologians that their bodies will be annealed like glass or asbestos-like or of the nature of salamanders.[232] This, then, is the future state of the large majority of men, quite independently of any fault of their own, or of the degree of their "guilt."[233] It would seem that even the felicity of the few who are saved must be seriously impaired by their contemplation of this endless and undescribable misery, but we are told that the case is just the reverse. They become as merciless as their god. Thomas Aquinas says that a perfect sight of the punishment of the damned is granted to them that they "may enjoy their beatitude and the grace of God more richly."[234] And the Puritans, especially, have revelled in the idea that "the sight of hell torments will exalt the happiness of the saints for ever," as a sense of the opposite misery always increases the relish of any pleasure.[235]

[Footnote 228: Alger, _op. cit._ p. 516.]

[Footnote 229: _Ibid._ p. 516.]

[Footnote 230: Milman, _History of Latin Christianity_, ix. 88, n. k.]

[Footnote 231: Alger, _op. cit._ p. 516 _sq._]

[Footnote 232: Alger, _op. cit._ pp. 518, 520. _Cf._ St. Augustine, _De Civitate Dei_, xxi. 2 _sqq._]

[Footnote 233: For the numbers of souls supposed to be lost see Alger, _op. cit._ p. 530 _sqq._ St. Chrysostom (_In Acta Apostolorum Homil. XXIV._ 4 (Migne, _op. cit._ Ser. Graeca, lx. 189]) doubted whether out of the many thousands of souls constituting the Christian population of Antioch in his day one hundred would be saved. And at the end of the seventeenth century a History Professor at Oxford published a book to prove "that not one in a hundred thousand (nay probably not one in a million) from Adam down to our times, shall be saved" (Du-Moulin, _Moral Reflections upon the Number of the Elect_, title page).]

[Footnote 234: Thomas Aquinas, _Summa theologica_, iii. Supplementum, qu. xciv. 1. 2 (Migne, _op. cit._ Ser. Secunda, iv. 1393).]

[Footnote 235: Jonathan Edwards, _Works_, vii. 480. Alger, _op. cit._ p. 541.]

In the present times there is a distinct tendency among Christian theologians to humanise somewhat the doctrines of the future life.[236] But if Christianity is to be judged from the dogmas which almost from its beginning until quite recent times have been recognised by the immense majority of its adherents, it must be admitted that its {725} conception of a heavenly Father and Judge has been utterly inconsistent with all ordinary notions of goodness and justice. Calvin himself avowed that the decree according to which the fall of Adam involved, without remedy, in eternal death so many nations together with their infant children, was a "horrible" one. "But," he adds, "no one can deny that God foreknew the future final fate of man before he created him, and that he did foreknow it because it was appointed by his own decree."[237]

[Footnote 236: Thus the doctrine of endless torments is opposed by a considerable number of theologians (Alger, _op. cit._ p. 546), and, "if held, is not practically taught by the vast majority of the English clergy" (Stanley, _op. cit._ p. 94).]

[Footnote 237: Calvin, _op. cit._ iii. 23. 7, vol. ii. 151.]

Like Christianity, Muhammedanism adorns its godhead with the highest moral attributes and at the same time ascribes to him decrees and actions which flatly contradict even the most elementary notions of human justice. The god of Islam is addressed as the compassionate and merciful; but his love is restricted to "those who fear,"[238] and his mercy can only be gained by that submissiveness or self-surrender which is indicated by the very name of Islam. He demands a righteous life, he punishes the wrongdoer and rewards the charitable.[239] Through his Prophet he has revealed to mankind both the rules of morality and the elements of a social system containing minute regulations for a man's conduct in various circumstances of life, with due rewards or penalties according to his fulfilment of these regulations.[240] The whole constitution of the State has on it a divine stamp; as an Arab proverb says, "country and religion are twins."[241] But foremost among duties is to believe in God and his Prophet. "God," it is said, "does not pardon polytheism and infidelity, but He can, if He willeth, pardon other crimes."[242] And the "pillars of religion" are the five duties of reciting the Kalimah or creed, of performing the five stated daily prayers, of fasting--especially in the month of Rama[d.]ân,--of giving the legal alms, and of making the pilgrimage to Mecca.[243] These duties are based on clear {726} sentences of the Koran, but the traditions have raised the most trivial ceremonial observances into duties of the greatest importance. It is true that hypocrisy and formalism without devotion were strongly condemned by Muhammed. "Righteousness," he said, "is not that ye turn your faces towards the East or the West, but righteousness is, one who believes in God, and the last day, and the angels, and the Book, and the prophets, and who gives wealth for His love to kindred, and orphans, and the poor, and the son of the road, and beggars, and those in captivity; and who is steadfast in prayer, and gives alms; and those who are sure of their covenant when they make a covenant; and the patient in poverty, and distress, and in time of violence; these are they who are true, and these are those who fear."[244] Yet in Muhammedanism, as in other ritualistic religions, the chief importance is practically attached to the punctual performance of outward ceremonies, and the virtue of prayer is made dependent upon an ablution.[245] In the future life the felicity or suffering of each person will be proportionate to his merits or demerits,[246] but the admittance into paradise depends in the first place on faith. "Those who believe, and act righteously, and are steadfast in prayer, and give alms, theirs is their hire with their Lord."[247] Those who have acknowledged the faith of Islam and yet acted wickedly will be punished in hell for a certain period, but will finally enter paradise.[248] As regards the future state of certain infidels the Koran contains contradictory statements. In one place it is said, "Verily, whether it be of those who believe, or those who are Jews or Christians or Sabaeans, whosoever believe in God and {727} the last day and act aright, they have their reward at their Lord's hand, and there is no fear for them, nor shall they grieve."[249] But this passage is considered to have been abrogated by another where it is stated that whoso desires any other religion than Islam shall in the next world be among the lost.[250] The punishments inflicted upon unbelievers are no less horrible than the torments of the Christian hell. Yet in one point the Muhammedan doctrine of the future life is more merciful than the dogmas of Christianity. The children of believers will all go to paradise, and the children of unbelievers are generally supposed to escape hell. Some think they will be in A[(]ráf, a place situated between heaven and hell; whilst others maintain that they will be servants to the true believers in paradise.[251]

[Footnote 238: _Koran_, iii. 70.]

[Footnote 239: _Supra_, i. 553.]

[Footnote 240: _Cf._ Muir, _Life of Mahomet_, iii. 295 _sq._; Lane-Poole, _Studies in a Mosque_, p. 101.]

[Footnote 241: Sell, _Faith of Islám_, pp. 19, 39.]

[Footnote 242: _Ibid._ p. 241.]

[Footnote 243: _Ibid._ p. 251.]

[Footnote 244: _Koran_, ii. 172.]

[Footnote 245: _Cf._ Polak, _Persien_, i. 9; Wallin, _Reseanteckningar från Orienten_, iv. 284 _sq._; Sell, _op. cit._ p. 256.]

[Footnote 246: Lane, _Manners and Customs of the Modern Egyptians_, i. 95 _sq._ Sell, _op. cit._ p. 231. Lane-Poole, _Studies in a Mosque_, p. 319.]

[Footnote 247: _Koran_, ii. 277.]

[Footnote 248: Lane, _op. cit._ i. 95. Sell, _op. cit._ p. 228. The Mu[(]tazilas, however, teach that the Muslim who enters hell will remain there for ever. They maintain that the person who, having committed great sins, dies unrepentant, though not an infidel, ceases to be a believer, and hence suffers as the infidels do, though the punishment is lighter than that which an infidel receives (Sell, _op. cit._ pp. 229, 241).]

[Footnote 249: _Koran_, ii. 59.]

[Footnote 250: _Ibid._ iii. 79. Sell, _op. cit._ p. 359 _sq._]

[Footnote 251: Sell, _op. cit._ p. 204 _sq._]

The formalism of Muhammedan orthodoxy has from time to time called forth protests from minds with deeper aspirations. The earlier Muhammedan mystics sought to impart life to the rigid ritual;[252] and in the nineteenth century Bábíism revolted against orthodox Islam, opposing bigotry and enjoining friendly intercourse with persons of all religions.[253] At present there are some liberal Muhammedans who set aside the scholastic tradition, maintain the right of private interpretation of the Koran, and warmly uphold the adaptability of Islam to the most advanced ideas of civilisation.[254] To them Muhammed's mission was chiefly that of a moral reformer. "In Islam," says Syed Ameer Ali, "the service of man and the good of humanity constitute pre-eminently the service and worship of God."[255]

[Footnote 252: _Ibid._ p. 110.]

[Footnote 253: _Ibid._ p. 136 _sqq._]

[Footnote 254: Ameer Ali, _Life and Teachings of Mohammed_, _passim_. _Idem_, _Ethics of Islâm_, _passim_. _Cf._ Lane-Poole, _Studies in a Mosque_, p. 324; Sell, _op. cit._ p. 198 _sq._]

[Footnote 255: Ameer Ali, _Ethics of Islâm_, p. 3 _sq._ _Idem_, _Life and Teachings of Mohammed_, p. 274.]

In the next chapter I shall try to explain the chief facts now set forth relating to gods as guardians of **worldly morality.