Introduction. — page 2 — Cyril of Jerusalem

Chapter V. —Eucharistic Rites. Liturgy. § 1. First Communion . When the rites of Baptism and Chrism were completed, the new-made Christians, clothed in white robes ( Myst . iv. 8), and bearing each a lighted taper in his hand, passed in procession from the Baptistery into the great “Church of the Resurrection. ” The time was still night, as we gather from the allusion in Procat . , § 15: “May God at length shew you that night, that darkness which shines like the day, concerning which it is said, darkness shall not be hidden from thee, and the night shall be light as the day. ” As the newly-baptized entered the church, they were welcomed in the words of the 32nd Psalm. “Even now,” says Cyril ( Procat . , § 15), “let your ears ring, as it were, with that glorious sound, when over your salvation the Angels shall chant, Blessed are they whose iniquities are forgiven, and whose sins are covered ; when like stars of the Church you shall enter in, bright in the body and radiant in the soul. ” During the chanting of the Psalm the neophytes seem to have stood in front of the raised ‘bema’ or sanctuary, as we learn from Cyril’s eloquent contemporary, Gregory Nazianzen, Orat . XL. § 46: “The station in which presently after Baptism thou wilt stand before the great sanctuary prefigures the glory from yonder heaven; the psalmody, with which thou wilt be welcomed, is a prelude of those heavenly hymns; the lamps, which thou wilt light, are a mystic sign of the procession of lights, with which bright and virgin souls shall go forth to meet the Bridegroom, with the lamps of faith burning brightly. ” From the Syriac “Treatise of Severus, formerly Patriarch of Alexandria (Antioch), concerning the rites of Baptism and of Holy Communion (Synaxis) as received among the Syrian Christians” (Resch, Agrapha , § 12, p. 361); we learn that it was the custom “to lift up the newly-baptized to the altar, and after giving them the mysteries the Bishop ( Sacerdos ) crowned them with garlands. ” The white garments ( Procat . , § 2: Mystag . , iv. 88) were worn until the Octave of Easter, Low Sunday, Dominica in Albis (Bingham, XII. c. iv. § 3). § 2. The Liturgy . In Cyril’s last Lecture, Mystagogic V. , he reminds his hearers of what they had witnessed at their first Communion on Easter-day, and thus gives a most valuable testimony to the prescribed form of administering the Holy Eucharist in the Eastern Church in the middle of the fourth century. Passing over all the preparatory portion of the Liturgy, he tells us first that the Deacon brings water to the Bishop or Priest ( τῷ ἱερεῖ ) and to the Presbyters who stand round the altar, that they may wash their hands in token of the need of purification from sin; a ceremony which evidently had reference to the words of the Psalmist, “I will wash mine hands in innocency; so will I compass Thine altar, O Lord . ” In some Churches, perhaps also at Jerusalem, the words were actually chanted during the ablution . “Then the Deacon cries aloud, Receive ye one another: and let us salute ( ἀσπαζώμεθα ) one another. ” In the Clementine Liturgy the “Kiss of Peace” precedes the “Ablution. ” Sometimes these two sentences are combined: “Salute ye one another with the holy kiss . ” In the Liturgy of S.

James there are two separate rubrics, one immediately after the dismissal of the Catechumens, “Take knowledge one of another,” and a second after the Creed, “Let us embrace ( ἀγαπήσωμεν ) one another with a holy kiss. ” “After this the Priest ( ἱερεύς ) cries aloud, Lift up your hearts. Then ye answer, We lift them up unto the Lord . ” The meaning of this Preface, as explained by Cyril, is an exhortation by the Priest, or Bishop when present, and a promise by the people, to raise all their thoughts to God on high, in preparation for the great Thanksgiving to which they were further invited: “Let us give thanks unto the Lord,”—“It is meet and right . ” Then follows a very brief summary of the Eucharistic Preface, and after that the Trisagion , corresponding in part to the long Thanksgiving in the Apostolic Constitutions for all God’s mercies in creation, providence, and redemption . It is important to observe how S. Cyril in this and the following sections associates the people with the Priest, using throughout the Plural “We. ” That this is intentional and significant, we may learn from a passage of S. Chrysostom which is so interesting that we may be allowed to translate it at length: “Sometimes moreover no difference is made between the Priest and those over whom he presides, as for example when we are to partake of the awful mysteries; for we are all alike deemed worthy of the same privileges: not as in the Old Covenant some parts were eaten by the Priest, and others by the governed ( ὁ ἀρχόμενος ), and it was not lawful for the people to share in what the Priest partook of. It is not so now: but one Body is set before all, and one Cup. And in the prayers also one may see the laity contributing much. For the prayers on behalf of the Energumens, and on behalf of those in Penitence are offered in common both by the Priest and by themselves; and all say one prayer, a prayer that is full of compassion. Again, after we have excluded from the sacred precincts those who are unable to partake of the Holy Table, there is another prayer to be made, and we all alike lie prostrate on the floor, and all alike rise up. When again we are to receive and give a kiss of peace, we all alike embrace each other. Again even amid the most tremendous Mysteries the Priest prays over the people, and the people over the Priest: for the formula, “With Thy Spirit,” is nothing else than this. The words of the Thanksgiving again are common: for he does not give thanks alone, but also the whole people. For having first got their answer, and they agreeing that ‘It is meet and right so to do,’ he then begins the thanksgiving. And why wonder that the people sometimes speak with the Priest, when even with the very Cherubim and the Powers on high they send up those sacred hymns in common. Now all this I have said in order that each of the common people ( τῶν ἀρχομένων ) also may be vigilant, that we may learn that we are all one Body, having only as much difference between one and another, as between members and members, and may not cast the whole work upon the Priests, but ourselves also care for the whole Church even as for a common Body.

” It is remarkable that in Cyril’s account of the Eucharistic rites in this Lecture there is not the slightest reference to the words of Institution, though these hold so prominent a place before the Invocation both in the Clementine Liturgy and in the Liturgy of S. James. But we cannot justly assume, from a mere omission in so brief a summary, that the Commemoration of the Institution had no place in the Liturgy then in use at Jerusalem. It seems more probable that Cyril did not think it necessary, after his repeated references to the Institution in the preceding Lecture, to make further mention of a custom so well known as the recitation of Christ’s own words in the course of the Prayer preceding the Invocation. On the previous day he had quoted S. Paul’s account of the Institution, with the remark, “Since then He Himself has declared and said of the Bread, This is My Body, who shall dare doubt any longer? And since He has Himself affirmed and said, This is My Blood, who shall ever hesitate, saying that it is not His Blood ? ” The like efficacy he again ascribes to “the Lord’s declaration” concerning both the Bread and the Wine, that they are “the Body and Blood of Christ . ” In the Didaché, which gives the oldest elements of an Eucharistic Service, there is neither the Commemoration nor the Invocation, but only two short and simple forms of Thanksgiving “for the Holy Vine of David,” and “for the broken Bread . ” Justin Martyr seems to imply that the consecration is effected by the Commemoration of Christ’s own words in the Institution: “We have been taught,” he says, “that the food which is blessed by the prayer of the word which comes from Him ( τὴν δι᾽ εὐχῆς λόγου τοῦ παρ αὐτοῦ εὐχαριστηθεῖσαν τροφήν ), and by which our blood and flesh are by transmutation nourished, is the Flesh and Blood of that Jesus who was made Flesh. ” He gives no separate Invocation of the Holy Ghost, but this may have been supplied in the “praise and glory” or in the “prayer and thanksgivings” sent up “to the Father of all through the name of the Son and of the Holy Ghost . ” Irenæus is apparently the earliest writer who represents the Invocation of the Holy Ghost as the immediate act of consecration: “We make an oblation to God of the bread and the cup of blessing, giving Him thanks for that He has commanded the earth to bring forth these fruits for our nourishment. And then, having completed the oblation, we call forth ( ἐκκαλοῦμεν ) the Holy Spirit, that He may exhibit this sacrifice, both the bread the Body of Christ, and the cup the Blood of Christ, in order that the partakers of these antitypes may obtain the remission of sins and life eternal . ” Mr. Hammond writes that, “By the Oriental Churches an Invocation of the Holy Spirit is considered necessary to complete the consecration. In the three Oriental Families of Liturgies such an Invocation is invariably found shortly after the Words of Institution . ” It is in accordance with this statement that, we find Cyril so frequently declaring that the elements which before the Invocation are simple bread and wine, become after the Invocation the Body and Blood of Christ . In the first of the passages referred to below he speaks of “the Holy Invocation of the Adorable Trinity,” in the others of the Holy Spirit only.

Cyril next describes the Invocation as “completing the Spiritual Sacrifice, the bloodless Service,” and then gives a summary of the “Great Intercession” as made “over that Sacrifice of the Propitiation. ” The Intercession, as represented by Cyril, is not simply a prayer, but an offering of the Sacrifice , and this is in accordance with the usual language of the Liturgies. ” We offer to Thee, O Lord, on behalf also of Thy holy places, which Thou hast glorified by the Theophany of Thy Christ, and by the visitation of Thine All-Holy Spirit: especially on behalf of glorious Sion, the Mother of all the Churches, and on behalf of Thy Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church throughout the whole world . ” In the Liturgy of S. Chrysostom, as now commonly used in the Orthodox Eastern Church, we find the fuller phrase, “We offer unto Thee this reasonable Service on behalf of the world, on behalf of the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church . ” In some particulars Cyril’s summary agrees most nearly with the Clementine Liturgy, as, for example, in the prayer “for the King and those in authority, and for the whole army, that they may be at peace with us . ” In others he follows the Liturgy of S. James, as in the intercession for “every Christian soul afflicted and distressed, that stands in need of Thy pity and succour . ” Cyril next describes the commemoration of departed Saints, and “of all who in past years have fallen asleep among us,” that is, in the bosom of the Church, and states his belief “that it will be a very great benefit to the souls, for whom the supplication is put up while that holy and most awful Sacrifice is presented . ” He refers to objections against this belief, and brings forward in defence of it a reason applicable only to sinners: “When we offer,” he says, “our supplications for those who have fallen asleep, though they be sinners, we offer up Christ sacrificed for our sins, propitiating our merciful God for them as well as for ourselves . ” His language on this subject seems in fact to shew an advance in doctrine beyond the earliest Liturgies. In those of S. James and S. Basil we find prayers that the offering may be acceptable as a propitiation “for the rest of the souls that have fallen asleep aforetime,” and again, “that we may find mercy and grace with all the Saints who have ever been pleasing in Thy sight from generation to generation, forefathers, fathers, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, Martyrs, Confessors, Teachers, holy men, and every righteous spirit made perfect in the faith of Thy Christ. ” There is nothing here, nor in the Clementine Liturgy, nor in that of S. Mark, corresponding to the purpose which Cyril ascribes to the commemoration, “that at their prayers and intercessions God would receive our petition. ” In the Anaphora of S. Chrysostom contained in the later form of the Liturgy of Constantinople we find, apparently for the first time, this prayer added to the commemoration of all Saints, “at whose supplications look upon us, O God. ” There was much controversy on the subject of prayers for the dead in Cyril’s time, and the objections which he notices were brought into prominence by Ærius, and rebuked by Epiphanius . From the commemoration of the departed Cyril passes at once to the Lord’s Prayer , omitting the Preface which is found in the Liturgies of S. James and S. Mark.

In the Clementine Liturgy, contrary to general use, the Lord’s Prayer is not said at all. Cyril adds an exposition of each petition, and gives an unusual explanation of ἐπιούσιος , for which see the footnote: he also explains τοῦ πονηροῦ as referring to “the wicked one,” following in this the Embolismus of S. James, “deliver us from the wicked one and from his works. ” “After this the Bishop says, Holy things for holy men . ” Chrysostom explains this as being both an invitation to the Faithful in general to communicate, and a warning to the unholy to withdraw. “The Bishop, with loud voice and awe-inspiring cry, raising high his arm like a herald, and standing on high in sight of all, above that awful silence cries aloud, inviting some and repelling others, and doing this not with his hand, but with his tongue more clearly than with the hand.. …For when he says, Holy things for the holy, he means this: Whosoever is not holy, let him not draw near . ” In regard to the doctrinal significance of the formula, Dr. Waterland’s remarks should be consulted . The response of the people to the “Sancta Sanctis” is given by Cyril in accordance with the Liturgy of S. James and the Clementine: “One is Holy, One is the Lord, Jesus Christ:” but he does not mention the “Gloria in excelsis” nor the “Hosanna,” both of which follow here in the Clementine. “After this,” says Cyril, “ye hear the chanter inviting you with a sacred melody to the Communion of the Holy Mysteries, and saying, O taste and see that the Lord is good . This agrees with the Clementine rubric: “Let the 33rd Psalm be sung while all the rest are partaking. ” In the Liturgy of S. James, while the Bishop is breaking the Bread and dipping in the Wine, the “Agnus Dei” and several Psalms were sung: but of these there is no mention in the Clementine Liturgy or in Cyril. On Cyril’s directions for receiving the Bread and the Cup with due reverence, see the footnotes on the passages . His final injunction to remain for the prayer and thanksgiving is taken from that in the Clementine Liturgy: “Having partaken of the precious Body and the precious Blood of Christ, let us give thanks to Him who hath counted us worthy to partake of His holy Mysteries. ” The thanksgiving, benediction, concluding prayers, and dismissal, vary much in the different Liturgies.

Chapter VI. —Effects of Baptism and of Chrism. § 1. Baptism . When we try to ascertain the exact relation between Baptism and the Unction or Chrism which immediately followed, we find that Cyril’s teaching on the subject has been understood in very different senses. By some he is thought to regard the Unction as being merely an accessory rite of the one great Sacrament of Baptism; to others he seems to draw a clear distinction between them, assigning to each its proper grace and efficacy. The former view is stated by the Oxford editor, Milles, in his note on the words: “And in like manner to you also, after you had come up from the pool of the sacred waters, there was given an unction, a figure ( ἀντίτυπον ) of that with which Christ was anointed; and that is the Holy Ghost . ” “It is evident,” says Milles, “from his words here, that the Chrism of which Cyril treats in this Lecture is not to be referred to the Unction which is administered by the Romanists in Confirmation. For every one sees that by Unction in this passage a ceremony of Baptism is indicated. The ancients employed two Unctions in Baptism, the first before the immersion in the water, of which he spoke in the preceding Lecture; the second immediately upon ascending from the water, of which he speaks in this Lecture. ” This opinion is elaborately discussed by the Benedictine editor, Touttée, Dissertatio iii. c. 7, who argues that the Unction described by Cyril is a Sacrament distinct from Baptism, that it has for its proper grace the gift of the Holy Spirit, and further that this gift is not conferred in Baptism. Of these assertions the first and second appear to represent Cyril’s view correctly: the last is an exaggeration and a mistake, the tendency of which is to identify the Chrism of the Eastern Church with that which is used in Confirmation by the Roman Church, and to exalt the rite of Confirmation as a proper Sacrament distinct from Baptism, and even superior to it. A view differing in some respects from both of these has been recently put forward by a learned and devout writer of our own Church, who has fully discussed the teaching of Cyril and other Eastern Fathers, and gives the result of his investigation in the following “Summary :” “For very many centuries the Christians of the East have never been forced to define to themselves at all clearly the position of a person baptized but unconfirmed. Their mode of administering Confirmation ( Chrism ? ) by the hands of the baptizing Presbyter—though among the Greeks and some others with chrism prepared by the Bishop—relieves them from the necessity which weighs upon us Westerns, of teaching Christian children what their status is between the two rites. Confirmation ( Chrism ? ) is for them, far more than it has been for a long while in the West, a factor in Baptism. Only a more or less conscious desire not to fall behind Western teachers in honouring the perfecting Unction can have led their later authorities to treat that Unction as a sacrament numerically distinct from Baptism. To all the early doctors of the East the two things are one, and Baptism culminates in the Unction.

The tendency among Oriental Christians was, not to attribute to Baptism in our modern sense the gift of the Holy Ghost, but rather to consider Baptism by itself as a bare rite, benefiting the body alone, and dependent for its spiritual efficacy upon other actions, after and before. Not that this tendency has its full way. The Greek Fathers may be said certainly on the whole to trace the forgiveness of sins, the preparatory cleansing, to the baptismal Laver; the gift of the Holy Ghost, for the ordinary purposes of Christian living, they trace, like S. Chrysostom, to that act which comes “ immediately after Baptism, and before the Mysteries. ” When we come to inquire how far these several theories agree with the teaching of Cyril himself, we must in the outset put aside altogether the name Confirmation : for as applied to the Unction used in the Eastern Church it is only confusing and misleading. In the early ages of the Church Confirmation was not known even by name. In the Latin Church “neither Tertullian, Cyprian, Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, nor any of the Latin Fathers, makes mention of Confirmation in this sense. Nor have the Greeks any word to answer to this Latin term . ” So far, therefore, Milles appears to be perfectly right in refusing to connect the Chrism of which Cyril treats with the Unction used in Confirmation by the Roman Church. We may add that in Cyril’s account of Chrism it is wholly unconnected with Confirmation, both in its symbolic reference and in its outward form. Chrism, he says, is the antitype of the Unction of Christ by the Holy Ghost at His Baptism: Confirmation is universally admitted to have been a following of the Apostles in their laying on of hands. But in that Apostolic rite there was no unction, and in Chrism there was no such laying on of hands. In several passages Cyril clearly distinguishes the outward form of Baptism from the spiritual grace. “If thy body be here, but not thy mind, it profiteth thee nothing. Even Simon Magus once came to the Laver: he was baptized, but was not enlightened; and though he dipped his body in water, he enlightened not his heart with the Spirit: his body went down and came up, but his soul was not buried with Christ, nor raised with Him . ” It is impossible here to regard “the Spirit” as referring to the grace of Unction: for (1) Baptism was not accompanied by Unction in the time of the Apostles, and (2) we should thus make a false antithesis between the outward part of the one rite (“he dipped his body in water”), and the inward part of the other. Here, therefore, Cyril attributes enlightenment of the heart by the Spirit to Baptism apart from Unction, and at the same time lays stress upon the difference between the worthy and unworthy recipient of the outward form. The importance of this difference is further enforced throughout the next two sections, and at the close of § 4 the distinction between the outward sign and inward grace of Baptism, strictly so called, is again asserted, “though the water will receive thee, the Spirit will not accept thee. ” “Some might suppose,” it is said, “from these words that Cyril thought of water and the Spirit as the sign and the thing signified in Baptism respectively, and a passage in a later Lecture upon the subject of the Sacrament (of Baptism) at first confirms that impression .

” To suppose that Cyril had any other thought in the former passage, seems to me impossible for any ordinary reader, and the later passage, not only at first, but more fully the longer it is considered, confirms that impression beyond all doubt. The whole quotation, including Cat. iii. §§ 3, 4, is too long to repeat here, but may be read in its proper place. It will be sufficient to give the passages which are of chief importance in the question before us, according to Canon Mason’s translation. Cat. iii. § 3. “Do not attend to the laver as mere water, but to the spiritual grace given along with the water”…“the mere water, receiving the invocation of the Holy Ghost, and of Christ, and of the Father, acquires a power of sanctity. For since man is a two-fold being composed of soul and body, the cleansing element also is two-fold, the incorporeal for the incorporeal, the bodily for the body. And the water cleanses the body, but the Spirit seals the soul, in order that having our hearts sprinkled by the Spirit, and our bodies washed with pure water, we may draw nigh to God. When, therefore, you are about to go down into the water do not pay attention to the mere nature of the water, but expect salvation by the operation of the Holy Ghost. For without both it is impossible for thee to be perfected. ” No words could state more clearly the distinction between the outward sign and the inward grace of Baptism, and the absolute necessity for both. There is no possible reference to Unction, but “the operation of the Holy Ghost” in cleansing and sealing the soul is unmistakably connected with Baptism as “the grace given with the water” ( μετὰ τοῦ ὕδατος ), and below, as “the seal by water” ( τὴν δι᾽ ὕδατος σφραγῖδα ), the latter phrase shewing that Baptism by water is the signum efficax of the grace in question. Cyril then quotes our Lord’s words, Except a man be born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God , and explains them thus: “On the one hand he who is being baptized ( βαπτιζόμενος ) with the water, but has not had the Spirit vouchsafed to him ( καταξιωθείς ), has not the grace in perfection: on the other hand, even if a man be distinguished for virtue in his deeds, but does not receive the seal bestowed by means of water ( τὴν δι᾽ ὕδατος σφραγῖδα ), he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. ” Canon Mason, whose translation I have followed, finds here a reference both to Baptism and to Unction as “the first baptismal act and the second,” and in support of this interpretation gives a second and more emphatic version: “He who is in course of being baptized with the water, but has not yet had the Spirit vouchsafed to him, has not the grace in perfection. ” This introduction of the word “ yet ,” in order to represent a distinction between two separate acts, is not justified either by the reading of the older editions ( οὐδὲ τῷ ὕδατι βαπτιζόμενος μὴ καταξιωθεὶς δὲ τοῦ Πνεύματος ), nor by that of Codices Monac. Roe, Casaub. adopted by Reischl ( οὔτε ὁ βεβαπτισμένος κ. τ. λ . ), nor by the Benedictine text ( οὔτε ὁ βαπτιζόμενος κ. τ. λ . ).

The obvious meaning of the passage, with either reading, is that “the man who in Baptism did not receive the Holy Spirit, has not the grace (of Baptism) complete. ” The Benedictine Editor in his elaborate argument for regarding Chrism as a distinct sacrament ”, does not even refer to this passage. A statement which is important in this connexion is found in Mystag . ii. § 6: “Let no one then suppose that Baptism is the grace of remission of sins only, or further of adoption, as the Baptism of John conferred only remission of sins; but as we know full well that it cleanses from sins and procures a gift of the Holy Spirit, so also it is a counterpart ( ἀντίτυπον ) of the sufferings of Christ. ” Here besides “the remission of sins, which no man receiveth without the Holy Spirit ,” we find “a gift of the Holy Ghost,” and the fellowship of Christ’s Passion distinctly attributed to Baptism. If the “adoption” mentioned at the beginning of this passage were identical (as Touttée thinks) with the “gift of the Holy Ghost,” it would by no means follow that Cyril here means to include Unction in Baptism. For the grace which beyond all others is exclusively attached to Baptism, and not to Unction, is the new birth, and this is “the new birth into freedom and adoption . ” In fact Cyril’s teaching on this point is in strict accordance with that of St. Paul in Gal. iv. 4–6 , that we first receive the adoption of sons ( υἱοθεσίαν ), and then “ because ye are sons, God sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father . ” So again in Rom. viii. 15, 16 , he says, “ Ye received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. The Spirit Himself beareth witness with our spirit that we are the children of God . ” In both passages St. Paul clearly distinguishes two things, “the adoption” itself, and the witness of it by “the Spirit of adoption. ” Cf. Bengel on v. 4: “Prius adoptionem , deinde Spiritum adoptionis accepimus;” and on v. 6: “ Filiorum statum sequitur inhabitatio Spiritus Sancti, non hanc ille. ” The adoption itself belongs to Baptism strictly so called, in which we are made children of God and joint heirs with Christ (cf. Cat. iii. 15): the witness of the indwelling Spirit of adoption is the special grace ascribed to Chrism in the Eastern Church, and to Confirmation in the Western. There are many other passages in which Cyril ascribes to Baptism itself, as distinct from Chrism, a gift of the Spirit, such as the following: “But He trieth the soul: He casteth not His pearls before the swine: if thou dissemble, men will baptize thee now, but the Spirit will not baptize thee . ” “The Lord, preventing us according to His loving-kindness, has granted repentance at Baptism, in order that we may cast off the chief—nay, rather the whole burden of our sins, and having received the seal by the Holy Ghost, may be made heirs of eternal life . ” Again, after speaking of “the invocation of grace having sealed the soul,” he adds: “Having gone down dead in sins, thou comest up quickened in righteousness. For if thou hast been united with the likeness of the Saviour’s death , thou shalt also be deemed worthy of His Resurrection .

” The benefits ascribed to Baptism in these several passages without any allusion to Chrism, are brought together with rhetorical effect in the Introductory Lecture, § 16: “Great is the Baptism that lies before you; a ransom to captives, a remission of offences, a death of sin, a new birth of the soul, a garment of light, a holy indissoluble seal, a chariot to heaven, the delight of Paradise, a welcome into the kingdom, the gift of adoption. ” From such language it is clear beyond question that in Cyril of Jerusalem, not to speak of other Oriental Fathers, the tendency is not “to consider Baptism by itself as a bare rite, benefiting the body alone, and dependent for its spiritual efficacy upon other actions after and before,” but as depending on the power of the Holy Ghost, and the sincerity of repentance and faith in man. If further proof were needed, a glance at the Index under the word “Baptism” will shew the extraordinary richness, variety, and precision of Cyril’s teaching, as to the gifts of the Holy Ghost conferred therein. § 2. Chrism . When spiritual blessings so many and so great have been ascribed to Baptism, in what light, it may be asked, does Cyril regard the Unction which follows? Does he treat it as being merely an additional ceremony subordinate to Baptism, or as having for its own proper grace some special gift of the Holy Ghost? We find no answer to this question in the earlier course of Lectures . But that Chrism was not regarded by Cyril as a mere accessory to Baptism, as Milles thought , may be safely inferred from the fact that in announcing the subjects of his Mystagogic Lectures, he mentions first Baptism, then “the seal of the fellowship of the Holy Ghost,” and then “the Mysteries at the altar of the New Covenant :” and this inference is fully confirmed by his language elsewhere: “Ye have heard enough of Baptism, and Chrism, and partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ . ” A mere additional ceremony of Baptism could not have been so independently placed between the two sacraments, and, as it were, in the same rank with them. The importance thus attached to Chrism is further shewn in the fact that Cyril uses the very same language in reference to the consecration of the ointment of Chrism and of the water of Baptism, and of the Eucharistic elements. “The bread and wine of the Eucharist before the Invocation of the Holy and Adorable Trinity are simple ( λιτός ) bread and wine, but after the Invocation the Bread becomes the Body and the Wine the Blood of Christ . ” Regard not the Laver as simple ( λιτῷ ) water, but rather regard the spiritual grace that is given with the water . ” “The simple water having received the Invocation of the Holy Ghost, and of Christ, and of the Father, acquires a new power of holiness . ” “But see thou suppose not this to be plain ( ψιλόν ) ointment. For as the Bread of the Eucharist, after the Invocation of the Holy Ghost is no longer simple ( λιτός ) bread, but the Body of Christ; so also this holy ointment is no longer plain ( ψιλόν ) ointment, nor, as one might say, common, after Invocation, but Christ’s gift of grace ( χάρισμα ), and is made effectual to impart the Holy Ghost by the presence of His own Godhead .

” The spiritual benefits which Cyril ascribes to the Unction are set forth in the same Lecture. “This holy thing is a spiritual safeguard of the body, and salvation of the soul” (§ 7): it sanctifies all the organs of sense: “the body is anointed with the visible ointment, and the soul is sanctified by the Holy and Life-giving Spirit” (§ 3). After being anointed the Christian is now entitled to that name in its fullest sense ; he is clothed with the whole armour of the Holy Ghost, that he may stand against the power of the adversary: he may say, “ I can do all things in Christ who strengtheneth me ” (§ 4). In regard to the supposed identity of Chrism and Confirmation, it is important to notice carefully how Cyril speaks of the laying on of hands in the only passage where he mentions it . He first illustrates the freedom of the Spirit, and His independence of human agency, by the gift of prophecy to the seventy elders, including Eldad and Medad: he then refers to the gift of the spirit of wisdom to Joshua by the laying on of Moses’ hands , and adds, “Thou seest everywhere the figure ( τύπον ) in the Old Testament, and in the New the same. In Moses’ time the Spirit was given by laying on of hands ( χειροθεσίᾳ ), and Peter gives the Spirit by laying on of hands : and upon thee also, who art to be baptized, the grace is about to come; but the manner ( τὸ πῶς ) I tell thee not, for I do not forestall the time. ” From this passage it has been inferred (i) that Cyril alludes to a gift of the Spirit by laying on of hands in immediate connexion with Baptism and Unction , and (2) that he refers this gift of the Spirit not to Baptism itself, but to the laying on of hands, or to the Unction as a figure that answers to it . (1) The first of these inferences is opposed to the fact that Cyril neither mentions the laying on of hands as part of the actual ceremonial in Baptism or Unction, nor as the analogous rite in the old Testament, but on the contrary expressly says that the symbol ( τὸ σύμβολον ) of this holy Chrism in the Old Testament lies in the consecration of Aaron to be High Priest, when Moses, “after the washing in water anointed him, and he was called ‘ anointed ,’ evidently from this figurative unction ( τοῦ χρίσματος δηλαδὴ τοῦ τυπικοῦ ). ” (2) In support of the second inference the argument offered is as follows: “That the Spirit was to come upon them in the course of their Baptism is here again clearly stated; but that Cyril did not intend them to suppose that Baptism itself would convey the gift is equally clear. Again and again in earlier Lectures, as well as in the words actually before us, Cyril has taught them to expect the gift in Baptism; if therefore the immersion itself were to be the means of receiving it, he has already told them his secret . Yet now he says that he will not tell them ‘how’ they are to receive it. That remains for a future occasion . ” The mistake, as I venture to consider it, lies in the words which I have marked with italics.

For of the mysteries which were to be concealed from the unbaptized ( ἀμύητοι ) the first was the manner of administering Baptism itself, and the second, the unction of Chrism; and in the preceding Lectures Cyril has no more told the secret of the one than of the other. “Baptism, the Eucharist, and the oil of Chrism, were things that the uninitiated ( ἀμύητοι ) were not allowed to look upon . ” “We bless,” says S. Basil , “both the water of Baptism and the oil of the Chrism, and moreover the baptized ( βαπτιζόμενον ) himself. From what written commands? Is it not from a secret ( σιωπωμένης ) and mystical tradition? Again, the very anointing with the oil, what word of Scripture taught that? And the dipping the man thrice, whence came it? And all the other accompaniments of Baptism, the renunciation of Satan and his angels, from what Scripture came they? Come they not from this unpublished and secret teaching, which our fathers guarded in a silence with which no prying curiosity might meddle, having been well taught to preserve the sanctity of the mysteries by silence? For how could it have been right to publish in writing the doctrine of these mysteries, which the unbaptized are not even allowed to look upon? ” As these secret ceremonies of Baptism and Unction are revealed by Cyril only in the Mystagogic Lectures, the supposed reason for saying, that in Cat. xvi. 26, the promised gift of the Spirit refers not to Baptism but only to Unction, at once falls to the ground. The true state of the case is well expressed by Bingham , “Though the ancients acquainted the Catechumens with the doctrine of Baptism so far as to make them understand the spiritual nature and design of it, yet they never admitted them to the sight of the actual ceremony, nor so much as to hear any plain discourse about the manner of its administration, till they were fitted and prepared for the actual reception of it,”—or rather, till they actually received it. There is in fact no reason to exalt the benefits of Unction, or Confirmation, by robbing Baptism of its proper grace. “It was this Unction, as the completion of Baptism, to which they ascribed the power of making every Christian in some sense partaker of a royal priesthood. To it they also ascribed the noble effects of confirming the soul with the strength of all spiritual graces on God’s part, as well as the confirmation of the profession and covenant made on man’s part . ” We may well be satisfied that the doctrine of the early Church has been so fully retained in essential points in our own Office of Confirmation, recalling as it does by the ratification of the baptismal vows the immediate connexion of the ancient Unction with Baptism, and in its Prayers invoking the same gifts of the Holy Spirit,—“Strengthen them, we beseech Thee, O Lord, with the Holy Ghost the Comforter, and daily increase in them Thy manifold gifts of grace; the spirit of wisdom and understanding; the spirit of counsel and ghostly strength; the spirit of knowledge and true godliness, and fill them, O Lord, with the spirit of Thy holy fear, now and for ever. Amen. ”

Chapter VII. —Eucharistic Doctrine. We have seen that Cyril makes the consecration of sacramental elements in every case consist in the Invocation of the Holy Ghost, after which the water of Baptism is no longer mere simple water , the ointment no longer plain ointment , the bread and the wine no longer plain bread and wine, but the Body and Blood of Christ . Upon these statements an argument against Transubstantiation has been founded by Bishop Cosin , and adopted both by Dr. Pusey and Dean Goode . It being universally admitted that the substance of the water and of the ointment remains unchanged, it is argued from the identity of the language employed in each case that, according to Cyril, no substantial change takes place in the Bread and Wine. Bishop Cosin quotes the following passage, of which the original is given below: “Take heed thou dost not think that this is a mere ointment only. For as the bread of the Eucharist after the invocation of the Holy Ghost is no longer ordinary bread, but is the body of Christ; so this holy ointment is no longer a bare common ointment after it is consecrated, but is the gift or grace of Christ, which, by His Divine Nature, and the coming of the Holy Ghost, is made efficacious; so that the body is anointed with the ointment, but the soul is sanctified by the holy and vivifying Spirit . ” Bishop Cosin proceeds to argue thus: “Can anything more clear be said? Either the ointment is transubstantiated by consecration into the spirit and grace of Christ, or the bread and wine are not transubstantiated by consecration into the Body and Blood of Christ. Therefore as the ointment retains still its substance, and yet is not called a mere or common ointment, but the Chrism or grace of Christ: so the bread and wine remaining so, as to their substance, yet are not said to be only bread and wine common and ordinary, but also the Body and Blood of Christ. ” Notwithstanding the great authority of Bishop Cosin, and the assent of Theologians of such opposite schools as Dr. Pusey and Dean Goode, it must be admitted that the argument, even as against Transubstantiation, is pressed beyond its just limits. The identity of language extends only to two points, (1) the mode of consecration by Invocation, (2) the effect negatively stated, that the material element in each case is no longer simply a material element. A change, therefore, of some kind has taken place, and we have still to inquire how the change in each case is described by Cyril. “The water acquires a power of sanctity,” otherwise described as “the spiritual grace given with the water . ” “The ointment is Christ’s gift of grace ( Χάρισμα ), and becomes effectual to impart by the presence of the Holy Ghost His Divine Nature . ” “The Bread becomes the Body and the Wine the Blood of Christ . ” There is here no such identity of language as would justify the assertion that the change described is of the same nature in each case, that because it leaves the substance of the water and the ointment untouched, therefore the substance of the Bread also must, according to Cyril, remain unchanged: this must be proved by other arguments.

We must also remember that if this argument based upon the identity of the language used on the two sides of a comparison is trustworthy, there is another passage in Cyril to which it may be applied: “He once, in Cana of Galilee, changed the water into wine akin to blood ( οἰκεῖον αἵματι ) , and is it incredible that He changed wine into blood? ” The change of the water into wine was a change of substance: are we then prepared to agree with the Roman Church that the change of the bread also is a change of substance? Nay further, would the Roman Church itself accept the principle of the argument? For observe that in fact Bishop Cosin himself, when he comes to deal with this passage, gives up his former argument, and distinctly rejects it. “Protestants,” he says, “do freely grant and firmly believe that the wine, in the sense already often mentioned, is changed into the Blood of Christ; but every change is not a transubstantiation; neither doth Cyril say that this change (i. e. of the wine) is like that of the water, for then it would appear to our senses; but that He who changed the water sensibly can also change the wine sacramentally, will not be doubted by any . ” Again, in describing the act of consecration, Cyril says: “We beseech the merciful God to send forth His Holy Spirit upon the gifts lying before Him, that He may make the bread the Body of Christ, and the wine the Blood of Christ, for certainly whatsoever the Holy Ghost has touched, is sanctified and changed ( ἡγίασται καὶ μεταβέβληται ) . ” Here again, as in the passage quoted from Myst . iii. § 3, a sacramental change of some sort is asserted, but its specific character is not defined. There is, however, a passage which throws some light on Cyril’s conception of the change in Myst . iv. § 3: “In the figure of Bread is given to thee His Body, and in the figure of Wine His Blood, that thou by partaking of the Body and Blood of Christ mightest be made of the same body and the same blood with Him. For thus we come to bear Christ in us, His Body and His Blood being distributed to our members ( εἰς τὰ ἡμέτερα ἀναδιδομένου μέλη ). ” Several good MSS read ἀναδεδεγμένοι , which would give the meaning, “having received of His Body and of His blood into our members. ” This does not alter the general sense of the passage; but the reading ἀναδιδομένου is supported by another passage, Myst . v. § 15: “Our common bread is not substantial ( ἐπιούσιος ): but this Holy Bread is substantial, that is, appointed for the substance of the soul. This Bread goeth not into the belly and is not cast out into the draught , but is distributed ( ἀναδίδοται ) into thy whole system for the benefit of body and soul. ” In order to accommodate these passages to the Roman doctrine of Transubstantiation the Benedictine Editor here introduces the idea of species , the outward forms or accidents of the bread. “We must not suppose,” he says, “that Cyril thought the Body of Christ to be divided and digested ( digeri ) into our body; but by a customary way of speaking he attributes to the Holy Body what is suitable only to the species which conceal it.

And he does not deny that the species pass into the draught, but only that the Body of Christ does so. ” But Cyril draws no such distinction between the species and the Body of Christ: to him the Bread and Wine after consecration are the Body and the Blood of Christ. For how could it be said that the species , which in Transubstantiation are the mere outward accidents of bread and wine, are distributed into the whole system for the benefit of body and soul ? In whatever sense the bread and wine become by consecration the Body and Blood of Christ, in that same sense the Body and Blood of Christ are, according to Cyril, distributed to our whole system. This was no new doctrine: Ignatius, Ephes . xxi. , speaks of Christians as “breaking one Bread, which is the medicine of immortality, and the antidote that we should not die, but live for ever in Jesus Christ. ” This is perhaps the earliest expression of the belief that the resurrection of the body is secured by the communion of the Body of Christ in the Eucharist. The manner in which this communion is effected is described by Justin Martyr ( Apolog . I. § 66) in language which shews clearly what Cyril meant: “We do not receive these things as common bread and common drink: but in the same way as Jesus Christ our Saviour was made flesh by the Word of God, and took both flesh and blood for our salvation, so we have been taught that the food over which thanksgiving has been made by prayer in the word received from Him ( τὴν δι᾽ εὐχῆς λόγου τοῦ παρ᾽ αὐτοῦ εὐχαριστηθεῖσαν τροφήν ), from which (food) our blood and flesh are by transmutation ( κατὰ μεταβολήν ) nourished, is both the Flesh and Blood of Him the Incarnate Jesus. ” Here it is plainly taught that by consecration the Bread and Wine have become the Flesh and Blood of Christ, and that as such they nourish our “blood and flesh” (observe the inverted order) by undergoing a change: in other words, the Eucharistic Body and Blood of Christ are changed into nourishment of our blood and flesh, by being distributed (as Cyril says) to all our members, that is by being subjected to the natural processes of digestion and assimilation. The unusual order of the words “our blood and flesh” is not accidental, but answers to the process of assimilation, in which the digested food first nourishes the blood and then the blood nourishes the flesh. The meaning is, as Otto says in his note, “that the divine food passes away into our bodies entire, so that nothing remains:” and Dr. Pusey seems to take the same view, in his note on the words, “from which (food) through transmutation our blood and flesh are nourished: “ i. e . the material parts are changed into the substance of the human body . ” Thus then, according to Cyril, the Eucharistic Body and Blood of Christ are distributed to all our members; His Flesh and Blood pass by a change into our blood and flesh, and we thereby become “of the same body and the same blood with Him :” and “this Bread does not pass into the belly, and is not cast out into the draught ,” but wastes away as the body itself wastes . However much this view of the Sacramental mystery may differ from later theories, it was certainly held by many of the Greek Fathers.

Irenæus, for example, in addition to those already mentioned, thus writes: “When therefore both the mingled cup and the created bread receive the Word of God, and the Eucharist becomes the Body of Christ, and from these the substance of our flesh increaseth and consisteth, how say they that the flesh is incapable of the gift of God which is eternal life, that flesh which is nourished from the Body and Blood of the Lord, and is already ( ὑπάρχουσα ) a member of Him? —even as the blessed Paul saith, that we are members of His Body, of His Flesh, and of His Bones . ” That this was also the teaching of Cyril’s contemporaries is clear from the famous passage of Gregory of Nyssa, in which this doctrine is fully developed. It will be sufficient to quote here the latter part of the passage, in which Gregory is speaking of the Wine. “Since then that God-containing flesh partook for its substance and support of this particular nourishment also, and since the God who was manifested infused Himself into perishable humanity for this purpose, viz. that by this communion with Deity mankind might at the same time be deified, for this end it is that, by dispensation of His grace, He disseminates Himself in every believer through that flesh whose substance comes from bread and wine, blending Himself with the bodies of believers, to secure that, by this union with the immortal, man too may be a sharer in incorruption. He gives these gifts by virtue of the benediction through which He transelements the natural quality of these visible things to that immortal thing . ” In another remarkable passage Cyril gives a further explanation of the effect of consecration: “In the New Testament there is heavenly Bread and a Cup of salvation, sanctifying soul and body: for as the Bread corresponds to the body, so also the Word ( ὁ λόγος ) is appropriate to the soul. ” With this language of Cyril we may compare further what is said by Gregory of Nyssa in the context of the passage already quoted: “Just then, as in the case of ourselves, as has been repeatedly said already, if a person sees bread he also in a kind of way looks on a human body, for by being within this it becomes this, so in that other case the Body into which God entered ( τὸ θεοδόχον σῶμα ), by partaking of the nourishment of bread was in a certain sense the same with it, since that nourishment, as we have said, is changed into the nature of the body: for that which is proper to all men is acknowledged also in the case of That Flesh, namely, that That Body too was maintained by bread; which Body also by the indwelling of God the Word was changed into the dignity of Godhead. Rightly then do we believe that now also the bread which is sanctified by the Word of God is changed into the Body of God the Word. For even that Body was once virtually ( τῇ δυνάμει ) bread, but has been sanctified by the inhabitation of the Word that tabernacled in the flesh. ” In this passage we have the full explanation of what Irenæus meant when he said that the elements “by receiving the Word of God become the Eucharist,” and what Cyril meant by saying that “as the Bread corresponds to the body, so also the Word is appropriate to the soul.

” Their common doctrine is, that besides the Body and Blood of Christ, that is, His Humanity offered upon the Cross for our redemption, His Divine Nature, the Word is also present, and that it is by receiving the Divine Word that the Bread is made the Body of Christ. “The fathers,” says Touttée, “often play upon the ambiguity of the term, saying at one time that the Divine Word, at another that the word and oracles of God nourish our soul. Both are true. For the whole life-giving power of the Eucharist is derived from the Divine Word united with the flesh which He assumed: and the whole benefit ( fructus ) of Eucharistic eating consists in the union of our soul with the Word, by meditation on His mysteries and words, and conformation thereto . ” O si sic omnia! In this view the Bread and Wine are signs or figures of the natural Body of Christ crucified, but they are also much more, they are endued by the Divine Word, and through the operation of the Holy Ghost, with the life-giving power of the same Body and Blood of Christ,—a power which being imparted to the faithful recipient makes him to be “of the same body and the same blood with Christ,” thereby assuring him of the resurrection of the body to eternal life, and at the same time strengthening and refreshing the soul by its being united through faith with the Word, and being thus made “ partaker of the Divine nature . ” This is not the language of the Western Church, whether Roman, Lutheran, or Anglican, but it is the language of the earliest Greek Fathers, and of Cyril, as is partly and reluctantly admitted by so cautious a writer as Dr. Waterland. After referring to the passage quoted above from Justin Martyr ( Apol . i. 66) he proceeds: “There is another the like obscure hint in Irenæus, which may probably be best interpreted after the same way. He supposes the elements to become Christ’s body by receiving the word (Word). He throws two considerations into one, and does not distinguish so accurately as Origen afterwards did between the symbolical food and the true food . ” The elements, Waterland adds, “are made the representative body of Christ; but they are at the same time, to worthy receivers , made the means of their spiritual union with Christ Himself; which Irenæus points at in what he says of the bread’s receiving the Logos , but should rather have said it of the communicants themselves, as receiving the spiritual presence of Christ, in the worthy use of the sacred symbols . ” Again, in c. vii. , he says more explicitly of Irenæus, what is equally true of Cyril; “Least of all does he favour the figurists or memorialists ; for his doctrine runs directly counter to them almost in every line: he asserts over and over, that Christ’s body and blood are eaten and drunk in the Eucharist, and our bodies thereby fed ; and not only so, but insured thereby for a happy resurrection : and the reason he gives is, that our bodies are thereby made or continued members of Christ’s body, flesh, and bones . ” From this view of Cyril’s doctrine concerning the Sacramental elements we can easily understand in what sense he applies the terms “ type” and “antitype” to the Eucharistic elements.

“The Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist having two parts, an outward and an inward, and the outward part having been instituted by our Blessed Lord with a certain relation to the inward, and gifted with a certain significance of it, nothing is more natural than that the titles, type, antitype, symbol, figure, image, should be given to the outward part . ” Add to this that, according to Cyril’s doctrine as already explained, the bread after the Invocation, without ceasing to be bread, not only signifies but also is the Body, and we see how natural it was for him to say in one passage that “His Body bore the figure of bread ,” in another that “in the figure of bread the Body is given . ” The Body which “is given” cannot be an absent Body of our Lord, but must be that Sacramental Body, of which Cyril goes on to say in the same sentence that it is “distributed to our members. ” Thus the Bread broken is a type or figure of Christ’s Body as crucified for us; and by virtue of its union with the Divine Word it becomes the life-giving Body, which makes the faithful recipient to be, in Cyril’s words, “of the same body and same blood with Christ. ” Another term applied by Cyril and other Greek Fathers to the sacramental elements is “antitype. ” In Mystag . ii. § 6, where Baptism is called “the counterpart ( ἀντίτυπον ) of Christ’s sufferings,” the meaning is clearly explained by the context: for in § 5 the reality of Christ’s sufferings is emphatically and repeatedly contrasted with the figurative representation of the same; and this figurative representation no less emphatically contrasted with the real and actual bestowal of the grace of salvation: ἐν εἰκόνι ἡ μίμησις, ἐν ἀληθείᾳ δὲ ἡ σωτηρία, . … ἵνα τῇ μιμήσει τῶν παθημάτων αὐτοῦ κοινωνήσαντες, ἀληθείᾳ τὴν σωτηρίαν κερδήσωμεν . We have thus a clear distinction of (1) the ‘res sacramenti,’ Christ’s Death and Resurrection, (2) the ‘sacramentum’ or ‘sign,’ the outward form of Baptism, and (3) the ‘virtus sacramenti,’ our real participation in the benefits of Christ’s Passion, “a death unto sin, and a new birth unto righteousness. ” Thus, as Cyril adds at the end of the section, Baptism “has the fellowship by representation of Christ’s true sufferings,” it is the spiritual counterpart in us of that which was actual in Him. In Mystag . iii. § i, speaking of the Chrism, Cyril says, “Now ye have been made Christs ( Χρισοί ) by receiving the antitype of the Holy Ghost, and all things have been wrought in you by imitation, because ye are images of Christ:” and again, “there was given to you an Unction, the antitype of that wherewith Christ was anointed, and this is the Holy Ghost. ” Here again we have (1) the ‘res sacramenti,’ the anointing of Christ with the Holy Ghost at His Baptism, (2) the sacramental sign or figure, the anointing of the baptized, and (3) the spiritual benefit received in the gift of the Holy Ghost, for, as Cyril adds at the end of § 3, “while Thy body is anointed with the visible ointment, thy soul is sanctified by the Holy and Life-giving Spirit. ” In these passages we see a distinction between τύπος and ἀντίτυπος . The former is simply the outward sign or figure; the latter includes with the sign the spiritual counterpart in us of the thing signified, the benefits of Christ’s Passion in the one case, the gift of the Holy Ghost in the other.

It only remains to inquire whether there is the same distinction in the meaning of the words as applied to the Holy Eucharist. In Mystag . v. § 20, Cyril informs us that during the Administration the words, “O taste and see that the Lord is good,” were sung: and in reference to that passage he adds, “In tasting we are bidden to taste not bread and wine, but the antitypical Body and Blood of Christ. ” To taste “the antitypical Body” is therefore to taste “that the Lord is good,” whence it clearly follows that “the antitypical Body” is not the mere sign or figure of Christ’s own natural Body, but the sacramental and spiritual counterpart of it, by which those who faithfully receive it are so united to Him, that their spirit, and soul, and body, are to be preserved entire without blame at His coming .

Chapter VIII. —Place of S. Cyril’s Lectures. We have seen in a passage already quoted that at Milan S. Ambrose expounded the Creed to Catechumens in the Baptistery. But whatever may have been the custom in other places, it is certain from numerous passages in Cyril’s Lectures that they were delivered in the great Basilica, or Church of the Resurrection, built by Constantine on the site of the Holy Sepulchre, and consecrated, as we have seen, with great splendour in the year 335 . In a passage where Cyril is speaking of the descent of the Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost, he says, “as we discourse on Christ and Golgotha here in Golgotha, so it were most fitting that we should also speak concerning the Holy Ghost in the Upper Church; yet since He who descended there jointly partakes of the glory of Him who was crucified here, we here speak concerning Him also who descended there. ” It appears from a passage in the Introductory Lecture that it was delivered in the Church itself before the whole congregation, after that portion of the daily Service to which Catechumens were usually admitted: “Dost thou behold this venerable constitution of the Church? Dost thou view her order and discipline, the reading of Scripture, the presence of the Ordained, the course of instruction? ” The same custom was retained in Jerusalem in the time of John, Cyril’s successor in the Bishopric, who in writing to Jerome says, “The custom with us is that we deliver the doctrine of the Holy Trinity publicly during forty days to those who are to be baptized . ” The Mystagogic Lectures were delivered not in the Church, but after the conclusion of the public Service “in the Holy Place of the Resurrection itself ,” that is, in the small Chapel which contained the Holy Sepulchre, and to which the name “Anastasis” more properly belonged. Happily we are not required by the purpose of this work to enter into the disputed questions concerning the Holy Places. Whether the cave re-fashioned and adorned by Constantine was the actual sepulchre in which our Lord’s body was laid, and whether the present Churches occupy the same site as the Basilica and Anastasis of Constantine, are matters still under discussion, and awaiting the result of further researches. What more properly concerns us is to collect the chief passages in which Cyril refers to these localities, and to try to give a fair representation of his testimony, comparing it with that of earlier or contemporary writers. Next to Eusebius, and the Bordeaux Pilgrim who visited Jerusalem in 333, Cyril is the earliest and most important witness as to the site of Constantine’s Churches. In Cat. xiv. § 5, he says, “It was a garden where He was crucified. For though it has now been most highly adorned with royal gifts, yet formerly it was a garden, and the signs and the remnants of this remain. ” From this it is evident that the traces of a garden close to the Church were still visible both to Cyril and his hearers. Twice again in § 11 he mentions the garden, which he had most probably himself seen in its former state, before the ground was cleared at the time of the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre in 326. On this point it may be well to quote the words of Mr.

Walter Besant, Honorary Secretary of the Palestine Exploration Fund, who, in an article on “The Holy Sepulchre” in the Dictionary of Christian Antiquities , writes as follows: “While the temple of Venus with its foundations was being cleared away, there might have been, and most probably was present, a Christian lad, native of Jerusalem, eleven years of age, watching the discovery, which did as much as the great luminous cross which appeared in the sky four (? twenty-four) years later to confirm the doubtful and strengthen the faithful, that of the rock containing the sacred tomb. It was Cyril, afterwards Bishop of Jerusalem. One must not forget that he is the third eye-witness who speaks of these things; that though he was a boy at the time of the discovery, he lived in Jerusalem, and must have watched, step by step, the progress of the great Basilica; that he was ordained before the completion and dedication of the buildings, and that many, if not all, of his lectures were delivered in the Church of the Anastasis itself. ” That Cyril’s testimony concerning the Holy Places was in full accordance with the general belief of his contemporaries is clear from the fact that he so frequently points to the traditional sites as bearing witness to the truth of the Crucifixion and Resurrection. He speaks of Golgotha in eight separate passages, sometimes as near to the Church in which he and his hearers are assembled , and sometimes as standing up above in their sight . In one place he asks, “Seest thou this spot of Golgotha? ” and the hearers answer with a shout of approval . In other passages he speaks as if the Church itself was in or rather on Golgotha , the same Preposition ( ἐν ) being repeated when he mentions “Him who was crucified thereon. ” In explanation of these different modes of speaking, the Benedictine Editor comments thus : “The Church of the Resurrection was built on part of the hill Golgotha ( intra montem G . ): but the actual rock on which our Lord was crucified was not within the limits of the Church, yet not far off, namely about “a stone’s throw,” as the author of the Jerusalem Itinerary says. For the Church had been built on the site of the Sepulchre. Some think that the place of Crucifixion was included in the vast area which was enclosed with colonnades between the Sepulchre and the Basilica,…that Golgotha was midway between the Basilica of the Crucifixion, and the Anastasis or Sepulchre. But the area in question Constantine paved with stones, and it must therefore have been flat, as we learn from Eusebius ; Golgotha, on the contrary, stood up high , and moreover shewed a cleft made there at Christ’s death , which would either have been a hindrance to the paving or covered up by it. In addition to this, from the doors of the Basilica there seems to have been a view of the Sacred Tomb . This would have been obstructed if Golgotha had been between them. ” The cleft in the rock of Golgotha is mentioned in a fragment of the defence made before Maximinus in 311 or 312 by Lucian the Martyr of Antioch : If yet you believe not, I will also offer you the testimony of the very spot on which the thing was done.

The place itself in Jerusalem vouches for these facts, and the rock of Golgotha broken asunder under the weight of the Cross: that cave also, which when the gates of hell were burst, gave back the Body in newness of life. ” On this passage Dr. Routh remarks that Maundrell, Journey from Aleppo to Jerusalem, at Easter , 1697, “shews that the rock had been rent not by any instrument, but by the force of an earthquake. Also it is related by Eusebius in his Theophania, a book now recovered, that there was one cave only in this cleft of the rock. ” According to Eusebius in the passages of the Life of Constantine already referred to, the Emperor first beautified the monument or sepulchre with rare columns, then paved with finely polished stone a large area open to the sky, and enclosed on three sides with long colonnades, and lastly erected the Church itself “at the side opposite to the cave, which was the Eastern side. ” The following is the statement of the Bordeaux Pilgrim: “From thence (the Palace of David) as you go out of the wall of Sion walking towards the gate of Neapolis, on the right side below in the valley are walls where the house or Prætorium of Pontius Pilate was: here our Lord was tried before His Passion. On the left hand is the little hill ( monticulus ) of Golgotha, where the Lord was crucified. About a stone’s throw from thence is a vault ( crypta ) wherein His body was laid, and rose again on the third day. There by command of the Emperor Constantine has now been built a Basilica, that is to say, a Church of wondrous beauty, having at the side reservoirs ( exceptoria ) from which water is raised, and a bath behind in which infants are washed (baptized). ” Neapolis was the name given by Vespasian to the ancient city of Shechem, now Nâbulus: the “porta Neapolitana” therefore was in the North wall of Sion. In reference to the passage quoted above, Mr. Aubrey Stewart says: “The narrative is clear and connected, and it is hardly possible, for any one who knows the ground, to read it without feeling that the Pilgrim from Bordeaux actually saw Constantine’s buildings standing on the site now occupied by the Church of the Holy Sepulchre . ” From these earlier testimonies, compared with the several passages already quoted from Cyril, we may safely draw the following inferences, (1) The Anastasis properly so called, or Church of the Holy Sepulchre, in which the five Mystagogic Lectures were delivered, was built by Constantine over the cave which, according to the evidence then existing, was fully believed to be the Burial-place of our Lord. (2) The Great Basilica, called also the Church of the Holy Cross, in which the Catechetical Lectures were delivered, was erected on the East of the Anastasis, and separated from it by a large open area. (3) The hill of Golgotha (on which at a later period there was built a third Church, called the Church of Golgotha, of Holy Calvary, or of Cranium) stood about a stone’s throw on the North side of Constantine’s two Churches, and about equidistant from them.

Chapter IX. —The Time and Arrangement of S. Cyril’s Lectures. § 1. The Year . The incidental notes of time in the Catechetical Lectures are sufficient to determine with considerable probability the exact year in which they were delivered. In Cat. xiv. 14, Cyril speaks in the Plural of the Emperors then reigning ( οἱ νῦν βασιλεῖς ) as having completed the building ( ἐξειργάσαντο ) and embellishment of the great Church of the Resurrection. This can only apply to the sons of Constantine, Constans and Constantius, and as Constans died early in 350, the Lectures must have been delivered before that year. In Cat. xv. § 6, Cyril asks, “Is there at this time war between Persians and Romans, or no? ” The time thus indicated was apparently that of the campaign which ended in the disastrous defeat of Constantius at Singara, 348, the battle being soon followed by a suspension of hostilities . The Benedictine Editor tries to find another proof of the date of the Lectures in Cyril’s description of the state of the Church in Cat. xv. §7: “If thou hear that Bishops advance against Bishops, and clergy against clergy, and laity against laity, even unto blood, be not troubled. ” Touttée refers this account to the fierce dissensions which followed the Synod of Sardica, where Athanasius and Marcellus were declared innocent and received into communion, while the Encyclical of the dissentient Bishops, who had withdrawn to Philippopolis, condemned them both. But it is now ascertained that the Synod of Sardica was held not in 347, as Touttée supposed, but in 344 : and Cyril’s description may unhappily be applied to the state of the Church at almost any time from the Council of Tyre, by which Athanasius had been deposed in 335, until long after any date which can possibly be assigned to Cyril’s Lectures. There is a much more definite note of time in Cat. vi. § 20, where speaking of Manes Cyril says: “The delusion began full seventy years ago. ” If we may assume that the outbreak of this heresy is to be dated from the famous disputation between Archelaus and Manes in 277 , it follows that Cyril must have made this statement in 347 or 348. And further, if Dr. Routh is correct in fixing the date of the Disputation between July and December 277, the Lent in which the Lectures were delivered must have been, as Touttée decides, that of 348, not of 347, as Tillemont had supposed. § 2. The days . It is expressly stated by Sozomen that “the interval called Quadragesima” was made to consist of six weeks in Palestine, “whereas it comprised seven weeks in Constantinople and the neighbouring provinces. ” It is certain the Catechetical Lectures i. –xviii. were all delivered in these six weeks, being preceded by the Procatechesis, which was addressed to the candidates before the whole congregation at the public Service on Sunday (§ 4). In the same context Cyril says, “Thou hast forty days for repentance,” and again in Cat i. § 5, “Hast thou not forty days to be free for thine own soul’s sake? ” It thus appears probable that the first of the eighteen (Catechetical Lectures was delivered on the Monday of the first week of the Fast, the forty days being completed on the night preceding the Great Sabbath, that is to say, the night of Good Friday, when the fast was brought to an end at a late hour. With regard to the date of Cat. iv.

, which contains a brief preliminary statement of all the articles of the Creed, we may obtain some evidence from an incident recorded in a letter of Jerome to Pammachius. John, who had then succeeded Cyril as Bishop of Jerusalem, had on a certain occasion discoursed on the Creed and all the doctrines of the Church in the presence of Epiphanius and the whole congregation. Jerome, being ignorant of the peculiar custom of the Church of Jerusalem, rebukes the supposed presumption of the Bishop, “that a man deficient in eloquence should in one discourse in Church discuss all the doctrines concerning the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Crucifixion, the descent into hell, the nature of angels, the state of departed souls, the Resurrection of Christ, and of ourselves, and other subjects. ” The rebuke calls out a statement from John: “The custom among us is that for forty days we publicly deliver the doctrine of the Holy and Adorable Trinity to those who are to be baptized. ” This being the custom at Jerusalem in Cyril’s time, we may conjecture that Cat. iv. , which corresponds closely to the description of John’s discourse, was delivered, like that, on a Sunday before the whole congregation: and this is in fact suggested by Cyril’s own words in § 3: “Let those here present, whose habit of mind is mature, and who have their senses already exercised to discern good and evil , endure patiently to listen to things fitted rather for children. ” That this could not have been later than the Sunday following that on which the Procatechesis was delivered, is shewn by the mention in the same section of “the long interval of the days of all this holy Quadragesima,” an expression which could not well have been used later than the second Sunday in Lent. In Cat. iv. § 32, Cyril speaks of having discoursed on Baptism “the day before yesterday,” that is, on the Friday. In Cat. v. we have first a discourse on the nature of faith, and then towards the end, between § 12 and § 13, the actual words of the Creed are for the first time recited by Cyril to the candidates alone. In the next four Lectures there are no marks of time, except that vi. , vii. , viii. , were delivered on successive days, as is proved by the word “yesterday”( τῇ χθὲς ἡμέρᾳ ) in vii. § 1, and viii. § 1. It thus appears probable that the five Lectures, v. –ix. , belong to the five days, Monday to Friday inclusive, of the second or third week. In Cat. x. § 14 Cyril reminds his hearers that he had preached on the words after the order of Melchizedek at the public Service on the Lord’s day. As he does not here employ his usual phrase “yesterday,” we may infer that Cat. x. was delivered not earlier than the Tuesday following the 4th Sunday in Lent, the Epistle for that Sunday in the Eastern Church being Heb. vi. 13–20 , which ends with the words on which Cyril had preached. The next two Lectures followed Cat. x. immediately on successive days, Wednesday and Thursday, the word “yesterday” recurring in xi. § 1, and xii. § 4. Cat. xiii. , which is occupied with the Crucifixion and Burial, seems to have followed them immediately on the Friday: it certainly came a few days only before Cat. xiv. § 1.

For speaking there of the preceding Lecture, Cyril says, “I know the sorrow of Christ’s friends in these past days; because, as our discourse stopped short at the Death and the Burial, and did not tell the good tidings of the Resurrection, your mind was in suspense to hear what you were longing for. ” Now we know that Cat. xiv. was delivered on the Monday after Passion Sunday: for the Epistle for that 5th Sunday in Lent was Heb. vi. 11–14 , referring to the Ascension : and in § 24 Cyril says, “The grace of God so ordered it, that thou heardest most fully concerning it, so far as our weakness allowed, yesterday on the Lord’s day, since by the providence of divine grace the course of the Readings ( ἀναγνωσμάτων ) in Church included the account of our Saviour’s going up into the heavens. ” In Cat. xv. there is no note of time to determine on what day it was spoken; but in § 33 Cyril speaks as if his course of teaching was to be interrupted for a little while: “If the grace of God should permit us, the remaining Articles also of the Faith shall be in good time ( κατὰ καιρόν ) declared to you. ” We may therefore assign Cat. xv. to the early part of Passion week, and the three remaining Catechetical Lectures to the week before Easter. This arrangement seems to be confirmed by Cat. xvii. 34, where Cyril speaks of the two Lectures on the Holy Spirit, xvi. and xvii. , as “these present Lectures,” distinguishing them from “our previous discourses. ” In the same section he refers to “the fewness of the days,” and in § 20 speaks of “the holy festival of the Passover” as being close at hand. We may therefore probably assign xvi. and xvii. to two consecutive days in the earlier part of the week before Easter. Cat. xviii. contains many indications from which we may conclude with certainty that it was delivered either on the night of Good Friday, or in the early hours of the morning of the “Great Sabbath. ” Thus in § 17 he speaks of “the weariness caused by the prolongation ( ὑπερθέσεως ) of the fast of the Preparation (Friday), and the watching. ” In § 21 he calls upon the Candidates to recite the Creed, which he had dictated to them, and which they would be required to repeat more publicly immediately before their Baptism, as we learn from § 32: “Concerning the holy Apostolic Faith which has been delivered to you to profess ( εἰς ἐπαγγελίαν ), we have spoken through the grace of the Lord as many Lectures as was possible in these past days of Lent. …But now the holy day of the Passover is at hand, and ye, beloved in Christ, are to be enlightened by the washing of regeneration . Ye shall therefore again be taught what is requisite if God so will; with how great devotion and order you must enter in when summoned, for what purpose each of the holy mysteries of Baptism is performed, and with what reverence and order you must go from Baptism to the holy altar of God, and enjoy its spiritual and heavenly mysteries. ” The additional instructions here promised were to be given on the same day as the last Lecture, Cat. xviii, that is on Easter Eve immediately before Baptism.

For it was forbidden to reveal the mysteries of Baptism, Chrism, and the Holy Eucharist to the uninitiated, and yet it was necessary that the Candidates should not come wholly unprepared to perform what would be required of them. The full explanation of the various ceremonies and of the doctrines implied in them was reserved for the Mystagogic Lectures, which were to be delivered on Easter Monday and the four following days, after the public Service, not in the great Basilica, but in the Holy Sepulchre itself. § 3. Arrangement . The Lectures of S. Cyril have a peculiar value as being the first and only complete example of the course of instruction given in the early centuries to Candidates seeking admission to the full privileges of the Christian Church. “The Great Catechetical Oration” of Gregory of Nyssa is addressed not to the learner but to the teacher, in accordance with the opening statement of the Prologue, that “The presiding ministers of the mystery of godliness have need of a system in their instructions, in order that the Church may be replenished by the accession of such as should be saved, through the teaching of the word of Faith being brought home to the hearing of unbelievers. ” As an instruction to the Catechist how he should refute the opponents of Christianity, it is an apologetic work rather than a Catechism. S. Augustine’s treatise De catechizandis rudibus is also addressed to the teacher, being an answer to Deogratias, a Deacon of Carthage, who on being appointed Catechist had written to Augustine for advice as to the best method of discharging the office. S. Augustine’s Sermons De traditione Symboli , and De redditione Symboli , are not a connected series, but single addresses to Catechumens consisting of brief comments on a few chief articles of the Creed. Cyril’s Lectures thus remain unique in character. After the Procatechesis, which is simply an introductory exhortation to the newly admitted Candidates, he devotes three Lectures to the need of a sincere purpose of mind, the efficacy of repentance, and the general nature and importance of Baptism. The fourth Lecture gives “a short summary of necessary doctrines,” stating with admirable clearness and brevity ten chief points of the Faith, and the arguments on each point, which are to be developed in the remaining Catechetical Lectures v. –xviii. He thus traverses the whole ground of Theology as expressed in the Creed of Jerusalem, of which the exact language is given in the titles of the successive Lectures. These instructions to the ‘Illuminandi’ ( φωτιζομένων ) were followed on Easter-day by the administration of Baptism, Chrism, and Holy Communion: and on the following days of Easter-week the ceremonies and doctrines proper to each of these Sacraments were explained in the five Lectures on the Mysteries ( Μυσταγωγίαι ) to the newly-baptized ( πρὸς τοὺς Νεοφωτίστους ). These Mystagogic Lectures thus form a most important record of the Sacramental Rites and Doctrines of the Eastern Church in the fourth Century, the most critical period of Ecclesiastical History.

Chapter X. —The Creed of Jerusalem: Doctrine of the Holy Trinity. § 1. The Creed . The ancient Creed which was used by the Church of Jerusalem in the middle of the fourth Century, and which Cyril expounded in his Catechetical Lectures, was recited by him to the Catechumens at the end of the fifth Lecture, to be committed to memory, but not to be written out on paper (§ 12). Accordingly it is not found in any of the MSS. , but instead of it the Nicene Creed with the Anathema is there inserted in Codd. Roe, Casaub. This could only have been added after Cyril’s time, when the motives for secrecy had ceased. The Creed which Cyril really taught and expounded may be gathered from various passages in the Lectures themselves, and especially from the Titles prefixed to them. With the Creed of Jerusalem thus ascertained, it will be instructive to compare the Nicene formula, and for this purpose we print them in parallel columns. CREED OF S. CYRIL OF JERUSALEM. CREED OF NICÆA. From S. Athanasius, De Decretis Fidei Nicænæ. ___________________ ___________________ Πιστεύομεν εἰς ἕνα Θεόν , Πατέρα Παντοκράτορα , Ποιητὴν οὐρανοῦ καὶ γῆς ῾Ορατῶν τε πάντων καὶ ἀοράτων . Καὶ εἰς ἕνα Κύριον ᾽Ιησοῦν Χριστόν , τὸν Ψἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ τὸν Μονογενῆ, τὸν ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς γεννηθέντα, Θεὸν ἀληθινὸν πρὸ πάντων τῶν αἰώνων, δι᾽ οὗ τὰ πάντα ἐγένετο , τὸν σαρκωθέντα καὶ ἐνανθρωπήσαντα , σταυρωθέντα καὶ ταφέντα , καὶ ἀναστάντα ἐκ νεκρῶν τῇ τρίτῃ ἡμέρᾳ, καὶ ἀνελθόντα εἰς τοὺς οὐρανούς, καὶ καθίσαντα ἐκ δεξιῶν τοῦ Πατρός , καὶ πάλιν ἐρχόμενον ἐν δόξῃ κρῖναι ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, οὗ τῆς βασιλείας οὐκ ἔσται τέλος . Καὶ εἰς ἓν ἅγιον Πνεῦμα τὸν Παράκλητον, τὸ λαλῆσαν ἐν τοῖς προφήταις . καὶ εἰς ἓν βάπτισμα μετανοίας εἰς ἄφεσιν ἁμαρτιῶν , καὶ εἰς μίαν ἁγίαν καθολικὴν ἐκκλησίαν, καὶ εἰς σαρκὸς ἀνάστασιν, καὶ εἰς ζωὴν αἰώνιον . Πιστεύομεν εἰς ἕνα Θεόν, Πατέρα παντοκράτορα, πάντων ὁρατῶν τε καὶ ἀοράτων ποιήτην, καὶ εἰς ἕνα Κύριον ᾽Ιησοῦν Χριστόν, τὸν Ψἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ, γεννηθέντα ἐκ τοῦ Πατρὸς μονογενῆ, τουτέστιν ἐκ τῆς οὐσίας τοῦ Πατρός, Θεὸν ἐκ Θεοῦ, φῶς ἐκ φῶτος. Θεὸν ἀληθινὸν ἐκ Θεοῦ ἀληθινοῦ, γεννηθέντα οὐ τοιηθέντα, ὁμοούσιον τῷ Πατρί, δι᾽ οὗ τὰ πάντα ἐγένετο, τά τε ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ καὶ τὰ ἐπὶ τῆς γῆς, τὸν δι᾽ ἡμὰς τοὺς ἀνθρώπους καὶ διὰ τὴν ἡμετέραν σωτηρίαν κατελθόντα καὶ σαρκωθέντα, ἐνανθρωπήσαντα, παθόντα, καὶ ἀναστάντα τῇ τρίτῃ ἡμέρᾳ, ἀνελθόντα εἰς οὐρανούς, καὶ ἐρχόμενον κρῖναι ζῶντας καὶ νεκρούς, καὶ εἰς τὸ ἅγιον Πνεῦμα. Τοὺς δὲ λέγοντας· ἦν ποτε ὅτε οὐκ ἦν, καί τρὶν γεννηθῆναι οὐκ ἦν, καὶ ὅτι ἐξ οὐκ ὄντων ἐγένετο, ἢ ἐξ ἑτέρας ὑποστάσεως ἢ οὐσίας φάσκοντας εἶναι ἢ κτιστὸν ἢ τρεπτὸν ἢ ἀλλοιωτὸν τὸν Ψἱὸν τοῦ Θεοῦ. ἀναθεματίζει ἡ καθολικὴ ἐκκλησία. § 2. Doctrine of the Holy Trinity . “The doctrinal position of S. Cyril is admirably described, and his orthodoxy vindicated by Cardinal Newman in the following passage of his Preface to the Lectures in the Library of the Fathers. “There is something very remarkable and even startling to the reader of S. Cyril, to find in a divine of his school such a perfect agreement, for instance as regards the doctrine of the Trinity, with those Fathers who in his age were more famous as champions of it.

Here is a writer, separated by whatsoever cause from what, speaking historically, may be called the Athanasian School, suspicious of its adherents, and suspected by them; yet he, when he comes to explain himself, expresses precisely the same doctrine as that of Athanasius or Gregory, while he merely abstains from the particular theological term in which the latter Fathers agreeably to the Nicene Council conveyed it. Can we have a clearer proof that the difference of opinion between them was not one of ecclesiastical and traditionary doctrine, but of practical judgment? that the Fathers at Nicæa wisely considered that, under the circumstances, the word in question was the only symbol which would secure the Church against the insidious heresy which was assailing it, while S. Cyril, with Eusebius of Cæsarea, Meletius and others shrank from it, at least for a while, as if an addition to the Creed, or a word already taken into the service of an opposite heresy, and likely to introduce into the Church heretical notions? Their judgment, which was erroneous, was their own; their faith was not theirs only, but shared with them by the whole Christian world . ” In regard to the doctrine of the Trinity in general the two great heresies which distracted the Church in S. Cyril’s day were Sabellianism and Arianism, the one “confounding the Persons,” the other “dividing the substance” of the indivisible Unity of the Godhead. Both these opposite errors Cyril condemns with equal energy: “Do thou neither separate the Son from the Father, nor by making a confusion believe in a Son-Fatherhood . ” Again he says: “Our hope is in Father, and Son, and Holy Ghost. We preach not three Gods: let the Marcionites be silenced; but with the Holy Ghost through One Son we preach One God. The Faith is indivisible; the worship inseparable. We neither separate the Holy Trinity, like some (that is the Arians); nor do we, as Sabellius, work confusion . ” “He says not, I am the Father, but the Father is in Me, and I am in the Father . And again He said not, I and the Father am one , but, I and the Father are One , that we should neither separate them, nor make a confusion of Son-Father . ” In the sequel of this last passage Cyril proceeds to argue that this unity of the Father and the Son lies in their Nature, “since God begat God,” in their Kingdom , in their Will , and in their joint Creation , thus at each step rejecting some prominent heretical tenet. The question, however, of Cyril’s orthodoxy depends especially upon his supposed opposition to the Creed of Nicæa, of which no evidence is alleged except his attendance at the Council of Seleucia, and the absence from his Lectures of the word ὁμοούσιον . The purpose of Cyril’s attendance at Seleucia was to appeal against his deposition by Acacius, and there is apparently no evidence of his having taken part in the doctrinal discussions, or signed the Creed of Antioch . What is certain is that Cyril’s bitterest enemies who refused to sit with him in the Council were Acacius and his Arian allies, who expressly rejected both ὁμοούσιος and ὁμοιούσιος and “altogether denied the Nicene formula and censured the Council, while the others, who were the majority, accepted the whole proceedings of the Council, except that they complained of the word ‘Co-essential,’ as obscure, and so open to suspicion .

” It thus appears that Cyril’s friends at Seleucia were partly those who approved the word “ Co-essential,” and partly those of whom Athanasius speaks as “brothers, who mean what we mean, and dispute only about the word . ” It needed in fact the profound insight of an Athanasius to foresee that in the end that word must triumph over all opposition, and be accepted by the Universal Church as the one true safeguard of the Christian Faith. Meanwhile it was the standard round which debate, and strife, and hatred, and persecution, were to rage for fifty years with unexampled fury. Was Cyril to be blamed, ought he not rather to be commended, for not introducing such a war-cry into the exposition of an ancient Creed, in which it had no place, the Creed of his own Church, the Mother of all the Churches, whose Faith he as a youthful Presbyter was commissioned to teach to the young Candidates for Baptism? But if we compare his doctrine with that of the Nicene formula, we shall find that, as Dr. Newman says, “His own writings are most exactly orthodox, though he does not in the Catechetical Lectures use the word ὁμοούσιον . ” The first point to be noticed in the comparison is the use of the title “Son of God. ” For this Eusebius in his Creed had substituted “Word of God. ” Athanasius explains the significance of the change: “Uniting the two titles, Scripture speaks of ‘Son’ in order to herald the natural and true offspring of His essence ( οὐσίας ); and on the other hand that none may think of the offspring as human, in again indicating His essence it calls Him Word, and Wisdom, and Radiance, for from this we infer that the generation was impassible ( ἀπαθές ), and eternal, and becoming to God . ” Cyril is here in full accord with Athanasius: in his Creed he found “Son of God,” and in his exposition he states that the Father is “by nature and in truth Father of One only, the Only-begotten Son :” “One they are because of the dignity pertaining to the Godhead, since God begat God :” “The Son then is Very God , having the Father in Himself, not changed into the Father . ” When he says that the Son is in all things like ( ὅμοιος ἐν πᾶσιν ) to Him who begat Him; begotten Life of Life, and Light of Light, Power of Power, God of God, and the characteristics of the Godhead are unchangeable ( ἀπαράλλακτοι ) in the Son ,” he is using in all good faith the very words of the orthodox Bishops at Nicæa, “ ὅμοιόν τε καὶ ἀπαράλλακτον αὐτὸν κατὰ πὰντα τῷ Πατρί . ” The further significance which Athanasius ascribes to the title “Logos,” is also expressed fully and repeatedly by Cyril: “Whenever thou hearest of God begetting, sink not down in thought to bodily things, nor think of a corruptible generation, lest thou be guilty of impiety . ” The “passionless generation,” to which so much importance was attached at Nicæa and by Athanasius, is also asserted by Cyril when he says that God “became a Father not by passion ( οὐ πάθει Πατὴρ γενόμενος ) .

” The eternal generation is most emphatically declared again and again: the Son, he says, “began not His existence in time, but was before all ages eternally and incomprehensibly begotten of the Father; the Wisdom, and the Power of God, and His Righteousness personally subsisting :” “Throughout His being ( ἐξ οὗπερ ἦν ), a being by eternal generation, He holds His royal dignity, and shares His Father’s seat . ” Believe that of One God there is One Only-begotten Son, who is before all ages God the Word; not the uttered word diffused into the air, nor to be likened to impersonal words; but the Word, the Son, Maker of all who partake of reason, the Word who heareth the father, and Himself speaketh . ” The importance of such language is better understood when we remember that Marcellus, “another head of the dragon lately sprung up in Galatia ,” entirely rejected the word “Begotten,” as implying a beginning, and “contradicting the eternity of the Logos, so distinctly proclaimed by S. John. ” An eternal generation, as stated by Athanasius and others, was to him unimaginable. The Logos in His pre-existence was unbegotten, and could not be called Son, but only the Logos invested with human nature was Son of God and begotten . ” These heretical opinions of Marcellus had been condemned in several Councils within a few years preceding Cyril’s Lectures. The next supposed proof of Cyril’s opposition to the Nicene doctrine is that he has not adopted in his Lectures the phrases “of the essence ( οὐσίας ) of the Father,” and “of one essence ( ὁμοούσιον ) with the Father. ” This omission is the chief ground of the reproaches cast upon the memory of Cyril by the writers of Ecclesiastical History; for this he was described by Jerome as an Arian, and by Rufinus as a waverer, while his formal acceptance of the terms used at Nicæa is called by Socrates and Sozomen an act of repentance. By others he was denounced as ᾽Αρειανόφρων because he had addressed his letter to Constantius as “the most religious king,” and never used the word ὁμοούσιον in his Lectures. We shall be better able to estimate the justice of these reproaches, if we consider first the history of these words οὐσία and ὁμοούσιος , and the reasons which Cyril may have had for not employing them in the instruction of youthful Candidates for Baptism. It is strange to find that seven hundred years before the great controversy at Nicæa on the introduction of the word Οὐσία into the Creed, it had been the war-cry of almost as fierce a conflict between rival schools of philosophy. “There appears,” says Plato in the person of the Eleatic stranger, “to be a sort of war of the giants going on between them because of the dispute concerning οὐσία . Some of them are dragging all things down from heaven and from the invisible to earth, grasping rocks and oaks in their hands; for of all such things they lay hold, in obstinately maintaining that what can be touched and handled alone has being ( εἶναι ), because they define ‘being’ and ‘body’ as one; and if any one else says that what is not a body has being, they altogether despise him, and will hear of nothing but body…. Therefore their opponents cautiously defend themselves from above out of some invisible world, mightily contending that certain intelligible and incorporeal ideas are the true essence ( οὐσίαν ) .