Category Archives: Christianity

by | May 21, 2015 · 8:21 pm

LACTANTIUS
(c. 240–c. 320)

from The Divine Institutes

 

Born sometime between 230 and 260 in proconsular North Africa to a non-Christian family who lived at Carthage, Lucius Caecilius Firmianus Lactantius became a rhetorician and professor of oratory in Nicomedia, in northwest Asia Minor. Known for his Latin prose style, he was sometimes called the “Christian Cicero” by Renaissance scholars. He had been appointed (c. 290) to his professorship at Nicomedia by the Roman emperor Diocletian, but when Diocletian began to initiate what came to be known as the Great Persecution, Lactantius, who had converted to Christianity by this time, resigned his professorship (c. 305) and began to write defenses of Christian theology for both Christians and non-Christian academics. He sought to refute polytheism and to show the falsity of pagan philosophy while demonstrating the truth of Christian tenets. After Constantine became emperor, he lifted Lactantius out of poverty and invited him to Trier to tutor his son, Crispus.

In The Divine Institutes (303–310), the first systematic summary in Latin of Christian teaching, Lactantius attacks Greek and Roman views of suicide. He addresses Plato’s view of the immortality of the soul and Cicero’s view that death will be better than life, or at least no worse. Lactantius replies, on the contrary, that death cannot be assumed to be good, but relative to a good or bad life lived. Lactantius also claims that the venerated Stoic examples of suicide, including such notable instances as that of Cato, were actually homicide victims of Stoic philosophy. Lactantius derides what he sees as an erroneous pagan “balance-sheet” mentality weighing pleasure against pain. Lactantius is the first writer in the Christian tradition to argue, as he does in this work, that killing oneself is worse than killing another person, a view that gains considerable currency in later Christian thought.

The dates of Lactantius’ life are not known. Estimates of his lifespan generally range between the years 240 and 330.

Sources

Lactantius, The Divine Institutes, Book III, chs. 18–19. Trans. Rev. William Fletcher. In The Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 7. Buffalo: 1886; New York 1899–1900. Available online at Christian Classic Ethereal Library.

 

from THE DIVINE INSTITUTES

The Pythagoreans and Stoics, While They Hold the Immortality of the Soul, Foolishly Persuade a Voluntary Death

Others, again, discuss things contrary to these, namely, that the soul survives after death; and these are chiefly the Pythagoreans and Stoics. And although they are to be treated with indulgence because they perceive the truth, yet I cannot but blame them, because they fell upon the truth not by their opinion, but by accident. And thus they erred in some degree even in that very matter which they rightly perceived. For, since they feared the argument by which it is inferred that the soul must necessarily die with the body, because it is born with the body, they asserted that the soul is not born with the body, but rather introduced into it, and that it migrates from one body to another. They did not consider that it was possible for the soul to survive the body, unless it should appear to have existed previously to the body. There is therefore an equal and almost similar error on each side. But the one side are deceived with respect to the past, the other with respect to the future. For no one saw that which is most true, that the soul is both created and does not die, because they were ignorant why that came to pass, or what was the nature of man. Many therefore of them, because they suspected that the soul is immortal, laid violent hands upon themselves, as though they were about to depart to heaven. Thus it was with Cleanthes and Chrysippus, with Zeno, and Empedocles, who in the dead of night cast himself into a cavity of the burning Ætna, that when he had suddenly disappeared it might be believed that he had departed to the gods; and thus also of the Romans Cato died, who through the whole of his life was an imitator of Socratic ostentation. For Democritus was of another persuasion. But, however, “By his own spontaneous act he offered up his head to death”; and nothing can be more wicked than this. For if a homicide is guilty because he is a destroyer of man, he who puts himself to death is under the same guilt, because he puts to death a man. Yea, that crime may be considered to be greater, the punishment of which belongs to God alone. For as we did not come into this life of our own accord; so, on the other hand, we can only withdraw from this habitation of the body which has been appointed for us to keep, by the command of Him who placed us in this body that we may inhabit it, until He orders us to depart from it; and if any violence is offered to us, we must endure it with equanimity, since the death of an innocent person cannot be unavenged, and since we have a great Judge who alone always has the power of taking vengeance in His hands.

All these philosophers, therefore, were homicides; and Cato himself, the chief of Roman wisdom, who, before he put himself to death, is said to have read through the treatise of Plato which he wrote on the immortality of the soul, and was led by the authority of the philosopher to the commission of this great crime; yet he, however, appears to have had some cause for death in his hatred of slavery. Why should I speak of the Ambraciot [Theombrotus]who, having read the same treatise, threw himself into the sea, for no other cause than that he believed Plato?—a doctrine altogether detestable and to be avoided, if it drives men from life. But if Plato had known and taught by whom, and how, and to whom, and on account of what actions, and at what time, immortality is given, he would neither have driven Cleombrotus [Theombrotus] nor Cato to a voluntary death, but he would have trained them to live with justice. For it appears to me that Cato sought a cause for death, not so much that he might escape from Cæsar, as that he might obey the decrees of the Stoics, whom he followed, and might make his name distinguished by some great action; and I do not see what evil could have happened to him if he had lived. For Caius Cæsar, such was his clemency, had no other object, even in the very heat of civil war, than to appear to deserve well of the state, by preserving two excellent citizens, Cicero and Cato. But let us return to those who praise death as a benefit. You complain of life as though you had lived, or had ever settled with yourself why you were born at all. May not therefore the true and common Father of all justly find fault with that saying of Terence:—

“First, learn in what life consists; then, if you shall be dissatisfied with life, have recourse to death.”

You are indignant that you are exposed to evils; as though you deserved anything good, who are ignorant of your Father, Lord, and King; who, although you behold with your eyes the bright light, are nevertheless blind in mind, and lie in the depths of the darkness of….

…[T]hose who assert the advantage of death, because they know nothing of the truth, thus reason: If there is nothing after death, death is not an evil; for it takes away the perception of evil. But if the soul survives, death is even an advantage; because immortality follows. And this sentiment is thus set forth by Cicero concerning the Laws: “We may congratulate ourselves, since death is about to bring either a better state than that which exists in life, or at any rate not a worse. For if the soul is in a state of vigour without the body, it is a divine life; and if it is without perception, assuredly there is no evil.” Cleverly argued, as it appeared to himself, as though there could be no other state. But each conclusion is false. For the sacred writings teach that the soul is not annihilated; but that it is either rewarded according to its righteousness, or eternally punished according to its crimes. For neither is it right, that he who has lived a life of wickedness in prosperity should escape the punishment which he deserves; nor that he who has been wretched on account of his righteousness, should be deprived of his reward. And this is so true, that Tully also, in his Consolation, declared that the righteous and the wicked do not inhabit the same abodes. For those same wise men, he says, did not judge that the same course was open for all into the heaven; for they taught that those who were contaminated by vices and crimes were thrust down into darkness, and lay in the mire; but that, on the other hand, souls that were chaste, pure, upright, and uncontaminated, being also refined by the study and practice of virtue, by a light and easy course take their flight to the gods, that is, to a nature resembling their own. But this sentiment is opposed to the former argument. For that is based on the assumption that every man at his birth is presented with immortality. What distinction, therefore, will there be between virtue and guilt, if it makes no difference whether a man be Aristides or Phalaris, whether he be Cato or Catiline? But a man does not perceive this opposition between sentiments and actions, unless he is in possession of the truth. If any one, therefore, should ask me whether death is a good or an evil, I shall reply that its character depends upon the course of the life. For as life itself is a good if it is passed virtuously, but an evil if it is spent viciously, so also death is to be weighed in accordance with the past actions of life. And so it comes to pass, that if life has been passed in the service of God, death is not an evil, for it is a translation to immortality. But if not so, death must necessarily be an evil, since it transfers men, as I have said, to everlasting punishment….

…What, then, shall we say, but that they are in error who either desire death as a good, or flee from life as an evil? unless they are most unjust, who do not weigh the fewer evils against the greater number of blessings. For when they pass all their lives in a variety of the choicest gratifications, if any bitterness has chanced to succeed to these, they desire to die; and they so regard it as to appear never to have fared well, if at any time they happen to fare ill. Therefore they condemn the whole of life, and consider it as nothing else than filled with evils. Hence arose that foolish sentiment, that this state which we imagine to be life is death, and that that which we fear as death is life; and so that the first good is not to be born, that the second is an early death….

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(c. 240–c. 320)

from The Divine Institutes

Filed under Africa, Afterlife, Ancient History, Christianity, Europe, Lactantius, Selections

by | · 7:36 pm

TERTULLIAN
(c. 160-c. 220)

from To the Martyrs
from The Crown of Martyrdom

 

Tertullian, born a Roman citizen at or near Carthage, was originally a pagan, the son of a Roman centurion. He was educated in rhetoric and law, the standard education of a well-to-do Roman, and converted to Christianity before the year 197. Following his conversion, Tertullian traveled through Greece and Asia Minor before settling in Carthage and marrying. According to St. Jerome, he served the church as a presbyter. He wrote numerous theological treatises, apologies, and attacks on various heresies, and was the first important Christian theologian to write in Latin. According to Augustine, Tertullian broke with Montanism and in his later years formed his own sect, the Tertullianists; some modern scholars assert that the sect was simply named after him. In either case, the sect survived some two centuries until the time of Augustine. Because of his apostasy, Tertullian was scorned in antiquity, but in the 19th and 20th centuries has been re-considered to be a seminal figure in early Christianity and, with Augustine, one of the preeminent formative fathers of modern Christianity.

Tertullian’s literary style was highly individualistic and original: he was witty, vehement, and eloquent, often employing puns and seeming contradictions. His work is often described as legalistic in character. Much of it falls into three main categories: attacks against Jews and other non-Christians (Apologeticum, an animated defense of Christians against Roman accusations of depravity and sedition, and Adversus Judaeos); denunciations of Christian heresies (Adversus Valentinianos, which attacked Gnosticism); and later writings in which he began to be critical of the “visible” Church and became sympathetic to the Montanists, a prophetic sect with a demanding moral code that had become well known from Asia Minor to Africa. Other writings (De cultu feminarum, on the proper dress of women, and De monogamia, concerning monogamy) dealt with practical and moral issues. Among his many contributions to Christian thought, Tertullian developed the concepts of the Trinity; of the dual nature, divine and human, of Jesus; and of Original Sin; as well as an early version of natural law and the view that Scripture can be interpreted rightly only within the Church, though he later emphasized private interpretation of scriptural texts. He promoted an extreme austerity in dress and fasting. In accordance with Montanist views, he strongly encouraged Christians to embrace persecution and even martyrdom.

In the early work entitled “To the Martyrs,” Tertullian praises past martyrs and invites Christians to accept the “harsher treatment” God has prepared for them and consider the “heavenly glory and divine reward” that awaits the willing martyr. This work and “The Crown of Martyrdom” together provide an account of the merits and benefits of martyrdom. Tertullian’s exhortation to martyrdom poses a challenge to the line between suicide and martyrdom; in it, he presents a number of examples of suicide that Roman culture would have respected—Empedocles, Lucretia, Regulus—and argues in effect that Christians too should be respected for their steadfastness in persecution and their willingness to sacrifice themselves for their faith.

Sources

Tertullian, “To the Martyrs,” chs. 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, in Disciplinary, Moral, and Ascetical Works, trs. Rudolph Arbesmann, Emily Daly, and Edwin Quain, in The Fathers of the Church, ed. Roy Defarrari. New York: Fathers of the Church, Inc., 1959, pp. 17-29; “The Crown of Martyrdom,” from The Christian’s Defense, in Fathers of the Church: A Selection of the Writings of the Latin Fathers,  tr. F. A. Wright, London: George Routledge and Sons, Ltd., 1928, pp. 48-51.

from TO THE MARTYRS

Blessed martyrs elect, along with the nourishment for the body which our Lady Mother the Church from her breast, as well as individual brethren from their private resources, furnish you in prison, accept also from me some offering that will contribute to the sustenance of the spirit.  For it is not good that the flesh be feasted while the spirit goes hungry.  Indeed, if care is bestowed on that which is weak, there is all the more reason not to neglect that which in still weaker.  Not that I am specially entitled to exhort you.  Yet, even the most accomplished gladiators are spurred on not only by their trainers and managers but also from afar by people inexperienced in this are and by all who choose, without the slightest need for it, with the result that hints issuing from the crowd have often proved profitable for them.

In the first place, then, O blessed, ‘do not grieve the Holy Spirit’ who has entered prison with you.  For, if He had not accompanied you there in your present trial, you would not be there today.  See to it, therefore, that He remain with you there and so lead you out of that place to the Lord.  Indeed, the prison is the Devil’s house, too, where he keeps his household.  But you have come to the prison for the purpose of trampling upon him right in his own house.  For you have engaged him in battle already outside the prison and trampled him underfoot.

Let him, therefore, not say: ‘Now that they are in my domain, I will tempt them with base hatreds, with defections or dissensions among themselves.’  Let him flee from your presence, and let him, coiled and numb, like a snake that is driven out by charms or smoke, hide away in the depths of his den.  Do not allow him the good fortune in his own kingdom of setting you against one another, but let him find you fortified by the arms of peace among yourselves, because peace among yourselves means war with him.  Some, not able to find this peace in the Church, are accustomed to seek it from the martyrs in prison.  For this reason, too, then, you ought to possess, cherish and preserve it among yourselves that you may perhaps be able to bestow it upon others also.

Other attachments, equally burdensome to the spirit, may have accompanied you to the prison gate; so far your relatives, too, may have escorted you.  From that very moment on you have been separated from the very world.  How much more, then, from its spirit and its ways and doings?  Nor let this separation from the world that is more truly a prison, we shall realize that you have left a prison rather than entered one.  The world holds the greater darkness, blinding men’s hearts.  The world puts on the heavier chains, fettering the very souls of men.  The world breathes forth the fouler impurities—human lusts.  Finally, the world contains the larger number of criminals, namely the entire human race.  In fact, it awaits sentence not from the proconsul but from God.  Wherefore, O blessed, consider yourselves as having been transferred from prison to what we may call a place of safety.  Darkness is there, but you are the light; fetters are there, but you are free before God.  It breathes forth a foul smell, but you are an odor of sweetness.  There the judge is expected at every moment, but you are going to pass sentence upon the judges themselves.  There sadness may come upon the man who sighs for the pleasures of the world.  The Christian, however, even when he is outside the prison, has renounced the world, and, when in prison, even prison itself.  It does not matter what part of the world you are in, you who are apart from the world.  And if you have missed some of the enjoyments of life, remember that it is the way of business to suffer some losses in order to make larger profits.

I say nothing yet about the reward to which God invites the martyrs.  Meanwhile, let us compare the life in the world with that in prison to see if the spirit does not gain more in prison than the flesh loses there.  In fact, owing to the solicitude of the Church and the charity of the brethren, the flesh does not miss there what it ought to have, while, in addition, the spirit obtains what is always beneficial to the faith: you do not look at strange gods; you do not chance upon their images; you do not, even by mere physical contact, participate in heathen holidays; you are not plagued by the foul fumes of the sacrificial banquets, not tormented by the noise of the spectacles, nor by the atrocity or frenzy or shamelessness of those taking part in the celebrations; your eyes do not fall on houses of lewdness; you are free from inducements to sin, from temptations, from unholy reminiscences, free, indeed, even from persecution.

The prison now offers to the Christian what the desert once gave to the Prophets.  Our Lord Himself quite often spent time in solitude to pray there more freely, to be there away from the world.  In fact, it was in a secluded place that He manifested His glory to His disciples.  Let us drop the name ‘prison’ and call it a place of seclusion.

Though the body is confined, though the flesh is detained, there is nothing that is not open to the spirit. In spirit wander about, in spirit take a walk, setting before yourselves not shady promenades and long porticoes but that path which leads to God. As often as you walk that path, you will not be in prison. The leg does not feel the fetter when the spirit is in heaven. The spirit carries about the whole man and brings him wherever he wishes. And where your heart is, there will your treasure be also.  There, then, let our heart be where we would have our treasure.

Granted now, O blessed, that even to Christians the prison is unpleasant—yet, we were called to the service in the army of the living God in the very moment when we gave response to the words of the sacramental oath.  No soldier goes out to war encumbered with luxuries, nor does he march to the line of battle from the sleeping chamber, but from light and cramped tents where every kind of austerity, discomfort, and inconvenience is experienced.  Even in time of peace soldiers are toughened to warfare by toils and hardships: by marching in arms, by practicing swift maneuvers in the field, by digging a trench, by joining closely together to form a tortoise-shield.  Everything is set in sweating toil, lest bodies and minds be frightened at having to pass from shade to sunshine, from sunshine to icy cold, from the tunic to the breastplate, from hushed silence to the war cry, from rest to the din of battle.

In like manner, O blessed, consider whatever is hard in your present situation as an exercise of your powers of mind and body.  You are about to enter a noble contest in which the living God acts the part of superintendent and the Holy Spirit is your trainer, a contest whose crown is eternity, whose prize is angelic nature, citizenship in heaven and glory for ever and ever.  And so your Master, Jesus Christ, who has anointed you with His Spirit and has brought you to this training ground, has resolved, before the day of the contest, to take you from a softer way of life to a harsher treatment that your strength may be increased.  For athletes, too, are set apart for more rigid training that they may apply themselves to the building up of their physical strength.  They are kept from lavish living, from more tempting dishes, from more pleasurable drinks.  They are urged on, they are subjected to torturing toils, they are worn out: the more strenuously they have exerted themselves, the greater is their hope of victory.  And they do this, says the Apostle, to win a perishable crown.  We who are about to win an eternal one recognize in the prison our training ground, that we may be led forth to the actual contest before the seat of the presiding judge well practiced in all hardships, because strength is built up by austerity, but destroyed by softness.

We know from our Lord’s teaching that, while the spirit is willing, the flesh is weak.  Let us, however, not derive delusive gratification from the Lord’s acknowledgement of the weakness of the flesh.  For it was on purpose that He first declared the spirit willing: He wanted to show which of the two ought to be subject to the other, that is to say, that the flesh should be submissive to the spirit, the weaker to the stronger, so that the former draw strength from the latter.  Let the sprit converse with the flesh on their common salvation, no longer thinking about the hardships of prison but, rather, about the struggle of the actual contest.  The flesh will perhaps fear the heavy sword and the lofty cross and the wild beasts mad with rage and the most terrible punishment of all—death by fire—and, finally, all the executioner’s cunning during the torture.  But let the spirit present to both itself and the flesh the other side of the picture: granted, these sufferings are grievous, yet many have borne them patiently, nay, have even sought them on their own accord for the sake of fame and glory; and this is true not only of men but also of women so that you, too, O blessed women, may be worthy of your sex.

It would lead me too far were I to enumerate each one of those who, led by the impulse of their own mind, put an end to their lives by the sword. Among women there is the well-known instance of Lucretia. A victim of violence, she stabbed herself in the presence of her kinsfolk to gain glory for her chastity. Mucius burnt his right hand on the altar that his fair fame might include this deed.  Nor did the philosophers act less courageously: Heraclitus, for instance, who put an end to his life by smearing himself with cow dung; Empedocles, too, who leaped down into the fires of Mt.Etna; and Peregrinus who not long ago threw himself upon a funeral pile. Why, even women have despised the flames: Dido did so in order not to be forced to marry after the departure of the man she had loved most dearly; the wife Hasdrubal, too, with Carthage in flames, cast herself along with her children into the fire that was destroying her native city, that she might not see her husband a suppliant at Scipio’s feet. Regulus, a Roman general, was taken prisoner by the Carhaginians, but refused to be the only Roman exchanged for a large number of Carthaginian captives. He preferred to be returned to the enemy, and, crammed into a kind of chest, suffered as many crucifixions as nails were driven in from the outside in all directions to pierce him. A woman voluntarily sought out wild beasts, namely, vipers, serpents more horrible than either bull or bear, which Cleopatra let loose upon herself as not to fall into the hands of the enemy.

You may object: ‘But the fear of death is not so great as the fear of torture.’  Did the Athenian courtesan yield on that account to the executioner?  For, being privy to a conspiracy, she was subjected to torture by the tyrant.  But she did not betray her fellow conspirators, and at last bit off her own tongue and spat it into the tyrant’s face to let him know that torments, however prolonged, could achieve nothing against her.  Everybody knows that to this day the most important festival of the Lacedaemonians is the δίαμαστίγwσις, that is, The Whipping.  In this sacred rite all the noble youth are scourged with whips before the altar, while their parents and kinsfolk stand by and exhort them to perseverance.  For they regard it as a mark of greater distinction and glory if the soul rather than the body has submitted to the stripes.

Therefore, if earthly glory accruing from strength of body and soul is valued so highly that one despises sword, fire, piercing with nails, wild beasts and tortures for the reward of human praise, then I may say the sufferings you endure are but trifling in comparison with the heavenly glory and divine reward.  If the bead made of glass is rated so highly, how much must the true pearl be worth?  Who.  Therefore, does not most gladly spend as much for the true as others spend for the false?

I omit here an account of the motive of glory. For inordinate ambition among men as well as a certain morbidity of mind have already set at naught all the cruel and torturing contests mentioned above.  How many of the leisure class are urged by an excessive love of arms to become gladiators?  Surely it is from vanity that they descend to the wild beasts in the very arena, and think themselves more handsome because of the bites and scars.  Some have even hired themselves out to tests by fire, with the result that they ran a certain distance in a burning tunic.  Others have pranced up and down amid the bullwhips of the animal-baiters, unflinchingly exposing their shoulders.  All this, O blessed, the Lord tolerates in the world for good reason, that is, for the sake of encouraging us in the present moment and of confounding us on that final day, if we have recoiled from suffering for the truth unto salvation what others have pursued out of vanity unto perdition.

Let us, however, no longer talk about those examples of perseverance proceeding from inordinate ambition.  Let us, rather, turn to a simple contemplation of man’s ordinary lot so that, if we ever have to undergo such trials with fortitude, we may also learn from those misfortunes which sometimes even befall unwilling victims, For how often have people been burned to death in conflagrations!  How often have wild beasts devoured men either in the forests or in the heart of cities after escaping from their cages!  How many have been slain by the sword of robbers!  How many have even suffered the death of the cross at the hands of enemies, after having been tortured first and, indeed, treated with every kind of insult!  Furthermore, many a man is able to suffer in the cause of a mere human being what he hesitates to suffer in the cause of God.  To this fact, indeed, our present days may bear witness.  How many prominent persons have met with death in the cause of a man, though such a fate seemed most unlikely in view of their birth and their rank, their physical condition and their age!  Death came to them either from him, if they had opposed him, or from his enemies, if they had sided with him.

 

from THE CROWN OF MARTYRDOM

“Why do you Christians complain,” you say, “that we persecute you, if you wish to suffer, since you ought to love those by whom you suffer what you wish?” Certainly we wish to suffer, but in the way in which a soldier suffers war. Nobody indeed willingly suffers war, since both panic and danger there must inevitably be faced; but yet the man who just now was complaining about battle fights with all his strength and rejoices when he wins a victory in battle, because he gains both glory and spoil. Our battle is to be summoned before tribunals, where we fight for the truth at the risk of our lives. And our victory is to obtain that for which you strive, a victory which brings with it both the glory of pleasing God and the spoil of eternal life. But, you may say, we are convicted; yes, when we have won the day; we conquer when we are killed, and we escape when we are convicted. You may call us “faggoted” and “axle-men”, because bound to a stake half an axle’s length we are burned amid heaps of faggots; but that is our garb of victory, our chariot of triumph, our garment decked with palm-leaves. Naturally therefore we do not please those whom we have conquered, and so we are regarded as desperate and reckless men.

Among you, however, such desperation and recklessness raises the standard of virtue in the cause of glory and renown. Mucius, for example, willingly left his right hand in the altar fire: “Oh loftiness of spirit!” Empedocles freely gave all his body to the flames of Etna for the people of Catana’s sake: “Oh what strength of mind!” The queen who founded Carthage flung herself upon the pyre in accordance with her marriage vow: “What an encomium for chastity!” Regulus, rather that be the one of all the foemen spared, suffered tortures all over his body: “What a brave man, victorious even in captivity!” Anaxarchus, when he was being crushed to death with a barely pestle, kept saying: “Pound, pound away: it is Anaxarchus’ coating, not Anaxarchus himself, that your are pounding”: “What a magnanimous philosopher who could even joke about such a death as his!”

In these cases glory was lawful, because it was human, and no imputation of reckless prejudice or desperate conviction was cast upon them when they despised death and every sort of cruelty. They were allowed for country, for empire, and for friendship to suffer what we are not allowed to suffer for God. For all these you cast statues and write inscriptions on their portraits, and engrave them epitaphs to last for ever. Certainly, as far as records can do it, you yourselves confer a kind of resurrection from God, if he should suffer for God, you deem to be mad. Go on, good governors; the mob will think you all the better if you sacrifice Christians to them; crucify, torture, condemn, destroy us; your injustice is the proof of our innocence. For that reason God allows us to suffer these things. Just recently by condemning a Christian woman to the brothel rather than to the wild beasts, you acknowledged that stain upon chastity is reckoned among us as more dreadful than any punishment and any death. Your cruelties, though each be more elaborate that the last, do not profit you; they serve rather as an attraction to our sect. The more you mow us down the greater our numbers become; our blood is the seed from which new Christians spring.

Many men among yourselves have written exhortations for the endurance of pain and death; Cicero, for example, in the Tusculans, Seneca in the treatise On Chance, Diogenes, Pyrrho, and Callinicus. But their words do not find as many disciples as the Christians make by their deeds. The very obstinacy, with which you reproach us, is our best teacher. Who is there that is not roused by the sight of it to ask what there is really within it? Who does not join us when once he has asked? Who does not long to suffer, when once he has joined, that he may buy back the whole grace of God and procure all indulgence from Him by the payment of his own blood? To this action all sins are forgiven. Hence it is that even in court we thank you for your verdict. There is an enmity between what is of God and what is of man; and when we are condemned by you we are acquitted by God.

Comments Off on TERTULLIAN
(c. 160-c. 220)

from To the Martyrs
from The Crown of Martyrdom

Filed under Africa, Ancient History, Christianity, Europe, Martyrdom, Selections, Tertullian

by | · 7:33 pm

CLEMENT OF ALEXANDRIA
(c. 150-c. 215)

from The Miscellanies (Stromata)
   The Praises of Martyrdom
   Those Who Offered Themselves for       Martyrdom Reproved

 

Titus Flavius Clemens, or St. Clement of Alexandria, was a Greek theologian of the early Christian church, the second known leader of the Alexandrian school of theology. He was born to a pagan family, allegedly in Athens, although his place of birth and the dates of his birth and death are uncertain. He studied under Pantaeus at the Catechetical School of Alexandria, the first Christian scholastic institution of its kind, known for promoting the allegorical method of biblical interpretation. Clement succeeded Pantaeus as its leader from about 190 until 203. Under the leadership of Pantaeus, Clement, and his pupil Origen, this school grew famous as a center of learning at the time.

Clement was the author of Exhortation to the Greeks, the three books of The Tutors, and the eight books of the Stromateis or Stromata, usually translated as Miscellanies, from which the selections here are taken. Clement also wrote Who Is the Rich Man That Shall Be Saved? In 202 or 203, Clement left Alexandria as a new round of persecutions of Christians began.

In the short selections here, Clement addresses what had become a troubling issue for the church, especially during periods of persecution. Christians were committed to belief in God and the divinity of Christ, and would prefer death to denying this faith. But some writers, notably Ignatius [q.v.] and Tertullian [q.v.], stressed the desirability of martyrdom and exhorted Christians to become martyrs. Indeed, some Christians openly flaunted their faith as a way of courting or provoking their own martyrdom. Clement, in a view the church came to accept, opposes this excess; he honors the genuine martyr, the one who achieves perfection and performs “the perfect work of love” in voluntarily sacrificing his body, but excoriates those who have “rushed on death” or have “presented themselves for capture.” In Clement’s view, they are guilty in much the same way as the murderer and the self-killer, the suicide; while martyrdom is to be respected, the true Christian should do everything possible to avoid it, short of betraying one’s faith.

Source

The Writings of Clement of Alexandria, Vol. II. Miscellanies (Stromata), Book IV, chs. iv, x. tr. Rev. William Wilson. Ante-Nicene Christian Library, Vol. XII.  Edinburgh: T &T Clark, 1869, pp. 145-148, 173-174.

from THE PRAISES OF MARTYRDOM

Whence, as is reasonable, the gnostic, when called, obeys easily, and gives up his body to him who asks; and, previously divesting himself of the affections of this carcase, not insulting the tempter, but rather, in my opinion, training him and convincing him,

“From what honour and what extent of wealth Fallen,”

as says Empedocles, here for the future he walks with mortals.  He, in truth, bears witness to himself that he is faithful and loyal towards God; and to the tempter, that he in vain envied him who is faithful through love; and to the Lord, of the inspired persuasion in reference to His doctrine, from which he will not depart through fear of death; further, he confirms also the truth of preaching by his deed, showing that God to whom he hastes is powerful.  You will wonder at his love, which he conspicuously shows with thankfulness, in being united to what is allied to him, and besides by his precious blood, shaming the unbelievers.  He then avoids denying Christ through fear by reason of the command; nor does he sell his faith in the hope of the gifts prepared, but in love to the Lord he will most gladly depart from this life; perhaps giving thanks both to him who laid the plot against him, for receiving an honourable reason which he himself furnished not, for showing what he is, to him by his patience, and to the Lord in love, by which even before his birth he was manifested to the Lord, who knew the martyr’s choice.  With good courage, then, he goes to the Lord, his friend, for whom he voluntarily gave his body, and, as his judges hoped, his soul, hearing from our Savior the words of poetry, “Dear brother,” by reason of the similarity of his life.  We call martyrdom perfection, not because the man comes to the end of his life as others, but because he has exhibited the perfect work of love.  And the ancients laud the death of those among the Greeks who died in war, not that they advised people to die a violent death, but because he who ends his life in war is released without the dread of dying, severed from the body without experiencing previous suffering or being enfeebled in his soul, as the people that suffer in diseases.  For they depart in a state of effeminacy and desiring to live; and therefore they do not yield up the soul pure, but bearing with it their lusts like weights of lead; all but those who have been conspicuous in virtue.  Some die in battle with their lusts, these being in no respect different from what they would have been if they had wasted away by disease.

If the confession to God is martyrdom, each soul which has lived purely in the knowledge of God, which has obeyed the commandments, is a witness both by life and word, in whatever way it may be released from the body,—shedding faith as blood along its whole life till its departure.  For instance, the Lord says in the Gospel, “Whosoever shall leave father, or mother, or brethren,” and so forth, “for the sake of the gospel and my name,” he is blessed; not indicating simple martyrdom, but the gnostic martyrdom, as of the man who has conducted himself according to the rule of the gospel, in love to the Lord (for the knowledge of the Name and the understanding of the gospel point out the gnosis, but not the bare appellation), so as to leave his worldly kindred, and wealth, and every possession, in order to lead a life free from passion. “Mother” figuratively means country and sustenance; “fathers” are the laws of civil polity: which must be contemned thankfully by the high-souled just man; for the sake of being the friend of God, and of obtaining the right hand in the holy place, as the Apostles have done.

Then Heraclitus says, “God and men honour those slain in battle;” and Plato in the fifth book of the Republic writes, “Of those who die in military service, whoever dies after winning renown, shall we not say that he is chief of the golden race?  Most assuredly.”  But the golden race is with the gods, who are in heaven, in the fixed sphere, who chiefly hold command in the providence exercised towards men.  Now some of the heretics who have misunderstood the Lord, have at once an impious and cowardly love of life; saying that the true martyrdom is the knowledge of the only true God (which we also admit), and that the man is a self-murderer and a suicide who makes confession by death; and adducing other similar sophisms of cowardice.  To these we shall reply at the proper time; for they differ with us in regard to first principles.  Now we, too, say that those who have rushed on death (for there are some, not belonging to us, but sharing the name merely, who are in haste to give themselves up, the poor wretches dying through hatred to the Creator)—these, we say, banish themselves without being martyrs, even though they are punished publicly.  For they do not preserve the characteristic mark of believing martyrdom, inasmuch as they have not known the only true God, but give themselves up to a vain death, as the Gymnosophists of the Indians to useless fire.

But since these falsely named [gnostics] calumniate the body, let them learn that the harmonious mechanism of the body contributes to the understanding which leads to goodness of nature.  Wherefore in the third book of the Republic, Plato, whom they appeal to loudly as an authority that disparages generation, says, “that for the sake of harmony of soul, care must be taken for the body,” by which, he who announces the proclamation of the truth, finds it possible to live, and to live well.  For it is by the path of life and health that we learn gnosis.  But is he who cannot advance to the height without being occupied with necessary things, and through them doing what tends to knowledge, not to choose to live well?  I living, then, living well is secured. And he who in the body has devoted himself to a good life, is being sent on to the state of immortality.

 

from THOSE WHO OFFERED THEMSELVES FOR MARTYRDOM REPROVED

When, again, He says, “When they persecute you in this city, flee ye to the other,” He does not advise flight, as if persecution were an evil thing; nor does He enjoin them by flight to avoid death, as if in dread of it, but wishes us neither to be the authors nor abettors of any evil to any one, either to ourselves to the persecutor and murderer.  For He, in a way, bids us take care of ourselves.  But he who disobeys is rash and foolhardy.  If he who kills a man of God sins against God, he also who presents himself before the judgment-seat becomes guilty of his death.  And such is also the case with him who does not avoid persecution, but out of daring presents himself for capture.  Such a one, as far as in him lies, becomes an accomplice in the crime of the persecutor.  And if he also uses provocation, he is wholly guilty, challenging the wild beast.  And similarly, if he afford any cause for conflict or punishment, or retribution or enmity, he gives occasion for persecution.  Wherefore, then, we are enjoined not to cling to anything that belongs to this life; but “to him that takes our cloak to give our coat,” not only that we may continue destitute of inordinate affection, but that we may not by retaliating make our persecutors savage against ourselves, and stir them up to blaspheme the name.

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(c. 150-c. 215)

from The Miscellanies (Stromata)
   The Praises of Martyrdom
   Those Who Offered Themselves for       Martyrdom Reproved

Filed under Africa, Ancient History, Christianity, Clement of Alexandria, Martyrdom, Selections, Sin

by | · 7:31 pm

JUSTIN MARTYR
(c. 100-165)

from The Second Apology: Why Christians Do Not Kill Themselves

 

Saint Justin (the) Martyr, theologian and philosopher, was one of the first Christian apologists, sainted and numbered among the Fathers of the Church. He was born in the city of Flavia Neapolis (now Nabulus, West Bank), a Roman city built on the site of the ancient Shechem, in Samaria. His parents practiced the Roman religion. Justin studied Greek philosophy, especially that of Plato and the Stoics, before converting to Christianity; he also knew Judaism and Greco-Roman religion well. After his conversion to Christianity, he traveled about on foot defending its truths, often entering into violent controversies, and later opened a Christian school in Rome. He developed the conception of a divine plan in history and laid the foundation for a theology of history drawing from both philosophy and Christian revelation.

In Rome, Justin wrote the Dialogue with Trypho, emphasizing the continuity of the Old and the New Testaments, and two Apologies for the Christians, collections of reasoned defenses against Roman allegations of Christian insurrection, directed to the emperors Antoninus Pius and Marcus Aurelius. Justin’s work in general addressed a philosophically sophisticated Greek and Roman audience. After debating with the Cynic Crescens, however, Justin was denounced to the Roman prefect as subversive and condemned to death; he was scourged and martyred by beheading in Rome during the rule of Marcus Aurelius.

In this very short selection from “The Second Apology,” Justin provides an earnest answer to the sort of flippant remark that might be made by a non-Christian detractor, perhaps a Roman who is influenced by Stoicism and thus views suicide as a potentially rational and prudent act, and who mocks the Christian belief in a personal afterlife. If Christians believe in a personal  afterlife in which one will be received into the presence of God, the detractor seems to imply,  why do they suffer martyrdom rather than commit suicide? Why not kill oneself and go directly to God? Justin’s brief answer alludes to the central Christian values of the educative, formative purpose of human life, the pursuit of moral good and the rejection of evil, and the importance of continuing the Christian faith (i.e., instruction in the divine doctrines), as well as preserving God’s creation, the human race itself; his reasons display the basis of the Christian belief that suicide is wrong.

Source

Justin Martyr,  “The Second Apology of Justin for the Christians Addressed to the Roman Senate,” ch. 4. In Ante-Nicene Fathers,  ed. Philip Schaff,  vol I: The Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts and  James Donaldson, Edinburgh, 1867.

 

from THE SECOND APOLOGY: WHY CHRISTIANS DO NOT KILL THEMSELVES

Lest any one should say to us, ‘All of you, go, kill yourselves and thus go immediately to God, and save us the trouble,’ I will explain why we do not do that, and why, when interrogated, we boldly acknowledge our faith.  We have been taught that God did not create the world without a purpose, but that He did so for the sake of mankind; for we have stated before that God is pleased with those who imitate His perfections, but is displeased with those who choose evil, either in word or in deed.  If, then, we should all kill ourselves we would be the cause, as far as it is up to us, why no one would be born and be instructed in the divine doctrines, or even why the human race might cease to exist; if we do act thus, we ourselves will be opposing the will of God.

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(c. 100-165)

from The Second Apology: Why Christians Do Not Kill Themselves

Filed under Ancient History, Christianity, Europe, Justin Martyr, Middle East, Selections, Stoicism

by | · 6:53 pm

THE NEW TESTAMENT
(c. 50-c. 125)

Matthew: The Death of Jesus and the    Suicide of Judas
Acts: Paul Prevents a Suicide
I Corinthians: The Body as Temple
Philippians: Paul in Prison: On the    Desire to Die

 

In addition to the texts of the Hebrew Bible [q.v.], known to Christians as the Old Testament, the Christian Bible also includes the books and letters known as the New Testament. These texts are accounts of the life and death of Jesus of Nazareth (c. 8–4 B.C. to c. 30–36 A.D.) by his immediate disciples and subsequent followers, expressions of their faith in his divine and human nature as Jesus Christ, the Messiah, and the Son of God, as well as their understandings of the history of their tradition and God’s purpose for the world. Preserved in koine, the Greek dialect common to the eastern Mediterranean regions, these 27 texts include the four gospels (the books of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John), the historical book of Acts, the letters by and attributed to Paul, letters from disciples, and the Apocalypse (Revelations) attributed to John. These texts from the 1st and possibly 2nd century A.D. form the scriptures distinctive to Christianity, a new religion arising from Judaism that would distinguish itself from both Judaism and the Roman state religion, and within a few hundred years, would itself become the dominant religion in the West. The effort to compile a single, coherent collection of the authoritative early writings of this new religion began sometime during the last decades of the 2nd century, and it was not until the second half of the 4th century that the New Testament reached its settled, final shape.

The texts presented here—from Matthew, Acts, I Corinthians, and Philippians—are placed in the order in which they occur in the canonical New Testament, though this does not reflect their dates of composition. The earliest, Paul’s Letter to the Philippians, was written sometime between 50 and 60 A.D., before he was imprisoned in Rome for the first time. Paul’s first extant letter to the church at Corinth, I Corinthians, was written from Ephesus sometime around Easter, probably in the year 55, during one of his many missionary journeys. The Gospel of Matthew was composed between 80 and 90, and Acts, a history of the early church by the author of the gospel attributed to Luke, has been dated as early as 60 and as late as 125.

The text presented here from Matthew describes the only suicide reported in the canonical gospels, that of Judas Iscariot, one of Jesus’ 12 disciples. Judas had betrayed Jesus to the Roman authorities, a betrayal that led to Jesus’ crucifixion. Although a different version of Judas’s death, not involving suicide, can be found in Acts 1:18–20, the account in Matthew interprets Judas’s self-hanging as a suicide of remorse. Some later commentators have seen Judas’s suicide as an act of ultimate atonement for the sin of betrayal, although by the High Middle Ages, Judas’s suicide was often seen as a greater sin than the betrayal itself. Acts also contains an account of the jailor in Philippi who, responsible for keeping Paul and Silas under close guard, attempts suicide when he believes they have escaped; it is Paul who prevents the jailor’s suicide.

Paul’s letters address many questions about church discipline and practice, questions of morality, and fundamental Christian doctrine. The passage from I Corinthians provides part  of the theological basis for the Christian prohibition of suicide: the view that the body is the  “temple of God,” the place where the soul dwells, the site of the fusion between spirit and flesh that is the human person. Suicide is wrong in part because it destroys the body that is the seat of the soul.

Paul’s Letter to the Philippians provides indirect insight into Christian attitudes about  suicide. As many later writers (e.g., Angela of Foligno [q.v.]) also do, Paul describes his ambivalence about death: he desires to “depart and be with Christ,” and he sees death and the afterlife it promises as “a gain”; but he also recognizes reasons for remaining in the body, reasons that persuade him that it is better not to end his life. This tension between the desire to die and the obligation to live remains of continuing concern in the Christian view of suicide throughout its later history.

Source

The Oxford Study Bible: Revised English Bible with the Apocrypha, eds. M. Jack Suggs, Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, and James R. Mueller, New York: Oxford University Press, 1992, pp. 1299-1301, 1414-1415, 1450, 1488.

from THE NEW TESTAMENT

Jesus then came with his disciples to a place called Gethsemane, and he said to them, ‘Sit here while I go over there to pray.’ He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee. Distress and anguish overwhelmed him, and he said to them, ‘My heart is ready to break with grief.  Stop here, and stay awake with me.’ Then he went on a little farther, threw himself down, and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass me by. Yet not my will but yours.’

He came back to the disciples and found them asleep; and he said to Peter, ‘What! Could none of you stay awake with me for one hour?  Stay awake, and pray that you may be spared the test.  The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.’

He went away a second time and prayed: ‘My Father, if it is not possible for this cup to pass me by without my drinking it, your will be done.’  He came again and found them asleep, for their eyes were heavy.  So he left them and went away again and prayed a third time, using the same words as before.

Then he came to the disciples and said to them, ‘Still asleep?  Still resting?  The hour has come!  The Son of Man is betrayed into the hands of sinners.  Up, let us go!  The traitor is upon us.’

He was still speaking when Judas, one of the Twelve, appeared, and with him a great crowd armed with swords and cudgels, sent by the chief priests and the elders of the nation.  The traitor had given them this sign: ‘The one I kiss is your man; seize him.’  Going straight up to Jesus, he said, ‘Hail, Rabbi!’ and kissed him.  Jesus replied, ‘Friend, do what you are here to do.’  Then they came forward, seized Jesus, and held him fast.

At that moment one of those with Jesus reached for his sword and drew it, and struck the high priest’s servant, cutting off his ear.  But Jesus said to him, ‘Put up your sword.  All who take the sword die by the sword.  Do you suppose that I cannot appeal for help to my Father, and at once be sent more than twelve legions of angels?  But how then would the scriptures be fulfilled, which say that this must happen?’

Then Jesus spoke to the crowd: ‘Do you take me for a bandit, that you have come out with swords and cudgels to arrest me?  Day after day I sat teaching in the temple, and you did not lay hands on me.  But this has all happened to fulfil what the prophets wrote.’

Then the disciples all deserted him and ran away.

Jesus was led away under arrest to the house of Caiaphas the high priest, where the scribes and elders were assembled.  Peter followed him at a distance till he came to the high priest’s courtyard; he went in and sat down among the attendants, to see how it would all end.

The chief priests and the whole council tried to find some allegation against Jesus that would warrant a death sentence; but they failed to find one, though many came forward with false evidence.  Finally two men alleged that he had said, ‘I can pull down the temple of God, and rebuild it in three days.’  At this the high priest rose and said to him, ‘Have you no answer to the accusations that these witnesses bring against you?’  But Jesus remained silent.  The high priest then said, ‘By the living God I charge you to tell us: are you the Messiah, the Son of God?’  Jesus replied, ‘The words are yours.  But I tell you this: from now on you will see the Son of Man seated at the right hand of the Almighty and coming on the clouds of heaven.’  At these words the high priest tore his robes and exclaimed, ‘This is blasphemy!  Do we need further witnesses?  You have just heard the blasphemy.  What is your verdict!’  ‘He is guilty,’ they answered; ‘he should die.’

Then they spat in his face and struck him with their fists; some said, as they beat him, ‘Now, Messiah, if you are a prophet, tell us who hit you.’

Meanwhile Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard when a servant-girl accosted him; ‘You were with Jesus the Galilean,’ she said.  Peter denied it in front of them all.  ‘I do not know what you are talking about,’ he said.  He then went out to the gateway, where another girl, seeing him, said to the people there, ‘He was with Jesus of Nazareth.’  Once again he denied it, saying with an oath, ‘I do not know the man.’  Shortly afterwards the bystanders came up and said to Peter, ‘You must be one of them; your accent gives you away!’  At this he started to curse and declared with an oath: ‘I do not know the man.’  At that moment a cock crowed; and Peter remembered how Jesus had said, ‘Before the cock crows you will disown me three times,’ And he went outside, and wept bitterly.

When morning came, the chief priests and the elders of the nation all met together to plan the death of Jesus.  They bound him and led him away, to hand him over to Pilate, the Roman governor.

When Judas the traitor saw that Jesus had been condemned, he was seized with remorse, and returned the thirty silver pieces to the chief priests and elders.  ‘I have sinned,’ he said; ‘I have brought an innocent man to his death.’  But they said, ‘What is that to us?  It is your concern.’  So he threw the money down in the temple and left; he went away and hanged himself.

Acts 16: 16-34: Paul Prevents a Suicide

Once, on our way to the place of prayer, we met a slave-girl who was possessed by a spirit of divination and brought large profits to her owners by telling fortunes.  She followed Paul and the rest of us, shouting, ‘These men are servants of the Most High God, and are declaring to you a way of salvation.’  She did this day after day, until, in exasperation, Paul rounded on the spirit.  ‘I command you in the name of Jesus Christ to come out of her,’ he said, and it came out instantly.

When the girl’s owners saw that their hope of profit had gone, they seized Paul and Silas and dragged them to the city authorities in the main square; bringing them before the magistrates, they alleged, ‘These men are causing a disturbance in our city; they are Jews, and they are advocating practices which it is illegal for us Romans to adopt and follow.’  The mob joined in the attack; and the magistrates had the prisoners stripped and gave orders for them to be flogged.  After a severe beating they were flung into prison and the jailer was ordered to keep them under close guard.  In view of these orders, he put them into the inner prison and secured their feet in the stocks.

About midnight Paul and Silas, at their prayers, were singing praises to God, and the other prisoners were listening, when suddenly there was such a violent earthquake that the foundations of the jail were shaken; the doors burst open and all the prisoners found their fetters unfastened.  The jailer woke up to see the prison doors wide open and, assuming that the prisoners had escaped, drew his sword intending to kill himself.  But Paul shouted, ‘Do yourself no harm; we are all here.’  The jailer called for lights, rushed in, and threw himself down before Paul and Silas, trembling with fear.  He then escorted them out and said, Sirs, what must I do to be saved?’  They answered, ‘Put your trust in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved, you and your household,’ and they imparted the word of the Lord to him and to everyone in his house.  At that late hour of the night the jailer took them and washed their wounds, and there and then he and his whole family were baptized.  He brought them up into his house, set out a meal, and rejoiced with his whole household in his new-found faith in God.

1 Corinthians 3: 9-17: The Body as Temple

Or again, you are God’s building.  God gave me the privilege of laying the foundation like a skilled master builder; others put up the building.  Let each take care how he builds.  There can be no other foundation than the one already laid: I mean Jesus Christ himself.  If anyone builds on that foundation with gold, silver, and precious stones, or with wood, hay, and straw, the work that each does will at last be brought to light; the day of judgement will expose it.  For that day dawns in fire, and the fire will test the worth of each person’s work.  If anyone’s building survives, he will be rewarded; if it burns down, he will have to bear the loss; yet he will escape with his life, though only by passing through the fire.  Surely you know that you are God’s temple, where the Spirit of God dwells.  Anyone who destroys God’s temple will himself be destroyed by God, because the temple of God is holy; and you are that temple.

Philippians 1: 12-26: Paul in Prison: On the Desire to Die

My friends, I want you to understand that the progress of the gospel has actually been helped by what has happened to me.  It has become common knowledge throughout the imperial guard, and indeed among the public at large, that my imprisonment is in Christ’s cause; and my being in prison has given most of our fellow-Christians confidence to speak the word of God fearlessly and with extraordinary courage.

Some, it is true, proclaim Christ in a jealous and quarrelsome spirit, but some do it in goodwill.  These are moved by love, knowing that it is to defend the gospel that I am where I am; the others are moved by selfish ambition and present Christ from mixed motives, meaning to cause me distress as I lie in prison.  What does it matter?  One way or another, whether sincerely or not, Christ is proclaimed; and for that I rejoice.

Yes, and I shall go on rejoicing; for I know well that the issue will be my deliverance, because you are praying for me and the Spirit of Jesus Christ is given me for support.  It is my confident hope that nothing will daunt me or prevent me from speaking boldly; and that now as always Christ will display his greatness in me, whether the verdict be life or death.  For to me life is Christ, and death is gain.  If I am to go on living in the body there is fruitful work for me to do.  Which then am I to choose?  I cannot tell.  I am pulled two ways: my own desire is to depart and be with Christ—that is better by far; but for your sake the greater need is for me to remain in the body.  This convinces me: I am sure I shall remain, and stand by you all to ensure your progress and joy in the faith, so that on my account you may have even more cause for pride in Christ Jesus—through seeing me restored to you.

Comments Off on THE NEW TESTAMENT
(c. 50-c. 125)

Matthew: The Death of Jesus and the    Suicide of Judas
Acts: Paul Prevents a Suicide
I Corinthians: The Body as Temple
Philippians: Paul in Prison: On the    Desire to Die

Filed under Ancient History, Christianity, Middle East, New Testament, Selections

by | May 15, 2015 · 4:29 pm

IGNATIUS OF ANTIOCH
(c. 35/50-c. 107)

Epistle: To the Romans

 

Saint Ignatius of Antioch (also known as Ignatius Theophoros), one of the Apostolic Fathers believed to have been in contact with the Apostles or received instruction from their disciples, served as bishop of Antioch from the late 60s to the early 100s. Early traditions hold that he was converted to Christianity by the Apostle John and consecrated as bishop by Peter and Paul. The exact date of Ignatius’ birth is unknown, but it was probably about 35 A.D., perhaps as late as 50, in Syria; he became bishop of Antioch around the year 69. Little is known about Ignatius’ life except what can be distilled from the seven letters he wrote on his journey in captivity, between his arrest in Antioch and—though this is not certain—his arrival in Rome. When Ignatius reached Rome, according to tradition, he was martyred for the faith: he refused to allow the faithful to obtain his release and was killed by two ravenous lions in the Colosseum, who left in the bloody sand only a few of the larger bones. The dates given for his death range from 98 to 117, with 107 the most likely. Ignatius is revered not only in the Roman Catholic Church but also in the independent West Syrian Church centered in Damascus, and almost every patriarch in the latter since 1293 bears the surname Ignatius in his honor.

Ignatius’ letters—most of them given to fellow bishops for their churches—warn against heresy and urge Christian unity. In this letter to the Romans, one of the seven believed to be authentic rather than forged (as some clearly were) and his last letter from Smyrna, Ignatius argues against being saved from martyrdom, which he welcomes because, he believes, it will bring him into union with Jesus Christ. He foresees that his body will become as “God’s wheat”—ground by the teeth of wild beasts, a sacrifice to God. Ignatius stresses the voluntary nature of his death and his complete willingness to die.

Perhaps as much as any call to martyrdom in early Christianity, Ignatius’ evident eagerness for death among the lions can be seen by later readers as challenging the distinction between martyrdom and suicide. Ignatius does not say that he desires to die simpliciter, a wish that might be interpreted as suicidal but only that he would rather die and come to Christ more than anything else. He clearly does not seek death out of despair, something also often associated with suicide. But he does say that if the beasts do not attack him, he will “compel them” to do so—that is, incite or force (ἐγὼ προσβιάσομαι) the beasts to kill him. Indeed, he asks pardon for this. Ignatius’ expression thus raises the question of whether in this way he would be deliberately bringing about his own death, and what causal, as well as volitional, role he might play.

Source

Ignatius of Antioch, “The Epistle of Ignatius to the Romans,” short version, from Ante-Nicene Fathers,  ed. Philip Schaff, Vol I: The Apostolic Fathers, Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts and James Donaldson, Edinburgh, 1867, available online from the Christian Classic Ethereal Library, Calvin College.

 from EPISTLE: TO THE ROMANS

Ignatius, who is also called Theophorus, to the Church which has obtained mercy, through the majesty of the Most High Father, and Jesus Christ, His only-begotten Son; the Church which is beloved and enlightened by the will of Him that willeth all things which are according to the love of Jesus Christ our God, which also presides in the place of the report of the Romans, worthy of God, worthy of honour, worthy of the highest happiness, worthy of praise, worthy of obtaining her every desire, worthy of being deemed holy, and which presides over love, is named from Christ, and from the Father, which I also salute in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father: to those who are united, both according to the flesh and spirit, to every one of His commandments; who are filled inseparably with the grace of God, and are purified from every strange taint, [I wish] abundance of happiness unblameably, in Jesus Christ our God.

Through prayer to God I have obtained the privilege of seeing your most worthy faces, and have even been granted more than I requested; for I hope as a prisoner in Christ Jesus to salute you, if indeed it be the will of God that I be thought worthy of attaining unto the end. For the beginning has been well ordered, if I may obtain grace to cling to my lot without hindrance unto the end. For I am afraid of your love, lest it should do me an injury. For it is easy for you to accomplish what you please; but it is difficult for me to attain to God, if ye spare me.

For it is not my desire to act towards you as a man-pleaser, but as pleasing God, even as also ye please Him. For neither shall I ever have such [another] opportunity of attaining to God; nor will ye, if ye shall now be silent, ever be entitled to the honour of a better work. For if ye are silent concerning me, I shall become God’s; but if you show your love to my flesh, I shall again have to run my race. Pray, then, do not seek to confer any greater favour upon me than that I be sacrificed to God while the altar is still prepared; that, being gathered together in love, ye may sing praise to the Father, through Christ Jesus, that God has deemed me, the bishop of Syria, worthy to be sent for from the east unto the west. It is good to set from the world unto God, that I may rise again to Him.

Ye have never envied any one; ye have taught others. Now I desire that those things may be confirmed [by your conduct], which in your instructions ye enjoin [on others]. Only request in my behalf both inward and outward strength, that I may not only speak, but [truly] will; and that I may not merely be called a Christian, but really be found to be one. For if I be truly found [a Christian], I may also be called one, and be then deemed faithful, when I shall no longer appear to the world. Nothing visible is eternal. “For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.” For our God, Jesus Christ, now that He is with the Father, is all the more revealed [in His glory]. Christianity is not a thing of silence only, but also of [manifest] greatness.

I write to the Churches, and impress on them all, that I shall willingly die for God, unless ye hinder me. I beseech of you not to show an unseasonable good-will towards me. Suffer me to become food for the wild beasts, through whose instrumentality it will be granted me to attain to God. I am the wheat of God, and let me be ground by the teeth of the wild beasts, that I may be found the pure bread of Christ. Rather entice the wild beasts, that they may become my tomb, and may leave nothing of my body; so that when I have fallen asleep [in death], I may be no trouble to any one. Then shall I truly be a disciple of Christ, when the world shall not see so much as my body. Entreat Christ for me, that by these instruments I may be found a sacrifice [to God]. I do not, as Peter and Paul, issue commandments unto you. They were apostles; I am but a condemned man: they were free, while I am, even until now, a servant. But when I suffer, I shall be the freed-man of Jesus, and shall rise again emancipated in Him. And now, being a prisoner, I learn not to desire anything worldly or vain.

From Syria even unto Rome I fight with beasts, both by land and sea, both by night and day, being bound to ten leopards, I mean a band of soldiers, who, even when they receive benefits, show themselves all the worse. But I am the more instructed by their injuries [to act as a disciple of Christ]; “yet am I not thereby justified.” May I enjoy the wild beasts that are prepared for me; and I pray they may be found eager to rush upon me, which also I will entice to devour me speedily, and not deal with me as with some, whom, out of fear, they have not touched. But if they be unwilling to assail me, I will compel them to do so. Pardon me [in this]: I know what is for my benefit. Now I begin to be a disciple. And let no one, of things visible or invisible, envy me that I should attain to Jesus Christ. Let fire and the cross; let the crowds of wild beasts; let tearings, breakings, and dislocations of bones; let cutting off of members; let shatterings of the whole body; and let all the dreadful torments of the devil come upon me: only let me attain to Jesus Christ.

All the pleasures of the world, and all the kingdoms of this earth, shall profit me nothing. It is better for me to die in behalf of Jesus Christ, than to reign over all the ends of the earth. “For what shall a man be profited, if he gain the whole world, but lose his own soul? ” Him I seek, who died for us: Him I desire, who rose again for our sake. This is the gain which is laid up for me. Pardon me, brethren: do not hinder me from living, do not wish to keep me in a state of death; and while I desire to belong to God, do not ye give me over to the world. Suffer me to obtain pure light: when I have gone thither, I shall indeed be a man of God. Permit me to be an imitator of the passion of my God. If any one has Him within himself, let him consider what I desire, and let him have sympathy with me, as knowing how I am straitened.

The prince of this world would fain carry me away, and corrupt my disposition towards God. Let none of you, therefore, who are [in Rome] help him; rather be ye on my side, that is, on the side of God. Do not speak of Jesus Christ, and yet set your desires on the world. Let not envy find a dwelling-place among you; nor even should I, when present with you, exhort you to it, be ye persuaded to listen to me, but rather give credit to those things which I now write to you. For though I am alive while I write to you, yet I am eager to die. My love has been crucified, and there is no fire in me desiring to be fed; but there is within me a water that liveth and speaketh, saying to me inwardly, Come to the Father. I have no delight in corruptible food, nor in the pleasures of this life. I desire the bread of God, the heavenly bread, the bread of life, which is the flesh of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who became afterwards of the seed of David and Abraham; and I desire the drink of God, namely His blood, which is incorruptible love and eternal life.

I no longer wish to live after the manner of men, and my desire shall be fulfilled if ye consent. Be ye willing, then, that ye also may have your desires fulfilled. I entreat you in this brief letter; do ye give credit to me. Jesus Christ will reveal these things to you, [so that ye shall know] that I speak truly. He is the mouth altogether free from falsehood, by which the Father has truly spoken. Pray ye for me, that I may attain [the object of my desire]. I have not written to you according to the flesh, but according to the will of God. If I shall suffer, ye have wished [well] to me; but if I am rejected, ye have hated me.

Remember in your prayers the Church in Syria, which now has God for its shepherd, instead of me. Jesus Christ alone will oversee it, and your love [will also regard it]. But as for me, I am ashamed to be counted one of them; for indeed I am not worthy, as being the very last of them, and one born out of due time. But I have obtained mercy to be somebody, if I shall attain to God. My spirit salutes you, and the love of the Churches that have received me in the name of Jesus Christ, and not as a mere passer-by. For even those Churches which were not near to me in the way, I mean according to the flesh, have gone before me, city by city, [to meet me.]

Now I write these things to you from Smyrna by the Ephesians, who are deservedly most happy. There is also with me, along with many others, Crocus, one dearly beloved by me. As to those who have gone before me from Syria to Rome for the glory of God, I believe that you are acquainted with them; to whom, [then, ] do ye make known that I am at hand. For they are all worthy, both of God and of you; and it is becoming that you should refresh them in all things. I have written these things unto you, on the day before the ninth of the Kalends of September (that is, on the twenty-third day of August). Fare ye well to the end, in the patience of Jesus Christ. Amen.

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Epistle: To the Romans

Filed under Ancient History, Christianity, Ignatius of Antioch, Martyrdom, Middle East, Selections

by | May 8, 2015 · 5:38 pm

THE HEBREW BIBLE AND APOCRYPHA
(c. 12th-1st centuries B.C.)

Genesis: The Prohibition of Bloodshed
Exodus: The Ten Commandments
Judges: Samson and the Philistines
I Samuel-II Samuel: Saul and his    Armor-Bearer
Job: The Sufferings of Job
Daniel: Shadrach, Meschach, Abednego    and the Fiery Furnace
II Maccabees: The Suicide of Razis

 

The collection of texts originating among the Hebrews of the first millennium B.C., the Hebrew Bible, generally referred to as the Tanakh by Jews and as the Old Testament by Christians, is a compilation recognized as scriptural in both traditions. It is complex in textual history. Written in classical Hebrew (except for some brief portions in a cognate language, Aramaic), it includes material believed to have been transmitted orally, as well as in written form, spanning over a thousand years of history from the 12th through the 1st century B.C.. No original manuscripts from the earliest period have survived, though the Qumran manuscripts of some sections, known as the Dead Sea Scrolls, date from as early as the 1st century B.C. After the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D., Jewish religious leaders compiled a comprehensive text from those manuscripts that survived the destruction; the earliest surviving manuscripts of this Bible date from the 9th century A.D..

The oldest sections of the Hebrew Bible, the “five books of Moses” or Pentateuch, comprising the Torah in the strict sense, are the five books from Genesis through Deuteronomy. These books, from which the first two selections here are taken, provide among other things the Hebrews’ origin accounts. The Deuteronomic histories (the books of Joshua, Judges, Samuel, and Kings), which chronicle Hebrew history, are the source of the second two selections. A selection is also included from the Book of Job, framed around a central poetic dialogue, probably written around the time of the Persian Conquest and the Jewish Exile of the 6th century B.C. Also included is a passage from one of the Apocrypha: II Maccabees. The Apocrypha are books and portions of books written in Hebrew or Greek in the second and first centuries B.C., ultimately rejected as canonical by later Jewish authorities but preserved in Christian textual collections and whose inclusion in the Old Testament canon was disputed by Christian thinkers. While II Maccabees is not recognized as part of the Hebrew Bible by Jews or as part of the Old Testament by Protestant Christians, it is recognized as scriptural and part of the Old Testament by Catholics and Orthodox Christians. 

Within the older material of the Hebrew Bible, or Old Testament, two kinds of text bear on the issue of suicide: statements or imperatives held to define the morality of suicide, and accounts of specific instances of suicide. Of the first kind are Genesis 9:5, “for your lifeblood I will demand satisfaction,” now often said to be the basis on which Judaism’s prohibition of suicide is grounded, and Exodus 20:13, “thou shalt not kill” (or, in the New English Bible translation used here, “Do not commit murder”), the principal basis of Christianity’s prohibition. Christian authors do not typically appeal to Genesis 9:5 as the basis of the prohibition, nor do Jewish authors typically appeal to Exodus 20:13, though both texts are scriptural for both traditions. Of the second kind are the six instances of suicide narrated in the Hebrew Bible proper, as well as two in the Apocrypha: Abimelech (Judges 9:54); Samson (Judges 16:23-32); Saul and his armor bearer (the story runs continuously from I Samuel 31:4 through II Samuel 1:6, and is also related in I Chronicles 10:4); Ahithophel (II Samuel 17:23); Zimri (I Kings 16:18); Razis (II Maccabees 14:41); and Ptolemy Macron (II Maccabees 10:13). These narratives neither moralize about suicide nor express any explicit prohibition of self-killing. Job provides a negative instance of suicide, in which it is not undertaken despite a strong wish for death and a wife’s urging, and the Book of Daniel’s account of Shadrach, Meschach, and Abednego as they are thrown into the fiery furnace has served in the Jewish tradition as a paradigm of martyrdom to avoid apostasy (generally distinguished from suicide).

These texts pose numerous interpretive challenges. The plain meaning of the selection from Genesis does not explicitly address suicide per se. The explanation of how it has come to serve as the basis of Judaism’s prohibition of suicide involves what Noam Zohar calls “creative midrashic interpretation—so grammatically fantastic (as is not unusual in midrash) as to hardly merit being called an ‘interpretation’ at all.” Daniel Greenwood, in contrast, disagrees that there is a syntactical problem. But both agree on the conceptual implications: Genesis 9:5 eloquently expresses a basic valuation of human life, easily extended to a new context. As Zohar says, its “proclaim[ation of] the sanctity of human life, created in God’s image, and the consequent view of its destruction as amounting to sacrilege . . . provides (far more clearly than a turn of phrase in verse 9:5) the basis for the later midrashic interpretation as prohibiting suicide. . . .” The later interpretation applying the verse to suicide is to be found in Genesis Rabbah [q.v.] and in subsequent texts, including Tosafot [q.v.].

The story of Samson in Judges 16, which may seem to have implications for contemporary discussions of tactical suicide in military and quasi-military situations for subject peoples, is notable for its reference to intention. Samson asks for (and apparently receives) God’s assistance in destroying over 3,000 people and killing himself in the process. As in other military cultures, it is unclear whether Samson’s own death, whether seen as revenge for his blinding or as self-sacrifice in the cause of military success, is to be classified as a form of suicide.

1 Samuel 31:3 and the beginning of II Samuel present a substantial textual challenge: the phrase rendered here describing Saul as “wounded severely” can also be translated, and perhaps more plausibly, as holding that Saul was “very afraid of the archers.” How the passage is translated and how the alternative versions are understood make substantial differences in whether Saul’s suicide, or request for euthanasia, the coup de grâce, is to be understood as preemptive, as the hastening of a dying process already underway, as an act of cowardice, or—as David appears to think—murder, indeed regicide.

In the Book of Job—its inquisition modeled, some commentators hold, on the Persian secret service of the post-Conquest period—God permits “the Adversary,” Satan, to test Job’s renowned piety by imposing hardships on him. Job has had an ample family, extensive property, and good fortune and repute; and so, Satan argues, faith may be easy. With the permission of God, Satan inflicts a series of calamities on Job: his family dies, he loses his property, and he suffers painful physical ailments. The text is excerpted here to highlight not so much Job’s remonstration with God, the usual focus of readings of the text, but the strength of Job’s wish for death. In later commentaries, Job stands as the preeminent scriptural figure of endurance: Despite his wish for death as a relief from his unbearable afflictions, and even in spite of his wife’s suggestion that he curse God and thereby bring about his own death, he does not kill himself.

The selection from the Book of Daniel relates the story of Chananyah, Mishael, and Azaryah, who have been given the foreign names Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego; it describes how they are thrown into a fiery furnace for refusing to worship Nebuchadnezzar’s idol. Even though they are miraculously saved in the end, their willingness to die rather than commit apostasy serves as a paradigm of martyrdom for much of later Judaism.

The final selection, recounting the suicide of the Jewish patriot Razis, is taken from the Apocryphal text II Maccabees. This text, said to be an abridgment of a longer historical work by Jason of Cyrene written in Greek that is no longer extant, narrates resistance under the leadership of the priest Matthias and his son Judas Maccabaeus to Hellenization by the Seleucid rulers of Palestine, and the forced introduction of idols and other forms of worship to Judea in general and the Jerusalem temple in particular. The rebellion succeeded, culminating in the rededication of the Temple in 164 B.C.. Significant in this episode is Razis’s desire, as he faces capture by the enemy, to “die nobly” in otherwise humiliating circumstances, both echoing the legacy of Saul and showing the influence of Roman Stoicism.

Sources

Genesis 9:1-6; Exodus 20:1-22; Judges 15:9-16:31; I Samuel 31:1-II Samuel 1:16; Job 1:1-4:17, 5:6-5:9, 5:17-5:18, 6:1-7:21, 9:32-10:22, 27:1-6, 36:1-12, 37:14-16, 37:19-38:18, 42:1-6; II Maccabees 14:37, The Oxford Study Bible: Revised English Bible with the Apocrypha, eds. M. Jack Suggs, Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, and James R. Mueller,  New York: Oxford University Press, 1992, pp. 18, 82-83, 264-266; 310-311; 510-517, 519-520, 534, 543-546, 549-550, 1255-1256. The Book of Daniel, The New English Bible, with the Apocrypha, Oxford Study Edition, ed. Samuel Sandmel, New York:  Oxford University Press, 1976, pp. 945-950.  Quotations in introduction from Noam Zohar and Daniel J.H. Greenwood.

 

 from THE HEBREW BIBLE/THE OLD TESTAMENT

 

GENESIS

The Prohibition of Bloodshed

God blessed Noah and his sons; he said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in numbers, and fill the earth.  Fear and dread of you will come on all the animals on earth, on all the birds of the air, on everything that moves on the ground, and on all fish in the sea; they are made subject to you.  Every creature that lives and moves will be food for you; I give them all to you, as I have given you every green plant.  But you must never eat flesh with its life still in it, that is the blood.

And further, for your life-blood I shall demand satisfaction; from every animal I shall require it, and from human beings also I shall require satisfaction for the death of their fellows.

‘Anyone who sheds human blood,
for that human being his blood will be shed;
because in the image of God
has God made human beings.’

 

EXODUS

The Ten Commandments

God spoke all these words: I am the LORD your God who brought you out of Egypt, out of the land of slavery.

You must have no other God besides me.

You must not make a carved image for yourself, not the likeness of anything in the heavens above, or on the earth below, or in the waters under the earth.

You must not bow down to them in worship; for I, the LORD your God, am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sins of the parents to the third and fourth generation of those who reject me. But I keep faith with thousands, those who love me and keep my commandments.

You must not make wrong use of the name of the LORD your God; the LORD will not leave unpunished anyone who misuses his name.

Remember to keep the Sabbath day holy.  You have six days to labour and do all your work; but the seventh day is a Sabbath of the LORD your God; that day you must not do any work, neither you, nor your son or your daughter, your slave or your slave-girl, your cattle, or the alien residing among you; for in six days the LORD made the heavens and the earth, the sea, and all that is in them, and on the seventh day he rested.  Therefore the LORD blessed the Sabbath day and declared it holy.

Honour your father and your mother, so that you may enjoy long life in the land which the LORD your God is giving you.

Do not commit murder.
Do not commit adultery.
Do not steal.
Do not give false evidence against your neighbour.
Do not covet your neighbour’s household: you must not covet you neighbour’s wife, his slave, his slave-girl, his ox, his donkey, or anything that belongs to him.

When all the people saw how it thundered and the lightning flashed, when they heard the trumpet sound and saw the mountain in smoke, they were afraid and trembled.  They stood at a distance and said to Moses, ‘Speak to us yourself and we will listen; but do not let God speak to us or we shall die.’

Moses answered, ‘Do not be afraid.  God has come only to test you, so that the fear of him may remain with you and preserve you from sinning.’  So the people kept their distance, while Moses approached the dark cloud where God was.

The LORD said to Moses, Say this to the Israelites: You know now that I have spoken from heaven to you.

 

JUDGES

Samson and the Philistines

. . . Samson fell in love with a woman named Delilah, who lived by the wadi of Sorek.  The lords of the Philistines went up to her and said, ‘Cajole him and find out what gives him his great strength, and how we can overpower and bind him and render him helpless.  We shall each give you eleven hundred pieces of silver.’

Delilah said to Samson, ‘Tell me, what gives you your great strength?  How could you be bound and made helpless?’  ‘If I were bound with seven fresh bowstrings not yet dry,’ replied Samson, ‘then I should become no stronger than any other man.’  The lords of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings not yet dry, and she bound him with them.  She had men concealed in the inner room, and she cried, ‘Samson, the Philistines are upon you!’  Thereupon he snapped the bowstrings as a strand of tow snaps at the touch of fire, and his strength was not impaired.

Delilah said to Samson, ‘You have made a fool of me and lied to me.  Now tell me this time how you can be bound.’  He said to her, ‘If I were tightly bound with new ropes that have never been used, then I should become no stronger than any other man.’

Delilah took new ropes and bound him with them.  Then, with men concealed in the inner room, she cried, ‘Samson, the Philistines are upon you!’  But he snapped the ropes off his arms like thread.

Delilah said to him, ‘You are still making a fool of me, still lying to me.  Tell me: how can you be bound?’  He said, ‘Take the seven loose locks of my hair, weave them into the warp, and drive them tight with the beater; then I shall become no stronger than any other man.’  So she lulled him to sleep, wove the seven loose locks of his hair into the warp, drove them tight with the beater, and cried, ‘Samson, the Philistines are upon you!’  He woke from sleep and pulled away the warp and the loom with it.

She said to him, ‘How can you say you love me when you do not confide in me?  This is the third time you have made a fool of me and have not told me what gives you your great strength.’  She so pestered him with these words day after day, pressing him hard and wearying him to death, that he told her the whole secret.  ‘No razor has touched my head,’ he said, ‘because I am a Nazirite, consecrated to God from the day of my birth.  If my head were shaved, then my strength would leave me, and I should become no stronger than any other man.’

Delilah realized that he had told her his secret, and she sent word to the lords of the Philistines: ‘Come up at once,’ she said; ‘he has told me his secret.’  The lords of the Philistines came, bringing the money with them.

She lulled Samson to sleep on her lap, and then summoned a man to shave the seven locks of his hair.  She was now making him helpless.  When his strength had left him, she cried, ‘Samson, the Philistines are upon you!’  He woke from his sleep and thought, ‘I will go out as usual and shake myself’; he did not know that the Lord had left him.  Then the Philistines seized him, gouged out his eyes, and brought him down toGaza. There they bound him with bronze fetters, and he was set to grinding grain in the prison.  But his hair, after it had been shaved, began to grow again.

The lords of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice to their god Dagon, and to rejoice and say, ‘Our god has delivered into our hands Samson our enemy.’

The people, when they saw him, praised their god, chanting: ‘Our god has delivered our enemy into our hands, the scourge of our land who piled it with our dead.’

When they grew merry, they said, ‘Call Samson, and let him entertain us.’  When Samson was summoned from prison, he was a source of entertainment to them.  They then stood him between the pillars, and Samson said to the boy who led him by the hand, ‘Put me where I can feel the pillars which support the temple, so that I may lean against them.’  The temple was full of men and women, and all the lords of the Philistines were there, and there were about three thousand men and women on the roof watching the entertainment.

Samson cried to the Lord and said, ‘Remember me, Lord God, remember me: for this one occasion, God, give me strength, and let me at one stroke be avenged on the Philistines for my two eyes.’  He put his arms round the two central pillars which supported the temple, his right arm round one and his left round the other and, bracing himself, he said, ‘Let me die with the Philistines.’  Then Samson leaned forward with all his might, and the temple crashed down on the lords and all the people who were in it.  So the dead whom he killed at his death were more than those he had killed in his life.

 

I SAMUEL—II SAMUEL

Saul and his Armor-Bearer

The Philistines engaged Israel in battle, and the Israelites were routed, leaving their dead on Mount Gilboa.  The Philistines closely pursued Saul and his sons, and Jonathan, Adinadab, and Malchishua, the sons of Saul, were killed.  The battle went hard for Saul, and when the archers caught up with him they wounded him severely.  He said to his armour-bearer, ‘Draw your sword and run me through, so that these uncircumcised brutes may not come and taunt me and make sport of me.’  But the armour-bearer refused; he dared not do it.  Thereupon Saul took his own sword and fell on it.  When the armour-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he too fell on his sword and died with him.  So they died together on that day, Saul, his three sons, and his armour-bearer, as well as all his men.  When the Israelites in the neighborhood of the valley and of the Jordan saw that the other Israelites had fled and that Saul and his sons had perished, they fled likewise, abandoning their towns; and the Philistines moved in and occupied them.

Next day, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, they found Saul and his three sons lying dead on Mount Gilboa.  They cut off his head and stripped him of his armour; then they sent messengers through the length and breadth of their land to carry the good news to idols and people alike.  They deposited his armour in the temple of Ashtorethand nailed his body on the wall of Beth-shan.  When the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead heard what the Philistines had done to Saul, all the warriors among them set out and journeyed through the night to recover the bodies of Saul and his sons from the wall of Beth-shan.  They brought them back to Jabesh and burned them; they took the bones and buried them under the tamarisk tree in Jabesh, and for seven days they fasted.

AFTER Saul’s death David returned from his victory over the Amalekites and spent two days in Ziklag.  On the third day a man came from Saul’s camp; his clothes were torn and there was dust on his head.  Coming into David’s presence he fell to the ground and did obeisance.  David asked him where he had come from, and he replied, ‘I have escaped from the Israelite camp.’  David said, ‘What is the news?  Tell me.’  ‘The army has been driven from the field,’ he answered, ‘many have fallen in battle, and Saul and Jonathan his son are dead.’  David said to the young man who brought the news, ‘How do you know that Saul and Jonathan are dead?’  He answered, ‘It so happened that I was onMountGilboaand saw Saul leaning on his spear with the chariots and horsemen closing in on him.  He turned and, seeing me, called to me.  I said, “What is it, sir?”  He asked me who I was, and I said, “An Amalekite.”  He said to me, “Come and stand over me and dispatch me.  I still live, but the throes of death have seized me.”  So I stood over him and dealt him the death blow, for I knew that, stricken as he was, he could not live.  Then I took the crown from his head and the armlet from his arm, and I have brought them here to you, my lord.’  At that David and all the men with him took hold of their clothes and tore them.  They mourned and wept, and they fasted till evening because Saul and Jonathan his son and the army of the Lord and the house of Israel had fallen in battle.

David said to the young man who brought him the news. ‘Where do you come from?’  and he answered, ‘I am the son of an alien, an Amalekite.’  ‘How is it’, said David, ‘that you were not afraid to raise your hand to kill the Lord’s anointed?’  Summoning one of his own young men he ordered him to fall upon the Amalekite.  The young man struck him down and he died.  David said, ‘Your blood be on your own head; for out of your own mouth you condemned yourself by saying, “I killed the LORD’s anointed.”’

 

THE BOOK OF JOB

The Sufferings of Job

THERE lived in the land of Uz a man of blameless and upright life named Job, who feared God and set his face against wrongdoing.  He had seven sons and three daughters; and he owned seven thousand sheep, three thousand camels, five hundred yoke of oxen, and five hundred she-donkeys, together with a large number of slaves.  Thus Job was the greatest man in all the East.

His sons used to meet together and give, each in turn, a banquet in his own house, and they would send and invite their three sisters to eat and drink with them.  Then, when a round of banquets was over, Job would send for his children and sanctify them, rising early in the morning and sacrificing a whole offering for each of them; for he thought that they might somehow have sinned against God and committed blasphemy in their hearts.  This Job did regularly.

The day came when the members of the court of heaven took their places in the presence of the LORD, and the Adversary, Satan, was there among them.  The LORD asked him where he had been.  ‘Ranging over the earth’, said the Adversary, ‘from end to end.’

The LORD asked him, ‘Have you considered my servant Job? You will find no one like him on earth, a man of blameless and upright life, who fears God and sets his face against wrongdoing.’ ‘Has not Job good reason to be godfearing?’ answered the Adversary.

‘Have you not hedged him round on every side with your protection, him and his family and all his possessions?  Whatever he does you bless, and everywhere his herds have increased beyond measure.  But just stretch out your hand and touch all that he has, and see if he will not curse you to your face.’

‘Very well,’ said the LORD.  ‘All that he has is in your power; only the man himself you must not touch.’  With that the Adversary left the LORD’s presence.

On the day when Job’s sons and daughters were eating and drinking in the eldest brother’s house, a messenger came to Job and said, ‘The oxen were ploughing and the donkeys were grazing near them, when the Sabaeans swooped down and carried them off, after putting the herdsmen to the sword; only I have escaped to bring you the news.’

While he was still speaking, another messenger arrived and said, ‘God’s fire flashed from heaven, striking the sheep and the shepherds and burning them up; only I have escaped to bring you the news.’  While he was still speaking, another arrived and said, ‘The Chaldaeans, three bands of them, have made a raid on the camels and carried them off, after putting those tending them to the sword; only I have escaped to bring you the news.’  While this man was speaking, yet another arrived and said, ‘Your sons and daughters were eating and drinking in their eldest brother’s house, when suddenly a whirlwind swept across from the desert and struck the four corners of the house, which fell on the young people.  They are dead, and only I have escaped to bring you the news.’

At this Job stood up, tore his cloak, shaved his head, and threw himself prostrate on the ground, saying:

‘Naked I came from the womb,
naked I shall return whence I came.
The LORD gives and the LORD takes away;
blessed be the name of the LORD.’

Throughout all this Job did not sin, nor did he ascribe any fault to God.

Once again the day came when the members of the court of heaven took their places in the presence of the LORD, and the Adversary was there among them. The LORD enquired where he had been. ‘Ranging over the earth’, said the Adversary, ‘from end to end.’  The LORD asked, ‘Have you considered my servant Job?  You will find no one like him on earth, a man of blameless and upright life, who fears God and sets his face against wrongdoing.  You incited me to ruin him without cause, but he still holds fast to his integrity.’  The Adversary replied, ‘Skin for skin!  To save himself there is nothing a man will withhold.  But just reach out your hand and touch his bones and his flesh, and see if he will not curse you to your face.’  The LORD said to the Adversary, ‘So be it. He is in your power; only spare his life.’

When the Adversary left the LORD’s presence, he afflicted Job with running sores from the soles of his feet to the crown of his head, and Job took a piece of a broken pot to scratch himself as he sat among the ashes.  His wife said to him, ‘Why do you still hold fast to your integrity?  Curse God, and die!’

He answered, ‘You talk as any impious woman might talk.  If we accept good from God, shall we not accept evil?’  Throughout all this, Job did not utter one sinful word.

When Job’s three friends, Eliphaz of Teman, Bildad of Shuah, and Zophar of Naamah, heard of all these calamities which had overtaken him, they set out from their homes, arranging to go and condole with him and comfort him. But when they first saw him from a distance, they did not recognize him; they wept aloud, tore their cloaks, and tossed dust into the air over their heads.

For seven days and seven nights they sat beside him on the ground, and none of them spoke a word to him, for they saw that his suffering was very great.

Job’s complaint to God

AFTER this Job broke his silence and cursed the day of his birth:

Perish the day when I was born, and the night which said, ‘A boy is conceived’!
May that day turn to darkness;
may God above not look for it,
nor light of dawn shine on it.
May gloom and deep darkness claim it again;
May cloud smother that day, blackness eclipse its sun.

May blind darkness swallow up that night!
May it not be counted among the days of the year
or reckoned in the cycle of the months.
May that night be barren for ever,
may no cry of joy be heard in it.
Let it be cursed by those whose spells bind the sea monster,
who have the skill to tame Leviathan.
May no star shine out in its twilight;
may it wait for a dawn that never breaks,
and never see the eyelids of the morning,
because it did not shut the doors of the womb that bore me
and keep trouble away from my sight.

Why was I not stillborn,
Why did I not perish when I came from the womb?
Why was I ever laid on my mother’s Knees
or put to suck at her breasts?
Or why was I not concealed like an untimely birth,
like an infant who never saw the light?
For now I should be lying in the quiet grave,
asleep in death, at rest
with kings and their earthly counselors
who built for themselves cities now laid waste,
or with princes rich in gold
whose houses were replete with silver.

There the wicked chafe no more,
there the tired labourer takes his ease;
the captive too finds peace there,
no slave-driver’s voice reaches him;
high and low alike are there,
even the slave, free from his master.

Why should the sufferer be born to see the light?
Why is life given to those who find it so bitter?
They long for death but it does not come,
they seek it more eagerly than hidden treasure.
They are glad when they reach the grave;
when they come to the tomb they exult.
Why should a man be born to wander blindly,
hedged about by God on every side?

Sighing is for me all my food;
groans pour from me in a torrent.
Every terror that haunted me has caught up with me.
There is no peace of mind, no quiet for me;
trouble comes, and I have no rest. . . .

. . . Does not every mortal have hard service on earth,
and are not his days like those of a hired labourer,
like those of a slave longing for the shade
or a servant kept waiting for his wages?
So months of futility are my portion,
troubled nights are my lot.
When I lie down, I think,
‘When will it be day, that I may rise?’
But the night drags on,
and I do nothing but toss till dawn.
My body is infested with worms,
and scabs cover my skin;
it is cracked and discharging.
My days pass more swiftly than a weaver’s shuttle
and come to an end as the thread of life runs out.

Remember that my life is but a breath of wind;
I shall never again see good times.
The eye that now sees me will behold me no more;
under your very eyes I shall vanish.
As a cloud breaks up and disperses,
so no one who goes down to Sheol ever comes back;
he never returns to his house,
and his abode knows him no more.

But I cannot hold my peace;
I shall speak out in my anguish of spirit
and complain in my bitterness of soul.

Am I the monster of the deep, am I the sea serpent,
that you set a watch over me?
When I think that my bed will comfort me,
that sleep will receive my complaint,
you terrify me with dreams
and affright me through visions.
I would rather be choked outright;
death would be better than these sufferings of mine.
I am in despair, I have no desire to live;
let me alone, for my days are but a breath.
What is man, that you make much of him
and turn your thoughts towards him,
only to punish him morning after morning
or to test him every hour of the day?
Will you not look away from me for an instant,
leave me long enough to swallow my spittle?
If I have sinned, what harm can I do you,
you watcher of the human heart?
Why have you made me your target?
Why have I become a burden to you?
Why do you not pardon my offence
and take away my guilt?
For soon I shall lie in the dust of the grave;
you may seek me, but I shall be no more.

God is not as I am, not someone I can challenge,
and say, ‘Let us confront one another in court.’
If only there were one to arbitrate between us
and impose his authority on us both,
so that God might take his rod from my back,
and terror of him might not come on me suddenly.
I should then speak out without fear of him,
for I know I am not what I am thought to be.

I am sickened of life . . .
***
You granted me life and continuing favour,
and your providence watched over my spirit.
Yet this was the secret purpose of your heart,
and I know what was your intent:
that, if I sinned, you would be watching me
and would not absolve me of my guilt.
If indeed I am wicked, all the worse for me!
If I am upright, I cannot hold up my head;
I am filled with shame and steeped in my affliction.
If I am proud as a lion, you hunt me down
and confront me again with marvelous power;
you renew your onslaught on me,
and with mounting anger against me
bring fresh forces to the attack.

Why did you bring me out of the womb?
Better if I had expired and no one had set eyes on me,
if I had been carried from womb to grave
and were as though I had not been born.
Is not my life short and fleeting?
Let me be, that I may be happy for a moment,
before I depart to a land of gloom,
a land of deepest darkness, never to return,
a land of dense darkness and disorder,
increasing darkness lit by no ray of light.

Then Job resumed his discourse

I swear by the living God, who has denied me justice,
by the Almighty, who has filled me with bitterness,
that so long as there is any life left in me
and the breath of God is in my nostrils,
no untrue word will pass my lips,
nor will my tongue utter any falsehood.
Far be it from me to concede that you are right!
Till I cease to be, I shall not abandon my claim of innocence.
I maintain and shall never give up the rightness of my cause;
so long as I live, I shall not change.

God’s answer and Job’s submission

THEN the LORD answered Job out of the tempest:

Who is this who darkens counsel
with words devoid of knowledge?
Brace yourself and stand up like a man;
I shall put questions to you, and you must answer.
Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundations?
Tell me, if you know and understand.
Who fixed its dimensions? Surely you know!
Who stretched a measuring line over it?
On what do its supporting pillars rest?
Who set its corner-stone in place,
while the morning stars sang in chorus
and the sons of God all shouted for joy?. . .

Who supported the sea at its birth,
when it burst in flood from the womb—
when I wrapped it in a blanket of cloud
and swaddled it in dense fog,
when I established its bounds,
set its barred doors in place,
and said, ‘Thus far may you come but no farther;
here your surging waves must halt’?

In all your life have you ever called up the dawn
or assigned the morning its place?
Have you taught it to grasp the fringes of the earth
and shake the Dog-star from the sky;
to bring up the horizon in relief as clay under a seal,
until all things stand out like the folds of a cloak,
when the light of the Dog-star is dimmed
and the stars of the Navigator’s Line go out one by one?

Have you gone down to the springs of the sea
or walked in the unfathomable deep?
Have the portals of death been revealed to you?
Have you seen the door-keepers of the place of darkness?
Have you comprehended the vast expanse on the world?
Tell me all this, if you know.

Job answered the LORD

I know that you can do all things
and that no purpose is beyond you.
You ask: Who is this obscuring counsel yet lacking knowledge?
But I have spoken of things
which I have not understood,
things too wonderful for me to know.
Listen, and let me speak. You said:
I shall put questions to you, and you must answer.
I knew of you then only by report,
but now I see you with my own eyes.
Therefore I yield,
repenting in dust and ashes.

Epilogue

WHEN the LORD had finished speaking to Job, he said to Eliphaz the Temanite, ‘My anger is aroused against you and your two friends, because, unlike my servant Job, you have not spoken as you ought about me.

Now take seven bulls and seven rams, go to my servant Job and offer a whole-offering for yourselves, and he will intercede for you.  I shall surely show him favour by not being harsh with you because you have not spoken as you ought about me, as he has done.’

Then Eliphaz the Temanite and Bildad the Shuhite and Zophar the Naamathite went and carried out the Lord’s command, and the Lord showed favour to Job when he had interceded for his friends.

The LORD restored Job’s fortunes, and gave him twice the possessions he had before . . . Job lived another hundred and forty years; he saw his sons and his grandsons to four generations, and he died at a very great age.

 

DANIEL

Shadrach, Meschach, Abednego and the Fiery Furnace

In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah, Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon came to Jerusalem and laid siege to it.  The LORD delivered Jehoiakim king of Judah into his power, together with all that was left of the vessels of the house of God; and he carried them off to the land of Shinar, to the temple of his god, where he deposited the vessels in the treasury.  Then the king ordered Ashpenaz, his chief eunuch, to take certain of the Israelite exiles, of the blood royal and of the nobility, who were to be young men of good looks and bodily without fault, at home in all branches of knowledge, well-informed, intelligent, and fit for service in the royal court; and he was to instruct them in the literature and language of the Chaldaeans.  The king assigned them a daily allowance of food and wine from the royal table.  Their training was to last for three years, and at the end of that time they would enter the royal service.

Among them there were certain young men from Judah called Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah; but the master of the eunuchs gave them new names: Daniel he called Belteshazzar, Hananiah Shadrach, Mishael Meshach and Azariah Abednego.  Now Daniel determined not to contaminate himself by touching the food and wine assigned to him by the king, and he begged the master of the eunuchs not to make him do so.  God made the master show kindness and goodwill to Daniel, and he said to him, ‘I am afraid of my lord the king: he has assigned you your food and drink, and if he sees you looking dejected, unlike the other young men of your own age, it will cost me my head.’  Then Daniel said to the guard whom the master of the eunuchs had put in charge of Hananiah, Mishael, Azariah and himself, ‘Submit us to this test for ten days.  Give us only vegetables to eat and water to drink; then compare our looks with those of the young men who have lived on the food assigned by the king, and be guided in your treatment of us by what you see.’  The guard listened to what they said and tested them for ten days.  At the end of ten days they looked healthier and were better nourished than all the young men who had lived on the food assigned them by the king.  So the guard took away the assignment of food and the wine they were to drink, and gave them only the vegetables.

To all four of these young men God had given knowledge and understanding of books and learning of every kind, while Daniel had a gift for interpreting visions and dreams of every kind.  The time came which the king had fixed for introducing the young men to court, and the master of the eunuchs brought them into the presence of Nebuchadnezzar.  The king talked with them and found none of them to compare with Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah; so they entered the royal service.  Whenever the king consulted them on any matter calling for insight and judgement, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and exorcists in his whole kingdom.  Now Daniel was there till the first year of King Cyrus.

In the second year of his reign Nebuchadnezzar had dreams, and his mind was so troubled that he could not sleep.  Then the king gave orders to summon the magicians, exorcists, sorcerers, and Chaldaeans to tell him what he had dreamt.  They came in and stood in the royal presence, and the king said to them, ‘I have had a dream and my mind has been troubled to know what my dream was.’  The Chaldaeans, speaking in Aramaic, said, ‘Long live the king!  Tell us what you dreamt and we will tell you the interpretation.’  The king answered.  ‘This is my declared intention.  If you do not tell me both dream and interpretation, you shall be torn in pieces and your houses shall be forfeit.  But if you can tell me the dream and the interpretation, you will be richly rewarded and loaded with honours.  Tell me, therefore, the dream and its interpretation.’  They answered a second time, ‘Let the king tell his servants the dream, and we will tell him the interpretation.’  The king answered, ‘It is clear to me that you are trying to gain time, because you see that my intention has been declared.  If you do not make known to me the dream, there is one law that applies to you, and one only.  What is more, you have agreed among yourselves to tell me a pack of lies to my face in the hope that with time things may alter.  Tell me the dream, therefore, and I shall know that you can give me the interpretation.’  The Chaldaeans answered in the presence of the king, ‘Nobody on earth can tell your majesty what you wish to know; no great king or prince has ever made such a demand of magician, exorcist, or Chaldaean.  What your majesty requires of us is too hard; there is no one but the gods, who dwell remote from mortal men, who can give you the answer.’  At this the king lost his temper and in a great rage ordered the death of all the wise men of Babylon.  A decree was issued that the wise men were to be executed, and accordingly men were sent to fetch Daniel and his companions for execution.

When Arioch, the captain of the king’s bodyguard, was setting out to execute the wise men ofBabylon, Daniel approached him cautiously and with discretion and said, ‘Sir, you represent the king; why has his majesty issued such a peremptory decree?’  Arioch explained everything; so Daniel went in to the king’s presence and begged for a certain time by which he would give the king the interpretation.  Then Daniel went home and told the whole story to his companions, Hananiah, Mishael and Azariah.  They should ask the God of heaven in his mercy, he said, to disclose this secret, so that they and he with the rest of the wise men of Babylon should not be put to death.  Then in a vision by night the secret was revealed to Daniel, and he blessed the God of heaven in these words:

Blessed be God’s name from age to age,
for all wisdom and power are his.
He changes seasons and times;
he deposes kings and sets them up;
he gives wisdom to the wise
and all their store of knowledge to
the men who know;
he reveals deep mysteries;
he knows what lies in darkness,
and light has its dwelling with him.

To thee, God of my fathers, I give
thanks and praise,
for thou hast given me wisdom and power;
thou hast now revealed to me what we asked,
and told us what the king is
concerned to know.

Daniel therefore went to Arioch who had been charged by the king to put to death the wise men of Babylon and said to him, ‘Do not put the wise men of Babylon to death.  Take me into the king’s presence, and I will now tell him the interpretation of the dream.’  Arioch in great trepidation brought Daniel before the king and said to him, ‘I have found among the Jewish exiles a man who will make known to your majesty the interpretation of your dream.’  Thereupon the king said to Daniel (who was also called Belteshazzar), ‘Can you tell me what I saw in my dream and interpret it?’  Daniel answered in the king’s presence, ‘The secret about which your majesty inquires no wise man, exorcist, magician, or diviner can disclose to you.  But there is in heaven a god who reveals secrets, and he has told King Nebuchadnezzar what is to be at the end of this age.  This is the dream and these the visions that came into your head: the thoughts that came to you, O king, as you lay on your bed, were thoughts of things to come, and the revealer of secrets has made known to you what is to be.  This secret has been revealed to me not because I am wise beyond all living men, but because your majesty is to know the interpretation and understand the thoughts which have entered you mind.

‘As you watched, O king, you saw a great image.  This image, huge and dazzling, towered before you, fearful to behold.  The head of the image was of fine gold, its breast and arms of silver, its belly and thighs of bronze,e  its legs of iron, its feet part iron and part clay.  While you looked, a stone was hewn from a mountain, not by human hands; it struck the image on its feet of iron and clay and shattered them.  Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold, were all shattered to fragments and were swept away like chaff before the wind from a threshing floor in summer, until no trace of them remained.  But the stone which struck the image grew into a great mountain filling the whole earth.  That was the dream.  We shall now tell your majesty the interpretation.  You, O king, king of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom with all its power, authority, and honour; in whose hands he has placed men and beasts and birds of the air, wherever they dwell, granting you sovereignty over them all—you are that head of gold.  After you there shall arise another kingdom, inferior to yours, and yet a third kingdom, of bronze, which shall have sovereignty over the whole world.  And there shall be a fourth kingdom, strong as iron; as iron shatters and destroys all things, it shall break and shatter the whole earth. As, in your vision, the feet and toes were part potter’s clay and part iron, it shall be a divided kingdom.  Its core shall be partly of iron just as you saw iron mixed with the common clay; as the toes were part iron and part clay, the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly brittle.  As, in your vision, the iron was mixed with common clay, so shall men mix with each other by intermarriage, but such alliances shall not be stable: iron does not mix with clay.  In the period of those kings the God of heaven will establish a kingdom which shall never be destroyed; that kingdom shall never pass to another people; it shall shatter and make an end of all these kingdoms, while it shall itself endure for ever.  This is the meaning of your vision of the stone being hewn from a mountain, not by human hands, and then shattering the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold.  The mighty God has made known to your majesty what is to be hereafter.  The dream is sure and the interpretation to be trusted.’

Then King Nebuchadnezzar prostrated himself and worshipped Daniel, and gave orders that sacrifices and soothing offerings should be made to him.  ‘Truly,’ he said, ‘your god is indeed God of gods and Lord over kings, a revealer of secrets, since you have been able to reveal this secret.’  Then the king promoted Daniel, bestowed on him many rich gifts, and made him regent over the whole province of Babylon and chief prefect over all the wise men ofBabylon.  Moreover at Daniel’s request the king put Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in charge of the administration of the province of Babylon.  Daniel himself, however, remained at court.

King Nebuchadnezzar made an image of gold, ninety feet high and nine feet broad.  He had it set up in the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon.  Then he sent out a summons to assemble the satraps, prefects, viceroys, counselors, treasurers, judges, chief constables, and all governors of provinces to attend the dedication of the image which he had set up.  So they assembled—the satraps, prefects, viceroys, counselors, treasurers, judges, chief constables, and all governors of provinces—for the dedication of the image which King Nebuchadnezzar had set up; and they stood before the image which Nebuchadnezzar had set up.  Then the herald loudly proclaimed, ‘O peoples and nations of every language, you are commanded, when you hear the sound of horn, pipe, zither, triangle, dulcimer, music, and singing of every kind, to prostrate yourselves and worship the golden image which King Nebuchadnezzar has set up.  Whoever does not prostrate himself and worship shall forthwith be thrown into a blazing furnace.’  Accordingly, no sooner did all the peoples hear the sound of horn, pipe, zither, triangle, dulcimer, music, and singing of every kind, than all the peoples and nations of every language prostrated themselves and worshipped the golden image which King Nebuchadnezzar had set up.

It was then that certain Chaldaeans came forward and brought a charge against the Jews.  They said to King Nebuchadnezzar, ‘Long live the king!  Your majesty has issued an order that every man who hears the sound of horn, pipe, zither, triangle, dulcimer, music, and singing of every kind shall fall down and worship the image of gold.  Whoever does not do so shall be thrown into a blazing furnace.  There are certain Jews, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, whom you have put in charge of the administration of the province of Babylon.  These men, your majesty, have taken no notice of your command; they do not serve your god, nor do they worship the golden image which you have set up.’  Then in rage and fury Nebuchadnezzar ordered Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to be fetched, and they were brought into the king’s presence.  Nebuchadnezzar said to them, ‘Is it true, Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, that you do not serve my god or worship the golden image which I have set up?  If you are ready at once to prostrate yourselves when you hear the sound of horn, pipe, zither, triangle, dulcimer, music, and singing of every kind, and to worship the image that I have set up, well and good.  But if you do not worship it, you shall forthwith be thrown in to the blazing furnace; and what god is there that can save you from my power?’  Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego said to King Nebuchadnezzar, ‘We have no need to answer you on this matter.  If there is a god who is able to save us from the blazing furnace, it is our God whom we serve, and he will save us from your power, O king; but if not, be it known to your majesty that we will neither serve your god nor worship the golden image that you have set up.’

Then Nebuchadnezzar flew into a rage with Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, and his face was distorted with anger.  He gave orders that the furnace should be heated up to seven times its usual heat, and commanded some of the strongest men in his army to bind Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego and throw them into the blazing furnace.  Then those men in their trousers, their shirts, and their hats and all their other clothes, were bound and thrown into the blazing furnace.  Because the king’s order was urgent and the furnace exceedingly hot, the men who were carrying Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego were killed by the flames that leapt out; and those three men, Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, fell bound into the blazing furnace.

Then King Nebuchadnezzar was amazed and sprang to his feet in great trepidation.  He said to his courtiers, ‘Was it not three men whom we threw bound into the fire?’  They answered the king, ‘Assuredly, your majesty.’  He answered, ‘Yet I see four men walking about in the fire free and unharmed; and the fourth looks like a god.’  Nebuchadnezzar approached the door of the blazing furnace and said to the men, ‘Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego, servants of the Most High God, come out, come here.’  Then Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego came out from the fire.  And the satraps, prefects, viceroys, and the king’s courtiers gathered round and saw how the fire had had no power to harm the bodies of these men; the hair of their heads had not been singed, their trousers were untouched, and no smell of fire lingered about them.

Then Nebuchadnezzar spoke out, ‘Blessed is the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego.  He has sent his angel to save his servants who put their trust in him, who disobeyed the royal command and were willing to yield themselves to the fire rather than to serve or worship any god other than their own God.  I therefore issue a decree that any man, to whatever people or nation he belongs, whatever his language, if he speaks blasphemy against the God of Shadrach, Meshach and Abed-nego, shall be torn to pieces and his house shall be forfeit; for there is no other god who can save men in this way.’  Then the king advanced the fortunes of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego in the province of Babylon.

 

 II MACCABEES

The Suicide of Razis

A man call Razis, a member of the Jerusalem senate, was denounced to Nicanor.  He was a patriot and very highly spoken of, one who for his loyalty was known as Father of the Jews.  In the early days of the revolt he had stood trial for practicing the Jewish religion, and with no hesitation had risked life and limb for that cause.  Nicanor, wishing to demonstrate his hostility towards the Jews, sent more than five hundred soldiers to arrest Razis; he reckoned that this would be a severe blow to the Jews.  The tower of his house was on the point of being captured by this mob of soldiers, the outer gate was being forced, and there were calls for fire to burn down the inner doors, when Razis, beset on every side, turned his sword on himself; he preferred to die nobly rather than fall into the hands of evil men and be subjected to gross humiliation.  With everything happening so quickly, he misjudged the stroke and, now that troops were pouring through the doorways, he ran up without hesitation on to the wall and heroically threw himself down into the crowd.  They hurriedly gave way and he fell to the ground in the space they left.  He was still breathing and still ablaze with courage; streaming with blood and severely wounded as he was, he picked himself up and dashed through the crowd.  Finally, standing on a sheer rock, and now completely drained of blood, he tore out his entrails and with both hands flung them at the crowd.  And thus, invoking him who disposes of life and breath to give them back to him again, he died.

Comments Off on THE HEBREW BIBLE AND APOCRYPHA
(c. 12th-1st centuries B.C.)

Genesis: The Prohibition of Bloodshed
Exodus: The Ten Commandments
Judges: Samson and the Philistines
I Samuel-II Samuel: Saul and his    Armor-Bearer
Job: The Sufferings of Job
Daniel: Shadrach, Meschach, Abednego    and the Fiery Furnace
II Maccabees: The Suicide of Razis

Filed under Ancient History, Christianity, Hebrew Bible, Judaism, Martyrdom, Middle East, Selections