THE HISTORY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT CHURCH
Lecture 2: "Apostolic Fathers - 350 A.D."
This is Volume 3 on Church History, taking up the study of
the Apostolic Fathers and Ante-Nicene Fathers. As we've said in
our previous volume, the men who followed the ministry of the
apostles in Church History are called "Church Fathers." Now, the
title comes from them being the leaders of the church at this
time, throughout the persecution of the Christians in the next
three or four centuries. And these Church Fathers are divided
into three groups:
The Apostolic Fathers, whose lives overlapped the lives of
the apostles.
And then the Ante-Nicene Fathers, whose lives take place
between about, oh, 280 a.d. and the Council of Nicea in 325 a.d.
And then the Post-Nicene Fathers, whose lives take place
approximately afterward. We say "approximately" because, of
course, there are overlapping dates.
The Apostolic Fathers are generally given--you can check the
last lecture for this on their lives, in the last volume:
Clement of Rome, 30-100 a.d.
Ignatius, 50-115 a.d.
Epictetus, 50-120.
Patheus, 60-130.
Baselides sometimes, whose death is 138.
Polycarp, 69-155 a.d.
Also given sometimes, Justin Martyr, 100-165 a.d.
Now, the thing that's so significant about this study of the
Church Fathers is, in the study of the Church Fathers and their
writings--and some of them do leave writings--we begin to see and
find the first deviations from the word of God. When Paul writes
to the Christians in Corinth, he already warns about somebody
corrupting the word of God. And, if there's anything the devil
would be interested in, it would be trying to corrupt the word of
God. Along this line, it's interesting to note that no New
Testament Christian ever quotes the Apocrypha. What is the
Apocrypha? The Apocrypha is a collection of about 14 books--some
canonical registers giving seven, some giving nine, some giving
14--of books that are not found anywhere in the Old Testament and
are stuck between the Old Testament and New Testament in most
editions. But seven of these books were stuck into the Old
Testament and considered to be canonical--part of the Holy
Spirit's writing--by the Roman Catholic Church, officially voted
in at the Council of Trent in 1546 a.d. These books were supposed
to have been in wide circulation before the time of Christ. And
they are found included as part of the Old Testament in what we
call the Septuagint. The Septuagint, of course, is discussed
thoroughly in our book called The Christian's Handbook of
Manuscript Evidence.
No Christian in the New Testament ever quotes from the
Apocrypha. Attempts have been made by the scholars to prove that
the New Testament Christians quoted from the Septuagint. But this
was done to make you think they accepted the Septuagint as
authoritative and canonical when it had the Apocryphal books in
it! Anything but the truth!
Now, the truth of the matter is, where the scholars say the
New Testament people quoted the Septuagint, all they've done is
taken writings of the Old Testament found in Origen's works, and
the Septuagint manuscripts written in 330 a.d. and taken these
and lined them up with the New Testament so you'll think the
writer is quoting a Septuagint Old Testament.
Now, we wouldn't have time to go into all of this right in
this lecture, because this deals with the time that goes from 330
to 340, the Post-Nicene Fathers. But the devilment is started by
a man named Origen, who is an Ante-Nicene Father. And this
devilment lies simply in taking the Old Testament manuscripts and
rewriting them in Greek, so the quotations from the Greek New
Testament match the Old Testament. The proof of this lies in the
fact that there isn't one Septuagint manuscript available to
anybody, quoting an Old Testament quotation, that was written
before the completion of the New Testament.
So, in the Church Fathers, we find the beginning of
apostasy. And we find the beginnings of apostasy in their
literary works, by watching what books they quote and what books
they accept as canonical and non-canonical.
We also find in the first writings of these early Apostolic
Fathers certain expressions borrowed from Greek Gnostics and from
unscriptural sources which deny truths of Scripture. This is why
Martin Luther once said, in a fit of vehement rage, "Some of the
Church Fathers ought to be called the Church Babies! To blazes
with the Church Fathers! What saith the Scripture?"
It is interesting to note that when the Roman Catholic
Church wants to prove any doctrine contrary to Scripture, they
always appeal to a Church Father. I'll say it one more time.
Whenever the Roman Catholic wants to teach a doctrine that is
non-Scriptural, or against Scripture, they always appeal to a
Church Father.
The writings of the Church Fathers, then, make up for the
Roman Catholic the great body of superstitious folklore which we
call tradition. This includes not only the Church Fathers but the
teaching of the Councils. And you should review our remarks on
Councils in the last volume.
Clement of Rome
All right, the Apostolic Fathers begin by deviating from the
truth. The clearest example of this is the writings and teachings
of the so-called Clement of Rome, who is supposed to have written
two epistles. And these two epistles, by the way, are found in
the Greek New Testaments of the Greek manuscripts used for the
new bibles--although, of course, they have left them
untranslated--showing that we're not only dealing with apostasy
in the body of Christ these days, but blatant hypocrisy.
Now the First and Second Epistle of Clement, so-called, and
something he wrote, the Clementine Homilies, another group of
writings, are found connected with Sinaiticus and Vaticanus, the
source and authority for Bob Jones University faculty members.
Dr. Custer inserted a slip of paper into the graduate assistants'
boxes at the end of the year 1974, telling them that any man who
criticized Robertson and Machen and Warfield was blaspheming the
memory of the dead, and that the superior text was the
Alexandrian Roman Catholic text of the Septuagint and the
Hexapla.
Clement I of Rome (30-100 a.d.) was bishop of Rome, we
guess. The place of his birth is not known. He was one of the
earliest bishops of Rome, according to tradition, and may
possibly have been the Clement mentioned by Paul in Philippians
4:3. At least the Roman Catholic Church would like to have you
think that. His epistle to the Corinthians, this is I and II
Clement, was written likely about a.d. 97, and is the oldest
specimen of post-Apostolic literature. That is, the first thing
you have after the completion of the New Testament is the Epistle
to the Corinthians, 97 a.d., by a bishop who was supposed to be a
bishop in Rome. It quotes profusely from the Old Testament and
has many references to Paul and Peter.
The scholars say of these writings they are valuable for
their information concerning the exalted position of the bishops
or elders in the church at the end of the first century. It is
valuable for its information concerning the "exalted position" of
bishops or elders in the church at the end of the first century.
Now, let's stop and think about that thing for a minute.
When Clement writes, it's true that he exalts the bishops and
exalts the elders. Does that prove that they were exalted? Does
that prove that they should be exalted? Doesn't that prove that
Clement has been deceived by the devil? You don't find them
exalted in the New Testament.
That isn't all. In Clement's writings, as in Papius'
writings, we find a mention of Simon Peter being at Rome. Now,
that's very odd. If you took the Living Bible it wouldn't be odd.
For the Living Bible has changed the word "Babylon" in 1 Peter 5
to Rome, in spite of the fact that there isn't a single Greek
manuscript in the universe that says "Rome." But Phillips and
Brother Taylor, who wrote the Phillips translation and the Living
Bible, are pro-Roman Catholic in their hatred for the King James
text. So they not only alter the King James text, but alter all
the Greek manuscripts, and say Peter was in Rome, 1 Peter 5.
You'd better know church history!
There's no evidence from the Bible that Peter ever was in
Rome. And the Bible is completed before church history proper
takes place.
For example, when Paul writes to the Christians in Rome
(Romans chapter 16), he is very careful not to mention Simon
Peter as ever having been there. As a matter of fact, if you read
Romans chapter 1, Romans chapter 15, you'll find that Peter
couldn't have been there, because Paul said he didn't want to
build on another man's foundation. That isn't all. When you find
Simon Peter in the Bible, he is dealing with the Jews of the
disperson in Asia Minor, Cappadocia, Asia and Bithinia, and
dealing with people who have already been saved and under the
ministry of Paul in Asia Minor, dealing with people in Babylon
and in Jerusalem up to Acts chapter 15, and nowhere do you find
him ever making a trip to Rome for anything.
Now this is very significant to say the least. The material
that says Peter was in Rome is based 100 percent on superstitious
folklore and legend. There isn't one indication in any Greek
manuscript for the New Testament or Hebrew for the Old Testament
that Peter ever came within 800 miles of Rome. Now, you need to
think about that a long time. Perhaps we should reduce that to
400 miles of Rome in case Peter got up into Asia Minor. But the
closest Simon Peter ever got to Rome, according to the New
Testament, is Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithinia.
Now, this is a heresy. If you want to get the heresy
corrected, you should read the material on the location of
Peter's tomb in Rome--first, the editions put out by the Roman
Catholic Church, which is a comic relief from the ordinary
drudgery of routine, and then the work by Peterson on Simon
Peter's Burial up there near Bethany, where they found the casket
and the name. Now, this heresy that Peter is in Rome in first
mentioned in the Clementine writings. And Papius mentions it, and
some others. And this is pure tradition, of which you were warned
against in Colossians 2, verse 8.
Somebody said, "Are you trying to say that all tradition is
not true?" No, we're not saying that at all. We're saying where
any tradition clearly contradicts the word of God, you can throw
it out. And the word of God is very clear; the Epistle to the
Romans is not written by Simon Peter; it's written by Paul.
Somebody said, "You are robbing Peter to pay Paul." No, God
robbed Peter to pay Paul. Any reader of the New Testament can
tell that it's Simon Peter from Acts 1 to Acts 15, and after that
it's Paul. Any reader of the New Testament in Galatians chapter 2
knows that Paul had to straighten Peter out on his doctrines. Any
reader of the New Testament knows that Simon Peter was a married
pope if he was a pope (Matthew chapter 8), with a mother-in-law
(chapter 8). Anybody who reads the New Testament knows that Simon
Peter was a cussing, Jewish, circumcised, pork-abstaining
commercial fisherman.
In London, you'll find St. Paul's, indicating somebody moved
toward the Pauline epistles and Protestant Christianity. In Rome,
you'll find St. Peter's, indicating somebody tried to get you
back under the Judaistic laws that dealt with circumcised Jewish
fishermen. Now, that's something to think about.
Clement is called the first Bishop of Rome. As to whether or
not he was the Bishop of Rome is pure conjecture. When we say
"Bishop," of course, we mean pastor or elder. And at this time a
pastor or elder of Rome would have been practically nothing, for
at this time coming up into 100, Trajan the emperor takes over
(98), and don't you think for a minute that a bishop of Rome in
those days had enough authority to go to the emperor and ask for
a favor! The bishop of Rome back in those days, and the days of
Peter and Paul, was a persecuted, harassed, Bible-believing
evangelist. He wasn't sitting around in a golden dias in a golden
basilica, with the emperor coming around saying, "Holy Papa, will
you please tell me what to do about the war in Spain?" "Is there
rain in Spain to the main? Or is it plain?"
So, we have Clement of Rome.
Ignatius
Now, the next man who shows up is Ignatius. We're being
critical of these men for the purpose of pointing out apostasy
from the word of God. We're not saying they weren't good men.
We're not saying they weren't godly men. We're not saying they
weren't better men than we are in many ways. What we're saying
is, when it comes to fidelity for the truth, you have to watch
your step! A little leaven leavens the whole lump.
What we say about Clement is, number one, his Epistle to the
Corinthians is not a Scriptural work. His Epistle to the
Corinthians, which I've read, Clement I and Clement II, denies
much of the New Testament in regards to salvation. It uses terms
that deny the premillennial coming of Christ. And it puts an
emphasis in places where neither Corinthian epistle Paul wrote
puts an emphasis. And it exalts the bishops and elders to a place
and a place of prominence that the New Testament does not give
them. In the New Testament, Christ said, "You know that they that
are great among the Gentiles are the leaders, and exercise
lordship and authority over them. But it shall not be so among
you!" Now, you know that! Paul's favorite expression for himself
was "a douas," "a slave or servant of Jesus Christ." "The Son of
man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister, and give His
life as a ransom for many." Any document that gives an exalted
place to the bishop or elder is a satanic document. I don't care
if General William Booth or R.A. Torrey wrote it. It's not
Scriptural. It's contrary to the word of God.
Then, the first bit of leaven begins to come in just as soon
as the New Testament is complete. And Paul mentions a corrupting
process going on while it is being written.
The next man is Ignatius. And this Ignatius is not bishop of
Rome, but bishop of Antioch. We can expect something from this
Ignatius. For, if you remember your Bible, which is the true
interpreter of history, the Bible says the disciples were first
called Christians at Antioch. This is Antioch of Syria--north of
Palestine. This is the place where the first missionary trip was
originated (Acts chapter 13), where the disciples were first
called Christians (Acts chapter 11), and where the first
missionary translation of the Bible into old Latin for north
Africa, and Syriac for Syria, were made. ANTIOCH. Ignatius was
probably a native of Syria, a pupil of the Apostle John. And he
was the second or the third bishop of the church of Antioch in
Syria, in the closing years of the first century and the early
years of the second.
We know very little bit about Ignatius, except what he tells
us in fifteen letters that are ascribed to him. He governed the
church with care. He was a "devout son of the church." This is a
very interesting expression. A "devout son of the church"? Where
did you read in your Bible that anybody who was saved was a "son
of the church"? Doesn't that strike you as rather odd? You say,
"Ruckman, you're being hypercritical!" Oh, no! No! I am a Bible
believer. And I'm not going to accept the word of any "great,
goodly, godly, dedicated, Spirit-filled, independent, missionary,
premillennial, soul-winning, fundamental" perverter of the word
of God! I don't read in my Bible where I'm a "son of the church."
I read that new Jerusalem, which is above, is free, which is the
"mother of us all" (Galatians chapter 4). I am a son of God (John
1). I'm a child that's been produced by New Jerusalem, and the
Holy Spirit has given me a new birth. But a son of the church?
Tsk, tsk, tsk! My, my!
Ol' Ignatius hasn't been too careful in some of his letters-
-but careful enough for the Roman Catholic Church to use it. He
loved Christ supremely and honored Him as God Incarnate. So
Ignatius is a fundamentalist; he believes in the deity of Jesus
Christ--exactly like Satan believes in it! Now, I didn't say that
to make you suspect Ignatius. I said that to make you think. And,
if there ever was a time when a Christian needs to think,
brother, it's now. He spoke of Christ as the "Godman." Ignatius
had a positive part in the development of the episcopacy. The
"episcopacy" simply means the governmental hierarchy of the
church. And he was perhaps the first to use the term "Catholic
Church." There's where the term came from. There isn't one
Catholic in your home town who knows where that word came from.
Stop the first 35,000 Catholics you meet in the street, and ask
them where the term "Catholic" came from, and they couldn't tell
you on a pile of bodies of St. Francis.
You say, "Why'd you say 'bodies'?" Oh, they've got "four"
heads of John the Baptist in Europe. Luther asked one monk one
time, "You got one skull up here one place, and one skull in
another, and one's bigger than the other. Which one is John the
Baptist?"
And the priest said, "Well, the little one is when he was a
boy."
Church history is not without its humor!
All right, the first time the word "Catholic" occurs is not
in the Bible. The first time it occurs, it occurs in the mouth of
a godly, dedicated man who loved the Lord so much that he said,
"I would rather die for Christ than rule the whole earth. Lead me
to the beasts, that I may by them be partaker of God." He was
thrown to the wild beasts in the Colisseum at Rome and was eaten
by the lions.
Now, who could find fault with such a godly, dedicated man?
Not me! But I'll tell you something. Where they undertake to
correct the word of God, I go the other way. And if you're a
Bible believer, you'd better go the other way.
Follow his example in loving Christ. Amen! Follow his
example in believing that Christ was God incarnate. Amen! Follow
his example in being willing to die for Christ. Amen! But when it
comes to talking about the Catholic Church, go roast a weenie!
Now, do you see where we're headed? Do you get the
orientation yet? You're either going to believe that Book, or you
are not going to believe that Book, and the people who are going
to turn you from that Book are going to be people who love Christ
enough to die for Him! They're not sinless! They all have old
natures! Don't you get that?
Then the first signs of departure from the New Testament
deal with the concept of the church. And the first departures put
the bishop and elder into a place of authority he has no business
in. Then they begin to call the Christian a "son of the church"
instead of a "son of God." Then the church hierarchy begins to be
referred to as a "Catholic" church. And this is where the
devilment begins! It begins, if you please, with the Church
Fathers. And in this case, of course, it begins with the
Apostolic Church Fathers, the Church Fathers whose lives overlap
the lives of the Apostles.
Epictetus
The next man is--I never could pronounce it--Epictetus (50-
120), a Greek Stoic philosopher. Early life, a slave of Rome,
then a free man under Nero. He studied and taught and wrote Stoic
philosophy. In 90 a.d. when Domitian--that's a Roman emperor,
whom we'll study later--banished the philosophers, Epictetus
settled at Necopolis and Nepuris, where he died. Some of his
moral writings bore similarity to those of the Christians,
perhaps influencing or being influenced by Christian thought. He
made virtue the purpose of the end of his life. He said man's
will is divine; hence, man is ruled by fate. He converted the
emperor Marcus Aurelius to the Stoic philosophy. So Epictetus, as
he stands, could not really be classified as a true Church
Father. However, there are some who include him in the list,
because of his writings bearing resemblance to Christian
writings. He's normally not included in the list.
Papius
Then we have Papius. Papius (60-130)--and dates on the birth
and death of all these vary, because the records on them are not
too clear. Papius is the bishop of Hieropolis. Papius is thought
to have been a disciple of the Apostle John. Some people think he
was a friend of Polycarp. And he was bishop of Hieropolis in
Phrygia, which is in Asia Minor. He was a pious and devout man, a
learned student of the Scripture. He seems to have written--it's
all tradition, legend--an exposition of the Lord's oracles.
Unfortunately, this manuscript has been lost since 1218, and it
is only through the writings of Iranaeus and Eusebius that we
know anything about it. About all we know of his theology is that
he held millennarian views. When they say "millennarian," they
mean simply that he was a premillennialist and believed that
Christ was coming back to set up the Kingdom upon this earth.
Where Papius believed that, fine, excellent! Where Papius
taught that Christ was born in a cave--did you ever hear that one
before?--scratch him! Where Papius believed that John the Apostle
did not write the Book of Revelation, but that an unknown
agnostic, Q-mark-X "missing link" "elder" wrote it, scratch him!
Did you ever hear that one?
As a matter of fact, if we study church history, if we
encompass the first four centuries of church history, we're
thoroughly prepared to overthrow the scholarship of any godly,
dedicated man who denies the word of God. There's nothing new
under the sun, and every damnable, hellish, blasphemous thing
pulled to overthrow the authority of the word was pulled off
before the Council of Nicea. And, if you study church history and
pay attention to it, you'll be forewarned and forearmed, and
you'll know where you're at. As we said in the first lecture, if
there's one thing in the world a Christian should know, he should
know where he's at.
Basilides
Now, Basilides is not usually given as a Church Father in
most lists because Basilides had a reputation as being a Gnostic,
a man well versed in Greek and Jewish and Alexandrian philosophy
and Egyptian theosophy--although some lists include him.
Basilides, of course, could not be called a real Church
Father because he taught, among other things, that Christ was
human only in appearance, and although He suffered He did not die
on the cross. He said that Simon of Cyrene was crucified in His
stead. Not a very good Church Father. Usually given as an
agnostic. He said the minds of all other people are shrouded in
eternal night, and the night of ignorance, and that Christ alone
was free from ignorance. His system, like the other Gnostic
systems, grew out of the endeavor to explain the problems of God
and the world, and of good and evil. Not usually given as a
Church Father, but sometimes some lists include him.
Polycarp
Then we have Polycarp. Polycarp is a dear and precious soul,
a man who loved the Lord enough to die for him, being burned for
the sake of Christ. And Polycarp's dates--and there may be
variation on the date, of course, in any of these--are about 69
to 155 a.d. He was a disciple of the Apostle John and a friend of
Ignatius, and a teacher of Popimus and Irenaeus. Born in Smyrna,
which, of course, is on the west coast of Asia Minor.
You'll notice that our first two men, Polycarp and Ignatius,
who die for Jesus Christ, have an intimate acquaintance with
John. Hence, if we want to find Scriptural Apostolic succession,
we're going to find it more closely with somebody connected with
Asia Minor and Antioch and the Gospel of John than somebody
connected with Simon Peter and Matthew and Mark. Did you notice
that? Simon Peter's connections are with Jerusalem and with
Babylon. Paul's connections are with Antioch and Asia Minor. The
connection of the Apostle John is Asia Minor; he was exiled at
Patmos, right off the coast of Smyrna. And Ignatius and Polycarp
are connected with John. Naturally, their approach toward
Christianity is going to be more Biblical than anybody at Rome,
like Peter--if he was there, which he wasn't--or Alexandria, with
Mark--if he was there, which he probably wasn't.
Polycarp is a Church Father, born at Smyrna. He's a definite
link between first and second century Christianity. We have one
letter by Polycarp, a letter to the Philippian church. Later in
his bishop's work, Polycarp is said to have made a trip to Rome--
that's legend--apparently to discuss some matters of theological
and ecclesiastical nature with Anacletus, the bishop of Rome--
another guesswork. Writings and life breathe a spirit of deep
devotion. About 155, in the reign of Antonius Pius, when a local
persecution was taking place in Smyrna and several of his members
had been martyred, he was singled out as the leader of the church
and marked for martyrdom. When asked to recant--that's to deny
what he believes and live--he is reputed to have said, "Eighty
and six years have I served Him, and He hath done me no wrong.
How can I speak evil of my King who saved me?" He was burned at
the stake, dying an heroic martyr for his faith.
Polycarp's only mistake, as far as we can find in his
writings, is referring to the church as "the mother of us all." I
believe he worded the thing as "the faith is the mother of us
all." That was his quotation. A rather unfortunate quotation,
because "the faith" is not the mother of anybody! As a matter of
fact, no man knows anything about "the faith" until he's saved.
"The faith" doesn't give birth to the child of God. The born-
again child of God accepts "the faith."
You say, "That's a little thing!" It's enough to set up the
Roman Catholic Church and lead 400 million people to hell! Did
you ever hear these fellows talking about "the Catholic faith"? I
remember my old priest saying to me, "All those people down in
the French quarter of New Orleans, there a little bit immoral,
But they kept the old faith." See that expression, "the faith"?
"The faith"?
Every non-Scriptural heresy taught by the Roman church is
based on the writings of a Church Father--which is why Martin
Luther said justifiably, "Some of the Church Fathers should have
been called the 'Church Babies.'" And there's a lot of truth in
that.
You see, the apostasy begins here. When we talk about
apostasy, we're talking about apostasy within the body of born-
again, saved, fundamental people. We're not talking about people
professing something they don't believe, and pretending to
profess it, and then later falling away from something they never
had. We're not coming down those lines.
Justin Martyr
All right, the last man, sometimes called an "Ante-Nicene
Father" but sometimes Apostolic, is Justin Martyr, 100-165 a.d. A
philosopher (Colossians 2:8) and martyr, born at Flavia Neopolis
in Samaria of heathen parents. He was well educated. Seems to
have had proficient means to lead a life by study and travel. He
studied Stoicism, Pythagoras' works, Platonism, Aritotelianism.
But he hated Epicureanism. And all that stuff just means this; it
means he's hard and tough and believes in living a good life.
That's all that means. You'll find the Stoics and the Epicureans
in Acts chapter 17. These two philosophies were (1) Stoic, tough
upper-lip, Zeno, "keep it up"; and (2) Epicureanism was "eat,
drink, and be merry, for tomorrow you're going to kick the
bucket."
Now, I realize that's an extreme over-simplification, but
this is a study on Church History, not Greek foolishness.
Then Platonism appealed the most to him, and he thought he
was about to reach the goal of his philosophy. But one day, in a
solitary walk on the seashore, he was witnessed to by an old
Christian, and that Christian shook his confidence and pointed
out to him that men more ancient than the Greek philosophers
wrote the Old Testament. Following the advice of the old
gentleman, Justin Martyr began to read the Old Testament and the
New Testament, and became a believing Christian.
He said, "I found this philosophy alone to be safe and
profitable." After his conversion, he devoted himself to the
vindication and spread of the Christian religion, with the
conviction that Christianity is the oldest, truest, and most
divine of philosophies. He continued to wear his "philosophers'
robes" (Colossians 2:8) and went about as an evangelist and
missionary. He spent some time in Rome and dealt with a Gnostic
named Marcian, whom we'll talk about later, and dealt with a Jew
named Trypho, and wrote to him about the Christian faith. He was
finally seized, scourged and beheaded in 166. He wrote one set of
apologies--a defense of the Christian faith called Apologies, and
another set called Dialogues--to justify his work.
And he said in his work that a man is regenerated when he's
sprinkled with water. You see how it goes?
Irenaeus
The next man to take this up is a man named Irenaeus. If you
want to find the roots of baptismal regeneration, they're not
found anywhere in the Old or New Testaments. If you want to find
the roots of baptismal regeneration, they are found in the
writings of the Apostolic Fathers. And everything that this bunch
of heretics have ever done to overthrow the New Testament, they
got by tradition, philosophy, or science--and you can bet your
bottom dollar on it.
The Epistle to Clement, Number Two, on the authority of
Eusebius, teaches that Christians should be compared to the
Levites for their ministry--which is entirely incorrect--and that
Christ was not the image of God, but the reflection of God.
So, you will find in the new bibles in Hebrews chapter 1,
the "express image of God" changed.
In the writings of others, like The Teaching of the Twelve,
what we call the Didache, you will find baptismal regeneration
taught. In the Epistle of Barnabas, which we'll talk about later,
you'll find baptismal regeneration taught. And on and on and on
and on.
We're not talking about unsaved people professing to have
something they don't have. We're talking about apostasy among
people who shed their blood for Jesus Christ. What could be more
foolish or more ridiculous or more stupid than somebody like John
R. Rice, or any of his friends, or Bob Jones III or any of his
friends, justifying the alteration and attack on the word of God
on the grounds that "other godly men did it too"?
St. Francis of Assisi was one of the most godly, separated,
holy men who ever lived. And, when it comes to the matter of
Biblical doctrine, you'd do well not to follow him across the
street.
So we have the first signs of apostasy in the body of Christ
showing up in the Church Fathers. And the question comes up,
"What were the mass of Christians doing at this time?"
You see, we get into this peculiar situation where the
writers are going to study the writers. What about the millions
of Christians who never wrote anything? What where they doing?
First, second, and third and fourth century Christianity has
been judged by the writers. That's very dangerous! Millions of
Christians wrote nothing. But scholars tend to honor scholars and
recognize scholars who recognize scholars who recognize each
other. I read the other day in Faith Magazine that a professor at
Bob Jones University was a "recognized scholar." Any fool can be
a recognized scholar! All he has to do is alter the King James.
They'll recognize him immediately! All a man has to do to be a
recognized scholar is spend time correcting the King James. He'll
be recognized. The devil will give him a crown so he can reign
now!
Now this baptismal regeneration, plus faith being "the
mother of us all," plus the "son of the church," plus the word
"Catholic," have been incorporated by the Roman Catholic Church
to give the root of Roman Catholic tradition. And, if you want to
know where the roots of Roman Catholicism start, they are found
nowhere in either Testament unless they're found back in the Book
of Judges, where a priest is called a "father" and sets up image
worship in a house, and idolatry, and is given his room and board
to act as a priest for a family he had no business acting as
priest to. You will find this information in Judges chapter 17,
and Judges chapter 18. Judges 17 and Judges 18.
The roots of Roman Catholicism lie in the pagan, Babylonian
mystery religions. And, to prove this, every Christian should
acquaint himself with The Two Babylons by Hislop. The Two
Babylons by Alexander Hislop, where the evidence is documented.
The roots are found back far beyond the time of Christ. As a
matter of fact, they are found clear back to the time of the
Egyptian priesthood before the time of Moses, and the time of
Abraham coming out of Ur of the Chaldees. This material is well
documented in the books by Paul Blanchard and Alexander Hislop,
and can be traced.
However, the conversion of the mystery Babylonian, pagan
Roman and Greek and Egyptian "mystery religions" to Christianity
begins with the Church Fathers. And one of the first things they
get in there is the "initiatory rite that initiates the man into
the mysteries"--sprinkling water. You'll not find it in the New
Testament; it's not there. Christ comes up out of the water
(Matthew 3). The Ethiopian eunuch goes down into the water (Acts
chapter 8). Baptism is said to be a picture of death, burial, and
resurrection (Romans 6), of drowning under the wrath of God (1
Peter chapter 3). Sprinkling is out of the question. With the
King James text, it's out of the question.
And the nitty-picking some Baptists find fault with the King
James because it will not emphasize immersion by translating the
word is beside the point. It isn't found there with the word
translated or untranslated. It begins with the Church Fathers--in
particular, Justin Martyr, Origen (who comes along a little bit
later), and Irenaeus, who is sometimes given as an Apostolic
Father, although he comes along a little bit late to get into the
act. And we usually include him with the Ante-Nicene Fathers
(130-202), the bishop of Lyons, France.
Now, here we conclude our study of the word and ministry of
the Apostolic Church Fathers. The Apostolic Church Fathers are
good men. Many of them are martyrs, and many of them write things
that are true and Scriptural. But in their writings are found the
seed plot for the great mother whore of Revelation 17, that great
herbal monstrosity of Matthew 13 that the fowls of the air come
and lodge in the branches, that great mother who picks up the
leaven and puts it in the lump until the whole lump is leavened
(Matthew 13). And you were warned about this in the Bible over
and over and over and over and over and over again.
And if you want to know why anybody calls themselves
"Catholic" in 1991, it's because of Ignatius, 115 a.d. If you
want to know why somebody talks about "Holy Mother Church" and
"the faith," you'll have to go to Polycarp (155 a.d.). And if you
want to know why some people are counting on their sprinkling as
babies to get them to Heaven, you'll have to go back to 100 a.d.,
Justin Martyr, and Iranaeus, and those people, who perverted the
living word of the living God--although they loved Christ enough
to die for Him.
Their emotional and spiritual life was correct. Their old
nature refused to submit itself to the word of God where it dealt
with terminology, organization, theology, and doctrine. And so
we're going to follow their example where they are right, and
where their example is wrong, we're not going to follow it thirty
feet.
Ebionites
At this time coming up in church history, up to about the
end of the first century, in 130 and 150, we have some
interesting groups arising in church history. The first of these
groups are what we call the Ebionites.
And although the Ebionites did not get much publicity until
the second or third century, their beginnings come at about the
time of the completion of the New Testament. To be very brief
about it, an Ebionite is a man who believes that James is to be
followed instead of Romans; and, in particular, that Matthew is
to be followed instead of John. Now, these groups are called
Ebionites in the second century. To them, Jesus was the son of
Joseph and Mary, and so completely fulfilled the Jewish law that
God chose Him to be the Messiah. He improved and added to the
law, and would come again to found a Messianic kingdom for the
Jews.
Now, the thing in that business is this. The Ebionite
doesn't outright deny the virgin birth, I mean, just in so many
words. But he would call it more a "divine conception." The
Ebionite was fixed up so that he believed that God kind of
reacted with Joseph when Christ was born. So that, although He
was not virgin born, He was still "divinely conceived."
There are a number of ways to handle that thing. But what it
was was an emphasis on Matthew, Mark, and Luke--the earthly
Jewish life of a man who is trying to get to Heaven by good
works, and He sort of earned His salvation--rather than God
manifest in the flesh, God incarnate in the flesh, and becoming
man to die for sins. It was sort of a combination of faith and
works, which we find in James. And the Ebionites varied among
themselves to an outright denial of the deity of Christ, to those
who professed to believe in the deity but thought you had to have
a little bit of works to go along with it, to kind of "help
things out."
And this group begins the first in a series of groups in
Christianity of an ecumenical movement, where people begin to
join the Christian group who begin to mix works and faith
together in what we call a legalistic situation, or a Judaistic
situation. And these people can always be spotted by the fact
that they do not accept the Pauline epistles as inspired. They
accept the Pauline epistles as Paul's interpretation of Christ,
and the Gospel of John as Johannine literature that interprets
Christ. But they will not accept the doctrinal truth of the
Gospel of John and Romans and Galatians about Christ, but accept,
rather, the historical account of a "revolutionary" in Matthew,
Mark, and Luke, who brought about some good things.
The Ebionite is present with us today and is very manifest
in the National Council of Churches in a number of ways.
By the year 100, Christianity was strongly represented in
Asia Minor and Syria. It was also found in Macedonia, Greece, and
Rome, and probably also in Egypt. It extended very slightly, if
at all, to the more western portion of the empire. Asia Minor was
more extensively Christianized than any other land, because of
Paul's ministry. And in 111 to 113, Pliny, the governor of
Bithynia, could report to Trajan, the Roman emperor, that it was
affecting the older temple worship. It was strongly missionary in
spirit and constantly extending. Common Christianity was far from
representing or even understanding the theological doctrines.
Common Christianity moved in a much simpler range of thought.
Profoundly loyal to Christ, it conceived of Him primarily as the
divine Revealer of the knowledge of the true God, a proclaimer of
a new law of simple, lofty, and strenuous morality. And it
regarded its jobs to be, primarily, convert and proselyte and win
people to Jesus Christ.
This, of course, accounts for the apostasy, by the fact that
the average writer or historian, in writing about early
Christianity, is going by the opinions primarily of the authors
and putting an undue emphasis or weight of emphasis upon the
writing portion of Christianity--and not a great enough emphasis
on the witnessing part of Christianity. And we'll talk about this
later in our fourth volume on church history that deals with the
ante-Nicene father.
Now suffice it to say here that, during the first century
and second century of church history, the heroes are martyrs.
They don't write anything. They're eaten by the lions. They're
sowed in leather bags with snakes and thrown into the river.
Their heads are cut off. They're burned alive. They're roasted on
gridirons. They're put on the rack, and their limbs are pulled
from them. They're smoked to death and suffocated to death and
stung to death with bees. They light the palace gardens at Rome
by being soaked with tar and pitch and being set fire.
And every child of God should acquaint himself with the
literature edited by Forbush, Foxe's Book of Martyrs, to see what
happened to the real, true, Biblical line of witnessing
Christianity.
This concludes our third study on church history, Volume
Number 3. In our fourth study, we'll take up a study of the Ante-
Nicean Church Fathers, and the times that took place between the
year 200 and the year 325 a.d.
Now, on this next volume, volume chapter 4 in church
history, we take up a study of a little bit later progress in the
history of the Christian church, the times that deal with Ante-
Nicene Fathers, roughly from around 150 or 200 up to 325 a.d. By
this time the Ebionites are well at work, trying to get the
Christian into Matthew and James and get him out of Romans and
Galatians.
By this time another group has sprung up called the
Montanists, which is a pre-millennial group that has a little
Holiness tinged to them. They tend to lean toward the tongues
movement and the gift of prophecy, but they're sound on the
Second Coming of Christ, premillennial--which is more than you
can say, of course, for Justin or Jerome or J. Gresham Machen or
Warfield or Dr. A.T. Robertson. At least they had enough sense to
believe the Old Testament, and were premillennial in their faith.
We come along to this group of Church Fathers, and this
group of Church Fathers can roughly be outlined. First of all,
Justin Martyr overlaps the Apostolic group. And then we have
Irenaeus, 130-202. We have Clement of Alexandria. Not Clement of
Rome, but Clement of Alexandria, 150-215 a.d. You understand the
term "a.d." means anno domini, not "after death." b.c. refers to
"before Christ;" "a.d." is anno domini, "in the year of our
Lord," dating also from the birth of Christ. The term 70 a.d. is
not dated from 70 years after the death of Christ, but 70 years
after the birth--"anno domini," a--point--d--point.
Clement of Alexandria (150-215), Tertullian (160-220 a.d.),
Hippolytus (170-236), and Origen, the most famous Father of them
all (184-254 a.d.). There may be some overlap, but of course
these are the main ones.
Now, throughout this period of church history, the Roman
Catholic Church is gaining ground by accumulating the writings of
the Fathers and the teachings of the Fathers, and the traditions,
and superimposing them over Scripture. The big bamboozle at this
time, of course, is accepting a man's word on a thing because
he's "godly," or because he's educated. The educated men, of
course, are men like Justin Martyr and Tertullian and Origen, who
pervert the word of God and are followed because of their
scholastic learning and the time they spent studying. And the men
who were followed because they loved Christ enough to die for
Him, men like Justin Martyr and Ignatius and Polycarp, are
followed because of their zeal for Christ.
After all, the best way to get the man to reject the word of
God is give him a good reason for doing so. And, rejection of the
word of God and overwriting has always been based upon something
good. Gullible, naive scholars to today, like Archer Weniger and
Kenneth Wuest and Thieme and other gullible people assume--and
it's strict assumption--they assume that, if the person is godly,
dedicated, and thoroughly learned and thoroughly studied, that he
can correct the word of God on the grounds that he is qualified
to do it.
Somewhere or another, it seemed to escape the notice of all
these gentlemen that when Eve first sinned, her motive for
sinning was good threefold. If you read the account in Genesis
chapter 3, you'll find there wasn't one bad thing presented to
her in disobeying the word of God. Look at it! The motive was
good throughout. We're not saying these men's motives were bad.
We're just saying the devil messed them up just as bad as he
messed up Eve.
After all, when the devil came to her, didn't he say, "Yea,
hath God said?" Wasn't the question a matter of authority? Then
if you want a man to reject the authority of God, wouldn't you
have to give him a pretty good motive? He gave Eve a good motive.
And a true motive! He said, "Your eyes will be opened"--and they
were! "And you'll know good and evil"--which she did!
After all, the best way to get a man to reject the word of
God is appeal to his heart and give him a good motive for doing
it. He'll bite at that every time, just about.
So when you see these centuries go by, that when the devil
wants to get the Christian to override the word of God, he'll
always appeal to a man who is a "good, godly, dedicated man" to
do it! Why would he appeal to a heretic, or an infidel? That
wouldn't impress anybody!
So, during the first two or three centuries of church
history, a body of legend and doctrine and tradition begins to
build up along the lines that the martyrs, who die for Christ,
are more authoritative than the word of God. So you can trust
what the martyrs said and did as your guide, instead of what God
said. And that body of tradition that builds up to the Ante-
Nicene Fathers comes to complete fruition at the Council of Nicea
in 325 a.d., where a bunch of Christians get together and decide
what orthodoxy is. And, when they decide what orthodoxy is, they
leave out the two most important orthodox statements. One, a
statement on the premillennial coming of Jesus Christ to reign on
this earth, which makes up more than three-quarters of the Bible;
and the gospel commission, the imperative to win people to Jesus
Christ.
Bob Jones has given you the gospel imperative to evangelize,
but ignored the other. That is, they're half right.
Now, we get into the the Nicene Fathers--the Ante-Nicene and
Post-Nicene. "Ante" meaning "before," "post-Nicene" meaning
"afterward." And by this time a considerable body of opposition
has arisen to the word of God, and a considerable body of Greek-
educated people are fouling up the body of Christ and getting
them to argue about doctrinal matters, so they'll get off
practical matters.
Tatian
Along about this same time in church history, we have a
number of very interesting characters showing up, which should be
studied. The first of these is a man named Tatian, a Christian
apologist who is alive somewhere around 140, 150 and 160. The
date of his birth and death are unknown. But both are within the
early second century. He was born in Assyria, east of the Tigris,
and received a good education in Greek. He stumbled upon the Holy
Scriptures and was won to the Christian faith. He became a pupil
or disciple of Justin Martyr, and a teacher. He wrote a harmony
of the Gospels called Tatian's Diatessaron, which is a harmony of
the Gospels, a lining up of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John
together.
After Justin's death, he became involved in the study of
esoteric questions and philosophies and deviated from the
orthodox faith. That is, according to Catholic tradition, he
deviated from the faith. He held to the Gnostic teaching that the
Demiurge was evil and in opposition to the true God. We don't
have time to go into that, but the Gnostic teaching was that of
the Greek-Alexandrian "knowers," or fellows who professed to have
higher through a diaimon, which is why the King James translated
"devil," which is a proper translation, and did not leave it
transliterated "demon," as it's found in the new bibles. And the
Gnostic teaching was that a "demi-urge"--that is, a lesser or
lower God--made the creation. The "proof" that Tatian believed
this is found nowhere except in the imagination of the Roman
Catholic Church. We read about Tatian, according to tradition,
that he made the Old Testament to oppose the New Testament.
I've read all the literature on Tatian, and never found
that. That's a very interesting conjecture.
And the reason for putting Tatian in with the heretics is
very apparent to a student of manuscript evidence. And I'll tell
you why. Tatian, a Syrian, when he wrote his Diatesseron, had a
King James text before him in 150 a.d. I find that very
interesting, don't you? I have a copy of Tatian's Diatesseron
here in the Works of the Ante-Nicene Fathers, edited by Philip
Schaff. And the reading in John 9:35 matches the King James. It
doesn't match the ASV or the New ASV. The reading in Luke 2:33
matches the King James--not the ASV or the New ASV. Tatian
evidently had a King James Bible 180 years before the Greek
manuscripts were written that are recommended by Bob Jones and
Tennessee Temple and Midwestern and Pensacola Christian College.
Don't you find that interesting, as the Germans say? VEDDDY
INTEDDDESTING!
So we have Tatian.
Marcian, Valentius, Basilides
Then we have another man coming up called Marcion and
Valentis and Basilides. These men are grouped together under a
group we call "Gnostics." A Gnostic was a "knower," literally,
the word coming from the Greek word "gnosis, gnosco." A Gnostic
was simply a man who professed to have superior knowledge to the
average man, and thought the secret of correct interpretation of
the Bible lay in Christian education--or at least pagan Greek
education. They varied. However, they all agreed that education
was the final authority. And these men are numerous; we won't
take time to study all of them. Among them are Basilides,
Valentius, and others, and their systems vary. They have
disagreements between themselves as to what a Gnostic should be
and what a Gnostic should not be. They have a number of systems.
Basically, they all agree that matter is evil. That is,
material is evil, and it has to be spiritual to be good.
Basilides, about 138, was one of the most celebrated of the
Gnostics, born in Alexandria, Egypt, a man well-versed in Greek
and Jewish Alexandrian philosophy and Egyptian theosophy. He
appeared in Alexandria as a religious leader about 133 a.d. He
claimed to have been a pupil of the apostle Matthias and an
interpreter of Peter--not Paul. Showing up in Alexandria, Egypt,
where the North African Latin Church came from, he puts the
emphasis on Peter's teaching. His system, like other Gnostic
systems, grew out of the endeavor to explain the problems of good
and evil.
And the idea is, matter must be bad and the spirit must be
good, which is an error, because there are unclean spirits. And,
among other things that came from this system of Gnosticism, was
the teaching that Christ could not have been a material, physical
being, since material, physical being is evil. Therefore, He was
only a spirit being and not a true man. Some of the Gnostics
might grant that He was the Son of God, but none of them would
grant that He was the Son of man in the literal, physical,
material sense--which of course He was and could not have been
tempted as a man unless He was a man.
Cyrinthus
Then we have others coming in. We have Cyrinthus, an early
Gnostic leader in the second half of the first century, born in
Egypt, of Jewish descent, and studied in Alexandria.
Now things are beginning to take a shape. The shape they're
beginning to take is this. They're beginning to come out Rome,
Antioch, and Alexandria. In our study of church history, we begin
to see some observable trends. And these trends are consistent
throughout subsequent studies. We observe that activity that
begins around Antioch and Syria--Tatian was a Syrian--matches the
King James Textus Receptus and the history of Apostolic
succession, true Christianity and revival. Although some of the
Church Fathers do make mistakes, and when they deviate from the
Bible, inject seeds which later produce corruption.
In Rome, we find an emphasis on the teachings of Simon
Peter, a legalistic, Judaistic, moralistic Christianity, that is
built around a universal proselyte that has a military and
political flavor to it.
And we find that, building around Alexandria, Egypt, a North
African, Latin type of Christianity, which is based on education
and Greek learning. Strangely enough, when we study manuscript
evidence, we find that the Greek manuscripts fall into three
classes--Syrian, Alexandrian, and Western. The Western text adds
to the true word of God; the Alexandrian subtracts from the true
word of God; and the true word of God is the Syrian, Byzantine
text of the King James 1611 A.V.
And you could get that from the Book of Acts, without
knowing Greek or Hebrew. For the great persecutor of the
Christians in the Book of Acts is Rome. And the corrupt
Libertines who dispute with Stephen are from Alexandria; and the
misguided scholar who didn't know his Bible is from Alexandria.
"Very instructive"--as Arthur W. Pink would say!
So we have Cyrinthus. He's halfway between a Gnostic and an
Ebionite. In fact, he was a kind of a link between the opposite
systems of Judaism and Gnosticism, and held a strange mixture of
Gnosticism, Judaism, and Ebionism. He denied the virgin birth,
and taught that the Logos or the "Christ" that descended upon
Jesus at baptism departed from Him before the crucifixion and
went back to the Father, and only the human Jesus was crucified.
Now, that's very interesting, because that's the reading
recommended by Bob Jones University for the Lockman Foundation.
You'll find in Luke chapter 23 the word "Lord" has been erased,
where the dying thief says, "Lord, remember me when thou comest
into thy kingdom." And the human term for Jesus has been
inserted: "Jesus, remember me." This Gnostic deprivation is from
Cyrinthus, about 90-120 a.d. That is, that corrupt blasphemy is
1900 years old! Don't you find that rather instructive?
The teaching that Jesus Christ ceased to be divine on the
cross and became a human is brought out in the erasing of the
word "Lord" from Luke 23 and insertion of the human word "Jesus,
remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom." This is the
reading recommended by Bob Jones III. While he's talking about a
university standing for the Bible, can you imagine? How unreal
can you get? Or, as the hippies say, "Fantastic, man! Fantastic!"
Imagine ten preacher boys from Bob Jones standing up in a
fundamental church and talking about how they thank God they're
going to an institution that stands for the Bible! Why, the
bibles they recommend don't even stand for the deity of Jesus
Christ! Like I say, a knowledge of church history will save you
from a lot of corruption.
That's the teaching of Cyrinthus. He accepted Christ as a
teacher of enlightenment and speculative knowledge, but not a
redeemer from sin. He rejected all of the New Testament, except
part of Matthew.
Well, don't I remember in Matthew where Jesus said, "Thou
art Peter, and upon this Rock I will build my church"? Isn't it
strange, all these early fellows, whether they're saved or lost,
all lean the same way? You remember Ignatius and Polycarp? They
put the emphasis on the Gospel of John--Antioch. In Alexandria,
we find the emphasis going on Mark and Matthew--Mark, as the
interpreter of Peter; and Matthew, "upon this Rock I will build
my church." Rather instructive, don't you think?
Saturninus
We find more Gnostics about this time. These are Greek
educators down near north Egypt and Alexandria, at the University
of Alexandria, that hang around Philo, whom we'll talk about
later, and Origen. One of these is Saturninus, a second-century
leader of Syrian Gnostics, born in Antioch. He studied under
Simon and Minander and was a contemporary of Basilides. He
established a school and taught at Antioch against the word of
God.
He made a distinction between a supreme God, or one unknown
Father, and "creations." He said, "When man was created by the
Demi-Urge [the lesser god], he could but crawl upon the earth as
a mere worm, until the Father sent down a Spark of His own divine
Light, and stood him upright." Hence, you will find many liberal
preachers talking about man having a "spark of divinity," after
evolving up from a worm.
Where does this teaching come from? Charlie Darwin? Oh, No!
No, this teaching is eighteen hundred years old. It's found in
church history.
Saturninus was a rigorous ascetic, attributing marriage and
procreation to Satan and rejecting meat. He denied the human
birth of Jesus, regarding His body as a mere appearance, and he
rejected the Old Testament.
His sect did not extend beyond Syria, and was short-lived.
You know why it was short-lived? Because he was right in the
middle of a hotbed of Biblical Christianity! And it couldn't
survive there, like it survived down in Egypt.
Now, during this time, of course, the Christians are getting
burned at the stake, and getting murdered and killed and shot,
and God knows what. And, as I said before, shot with arrows--I
had it right. And during this time, with all of them getting
murdered and killed and shot and burned, you should understand
that New Testament Christianity is found in the witnessing body
of believers who believe the word of God. And they're not wasting
their time arguing and fussing and fighting back and forth--like
the rest of this bunch is doing--with literary works.
But on it goes!
Marcion
There's Marcion, called Marcion the Heretic, 160. He is
founder of an early heretical sect. He was the son of a bishop,
born in Sinope on the south coast of the Black Sea. He went to
Rome and joined the congregation there, and he made generous
contributions to the church.
He thought the New Testament was unduly colored and
contaminated by the Jewish faith. He completely rejected the Old
Testament. Therefore, he formed a canon which consisted of eleven
books--an epurgated Gospel of Luke--not John--and ten of the
Pauline epistles. In his chief writings, called The Antithesis,
he propounded the ideas of the eternity of matter (Charlie
Darwin), the doscetic view of Christ, and an extremely ascetic
way of life.
Justin Martyr regarded him as the most insiduous and
dangerous heretic of the day. Polycarp called Marcion "the
firstborn of Satan." Philip Schaff said about Marcion the
Heretic, "He represents an extreme anti-Jewish and false Pauline
tendency, fanatical zeal for a pure, primitive Christianity, and
turned the gospel into an abrupt, unnatural, phantom-like
appearance."
Marcion the Heretic agrees with Origen in the passages in
the New and ASV that attack the deity of Jesus Christ. He died in
160. Eighteen hundred years ago, he and Origen agreed that the
readings of the New ASV should be accepted against the King
James. In the Greek manuscripts, you can prove it by checking the
critical apparatus in Nestle's Greek New Testament.
Christian Education in Alexandria
Now, leaving these Gnostics for a minute, these "higher
learners with the superior knowledge"--which Paul called
"foolishness; the Greeks seek for wisdom; but we preach Christ
crucified; unto the Greeks, foolishness"--leaving these educators
of Alexandria and North Africa (we'll come back to them in a
minute), let's take a general overall view of Christianity.
Dargan, the historian, notes that for 100 years after the
deaths of Peter and Paul the trace of preaching are extremely
scanty and do not exhibit any great degree of power. Dargan again
says that the spread of Christianity, both geographically and
numerically, had been largely the work of preaching. What
happened, then, to practical Christianity in this period? We find
these signs of belief in baptismal regeneration, the Epistle of
Barnabas, which we'll talk about later--Tertullian hints at them-
-Irenaeus is orthodox and Scriptural on eternal punishment, but
in his writings, as in Tertullian's writings, the seeds of an
episcopal hierarchy are already being sown, about which the Book
of Acts knows nothing.
Avoiding the doctrinal analysis of Irenaeus' Christology,
how did Irenaeus apply his theology? One writer says in his
preaching of the gospel, the conception of evangelical saving
faith is unfortunately a little obscured. If there's any
connection between Peter, James, and John, and Paul to some of
these Church Fathers, in their spirit of gospel crusading, nobody
has ever found it! Irenaeus representated a difficulty
encountered in finding what happened to the Apostolic witness of
the Book of Acts in the first and second century.
Polycarp and Ignatius were both martyred, of course. Both of
them, by the way, were premillennialists, according to Shirley
Case Jackson's work, The Millennial Hope, published in 1918. And
both of them approximate New Testament Christianity in their
practical work. Papius and Justin Martyr show some face of a
genuine Apostolic witness. He was a premillennialist also; Papius
was martyred about 155 a.d. But it was ol' Papius who started the
theory about Peter being the source of Mark's work for his
Gospel.
And by the way, it was dear old Papius who invented all that
hot air about an original Matthew's Gospel being in Aramaic. Did
you ever hear that one before? That's very interesting.
And we learned of Origen and these other Church Fathers. But
the Alexandrian church school and its associates formed a
peculiar juncture in the history of the church. So we're going to
have to take time out to talk about those things. The work of
Christian education in Alexandria in North Africa.
We've talked about the apologists writing in defense, and
their danger in using heathen terminology. And, at this point, we
should note that nearly all the Church Fathers were
millennialists of some kind--most of them premillennial. This
word is called "chiliastic" in the scholarly writings. Wherever
you find somebody hollering about a "chiliast" or "chiliastic,"
it's somebody who's complaining about the Second Coming of Jesus
Christ.
The main body of Christians are witnessing and winning
people to Christ and getting tortured and burned at the stake for
their faith, or getting thrown to the lions at this time. The
other fellows are arguing it out. As I said before, the
Christians at this time who are doing the job for God don't leave
any real writings.
The Pauline Obsession
This brings us to a very interesting thing we need to talk
about. After all, what was Paul? I mean, when we talk about Paul
as a Christian, what are we talking about? A writer or an
evangelist?
You see, the writers always confuse the writers with the
writers. And when they think of Paul they think of a doctrinal
theologian defending abstract precepts. Strangely enough, when we
read the Book of Acts and read about the life of Paul, we don't
get the picture of a writer at all. I mean, why is it that
theologians are constantly dragging Paul into the categories they
fashion when discussing theology? Well, they probably do it
because Paul was a brilliant man and a theologian in his own
right. But, more than that, Paul was a man, in the dynamic sense
of the word. To read the New Testament, one would think that Paul
had very little in common with the average theologian. Paul is
found preaching, then being stoned (Acts 14:19). He is found
reasoning of righteousness, temperance and judgment toward a
governor (Acts 24:25). He is stoned, jailed, whipped,
shipwrecked, persecuted, and treated for all the world like a
renegade anarchist (Acts 16:24-24:2). And if Paul were appear
preaching on the streets of our larger metropolises today, would
the Christian scholars be likely to include him among their
renowned theologians?
I call this peculiar obsession of these scholars to classify
Paul as a theologian as a writer, and then take church history
apart by the writers instead of by the soul-winners, I call it
"the Pauline Obsession." The tendency is to build a church
history on the collections of theologies and confessions and
writings, supposing Paul was primarily an original "thinker."
That is, a theologian who developed an original doctrine about
Christ.
This obsession is to make an academic theologian out of
Paul, and to compare his theology with subsequent. And that
business has obscured for nearly 1900 years the course the gospel
took following the Book of the Acts. And this point cannot be
overemphasized, if a correct analysis is to be made of practical
theology, the preaching and soul-winning part of church history.
The Book of the Acts, for example, shows an intensely
practical people, going about to fulfill and intensely practical
commission and obtaining intensely practical results. If it is
possible to trace any kind of apostolic succession from Acts 28
to where you are, we must look for witnesses who are Scriptural--
not dogmaticians who are orthodox.
Now, "The Pauline Obsession" can be illustrated in a number
of ways. The historians, when they write church history, they
team him up with a man who is unlike him. For example, Philip
Schaff teams him up with Luther, Calvin, and Thomas Acquinas. Or
Gustav Allen lines him up with John, Luther, and Augustine. Or
Lorrain Bettner lines him up with Moses, Hodge, and Warfield.
These classifications, however innocently constructed, reveal the
deep-seated obsession either to be like Paul, or to make him into
something he's not. Paul was no more like Hodge or Warfield than
Tiny Tim was like General William Booth. And you couldn't put
Paul and Augustine together any more than you could put Larry
Csonka in with David Cassidy!
Luther is classified as a theologian along with Paul by most
historians. Although a professor at Stanford University stated
that Luther was not a theologian and had not even made a thorough
of the theology of his times. It is accepted by most scholars
that Paul did not his revelation systematically in a theological
sense. Gowison omits Paul while listing Origen, Eusebius and
Calvin together.
Some of the classifications are sound. For example,
Augustine and John Calvin and Thomas Acquinas are three master
theological minds. That's true. In The Protestant Dilemma, a
church history written by Henry, he ties Barth up with Berkhof,
Engelder, Warfield, Murray and Schaeffer--which is true.
But theologicans constantly drag Paul into the categories
they fashion when they discuss theology. They do it all the time.
And the Pauline Obsession is illustrated by the manner in which
they treat the Pauline Epistles.
The last part of the Pauline Obsession, what I call it, is
the overlooking of the results of Paul's applied theology. "The
gospel," says Martin Luther, "is preaching and crying of the
grace of God. It stands not in books and letters but in an oral
preaching, a living word, a voice that resounds there into the
entire world and is publicly cried abroad."
One of the greatest crimes in the scholastic field is the
constant attempt to pull the doers into goosesteps with the
thinkers, at the same time persecuting the contemporary doers,
loudly crying, "They are not thinkers!" A thinker can be a doer,
but many of them in history have not been, as can be seen from an
honest study of church history. The use of strong adjectives in
drawing the line between the thinkers who were doers and the
thinkers who just wrote and wanted to be like the doers, must be
frequently resorted to in the study of church to history to show
you the difference. The names involved in church history, like
we've been studying here, have been handled by many writers in
such a way so as to cast a New Testament halo over some men who
are no more Paul's stature than Judas Iscariot's. And you need to
know that in studying church history.
I mean, the great, vast amount of these Christians here in
the first two centuries are simply winning people to Christ and
dying for their faith. They are not writing little epistles and
misusing the word of God and perverting the word of God and
borrowing heathen terminology and trying to fight intellectual
arguments with the heathen on an intellectual level. They are out
doing the work for God. And you should know that.
The University of Alexandria
All right, these Church Fathers who are what we call Ante-
Nicene Church Fathers also come up into Origen (184-254).
And here, for a minute, we need to go back and review the
events that take place behind the school that Origen studied at,
and later became principal of or head of. The study of this
school plays a very important part in church history. As a matter
of fact, it can hardly be overemphasized.
Because, as you know, in modern-day Christianity, the final
authority is not the word of God. It's Christian education. And I
say that without blanching or blushing in apologies to no one. I
don't have to retract it, because it's true. And if I were sued
in court, I could prove it in about fifteen or twenty minutes,
and the educators know it. So they're not going to take me to
court over it. They're going to mind their own business and be
good little boys and girls like they ought to be.
The final authority at Bob Jones University, for example, or
Pensacola Christian College, is not the Bible. They may advertise
about the authority of the Bible. But they don't believe that for
a minute. When you read a book by Custer on inspiration, where he
says, "Christians should use the inspired word," he's just lying.
He doesn't believe you have the inspired word. If you don't
believe it, ask him! Don't get mad at me. Don't be a bigot all
your life. Get around and find out what's going on.
When John R. Rice says, "How wicked of the Christian not to
read the inspired word of God," he's just kidding you. He doesn't
mean that. He doesn't believe the King James Bible is inspired;
he'd be very careful to tell you so every time you put him on the
mat for it. He doesn't believe that. He doesn't believe any
Christian can read the inspired word of God. He doesn't believe
that, and you he knows he doesn't believe it. And he knows he
doesn't believe it, and he lies to you about it.
And we're not saying that he's not a good man and hasn't won
souls. Imitate his example in soul-winning. Imitate his example
in being true to the fundamentals. Imitate his example in getting
places to preach. But when he corrects that Bible, just ignore
his example. Don't correct.
All right, now, getting back to this school at Alexandria.
This school probably had more influence on the things that took
place in Christianity up to the Council of Nicea than any other
single factor. As Eve wanted an education (Genesis 3), and the
desire to know is incurable in human nature--which is evidenced
by Genesis 3--so educated people, and especially college-educated
people, and seminary-educated people, always have a sort of an
edge, so to speak, on the common man, because they're looked up
to by the common man as sort of "demigods" or "demi-urges," or
whatever you want to call it.
And so the first Christian university, the world's most
unusual university, at Alexandria, Egypt, sported quite a record
and quite a history of which you should know something.
Philo of Alexandria
Now the first thing you should know about Origen's
background is the name of a Jewish philosopher (Colossians 2:8),
named Philo of Alexandria. He is born about 20 b.c., lives
through the time of Christ, and dies about 50 a.d., before the
completion of the New Testament.
Philo of Alexandria, Egypt, North Africa, where the Sphinx
is, and the pyramids--a type of the world. God was very careful
to call His Son out of Egypt and call Israel out of Egypt. And
some day He's going to call the body of Christ out of Egypt.
He was born in Alexandria and received a thorough education
in the "Septuagint Old Testament." The writer of this particular
statement, as all church historians, is taking for granted that
there was a Greek completed Old Testament in Greek around at the
time of Christ. This is sheer fantasy! I have right in front of
my in my office the Greek Septuagint Concordance--right on the
table in front of me. The Greek Septuagint Concordance has an
exhaustive concordance listing every Greek word found in the Old
Testament Greek Septuagint, and there isn't one word or one
manuscript that it quotes that was written before 200 a.d.--150
years after the death of Philo.
He was profoundly influenced by Greek thought, especially by
Plato and Pythagoras, and the doctrine of Stoicism. When an old
man, he headed an embassy of five Jews, who went to Rome to plead
with Emperor Caligula in behalf of the Jews of Alexandria. As a
philosopher (Colossians 2:8), he sought to reconcile Greek
philosophy (Colossians 2:8) and the Old Testament by the
allegorical means of interpretation and by Hellenistic philosophy
(Colossians 2:8), holding that Moses was the source of much Greek
philosophy (Colossians 2:8).
You were warned about philosophy in that Bible in Colossians
2:8, and you were warned in no uncertain terms. You couldn't
possibly miss it! And when you run to a philosopher from
Alexandria, Egypt, you better get on your toes and get ready to
fire, because you're headed for trouble!
The writings of Philo portray an attempt to blend Hebrew
monotheism (one God) with pagan pantheism (more than one god).
Yet he tried to maintain faith in a personal living God. Philo's
doctrine of God and God's relation to the world had a marked
influence upon the Gnostic teachings of the first three centuries
of Christianity.
Philo, then, is a genuine source for the Gnostic teaching
that Christ was not a man. The Gnostics elaborated on Philo's
doctrine, and between a perfect exalted God and a material world
there was an extended series of active spiritual beings or "demi-
urges" of "lesser gods." This leads to the New A.S.V. reading
recommended by Bob Jones III in John 1:18 (New A.S.V.), which
says a begotten God reveals another God. Read it! Don't get mad
at me! If you like the Bob Jones banquet with the pretty-faced
boys and girls and the beautiful brass trio, go on and make a
liar out of God and see where it gets you. If you don't know
church history, you're condemned to make a liar out of God and
make a fool out of yourself.
Philo begins the teaching of more than one god, bigger and
lesser, while maintaining faith in an absolute God. And we read
by any history Philo's method of allegorical interpretation had
much influence on the allegorical method of interpretation
followed by the Alexandrian Fathers, especially Clement of
Alexandria and Origen.
Now the untold damage done by the Christian education and
the faculty at the University of Alexandria should only be
estimated in terms of millions of souls. One might say the damage
done to the authority of the Bible and belief in the Bible was
greater when it was accomplished in Alexandria, Egypt, by
Christian educators, than any other five combined factors
including the Roman Catholic Church, Communism, atheism,
paganism, liberalism, modernism, and any other sect.
The Allegorical Method of Interpretation
Clement of Alexandria shows up to take over this school. And
Clement of Alexandria is a first-rate heretic by anybody's
standards. Clement of Alexandria (150-215 a.d.), a Father of the
Eastern Church, an Ante-Nicene Father, born of well-to-do pagan
parents in Athens. After conversion to Christianity in mature
years, he came in touch with Pantanus of Egypt, who strongly
influenced his life with Stoic philosophy and the allegorical
interpretation of Scripture.
You say, "What is this 'allegorical interpretation of
Scripture' I keep hearing about?" Well, allegorical
interpretation simply means that God's lying. Now, you know,
that's reducing it to the smallest common denominator. But, to
explain that, "allegory" means that Adam and Eve weren't in the
garden. "Adam" was the male principle, and "Eve" was the female
principle. The "garden" wasn't there; it was "democracy." The
cherub wasn't a cherub; he was "capitalism." Or, the tree of life
wasn't the tree of life; it was the Federal Reserve Bank. You
understand? Pharaoh wasn't really a king in Egypt; "Pharaoh" was
an unclean spirit. Moses wasn't born; Moses was the rhetorical
method of teaching on the Storah Porch at Athens. You understand?
"Allegory" simply means the Old Testament never happened,
it's just a beautiful picture and fantasy. It represents what I
think it means, and if you take what I think it means, you've got
the right answer. And if you take what he thinks it means, you
don't.
The allegorical method of interpretation, of course,
produces the amillennialist--the man who denies the Millennial
Reign of Christ. Dr. A.T. Robertson, for example. Hodges,
Warfield, Machen, for example.
The allegorical method of interpretation produces the
postmillennialist, the man who believes things are getting better
and better. Like Augustine, for example. And Beacher and the
Black Muslims and the NAACP, for example.
This allegorical method is the teaching that the Bible
doesn't mean what it says, and doesn't say what it means. If it
doesn't, then of course you have to have a key to interpretation.
You have to have somebody who tells you what it does mean--and
guess who it is? Us Christian scholars! Did you ever hear that
one before?
Joseph says, "Interpretations belong to God." Daniel says,
"There is a God in heaven who can interpret the dream." Paul
says, "The Spirit searches all things; yea, the deep things of
God. God has revealed them unto us by his Spirit." The Bible
says, "No prophecy of the Scripture--Old Testament--is of any
private interpretation. But holy men of God spake as they were
moved by the Holy Ghost." Which means, briefly, that if there's
one thing that is essential for the understanding of the Bible
and prophecy, it's not a knowledge of Greek and Hebrew. That
might be the fifth item on the list.
But the experts in Hebrew, Kyle, Delitsch, and Gesenius,
rejected three-quarters of the Bible. And the experts in Greek--
Davis, Robertson, Nestle, Aland, and Metzger--none of them were
premillennialists! And four of them didn't even profess to be
saved! That is, if there's one thing that's not essential to
understanding the Bible, it's Greek and Hebrew. That's for sure!
I'm not sure that they won't do a little bit of good in
their proper place. We teach the students down here three years
of Greek and a year of Hebrew, so he can handle the critical
apparatus in Greek and Hebrew Bibles and understand some of the
monkeyshines and the excursions into cloudland performed by the
Bible-rejecting people who lay so much emphasis upon it.
But, if you want to get correct interpretation, it doesn't
lie in the realm of Greek and Hebrew scholarship. The greatest
Hebrew and Greek scholars who ever lived missed three-quarters of
the Bible just as blind as a bat. They couldn't find a bowling
ball in a bathtub!
Pantaenus
Then we have this fellow Pantaenus. He died about 189. He
was the first known head of the school at Alexandria. Born in
Athens, a Stoic philosopher, like Philo. A Stoic philosopher,
like Tertullian. A Stoic philosopher, a teacher of Clement of
Alexandria.
Clement of Alexandria
All right, then Clement comes up with two men in his
background--Philo and Pantaenus. And Clement of Alexandria, as he
comes up, takes over the school in 189 after the death of
Pantaenus.
You say, "Do these men profess the new birth?" There is no
record that Clement or Pantaenus or Origen ever professed the new
birth--apart from sprinkling of water. They all thought water
baptism was regeneration; you'll find this throughout the
writings of Origen and Clement.
And Origen later became Clement's successor.
Then we have a very interesting thing here. We have a school
that professed to be a Christian school, starting up in
Alexandria, Egypt, started by a Jewish philosopher--which
automatically becomes "Christian" without anything taking place!
The successors being, first, Philo, then Pantaenus, then Clement,
then Origen--about whom we'll have a great deal to say in the
next volume.
Clement held a position as the head of the school in
Alexandria, until the time of Origen. And Origen and Alexander of
Jerusalem were two of Clement's most noted pupils. Origen later
became Clement's successor.
Early in Christian life, Clement became an elder in the
church at Alexandria. We have little of anything else about
Clement after this date. A school of wide reading, versed in all
branches of Greek philosophy, in the Old and New Testament, in
the Apocryphal writings, in Christian literature, took place
there. A scholar of wide reading taught that stuff at Alexandria.
All of the philosophers and writers say he was a "great
thinker" and "a great Christian philospher" (Colossians 2:8), and
he called his philosophy (Colossians 2:8) "Christian Gnosticism."
He said that Christianity had all the good of other philosophies
(Colossians 2:8), and much truth they didn't have. A copious
writer, Clement of Alexandria's writings are repetitious and lack
in clarity. The Catholic Church never saw fit to class him among
the saints, yet he was recognized as a "great scholar."
We give credit to Clement of Alexandria for writing the
oldest Christian hymn that has come to us, a poem entitled
"Shepherd of Tender Youth."
The background of the school of Alexandria is Greek
philosophy--warned about in Isaiah, chapter 26, chapter 29,
warned about in 1 Corinthians 1, 1 Corinthians 2, warned about in
Luke chapter 10, warned about in 1 Timothy 6, warned about in
Colossians chapter 2, and warned about from kivver to kivver,
through 31 chapters, in the Book of Proverbs.
This school that is taken over to Origen, the Church Father,
184-254, became the foundation bed for every apostate trend among
the writers and scholars in the church for the next eighteen
centuries. That's very important to notice. The influence of
Alexandria, Egypt. The reason why it is of special interest to
the New Testament student of 1991 and 1992 is because every
translation called "reliable" by Bob Jones III, John R. Rice,
Hyles-Anderson College, Falwell's University, and the Baptist
University of the South--every translation called "reliable" by
these schools other than the King James is an Alexandria bible
from Alexandria, Egypt, from Alexandrian manuscripts that are
called Alexandrian by every Greek scholar in the universe. They
are phony, godless, depraved, corrupt, blasphemous manuscripts
that attrack the deity of Christ, the virgin birth, the bodily
resurrection, the ascension, the restoration of Israel--and, in
one place or another, attack every fundamental of the faith
believed by fundamentalists. The fact that they do not attack all
fundamentals in every passes them off as "reliable translations"
by the gullible, naive, superstitious, pagan faculty members of
Christian schools. But one must never forget that the faculty
members of the University of Alexandria were all pagans who
professed conversion by baptismal regeneration.
Hence, by the time of 325, we find the body of Christ has
become apostate in its attitude toward authority, apostate in its
attitude toward the scope and coverage of the Bible, where it
speaks of things the Christian disagrees with, and has set up a
body of scholars and theologians who will sit in judgment on the
word of God, and judge it by tradition, legend, Greek education,
and Greek philosophy. We will study in our next volume more about
the Ante-Nicene Fathers, and of course, Origen in particular, who
becomes the kingpin, the foundation stone, the root and grounding
of every error taught by every faculty member of every Christian
school in the United States today.
If you know church history, you know what to look out for.
It is therefore expedient for the Christian to know church
history, and indispensable for the educated Christian to know the
progress of the church from Acts 28 to its present state.
Index of Preacher's Help and Notes
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