Church History (Vol.1-3). J. H. Kurtz
in its favour and much against it. To disprove this notion it is enough to refer to the Montanist fundamental idea of a higher stage of revelation above Moses and the prophets as well as above the Messiah and His Apostles. Neither can we agree with Neander in regarding the peculiar character of the Phrygian people, as exhibited in their extravagant and fanatical worship of Cybele, as affording a starting point for the Montanist movement, but at most as a predisposition which rendered the inhabitants of this province peculiarly susceptible in presence of such a movement. The origin of Montanism is rather to be sought purely among the specifically Catholic conditions and conflicts within the church of Asia which at that time was pre-eminently gifted and active. In regard to dogma Montanism occupied precisely the same ground as the Catholic church; even upon the trinitarian controversies of the age it took up no sectarian position but went with the stream of the general development. Not on the dogmatical but purely on the practical side, namely, on that of the Christian life and ecclesiastical constitution, discipline and morals, lay the problems which by the action of the Montanists were brought into conflict. But even upon this side Montanism, with all its eccentricities, did not assume the attitude of an isolated separatistic sect, but rather as a quickening and intensifying of views and principles which from of old had obtained the recognition and sanction of the church—views which on the wider spread of Christianity had already begun to be in every respect toned down or even obliterated, and just in this way called forth that reaction of enthusiasm which we meet with in Montanism. From the Apostles’ time the expectation of the early return of the Lord had stood in the foreground of Christian faith, hope and yearning, and this expectation continued still to be heartily entertained. Nevertheless the fulfilment had now been so long delayed that men were beginning to put this coming into an indefinitely distant future (2 Pet. iii. 4). Hence it happened that even the leaders of the church, in building up its hierarchical constitution and adjusting it to the social circumstances and conditions of life by which they were surrounded, made their arrangements more and more deliberately in view of a longer continuance of the present state of things, and thus the primitive Christian hope of an early Parousia, though not expressly denied, seemed practically to have been set aside. Hence the Montanist revivalists proclaimed this hope as most certain, giving a guarantee for it by means of a new divine revelation. Similarly too the moral, ascetic and disciplinary rigorism of the Montanist prophecy is to be estimated as a vigorous reaction against the mild practice prevailing in the church with its tendency to make concessions to human weakness, in favour of the strict exercise of church discipline in view of the nearness of the Parousia. Montanism could also justify the reappearance of prophetic gifts among its founders by referring to the historical tradition which from the Apostolic Age (Acts xi. 27 f.; xxi. 9) presented to view a series of famous prophets and prophetesses, endowed with ecstatic visionary powers. The exclusion of Montanism from the Catholic Church could not, therefore, have been occasioned either by its proclaiming an early Parousia or by its rigorism, or finally, even by its prophetic claims, but purely by its doctrine of the Paraclete. Under the pretence of instituting a new and higher stage of revelation, it had really undertaken to correct the moral and religious doctrines of Christ and the Apostles as defective and incomplete, and had thereby proved itself to the representatives of the church to be undoubtedly a pseudo-prophecy. The spiritual pride with which the Montanists proclaimed themselves to be the privileged people of the Holy Spirit, Πνευματικοὶ, Spirituales and characterized the Catholics as, on the contrary, Ψυχικοὶ, Carnales, as also the assumption that chose their own obscure Pepuza for the site of the heavenly Jerusalem, and the manifold extravagances committed by their prophets and prophetesses in their ecstatic trances, must have greatly tended to create an aversion to every form of spiritualistic manifestation. The origin of Montanism, the contesting of it and its final expulsion, constitute indeed a highly significant crisis in the historical development of the church, conditioned not so much by a separatistic sectarian tendency, but rather by the struggle of two tendencies existing within the church, in which the tendency represented by Montanism and honestly endeavouring the salvation of the church, went under, while that which was victorious would have put an end to all enthusiasm. The expulsion of Montanism from the church contributed greatly to freeing the church from the reproach so often advanced against it of being a narrow sect, made its consenting to the terms, demands and conditions of everyday life in the world easier, gave a freer course and more powerful impulse to its development in constitution and worship dependent upon these, as well as in the further building up of its practical and scientific endeavours, and generally advanced greatly its expansion and transformation from a sectarian close association into a universal church opening itself up more and more to embrace all the interests of the culture of the age;—a transformation which indeed in many respects involved a secularizing of the church and imparted to its spiritual functions too much of an official and superficial character.
§ 41. Schismatic Divisions in the Church.
Even after the ecclesiastical sentence had gone forth against Montanism, the rigoristic penitential discipline in a form more or less severe still found its representatives within the Catholic church. As compared with the advocates of a milder procedure these were indeed generally in the minority, but this made them all the more zealously contend for their opinions and endeavour to secure for them universal recognition. Out of the contentions occasioned thereby, augmented by the rivalry of presbyter and episcopus, or episcopus and metropolitan, several ecclesiastical divisions originated which, in spite of the pressing need of the time for ecclesiastical unity, were long continued by ambitious churchmen in order to serve their own selfish ends.
§ 41.1. The Schism of Hippolytus at Rome about A.D. 220.—On what seems to have been the oldest attempt to form a sect at Rome over a purely doctrinal question, namely that of the Theodotians, about A.D. 210, see § 33, 3.—Much more serious was the schism of Hippolytus, which broke out ten years later. In A.D. 217, after an eventful and adventurous life, a freedman Callistus was raised to the bishopric of Rome, but not without strong opposition on the part of the rigorists, at whose head stood the celebrated presbyter Hippolytus. They charged the bishop with scoffing at all Christian earnestness, conniving at the loosening of all church discipline toward the fallen and sinners of all kinds, and denounced him especially as a supporter of the Noetian [Noëtian] heresy (§ 33, 5). They took great offence also at his previous life which his opponent Hippolytus (Elench., ix. 11 ff.) thus describes: When the slave of a Christian member of the imperial household, Callistus with the help of his lord established a bank; he failed, took to flight, was brought back, sprang into the sea, was taken out again and sent to the treadmill. At the intercession of Christian friends he was set free, but failing to satisfy his urgent creditors, he despairingly sought a martyr’s death, for this end wantonly disturbed the Jewish worship, and was on that account scourged and banished to the Sardinian mines. At the request of bishop Victor the imperial concubine Marcia (§ 22, 3) obtained the freedom of the exiled Christian confessors among whom Callistus, although his name had been intentionally omitted from the list presented by Victor, was included. After Victor’s death he wormed himself into the favour of his weak successor Zephyrinus, who placed him at the head of his clergy, in consequence of which he was able by intrigues and craft to secure for himself the succession to the bishopric.—An opportunity of reconciliation was first given, it would seem, under Pontianus, the second successor of Callistus, by banishing the two rival chiefs to Sardinia. Both parties then united in making a unanimous choice in A.D. 235.109
§ 41.2. The Schism of Felicissimus at Carthage in A.D. 250.—Several presbyters in Carthage were dissatisfied with the choice of Cyprian as bishop in A.D. 248 and sought to assert their independence. At their head stood Novatus. Taking the law into their own hands they chose Felicissimus, the next head of the party, as a deacon. When Cyprian during the Decian persecution withdrew for a time from Carthage, they charged him with dereliction of duty and faint-heartedness. Cyprian, however, soon returned, A.D. 251, and now they used his strictness toward the Lapsi as a means of creating a feeling against him. He expressed himself very decidedly as to the recklessness with which many confessors gave without examination Libelli pacis to the fallen, and called upon these to commit their case to a Synod that should be convened after the persecution. A church visitation completed the schism; the discontented presbyters without more ado received all the fallen and, notwithstanding that Cyprian himself on the return of persecution introduced