URL 
 
 Patristic and Talmudic Studies. 
 
 FROM THE GERMAN OF DR. M. FRIEDLANDER. 
 
 CTOSIEIFIH: 
 
 MOSA1SM AND PLATONISM. 
 
 The writings of the fathers of the church 
 of recent centuries differ widely from those 
 which appeared in the times of the first 
 teachers of the new faith. While the former 
 offer too much shade, the latter present 
 more light. Although occasionally, Janus- 
 faced, glancing very fondly with one eye 
 into far distant regions, ogling the 
 heathen world, from which they had not 
 yet entirely severed their connection, yet 
 the other eye was exclusively devoted to us, 
 and with it they looked at us so charmingly 
 pleasant, so faithfully true, that we could 
 no longer bear any grudge against them. 
 Still we could not oblige them so much as 
 to accept that Platonic love with which 
 they wished to make us happy. Plato had 
 won them completely, had ensnared them 
 with his highly poetical philosophy. In- 
 toxicated with this Platonic draught, they 
 turned to the Jewish Mysteries and singu- 
 lar! before their deluded eyes stood their 
 Plato, his very self. How came he in these 
 works? How came this heathen Saul among 
 the prophets? This burning question had 
 to be answered and an answer was soon 
 found. Plato so the answer ran had at- 
 tended the Jewish schools, had studied 
 thoroughly the Mosaic law, and had trans- 
 lated it into his beloved Greek.* 
 
 This seemingly harmless phrase became 
 in course of time a firm basis, on which the 
 fathers of the church built a powerful, re- 
 ligious, philosophical system. A bridge be- 
 tween this side and the other was thus 
 found; nay, it had existed long ago, but the 
 deluded people could not see it. According 
 
 Euueb. Praep. Evang. Lib. iz. 6. Clem. Alex. 
 Strom. Lib. i. 
 
 to this discovery, Plato's divine philosophy 
 originated in the Mosaic law; it was, there- 
 fore, holy and could no more be forsaken. 
 It was now an invaluable treasure. The 
 Jewish law naturally felt itself highly flat- 
 tered and much rejuvenated when it heard 
 that such a glorious scholar as Plato had de- 
 rived all his philosophy from its source. 
 With this new adornment it could display 
 itself, with great advantage, among the 
 philosophers of heathendom. From this 
 forcible union of Mosaism with Platonism 
 new products arose, which departed from 
 the doctrines of both, and which made 
 every possible effort to cause- confusion in 
 both, and finally boasted of having refuted 
 the arguments of spariousness and apostasy 
 which had been made by both. 
 
 REPROACHES MADE AGAINST CHRISTIANS BY 
 JEWS AND HEATHENS. 
 
 The heathens, namely, reproached the 
 Christians as the fathers of the church re- 
 peatedly report that they have frivolously 
 turned their back to all the customs and 
 manners of their fathers, to precipitate 
 themselves into the ocean of Jewish myths 
 and fables; that at the same time they 
 neither worship the God of the Jews nor 
 practice their laws; that they have adopted 
 a path, shunned by both, to which neither 
 Greek nor barbarian traces lead.t 
 
 The Jews considered it very presumptu- 
 ous in the Christians that they, as strangers 
 and renegades from a heathenish camp, had 
 dared to attack the religion of their fathers 
 in an insolent and shameless manner.! 
 
 t Ib. Lib. i. 2; Lib. xvi. So also says the Jew of 
 Celsug Orig. Contr. Cels. Lib. ii. 
 I Praep. Evang. i. 2.
 
 2 
 
 Because thought they if a Christ really 
 had been foretold in their sacred writings, 
 it was done by Jewish prophets, and these 
 would have promised him to Jews alone and 
 not to other nations. What else of good 
 and beautiful had been promised concerned 
 the Jews alone; the Christians, however, 
 committed great wrongs in claiming for 
 themselves all that had been promised to 
 the Jews exclusively; that they committed 
 irreparable wrongs by basing these promises 
 on false rendering of Scriptures.* Their 
 manner of hunting with eagerness after 
 every evil that had been proclaimed against 
 them and of flinging it into their faces 
 whenever a chance presented itself, they 
 considered highly disgraceful, and as a still 
 greater outrage did they regard their mar- 
 velous silence about all those bright and 
 joyous promises for their future, or, when 
 obliged to speak, their taking it all for them- 
 selves. This was the greatest folly of all, so 
 contrary to all human reason, to claim for 
 themselves the rewards promised for the 
 observance of the Mosaic law, to which they 
 never adhered. t 
 
 Who will deny that these reproaches, re- 
 sults of sound reasoning, had their full 
 authorization. It is* indeed, a very pre- 
 sumptuous act to invade a strange, entirely 
 unknown region, to snatch it from him who 
 possessed it for thousands of years; to destroy 
 the old, juicy plants and in their stead plant 
 a variegated, fascinating imitation of a plant, 
 imported from distant regions, and more- 
 over to force the unhappy possessor, not only 
 to disavow all claims upon his ancient in- 
 heritance, but also to compel him to deny 
 it most emphatically and to exert himself to 
 his utmost to bring natural and unnatural 
 proofs that this state of affairs, which had 
 just now been established, has already ex- 
 isted for ages, thus whet the murderous 
 knife with his own hands to extinguish 
 with it the spark of life, and dying to ex 
 claim: Thus has God decreed it in His holy 
 writings centuries ago! It is self-evident 
 that at such impertinent demand the Jew 
 exclaimed with the prophet: "I had a vine- 
 yard on a rich hill-top and I fenced it in 
 and cleared it of stones, and planted it with 
 the choicest vines, and built a tower in its 
 midst and also a vine-press I hewed out 
 therein, and I hoped that it should bring 
 forth grapes, and it brought forth worthless 
 fruit" Or was he not obliged to oppose the 
 impetuous invader with the words of the 
 same prophet "When ye come to appear in 
 my presence, w 10 has required this at your 
 hand to tread down my courts?" 
 
 * Praep. Kvang. i. 2. 
 flbid. 
 
 These reproaches, made by the Jews 
 against the Christians of the first centuries, 
 based on good reason, and the mutilations 
 of Scriptural passages from the hands of the 
 Christians, were still not of such a nature 
 as to cause ill will or a spirit of persecution 
 among them. How striking is the contrast 
 between these representatives of Chris- 
 tianity and their fanatical and persecuting 
 successors? The former were people en- 
 dowed with humane feelings and imbued 
 with a sacrificing love for their neighbors of 
 different persuasion, whose only fault ex- 
 isted in revelling upon the open and dan- 
 gerous sea in a tottering, loosely -constructed 
 vessel whose sails were filled with religious 
 enthusiasm, and all this with the firmest 
 conviction that they possessed the safest 
 compass and the most infallible basis. 
 
 How could it be otherwise? Filled with 
 the Platonic philosophy, were they not 
 completely overcome when they thought 
 they had found the same doctrines in the 
 Old Testament? They could hold back no 
 longer. They poured as much of their holy 
 ardor as could be obtained over the heads 
 of the indifferent Jews. "One must be a 
 Jew," exclaims Origenes in ecstasy, "to be 
 contented with the natural sense of Scrip- 
 tures, here is deep philosophy hidden every- 
 where." 
 
 BIBLE ENTHUSIASM. 
 
 Although both adhered with the same 
 fervor and devotednesa to the Old Testa- 
 ment, yet they could not understand each 
 other. There existed between both parties 
 differences somewhat similar to that which 
 is manifested in the indolent, miseducated, 
 sentimental city dweller,and the sober, unso- 
 phisticated farmer who toils in the sweat 
 of his face. Place the former in a luxur- 
 ious rural oistrict and there is no limit to 
 his admiration; his frantic enthusiasm finds 
 no end; he loses himself gradually in this 
 revery, climbs to its misty hights further and 
 further; the ground beneath him spems to 
 reel; he notices it not; his excited phantasy 
 has transplanted him from reality. Partly 
 with compassion and partly with disgust he 
 regards the farmer below who, in the midst 
 of such sublime scenes, pursues his prosaic 
 vocation without sharing his ecstasy, who 
 even turns aside from him who indulges 
 such indolent enjoyment, and absorbs him- 
 self in his healthy labor. This reminds us 
 very forcibly of the following words of 
 Germany's great poet, with which he ad- 
 dresses a metaphysician, who is very con- 
 ceited of his own wit: 
 
 ,,2Bte tief Uegt unter mir bie SBelt ! 
 
 flaunt fefy' t$ nod? bie 2flenfdjlein unten toallen, 
 
 SBte tragt mt$ meine flunft, bie fyocfyfte unter alien,
 
 3 
 
 <5o nafye an be$ tmmel' 
 
 @o ruft Don feineS X 
 
 2)er djieferbecfer, fo bet Heine, grofie 3Wann, 
 
 an8 SJZetatob^fthig, in feinem @d}retbgemad}e. 
 
 ,,<5ag' an, bu fleiner, grofcer SRann, 
 
 2)er b.urm, toon bent bein 93Urf fo toornefym 
 
 nieberfdjaut, 
 
 SBobon ift er ttwauf ift er gebaut? 
 3Bie lamft bu felbft fyinauf unb feine fallen frozen, 
 SBoju finb fie bir niife' ate in ba Xtyal ju fe$en ? " 
 
 As this metaphysician, so the fathers of 
 the church looked from the heights of their 
 Platonic Bible enthusiasm at the prosaic 
 Jews, who, situated in a God like paradise, 
 contented themselves with a very plain, 
 strength-nurturing diet, who could not be 
 induced to partake of the delicious nee 
 tar and the eternal youth-conferring am- 
 brosia, so bountiful on this misty height, 
 who even preferred the piece of healthy 
 bread, the result of their own handiwork, 
 to all their fabulous, celestial mama, 
 which vanished into nothingness as soon as 
 it was brought into clear sunshine. The 
 fact is the Jews were and remained rational 
 in their religious intuitive vision. They 
 also understood the loose game of Bible 
 exegetics, but with them its influence was 
 never more than that of a game. The very 
 essence of their existence, namely, mono- 
 theism, was not to be touched, else their 
 kind disposition and good nature was at an 
 end. And it did come to an end when the 
 apostles of the new doctrine, who, infatuated 
 with the Platonic philosophy, would get 
 scent of a new philosophical system in every 
 word of the Old Testament, forced them- 
 selves among them, disputed with unheard 
 of audacity with their teachers, and criti- 
 cised their actions in a shameless manner. 
 The method of training the old, monotheistic 
 religion to their new systems found no at- 
 tentive ear among the Jews. Such a method 
 could never promise itself a popularity 
 among that people. Traditional Judaism 
 has denied its own sons who had tried to 
 accomplish this. The Aristobnles and the 
 Philos, whom the fathers of the church 
 raised to the very sky, and whom they 
 blindly followed through thick and thin, 
 are entirely ignored; Talmudic literature 
 has nothing to report of them. The great 
 mass knew them not and the present genera- 
 tion knows them scarcely by name. They 
 have rendered great service to heathenism, 
 to whom they opened the Jewish treasures, 
 but none to Judaism, which had philosophi- 
 cally evaporated under their handling. But 
 of this we will speak later. 
 
 We said that the fathers of the church 
 during the first centuries stood in very close 
 relationship with Judaism, and this existed 
 
 in their clasping the Bible with all their 
 might, considering it the purest, holiest and 
 most divine source, from which issued their 
 own religion. No Jew has ever believed 
 the divine origin of the Bible more posi- 
 tively and more devoutly than these; no one 
 has made greater efforts to have it promul- 
 gated and to find recognition for it from all 
 sides. They have delivered the Jewish 
 literature to the world, have sent forth many 
 streams from the Mosaic source. And with 
 what incessant diligence is its praise spread. 
 The whole Pagan literature is attacked by 
 them, only to bring evidence of the truth 
 and the old age of the Old Testament. 
 Poesy and prose is rummaged to gain, per- 
 haps, some slight spark which will speak for 
 the ancientness of Judaism and its litera- 
 ture. And when they discovered but an 
 ignis fatmw of very doubtful luster how in- 
 tensely is it entreated to loan for but a few 
 moments its flaring light. It is quite per- 
 ceptible that self-love was the main agent 
 that prompted them to this glorification of 
 Judaism; for it is self evident that, if it is 
 once shown that the Jewish root is beyond 
 any doubt an ancient, healthy, age-defying 
 radix, the trunk issuing from such a primi- 
 tive form must necessarily be strong and 
 entitled to great hopes. 
 
 EUSEBIUS CITES GRECIAN AUTHORS WHO SPEAK 
 FAVORABLY OF JUDAISM. 
 
 This continual activity of the young church 
 in playing the mediator between heathen- 
 ism and Judaism is demonstrated so clearly 
 in the case of Eusobius that there is no dif- 
 ficulty in pursuing the course of this new 
 doctrine through the stages of its prepara- 
 tion, development and ultimate result. The 
 charges preferred against Christianity by 
 the pagans, that they had blindly surren- 
 dered themselves to the Jewish mania for 
 miracles, had to be, if not entirely removed, 
 greatly weakened, and this could only be 
 accomplished by producing indisputable 
 evidence of the infallibility of the Jewish 
 religion. If they succeeded even by finding 
 but a few straws in the heathen literature 
 for support, their position in the eyes of 
 the pagans would be far more favorable. 
 
 With this object in view, Eusebius says 
 in his preface to the ix. volume of the Prae- 
 per. Evang.: " It is high time, since it baa 
 been proven already that the Jewish oracle* 
 were not heedlessly accepted by Chris- 
 tianity, but only after mature considera- 
 tion, to show that Judaism with all ita 
 organization was well known to the most 
 renowned Grecian authors, that some show- 
 ered praises on them while others even 
 pursued a similar theology."* 
 
 *Eoseb..Praep. Evang. vol. ix preface.
 
 4 
 
 ""We shall necessarily have to show," he 
 continues," that many Grecian authors make 
 mention of the Jews and Hebrews as well as 
 of their philosophy, which flourished even 
 in early times. This fact will explain that 
 not without counsel and judicious circum- 
 spection have we concluded to prefer the 
 Jewish philosophy to that of the pagans." 
 
 The manner of proof is, indeed, very 
 primitive. Passages are cited from Por- 
 phyrius, which he again had copied from 
 older authors, and which sound so heath en- 
 ifih that the deceived mind can discover 
 therein nothing else but a glorification of the 
 Jews. Very curious stories are frequently 
 told of them and of their ways of life re- 
 garded with heathen eyes, and from this 
 standpoint highly praised. Among other 
 matters their sacrificial culte is very defin- 
 itely spoken of. Their sober and aecetic 
 manner of life is very emphatically men- 
 tioned. Special praises are bestowed upon 
 them, because " on certain holy days they 
 devote themselves entirely, throughout the 
 whole day, to their God (which is very appro- 
 priate for a philosophical sect), and in the 
 evening with upturned eyes, looking at the 
 stars, they offer praise to their God" (Lib. 
 ix. 2). Further proofs for his assertions he 
 finds in Ilecateus, " who does not only dis- 
 tinguish himself as a philosopher, but also 
 as a social man," and who had dedicated a 
 volume to Jewish history. Whatever he 
 reports has reference to external appear- 
 ances alone, which clearly shows us that 
 he never had an insight into the internal 
 development of the Jews. 
 
 We find verbose descriptions of the coun- 
 try, city and Temple. Special mention is 
 made of the fact that an image of a god, a 
 grove or any similar emblem of idolatry can 
 nowhere be found ; that the priests take an 
 active part in bringing the offerings; that 
 they were, moreover, forbidden the use of 
 wine. In conclusion he narrated an interest- 
 ing story, in which the hero is a Jew, who 
 has highly distinguished himself for being 
 entirely free from prejudice. 
 
 An important discovery, and one which 
 was of great service to Eusebius,he believes 
 to have been made in the peripatetic Clear- 
 ch us. But Eusebius was not aware that the 
 passages of this author had been interpreted 
 before by Clemens of Alexandria (Strom; L). 
 C'learchus finds passages, even in Aristotle, 
 in which honorable mention is made of the 
 Hebrews. " What I have to tell you about 
 this subject," thus Clearch us makes his great 
 philosophical beginning, "will seem to you 
 very strange and peculiar." 
 
 Here he tells us of a most excellent Jew, 
 who in customs and language was entirely 
 Grecian, and whose acquaintance Aristotle 
 
 had accidentally made in Asia. There many 
 philosophers frequently met, questions of 
 great importance were discussed, in which 
 this Jew had rendered greater service to 
 these sages than they had to him. 
 
 Having finished with Clemens, Eusebius 
 begins with Nuina, King of Rome. As a 
 follower of Pythagoras, he said, he copied 
 from Moses the manner of divine worship, 
 prohibited his subjects every plastic repre- 
 sentation of the deity, and taught them that 
 God can only be conceived as spiritual, never 
 as corporeal. This is the cause that the Re- 
 mans during the first one hundred and 
 seventy years, though building many tem- 
 ples, never decorated them with any like- 
 ness of the deity. 
 
 Passages like these are for the fathers of 
 the church invaluable treasures, and they 
 gather them with unceasing diligence. 
 When the Pythagorean philosopher, Nume- 
 nius, ingenuously drops a werd about the re- 
 lationship between the Platonic, Jewish and 
 Eygptian philosophy, or when he says that 
 the prayers of Moses had great influence 
 with God, then the rejoicings of Eusebius 
 and his colleagues are beyond description, 
 and, with many thanks, they accept these 
 confessions from heathen sources as the 
 most reliable proof of the divinity of the 
 Jewish religion (ib. L. ix. 5). 
 
 Poetry also was rummaged, and the dis- 
 coveries in this branch of literature were 
 valued much more since they originated in 
 the works of one of the oldest poets, Choari- 
 bus. According to him, the Jews had ac- 
 companied Xerxes in his expedition against 
 Greece. He reports them to be a people 
 wild and fear- inspiring; their language 
 sounds like the Phoenician; their home is 
 in Solymis, near the great swamp. Their re- 
 pulsive head, shorn all round, strikes terror 
 into the lines of the enemy ; instead of a 
 helmet they wear the smoked hide of a 
 horse-head. 
 
 Whether this description, which is cer- 
 tainly not very flattering to the Jews, is 
 trae, of course we can not say. The fathers 
 of the church were allured by the antiquity 
 of this poet, and his reference to the Jews 
 had to be noted. Their only motive in cit- 
 ing this passage was the geographical posi- 
 tion of their country, which left no doubt 
 but that the Jews were really meant, (ib. 9.) 
 
 Not yet had the power of demonstrating 
 the good old age of Judaism reached its high- 
 est point. Gradually were they approach- 
 
 ig to that triumph, a success which, in their 
 ildest expectation, they never hoped to 
 realize. Until now, great men had spoken 
 favorably of Judaism, but all these were 
 only men. How, now, if a god opens his 
 mouth and gives certainty to their claims by
 
 5 
 
 his own mentioning of the Jews? How, if 
 Appollo himself, is lull of praise of Judaism 
 in his oracles, how then ? Did not this give 
 the heathen theory that the Christians had 
 precipitated themselves into the ocean of 
 Jewish myth and fables a death blow ? 
 And Appollo has really spoken so, and Por- 
 phyrius had learned it by listening, had 
 carefully marked all his words, and had ar- 
 ranged them, so that as soon as the fathers 
 of the church had need of them, they might 
 be ready for use.* 
 
 PROOFS THAT THE GRECIAN? PHILOSOPHY IS 
 DERIVED FROM JEWISH SOURCES. 
 
 The little we have said so far will, per- 
 haps, suffice to show what steps the church 
 took during the first few centuries, in order 
 to approach gradually, its ultimate object, 
 Christianity. The next ardent wish was 
 to prove that Jewish theology is the oldest, 
 and that all philosophy originated therein. 
 The entire tenth volume of the Praep.Evang. 
 treats of this subject, and nearly exhausts 
 itself in endless quotations. The Greeks are 
 here frequently accused of plagiarism, they 
 are charged with a want of originality, that 
 they borrow from other nations, that their 
 alphabet even was a foreign invention. "It 
 is established," so thinks Easebius, " that 
 Cadmus, who first taught the Greeks 
 grammar, was a Phoanician, which fact ex- 
 plains why some of the ancients call the let- 
 ters Phoenician. But these were not in- 
 vented by the Syrians, as some maintain, but 
 by the Hebrews. At the very first glance we 
 notice a striking resemblance between the 
 names of the Hebrew and Greek alphabets. 
 But since each letter of the former contains a 
 hidden meaning, an important signification, 
 which fact can not be maintained of the lat- 
 ter, it therefore proves conclusively that the 
 letters of the alphabet are not of a Grecian, 
 but of a Hebrew origin." 
 
 Now the twenty-two letters of the alpha- 
 bet are scrutinized one by one, out of each 
 separate letter a meaning is- forced, then an 
 experiment is made with three by three, 
 four by four, and so on in every possible 
 manner that any sense could be forced 
 by means of combination. 
 
 " Anything similar to this " so Eusebius 
 closes this favorite subject, of which he 
 speaks again (xi. 6)" you can not find 
 among the Greeks, and you can not help but 
 admit that the facts which I have so far laid 
 bare clearly show that the alphabet is not 
 the possession of the Greeks, but of the 
 Hebrews; that the former had secretly taken 
 them from the Jews, and with but slight 
 changes transferred them to their own 
 
 *Ib. 10 Just. Cohort, ad Grace, c. 25 ed. Otto. 
 
 language. What difference is there between 
 Alpha and Aleph, Betha and Beth, Gamma 
 and Gimmel, Delta and Daleth, Zeta and 
 Zai, Theta and Thet? This assures us, be- 
 yond doubt, that the alphabet is of a He- 
 brew origin and not of a Grecian, since each 
 letter has sense and signification. "t 
 
 By this discovery Eusebius makes con- 
 siberable of an advance toward establishing 
 his views. He has now reached such an 
 elevated point that he has a clear view on 
 all sides and can therefore work with greater 
 ease. If it is once clearly settled that many 
 Grecian authorities spoke favorably of Ju- 
 daism, if it is beyond all doubt that its an- 
 tiquity reaches far beyond any other re- 
 ligion, if finally the honesty of the Greeks 
 in literary affairs is questioned, if they are 
 even caught at numerous thefts, then is he 
 a happy Archimedes who has found a stand- 
 ing place outside of the earth, from which 
 position he may lift her out of her hinges 
 and suspend her by the smallest spider's 
 web. 
 
 PLATO, A PUPIL OF MOSES. 
 
 "If then" so Eusebius says, who places 
 us in medias res with the speed of an arrow 
 " if then, the Greeks coincide in their views 
 with those of Jewish theology and of the 
 prophets, we can not be in ignorance for a 
 moment in what quarters we must look for 
 the original. The thing to be well con- 
 sidered here is, whether the older took their 
 views from the younger, or vice versa. 
 Whether the Hebrews derived their views 
 from Grecian philosophy, which they were 
 not at all versed in, or whether the Grecians 
 borrowed theirs from the Hebrews, whose 
 literature they well knew, these Greeks who, 
 moreover, studied with the greatest energy 
 the customs and organizations of most na- 
 tions." (Ibid. x. 8.) And now we are 
 literally drowned in a flood of proofs, whose 
 object it is to show that Plato philosophizes 
 in numberless cases like Moses. Eusebius 
 takes any passage out of the Old Testament, 
 expounds it, enlarges on it, unconsciously 
 passes a Platonic idea into his interpreta- 
 tions, and then he rejoices in finding that 
 Plato teaches precisely the same as the Old 
 Testament. A few examples will illustrate 
 this novel way of expounding. Eusebius 
 finds in the words (Gen. i. 26): "Let us 
 make in our image," the doctrine of immor- 
 tality of the soul, as he continues in his 
 philosophy: "The substance of the soul 
 must be immortal, because the soul has been 
 created in the image of God." What other 
 meaning does image and likeness of God 
 convey but the imitation of the qualities 
 
 t Praep. Ev. Lib. x. 5; Lib. xi. 6.
 
 6 
 
 and virtues of God? And now he is already 
 deep in Platonic philosophy, and exclaims, 
 as if surprised by its own shadow: "Exactly 
 the same, Plato teaches in his Alcibiades, so 
 that one imagines he hears a pupil of Moses." 
 (Ibid. Lib. xi. 27.) . 
 
 When Plato further says: "As for the study 
 of law, the younger disciples should not be 
 permitted to form their own opinions con- 
 cerning it, or be allowed to criticise the 
 same. They should regard it as sacred and 
 inviolable, as if it were dictated by the 
 Deity itself. But if any of the older ones 
 find therein something too difficult to un- 
 derstand, then let them consult the repre- 
 sentatives of the law, or with their asso- 
 ciates, to which discussions the younger 
 disciples must not be admitted" (de Lege i ). 
 So is also this an old practice among the 
 Jewish savans, from whom he had copied it. 
 As a proof of this,Ti)uBebius, as well as his 
 predecessor, Clemens of Alexandria, quotes 
 a verse from Jes. 7, out of all its connec- 
 tion and falsely interpreted, which in Greek 
 translation reads: "If you do not believe 
 you will have no understanding;" and an- 
 other similar verse from the 115th Psalm: 
 "I believed, therefore have I spoken." 
 These Platonic-Biblical precepts, says our 
 guarantor, Christianity also has adopted, 
 since this branch of sacred writings could 
 be more readily grasped by the yet young 
 members of the new faith. To enter deeper 
 into it requires maturer age. In fact, Ease- 
 bius is very anxious to deduce all Platonic 
 views of the education of children from the 
 Old Testament. Poor Plato! Let him but 
 stir and they are pursuing him hard with the 
 Biblical whip. "I know," says Plato, "that 
 the beginning of everything is of great im 
 portance, and we must, therefore, have re- 
 gard for the tender child, whose mental 
 faculties are open to every impression and 
 which can so easily be harmfully trained. 
 Must we then tell the child all sorts of tales 
 and fables? By no means. We must, on 
 the contrary, examine carefully the materia- 
 to be narrated, must make a judicious selecl 
 tion by putting aside all that is not suited 
 fora child. The collection of stories, gathered 
 in this manner, must be handed over to 
 parents and nurses in time with special in- 
 structions, to recite them continually to the 
 child, so that the development of mind and 
 body keep equal pace," etc. This view, the 
 result of plain and honest thinking, is again 
 considered by the fathers of the church, as 
 copied from Judaism. "Since we all know 
 that gifted men and prophets, imbued with 
 the divine spirit of the Lord, had taught 
 the same, and that, moreover, Jewish 
 parents and educators had long since pur- 
 
 sued this plan, had laid a good foundation 
 to a beneficial education by reciting to the 
 children the stories and events of the Old 
 Testament and from which they hoped the 
 very best results/' (Ibid. xii. 5.) 
 
 Every other remark of Plato upon this 
 subject is similarly treated. When he 
 recommends that an interest should be 
 aroused in the child in its earliest infancy 
 for that subject which shall be its profession 
 when it grows to manhood, that is, let the 
 child play with the plow, build houses, etc., 
 if it is to becoire a good farmer or a suc- 
 cessful architect; that the child by play and 
 profitable amusement must be gradually ad- 
 vanced to the reality and to usefulness; 
 then again no credit is given him for his 
 original researches, he has again copied from 
 Moses, who says: "And these words which 
 I command thee this day shall be in thine 
 heart. And thou shall teach them dili- 
 gently unto thy children." And even the 
 following words of Plato: "Under discipline 
 I understand that virtue in which the child 
 has perfected itself first of all. This virtue 
 will enable it, should it be overpowered by 
 a passion of any sort, to select the right 
 path, hate the evil and love the good." Also 
 these simple words we find in the much 
 older Psalmist, which are supposed to con- 
 vey the same meaning: "Come ye children, 
 hearken unto me. I will teach you the fear 
 of the Lord. What man is he thatdesireth 
 life and loveth many days that he may see 
 good? Keep thy tongue from evil and do 
 good; seek peace and pursue it." 
 
 PLATO'S VIEWS ON THE "CREATION OP THE 
 WORLD DERIVED FROM THE OLD TESTAMENT. 
 
 The similarity in the Platonicand Biblical 
 views concerning the creation of the world 
 present to Eusebius by far the greatest op- 
 portunity for displaying his childish dilet- 
 tanteism. Here he not only discovers a 
 similarity in thoughts, but also in expres- 
 sions. Moses says: "Let there be lights in 
 the firmanent of the heaven to divide the 
 day from the night, and let them be for 
 signs, and for seasons, and for days and 
 years. And God made two great lights; the 
 greater light to rule the day and the lesser 
 light to .rule the night and also the stars. 
 And God set them in the firmanent of the 
 heaven to give light upon the earth." To 
 this the following words of Plato are placed 
 in close connection: "The word and the cog- 
 nizance of God have discovered the course 
 of the sun, moon and the five other planets, 
 to serve as determinations and separations 
 of time, and God created and fixed them for 
 the purpose of remaining faithful to their 
 courses."
 
 7 
 
 "Here you plainly see," exclaims Eusebius, 
 joyfully, "that the words of Plato correspond 
 entirely with those of the Old Testament." 
 He says nothing more than that which 
 Moses said long before him: "By the word 
 of God the heavens were made and by the 
 breath of his mouth all his hosts." And 
 when Moses says, "And God placed them 
 in the firmament of the heaven," etc., then 
 Plato writes, "And he fixed them for their 
 course," etc. (Ibid. xi. 30.) 
 
 We will follow no further this critical 
 father of the church in his stray wander- 
 ings, because it is in the first place too 
 fatiguing, and in the second place the ex- 
 amples which we have mentioned will am- 
 ply suffice to answer our purpose. If we 
 now consider the amount of proofs, gathered 
 with the greatest trouble and labor, we find 
 that two questions oppose themselves upon 
 us; first, why did not the fathers of the 
 church adhere to Plato, whom they loved to 
 such an extent as to make him a pupil of 
 Moses? Secondly, why did they not con- 
 tent themselves with him rather than throw 
 themselves into the arms of "his teacher?" 
 Both questions can be answered from one 
 standpoint, if we but take a hasty glance 
 at the condition of the heathens during that 
 time the riddle is solved. 
 
 PLATONISM THE STEPPING-STONE TO CHRIS- 
 TIANITY. 
 
 Heathenism with all its myths and fables 
 had come to an end. No one would believe 
 in it any longer. Olympus with its gods was 
 left in the lurch. People had begun to look 
 at this unapproachable sacred mount with 
 critical eyes. This old religion could weath- 
 er the storm no longer; a new one was ex- 
 pected to rise, Phoenix-like, from its ruins, 
 and this hope could only be realized by the 
 aid of philosophy. But since the great mass 
 was unable to climb to her misty heights, 
 Madame Philosophy saw the necessity of 
 coming down to them. But where was the 
 teacher who understood how to make this 
 divine spark the common possession of all? 
 Thousands wasted time and labor, but not 
 one succeeded. Christianity has accom- 
 plished it. On the part of the heathens 
 every possible instrument was set 
 in motion to mould out of the various 
 philosophical systems a popular religion, but 
 there was none more suitable for that pur- 
 pose than the Platonic-system. Here they 
 found a great, an all-embracing deity, which 
 could be easily divided into three powers, 
 each of these again could, without any diffi- 
 culty, be transformed into a god, and thus 
 both the thinking and unenlightened classes 
 were highly gratified. The former saw in this 
 
 classification but one God, whose universal 
 power they subdivided,in order to get a clear 
 comprehension of his infinite greatness; the 
 latter shaped it into a trinity to suit their for- 
 mer worship, polytheism. These still saw 
 three divinities, for they abhorred the idea 
 of one God. One God, thought they, is as 
 good as none; (unua den nullus eat.} Such 
 results were all they expected. This fully 
 assured them, that philosophy alone could 
 release them from the bonds of superstition 
 and despondency, that only this would suc- 
 ceed in forcing into the background the wide- 
 spreading nihilism, and thus inspire the old 
 now discredited myths, with new hopes and 
 rejuvenated vigor. 
 
 PHILOSOPHICAL DILETTANTEISM. 
 
 A new life began to unfold itself now. 
 There was a running and a racing from one 
 philosophical sect to another. Everywhere 
 an unquenchable thirst manifested itself, 
 not for knowledge, but revelation. On ac- 
 count of this change, shallow and greedy 
 sophists s welled with pride, and caused their 
 pupils to follow them obsequiously. But the 
 pupils at length grew tired of their overbear- 
 ing masters; they forsook them and sought 
 refuge with some other benighted sect. The 
 heathen philosophers, who had gradually 
 climbed to the highest point of knowledge, 
 alone found peace and comfort in their earn- 
 est studies. Philosophy, they thought, was 
 that branch of science, which, alone could 
 make them happy and blessed. Not so con- 
 tented was the great mass of hot-headed dis- 
 ciples, who were forever changing their 
 schools as well as their philosophical sys- 
 tems. They wished to obtain the much de- 
 sired result with the greatest possible speed, 
 and wherever an obstacle hindered their 
 progress, they looked for an experienced 
 guide to help them across. These were men 
 with restless heads, flaming hearts and an 
 enthusiastic phantasies. They were, there- 
 fore, corrupted philosophers, being discom- 
 posed by the numerous systems, they re- 
 mained superficial thinkers. 
 
 HILLEL AND THE HEATHEN. 
 
 The slow progress they made in the rug- 
 ged path that leads to knowledge discour- 
 aged them. They yearned for revelation and 
 as they found it not, they wandered from 
 school to school until they sank, exhausted 
 and weary at the door of Plato to regain 
 their former strength through his doctrines. 
 Thence to Christianity was but a short leap. 
 Very characteristic of this period, is the 
 story narrated in the Talmud, of the heath- 
 en who requested of Hillel to be taught the 
 Jewish religion, while he could stand on one
 
 8 
 
 leg. This is no exaggeration, it simply illus- 
 trates how eagerly they longed for revela- 
 tion, and what steps they took to procure it. 
 Even the mysteries of other sects were re- 
 sorted to, since their own could no more 
 pacify their yearnings. The answer which 
 our teacher gave to this absurd question is 
 highly important. It shows us how well he 
 understood those people. He knew that 
 their passionate enthusiasm would entirely 
 evaporate before they had accomplished the 
 first half of their journey. They were as- 
 piring to the grand result, but dreaded to 
 perform the necessary work. He could not 
 dismiss him without a word of comfort. He 
 therefore gave him what he wanted, and 
 what he conscientiously thought to be the 
 essence of Jewish religion, namely, "Love 
 thy neighbor as thyself," "every thing else," 
 said he, "is commentary to this verse.* 
 
 THE AUTHOR OP ' ( THE RECOGNITION" AND JUS- 
 TIN MARTYR DESCRIBE THEIR ADOPTION 
 OF CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 These proselytes from the various Phari- 
 saic philosophical schools were the actual 
 builders of the church. This is by no means 
 our individual view alone. Let us but read 
 the confessions of the first fathers of the 
 church, and all that we have said so far will 
 be fully corroborated. 
 
 The author of the Recognition, whose 
 name is Clemens Romanus, writes: "For 
 a thought within me, whence originating I 
 can not tell, led me to constantly ponder on 
 my mortal condition and to discuss such 
 questions as these: Whether there be any 
 life for me after death, or whether I am to 
 be wholly annihilated; whether I did not 
 exist before I was born, and whether there 
 shall be no remembrance of this life after 
 death, and so the boundlessness of time 
 shall consign all things to oblivion and 
 silence, so that we shall not only cease to be, 
 but there shall be no remembrance that we 
 have ever been. This also I revolved in my 
 mind, when the world was made, or what 
 was before it, or whether it has existed 
 during all time. . . . While I was con- 
 tinually revolving in my mind these and 
 such like questions, I was pining away won- 
 derfully through excess of grief. . . . 
 Having, therefore, such a bent of mind 
 
 Sabbat 31 a * 
 
 nina mmn 
 
 a rrnnn 
 
 a &n vsb to .vrae> pan 
 ton ir Tayn N!> -pan^ 
 wn 
 
 from my earliest years, the desire to learn 
 led me to frequent the schools of the philos- 
 ophers. There I saw that nought else was 
 done save that doctrines were asserted and 
 controverted without end, contests were 
 waged, and the arts of syllogisms and the 
 subtleties of conclusions were discussed. 
 . . . And I was all the more tortured 
 in the bottom of my heart, because I was 
 neither able to lay hold of any of those 
 things which were spoken of as firmly 
 established, nor was I able to lay aside the 
 desire of inquiry. . . . What, then, 
 shaU I do? This I shall do: I shall proceed 
 to Egypt and there cultivate the friendship 
 of the hierophants or prophets. . 
 Not to make a long story of it, whilst I was 
 tossed upon these billows of my thought a 
 certain report, which took its rise in the 
 regions of the East in the reign of Ti- 
 berius Csesar, gradually reached us. ... 
 For it was spread over all places, announc- 
 ing that there was a certain person in Judea 
 who was preaching the kingdom of God to 
 the Jews, and saying that those should re- 
 ceive it who should observe the ordinances 
 of His commandments and His doctrine. 
 And that his speech might be believed to 
 be worthy of credit and full of divinity, he 
 was said to perform many mighty works and 
 wonderful signs and prodigies by his mere 
 word; so that, as one having power from 
 God, he made the deaf hear, and the 
 blind see, and the lame stand erect, 
 and expelled every infirmity and all demons 
 from men; yea, that he even raised dead 
 persons who were brought to him, and that 
 there seemed to be absolutely nothing which 
 was impossible to him. . . . About the 
 same year a certain man, standing in a most 
 crowded place in the city, made a proclama- 
 tion to the people, saying: "Hear me, 
 ye citizens of Rome. The Son of God is 
 now in the land of Judea, promising eternal 
 life to those who will hear him, but upon 
 condition that they shall regulate their ac- 
 tions according to the will of him by whom 
 he hath been sent, even of God, the Father. 
 Whrefore turn ye from evil things to good, 
 from things temporal to things eternal. . . . 
 Now the man who spoke these things to the 
 people was from the regions of the East, by 
 nation a Hebrew, by name Barnabas. . . . 
 Learning of these things, I began, with the 
 rest of the multitude, to follow him and to 
 hear what he had to say. Truly 7 perceived 
 that there was nothing of dialectic artifice in the 
 man, and that he related without craft of speech 
 such things as he had heard from the Sim of 
 God or had seen."^f 
 
 t Recog. Lib. i., c. 3: Igitur cum a prima aetate in 
 hujus einodi auimoruin intentione versarer, cupiens
 
 9 
 
 This confession clearly shows how easily 
 these shifting philosophers were satisfied, 
 how little their head, and how munh their 
 heart wanted, and how correctly Hillel had 
 criticized their abilities. Let us now look 
 over the account which Justin Martyr gives 
 to Tryphon of his adoption of Cnrissiaaity. 
 " Philosophy is, in fact, the greatest posses- 
 sion, and most honorable before God, to | 
 whom it leads us and alone commends us; 
 and those are truly holy men who have be- 
 stowed attention on philosophy. What 
 philosophy is, however, and why it has been 
 sent down to man, have escaped the obser- 
 vation of most, for there would be neither 
 Platonists nor Stoics, nor Peripatetics, nor 
 Theoretics, ' nor Pythagoreans, this know! 
 edge being one. I wish to tell you why it 
 has become many- headed. Those who first 
 cultivated it (i. e. philosophy), and who 
 were therefore esteemed illustrious men, 
 were succeeded by those who made no in- 
 vestigations concerning truth. These latter 
 only admired the perseverance and self-dis- 
 cipline of the power as well as the novelty 
 of the doctrines. Each thought that to be 
 true which he learned from his teacher; 
 then, moreover, these disciples handed down 
 to their successors their derived ideas, and 
 others similar to them; and this system 
 took its name from the originator of the doc- 
 trine. Being at first desirous of personally 
 conversing with one of these men, I sur- 
 rendered myself to a certain Stoic. Having 
 spent considerable time with him, without 
 acquiring any further knowledge of God, 
 (for he, himself, did not know, and deemed 
 such instruction unnecessary), I left him 
 and betook myself to another. This man 
 was called a Peripatetic, and fancied him- 
 self shrewd. And having entertained me a 
 few days, he requested me to settle the fee 
 in order that our intercourse might not be 
 unprofitable. Him, too, for this reason I 
 abandoned, believing him to be no philoso- 
 pher at all. But since my soul was eagerly 
 desirous to hear the peculiar and choice 
 philosophy, I went to a Pythagorean, very 
 celebrated a man who thought much of his 
 own wisdom. And when I had expressed 
 my willingness to become his hearer and 
 disciple, he said, " Well, are you skilled in 
 
 aliquid discere, philosophorum frequentabam 
 scbulas, ubi uibil aliud quam dogmatum adsertionea 
 et iinpugnationes videbain agi sine flue cer lamina 
 aries syUugismorum conclusionumque agitari versu- 
 tias, etc. 
 
 Ibid. c. 4. 5 sqq. 
 
 Ibid, c, 7. Quiousego audltts, cum reliqua multi- 
 tuiiine sequi eum coepi et audire, q ao dicerei. Iu 
 teiligebaoi sane quod nihil diale ticae arils asset in 
 homme, sed simuliciter et absque ullo dicendi f uco. 
 quae audisset a fllio del vel viaisset, expoiieret. 
 
 music, astronomy and geometry ? Do you 
 expect to be able to perceive any of those 
 things which conduce to a happy life, if you 
 have not been first informed on those 
 points, which wean the soul from sensible 
 objects, and render it fitted for objects which 
 appertain to the mind, so that it can contem- 
 plate that which is honorable in its essence 
 and that which is good in its essence? 
 Having commended these branches of learn- 
 ing, and explained their necessity, he dis- 
 missed me when I confessed my ignorance. 
 Accordingly I bjre it rather impatiently, as 
 was to be expected, that I had failed in my 
 hope, the more so because I deemed the 
 man had some knowledge; but reflecting 
 again on the space of time during which I would 
 have to linger over those studies, I was not able to 
 endure longer procrastination. (Dial. c. Tr. c. 
 2. (ed. Otto.) In my helples* condition it oc- 
 curred to me to have a meeting with the Platon- 
 ists, for their fame was great. I, ttiereupon, 
 spent as muck of my time as possible with me 
 who had lately settled in our city, a sagacious 
 man. holding a high position among them and 
 1 progressed, and made the greatest improvement 
 daily. And (he perception of immaterial things 
 quite overpowered me, and the contemplation of 
 ideas furnish* d my mind with wings so that in 
 a little while 1 supposed that I had become wise; 
 and such was my stupidity I expected forth- 
 with to look upon, God, for this is the end of 
 Plato's philosophy. (Dial. c. Tr. c. 2. (ed. 
 Otto.) And while I was in this state of 
 mind, wishing once to be alone with my 
 thoughts, I went into a certain field not far 
 from the sea. And when I was near the 
 spot, a certain old man, by no means con- 
 temptible in appearance, ot meek yet vener- 
 able mien, followed me at a little distance." 
 This old man straightway kindled a de- 
 sire in his soul for Jewish philosophy. By 
 this he easily procured a passage for Justin 
 which led from the Plato to the Prophets. 
 After some debating pro and con, the object 
 of which was to lead Justin's vain efforts ad 
 absurdum, he presently be^an to plead with 
 all his oratorical skill in behalf of the Jew- 
 ish prophets. For at the close of his con- 
 verting speech, he says: "There existed, 
 long before this time, certain men more 
 ancient than all those who are esteemed 
 philosophers, righteous and beloved by God, 
 who spoke by the Divine Spirit, and fore- 
 told events which would take place, and 
 which are now taking place. They are 
 called prophets. These alone both saw and 
 announced the truth, neither reverencing 
 nor fearing any man, not influenced by a 
 desire for glory, but speaking those things 
 alone which they saw and heard, being 
 filled with the Holy Spirit. Their writings
 
 10- 
 
 are still extant, and he who has read them is 
 much helped in his knowledge of the beginning 
 and end of things and of thote matters which the 
 philosopher ought to know, provided he has be- 
 lieved them. For they did not use demons 
 tration in their treatises, seeing that they 
 were witnesses to the truth ahove all de- 
 monstration, and worthy of belief; (Dial. c. 
 7.) and those events which have happened, 
 and those which are happening, compel you 
 to assent to the utterances made by them, 
 although, indeed, they were entitled to 
 credit on account of the miracles which 
 they performed since they both glorified the 
 Creator, the God and Father of all things, 
 and proclaimed His Son, Christ." etc. 
 
 Such words easily persuaded this lone- 
 brooding Platonist. Unexpectedly he found 
 the man who pointed out a bright future for 
 him and the road that leads to it. With 
 great eagerness and zeal he threw himself 
 into this new ocean of thought in which a 
 new world arose before his eyes. He him- 
 self describes in the following manner the 
 impression the old man's words left upon 
 him. " But straightway a flame was kindled 
 in my soul ; and a love of the Prophets, and 
 of those men who are friends of Christ, pos- 
 sessed me; and whilst revolving his words 
 in my mind, I found this philosophy alone 
 to be safe and profitable. Tnus, and for 
 this reason, I am a philosopher." 
 
 MOSES AND PLATO, FAVORITES OP SENTIMENTAL 
 PHILOSOPHERS. 
 
 Justin could not possibly have spoken 
 clearer. He could not have afforded us a 
 better insight into all his thoughts and into 
 the manner of his conversion. He shows 
 us how he entered with trembling impa- 
 tience the vestibules of the various schools 
 without, however, advancing further, be- 
 cause the one was. too superficial in its teach- 
 ings, the other too greedy after gain, the 
 third demanded from the applying pupil, a 
 too thorough preparation, which, of courpe, 
 he did not have at all, and to acquire it, he 
 lacked entirely the necessary zeal and pa- 
 tience. Finally he is accepted by the Plato.- 
 nists; there the yearning after knowledge 
 is appeased. Sporting on triis wave of flat- 
 tered hopes and pleasant dreams, he was 
 gradually undulated to the broad sea of 
 " Jewish Philosophy." Thus the fathers of 
 the church substantiate on all sides, that 
 Moses and Plato coincide throughout, and 
 are not as foreign to each other, as appears 
 at the first glance. 
 
 The expression, "Jewish Philosophy." 
 which we have quite frequently used, is by 
 no means an arbitrary adaptation of our 
 own. The Jewish literature before and after 
 
 the Christian period was to the Heathen, as 
 soon as it ceased to be looked upon as a 
 terra incognita, the substance of all that, 
 which was termed "Philosophy" The 
 Alexandrian Schools are entitled to the 
 credit of having made this most happy dis- 
 covery. Since the time when Aristobul 
 labored to show how Plato hail extracted 
 his philosophy with the most unscrupulous 
 discretion from Jew'sh literature, how much 
 of the Phythagorean s.stem was drawn 
 from these sources, how many songs and 
 flowers of rhetoric, even Orpheus had 
 plucked from the garden of " Jewish prose 
 and poesy." Since then there was no end 
 of comparisons. This was carried to such 
 an extent, that the further they advanced 
 on this purely imaginative path, the less 
 space they had, until their foothold at length 
 disappeared entirely, and hypotheses, flut- 
 tering in the air, were accepted as incontest- 
 able truths. We must but hear Philo's 
 views on this topic. He is so much over- 
 come by this mania that he makes every 
 philosopher of Greece a pupil of Moses, 
 " whose doctrines are highly esteemed, not 
 only by Jews, but which is the more amaz- 
 ing also by those whose reputation for 
 wisdom is of great renown."* 
 
 And after some remarks concerning the 
 contempt in which the Greeks and Barbari- 
 ans h;ld. other religions, and even their 
 own, he continues. ''But not so with our 
 law, this has secured for itself the devotional 
 adherence of Jew and Greek, continent and 
 island, the orient and Occident, Europe and 
 Asia, in short the whole inhabited world." 
 
 This view did not remain isolated. Edu- 
 cated heathenism has partly accented it, and 
 has made it current. We soon see well 
 known biblical personages step to the front 
 and become pillars of the highest wisdom. 
 Special reverence was paid to the Patriarchs. 
 They were considered men who had sipped 
 knowledge from the purest springs. Of 
 Abraham it was affirmed that he surpassed 
 all the others in wisdom, and that be had 
 invented astrology.t 
 
 The names ot . these patriarchs became 
 consequently so familiar to the heathens, 
 that they were even used in the formulas of 
 the magicians. (Orig. c. Gels. L. iv.) The 
 emperor Julian himself, who considered the 
 prophets wicked and unworthy of their 
 
 'Compare Dahne, d. jud. alex. Religious 
 
 Phil. I. S. 7, sqq. 
 
 fEupol. ap. Euseb. Praen. Ev. Lib. ix. 6. 
 
 Even, the Talmud knows pomethinir about Abra- 
 ham's occupation witn Astrology, tinbb. 156 a. And 
 says al the same time, that Qua had dmsuaded him 
 irom it. Since, such a ccieueo has uo value for the 
 
 Jewish people.
 
 11 
 
 great God, repeatedly shows the highest 
 respect and veneration for the patriarchs. 
 He says: '* Although I am not one of those 
 who celebrates the Jewish feasts, I neverthe- 
 less worship the God of Abraham, Isaac 
 and Jacob, who originate from the sacred 
 theosophic race of the Chaldeans, and who 
 worship the God that is great and mighty, 
 and who is gracious to those who like Abra- 
 ham revere him." And in another place 
 he asserts that the Heathens worship the 
 same God as the Jews, but only under dif- 
 ferent names. 
 
 Thus we see bow the Heathens sought ap- 
 proaches everywhere, how they made com- 
 parisons wherever n opportunity presented 
 itself. The sole object of all this was to 
 form a union between Heathenism and Ju- 
 daism, and this was entirely accomplished 
 as soon as the Jewish religion was elevated 
 to the dignity of Philosophy. Fornow could 
 the heathen also run as easily from a philosophi 
 cal system, that did not please him, to Jeuish phi- 
 losophy, as he formerly wandered without scruple 
 or difficulty from one sect to another. All that 
 it required, was to regard this new philoeo 
 phy in the light of their old one, interpret 
 it as they previously did, and Christianity 
 was a completed actuality. Yet of all an- 
 cient philosophers, Plato is the only one who 
 afforded the easiest and surest passage to 
 Moses. Both not only spoke a very winning 
 phantasy- exciting language, but the sub- 
 stance of their teachings ie suited to human 
 necessity, it engaged the heart more than 
 the head, it dips the abstract ideas too diffi 
 cult for the understanding into the warm 
 blood of the heart, and makes them tangi- 
 ble as well as visible, gives them form as 
 well aa color. 
 
 SBie etnft tnit gltifyenbem SSerlangen 
 ?|}f;gmalton ben <3tein utnfdjlofj, 
 2M3 in beg 2Haraor' falte SBangen 
 mpfinbung gliifyenb fid) ergofj." 
 So both embraced with lover's arms the 
 marble cold ideas, until they began to glow 
 and re-animate in the bosom of these bards. 
 Those ever agitated questions concerning 
 the creation of the world how coldly have 
 they been treated, how inconsolingly have 
 they been solved by these greatest philoso- 
 phers of antiquity! These knew no pity, no 
 sympathy for mankind. In cold, over- 
 whelming words they unveiled their bare 
 truths. According to them, the world has ex- 
 isted from eternity, man is a mere product 
 of nature.a little better organized but not en- 
 titled to special claims. What a painful con- 
 sciousness for a heart agitated by a burning 
 mania for miracles! This was despair in- 
 stead of solace. In this icy world Moses 
 and Plato seemed like a well warmed room in 
 
 the winter, which, though but dimly lighted 
 by a little lamp, Rtill gives comfort to its 
 pious inmates, who severed all intercourse 
 with their fellowmen, and who in this half- 
 darkness, feel much more comfortable than 
 those outside under the bright, but cold 
 winter sun. This comfortably furnished 
 and heated cell affords peace from the rest- 
 less, unsatisfactory racing along the various 
 regions of science. Deceived in their wild 
 anticipations, they now feel inclined to con- 
 fine their vessel to the still and quiet waters 
 of their faith. 
 
 Plato and Moses! These were men, who, 
 inflamed with the wish of elevating man- 
 kind, based all their efforts upon the ardent 
 zeal in making them happy. They enter- 
 tained, therefore, their own views about 
 the creation of the world, by which the 
 How? and the Where? can be readily seen. 
 They did not teach like Thales, that the 
 world was created Irom waUr; not like An- 
 aximenes, that the universe was produced 
 from air; not like Heraclitus, that nature was 
 caused by fire ; not like Epicurus and Dem- 
 ocritus, that the earth was developed from 
 atoms ; not like Empedocles, that the globe 
 was generated from the four elements ; their 
 theory is not gray, it is the golden tree of 
 life, on which hang the choicest fruits and to 
 enjoy them, we have but to pluck them. 
 They taught that by emanation, the great 
 Deity itself sent forth a second principle, 
 which he placed as a medium between Him- 
 self and the world which was to be created, 
 in order to create everything by this means; 
 "on account of which, the Jews named this 
 principle, ''The word" Logos, or Wisdom 
 &>r>7iia,often "Divine Power" Theou dunamis 
 [Praep. Ev. L. vii, 12]. This, the fathers 
 of the church claimed, is very manifest 
 in the Old Testament. The frequent "God 
 said" demonstrates clearly that the ''Word" 
 of God created all things. (Praep. Ev. L. 
 vii, 12.) While these heathenish half-phil- 
 osophers Platonize thus in the Old Testa- 
 ment, they are already in the midst of Chris- 
 tianity, and propelled by the force of this 
 newly discovered truth, they instantly 
 sought to convert the remaining blind world 
 to their faith, a task, which as a whole was 
 not difficult to perform. For as the great mass 
 of the uncultivated Heathens reverenced 
 Jesus on this account, because he seemed to 
 them more powerful than any one cf their 
 gods, so also the philosopbists raised the 
 Jewish religion to the very skies, because 
 they expected to find therein the best phil- 
 osophical system. 
 
 It has already been mentioned, that at 
 the time, when Jesus made his first appear- 
 ance, the Heathens anticipated from philos-
 
 12 
 
 ophy a positive as well as a benefiting re- 
 ligion. But those Heathens who could boast 
 of a mind of their own, and who had re- 
 ceived a thorough education, could not be 
 induced to take part in erecting an edifice, 
 placed on a religious philosophical basis, 
 and which was destined to suit all classes of 
 people. This opposition was quite natural, 
 for, on the one side, they felt confident that 
 they could find in their own philosophy 
 anything that any other religion, even the 
 beet, could offer ; on the other hand, their 
 whole being revolted at the profanation of 
 this divine wisdom. They would never per- 
 mit, that their sublimest treasure should be 
 surrendered to the mercy of a frenzied rab- 
 ble, that it should be placed before the most 
 uncultivated like the daily food. This in 
 duced Celsus, Porphyrius and Julian to op- 
 pose Christianity with all the force at their 
 command. "Your religion," says Julian to 
 the Christians, suits all classes of society, as 
 much the merchant as the toll-gatherer or 
 the dancer, whose pursuits differ so much, 
 and who are nevertheless guided by the 
 bame religion." These men, trained in the 
 old philosophical school could never dream 
 of creating a national religion. This is there- 
 fore the work of those sentimental philoso- 
 phers who judged more with the heart than 
 with the head, who sympathized with the 
 necessities and miseries of the people. 
 
 They / were philosophers of the people, 
 who united the language of the heart with 
 the well-known scientific methods of the 
 various schools, and thus formed a league, 
 by which they completely defeated the most 
 important philosophers of the Heathens. 
 " They beat us," says the same Julian,' " as 
 the proverb says, with our own weapons, we 
 permit them to murder us with our own 
 swords." 
 
 PLATO AND THE TRINITY. 
 
 Let us now continue to follow our leader 
 to the very keystone of Christianity upon 
 which everything depends we mean the 
 Trinity which rises like an immense beacon 
 between Judaism and Heathenism, in order 
 to invite those who are tossed about on both 
 sides in the stormy sea to take part with 
 them in the safe harbor of their faith. 
 
 All those numberless praises lavished on 
 Plato, the boundless reverence paid to the 
 Hebrews and Moses, all those colossal stones 
 of buildings gathered from the most distant 
 places were to serve but one purpose, 
 namely: to form unyielding pillars for the 
 Trinity-monument, " a column which has ex 
 isted fiom eternity and which has outlived ages " 
 We shall not examine whether Orpheus 
 has actually taught the Trinity in his songs, 
 
 whether Pythagoras in his philosophy 
 as the fathers of the church maintain but 
 so much is undoubtedly true, that Plato 
 has imparted to his best pupils, in a most 
 careful and sacred manner, the doctrines of 
 the Trinity. The manner in which the 
 church applies every word of this philoso- 
 pher, turning and twisting it in every pos- 
 sible way, marks the violent road which 
 they pursued from the earliest times, and 
 on which no obstacle was too great for them. 
 We must naturally ask ourselves: How- 
 came this heathen philosopher to the most sublime 
 of all revelations, how came it that he taught a 
 similar Trinity and yet differed from the Chris- 
 tians in the third cardinal point f But in- 
 stead of receiving a plain answer, the fathers 
 of the church, by modifying his doctrine, 
 give it a very popular form and maintain 
 just the contrary, namely: "And if any 
 one will attentively consider the gift 
 that descends from God on the holy men 
 which gift the sacred prophets call the 
 Holy Ghost he shall find that this was an- 
 nounced under another name by Plato in 
 the dialogue with Meno. For, fearing to 
 name the gift of God, 'the Holy Ghost,' lest 
 he should seem, by following the teachings 
 of the prophets, to be an enemy of the 
 Greeks, he acknowledges, indeed, that it 
 comes down from God, yet does not think 
 fit to name it the Holy Ghost but 'virtue,' 
 (Aretay) (Jsstin Cohort, ad Graec. c. 32). 
 
 But in realty what has Plato taught on 
 this subject? Well, in general but very 
 little, but more than sufficient for these 
 phantastic, hypothesis-seeking philosophists.. 
 His pupils, especially the latter ones, pre- 
 cipitated themselves with a violence of a 
 soul despairing and yearning after revelation 
 upon this portion of the Platonic philoso- 
 phy, expanded it as much as possible, ex- 
 tended it to all sides, so that gradually there 
 appeared a very pleasant, plastic tangible 
 system. And as the Trojans, in former 
 years, entered triumphantly their city, re- 
 joicing with the direful gift of the Danai, 
 without having the least presentiment, that 
 from this Grecian present woful sufferings 
 would ensue, so also the Platonic Jews, 
 mounting the three-headed philosophical 
 Pegasus, galloped with it into Jewish litera- 
 ture, not giving a moment's thought that by 
 this seemingly harmless sport, the heart of 
 Judaism must be rent assunder. There 
 they stood now, wedged between door and 
 jamb. Larger grew the rent, more injurious 
 the confusion, wider and wider expanded 
 the yawning commissures a crash to 
 pieces fell the doctrine of the unity of the 
 Old Testament, and through the crumbled 
 waste stalked boastingly Polytheism re- 
 duced to three Godheads. Such results the
 
 13 
 
 Aristobules and the Philos have brought 
 about with their Plato. 
 
 Before answering these Jewish-Alexan- 
 drian philosophers, let us first bear what 
 Plato and his school have to say. Speaking 
 of the world as a creation of the most god- 
 like Logos, Plato, (in Epimenide) says: 
 (Hon. Kosmvn elaxe Logos Ho Pantoivn Thiota- 
 tog,) and in another place he speaks "of a 
 God that governs past, present, and future, 
 the Father and Lord of the beginning, as: 
 (Hegemonos Kai Aitiou Pater). This causes 
 Eusebius to make the following joyful ex- 
 clamation: "This is evident that Plato rea- 
 sons from Jewish standpoints, otherwise, 
 how else could he describe that other God as 
 the highest of all things and as the Father of 
 the superior leader? How could he pos- 
 sibly address the Father of the Demiurgos 
 with the title Lord, when no Grecian author 
 before him has ever done the same?" 
 (Praep. Ev. xi. 16). 
 
 A letter of Plato to Dionysius, written in 
 mysterious, awe-inspiring words, affording 
 thus unlimited space for diverse interpre- 
 tations, is by far the most important docu- 
 ment on this all absorbing question. He 
 speaks of a mighty King of the Universe 
 (Pantown Basileus) for whose sake all things 
 have sprung forth, and who is the cause of 
 all good ( Aition Hapantown Kalon), and he 
 mentions moreover a second and a third 
 principle. In these words of Plato, the 
 fathers of the church find the doctrine of 
 the sacred Trinity repeated in the manner 
 in which Jewish literature had taught it, 
 (Praep. Ev. Lib. I. xviii, xix, xx: VII. xii.) 
 But since these read Plato with commentary 
 prepaied by his own pupils, w~ think it will 
 not be unprofitable to make a short review 
 with the reflective reader of the writings of 
 the latter, and thus be enabled to follow 
 more closely the course which this doctrine 
 had taken for the final development of 
 Christianity. 
 
 THE NEO-PLATONISTS. 
 
 Plato has taught in his own words which 
 have just now been quoted his Trinity in 
 a hazy outline. Misty as it was, it never- 
 theless attained great favor in later years, 
 and the less it could be understood the 
 more it excited the minda of his pupils. 
 These explained those mysterious words, 
 that the first Almighty God and cause of all 
 good has produced by emanation the sec- 
 ond, called Nmis, and this again the third, 
 called Psyche. This interpretation gradually 
 gained its ground; They soon accustomed 
 themselves to consider these qualities which, 
 though but spiritually conceived by this 
 great teacher, yet, nevertheless belonging to 
 
 one and the same deity, as three God-heads 
 differing in person, being fully assured at the 
 same time that Plato never meant anything 
 else by this mysterious doctrine. So also 
 Plotin confesses that his explanation of 
 these mysterious words of Plato is not origi- 
 nal, but was the common opinion of many 
 before him. (Praep. Ev. 18, 19, 20. 
 yii. 12.) The Genesis of this holy Trinity 
 is very evident to him. Fire transmits its 
 heat to surrounding objects. Snow confines 
 not the cold to itself alone, but shares it 
 with neighboring things. The same can be 
 applied to all odors. The sun s6uds his 
 rays through all the universe, without suf- 
 fering the least loss of heat. In a similar 
 manner so he philosophizes we must 
 think of the first deity, which, by emanation 
 caused the second, and this again the third. 
 Numenius treats the Trinity more plas- 
 tically still. Yet he does not seem to care 
 much about the third god, and his novercal 
 style of speaking of it attracts the attention 
 of even the fathers of the church. Not one 
 of them knew what to do with him. The 
 Platonic school had of course afforded the 
 easiest ascent from earth to heaven, from 
 the material to the abstract by its doctrine 
 of the Trinity. This ladder of ascension, 
 while gradually expanding in its lofty height, 
 until it merges in a potent, self contented 
 deity, a purely spiritual, no longer conceiv- 
 able Goo, it contracts in the same propor- 
 tion beneath, until it falls to the ground 
 with the substance to which it gave life and 
 motion; and while the two divine beings 
 are, in their activity in continual motion, 
 the God above enjoys the most perfect and 
 undisturbed peace and rest. He is the great 
 King, who on account of fear, lest he might 
 lose some of his dignity, dare not depart 
 from his sphere, or descend from his aereal 
 abode to come in contact with Hyle be- 
 neath. Therefore He has His servants who 
 represent Him everywhere. He is the sun, 
 which does not leave its orbit, but sends 
 His rays to every part. He is the source 
 from which emanates the Logos, the all-per- 
 vading spirit of the universe, so that they 
 bring into reality His thoughts and execute 
 His will. "There is not a doubt, whatever," 
 says Numenius, "that the highest God keeps 
 aloof from labor, and is the King of the 
 world, that the world-creating God in his 
 passing through the heavens, guides and ar- 
 ranges all things. (Praep. Ev. 18, 19, 20. 
 vii. 12. 
 
 THE JEWISH PLATONISTS. 
 
 Just as the Neo Platonists found their 
 God, far distant from Hyle, who was every 
 where represented by his Demiurgos, in the 
 works of Plato, so the fathers of the church
 
 14 
 
 found their Deity and his assistants in the 
 Old Testament. Let us see how Justin ex- 
 presses himself to a Jew, regarding this 
 question: "You must not imagine that the 
 unbegotten God himself came down or went 
 up froin any place. For the ineffable Father 
 and Lord of all, neither comes to any place, 
 nor walks, nor sleeps, nor rises up, but re- 
 mains in His own place, wherever that is, 
 quick to behold and quick to hear, having 
 neither eyes nor ears, but being of inde- 
 scribable might ; and He sees all things and 
 knows all things, and none of us escapes 
 His observation ; and He is not moved or 
 confined (Oute Kinumenos) to a spot in the 
 whole world, for he existed before the 
 world was made. How then, could He talk 
 with any one, or be seen by any one, or ap- 
 pear on the smallest portion of the earth, 
 when the people of Sinai were not able to 
 look even on the glory of him who was sent 
 
 from Him Neither Abraham, nor 
 
 Isaac, nor Jacob, nor any other man saw the 
 Father and ineffable Lord of all, and also of 
 Christ, but [sawj Him who was according 
 to His will His Son, being God, and the 
 
 angel, because He ministered His will 
 
 Him they saw. (Dial. c. Tr. e. 127.) 
 
 Numenius, who has done his good share 
 in the erection of this Trinity edifice, un- 
 derstands the relationship between the high- 
 eat God, and His ministering Demiurges to 
 be the same as that which exists between 
 the landowner and those who till the soil for 
 him. The first God, the source of all life 
 communicates this to the Demiurgos, who 
 has been summoned to Hie immediate pres- 
 ence. This one again arranges and sifts this 
 emanated life of God and transplants it on 
 earth among men. (Phuteuei kai dianemei 
 kai metaphuleuei eis hemas hekastous.) Nume- 
 nius assigns to Demiurgos a situation of a 
 mediator between Heaven and Earth, God 
 and men. He is the messenger of the gods 
 whose hea.' extends into Heaven, where he 
 receives all necessary instructions from the 
 first God, and with his feet he touches the 
 earth, to which he gives life. He is the pilot 
 on high sea who steers the boat with the 
 rudder, yet at the same time he has his eye 
 turned to the sky to learn from its appear- 
 ance the course to be taken. 
 
 This is the manner in which Numenius 
 explains this emanation. All things earthly 
 when given away, prove two facts, loss and 
 gain. While the receiver gains, the giver 
 looses. Not so with divine things. Here 
 the giver looses nothing, while the receiver 
 gains. If one imparts to another some of 
 his learning he himself looses nothing by 
 the operation, but the other gains. Simi- 
 lar is the case with light. This can be im- 
 
 parted to another body without sustaining 
 the slightest loss. Just so has the second 
 god proceeded from the first, without caus- 
 ing him any loss of his former power. 
 (Praep. Ev. 18, 19, 20, vii. 12.) This Ema- 
 nation theory of the Platonic school was 
 universally adopted by the fathers of the 
 church. 
 
 Justin Martyr gives the following ac- 
 count of the production of the Logos: " I 
 shall give you another testimony, my 
 friends, from the Scriptures that God begot 
 before all creatures a Beginning [who was] 
 a certain rational power proceeding from 
 Himself dunamin Una ex Jieautau logiken) 
 who is called by the Holy Spirit, now the 
 Glory of the Lord, now the Son, now Wis- 
 dom, now an Angel, now God, now Lord and 
 Logos ; and on another occasion, He calls 
 Himself Captain .... He can be called by all 
 names, since He ministers to the Father's 
 will, and since He was begotten of the 
 Father by an act of will. It is the same 
 with ourselves; for when we utter some 
 word we beget the word, yet not by abscis- 
 sion, so as to lessen the word which remains 
 in us, when we emit it. So, also is it in the 
 case of a fire, which is not lessened when it 
 has kindled another, but remains the same; 
 and that which has been kindled by it, like- 
 wise appears to exist by itself, not diminish- 
 ing that from which it was kindled." (Dial. 
 c. Tr. c. 61.) And in another place he says, 
 "This power was begotten from the Father, 
 by His power and will, but not by abscis- 
 sion, as if the essence of the Father was di- 
 vided ; as all other things partitioned and 
 divided are not the same after as before 
 they were divided. For the sake of exam- 
 ple, I took the case of fires kindled from a 
 fire, which we see to be distinct from it, and 
 yet that from which many can be kindled 
 is by no means made less, but remains the 
 same." (Dial. c. Tr. c. 128.) 
 
 Thus the school of Plato had gradually 
 succeeded in fully establishing a doctrine 
 of a Trinity. One thing was still lacking 
 to make it a complete success and to gain 
 the full approval of the lower classes, and 
 that was the "corporality" of these deities, 
 with which they were wont to recognize 
 their former Gods. But how came this 
 doctrine into Judaism? For the fathers of 
 the church maintained that they knew it 
 and even reverenced it as the highest dogma. 
 It stands to reason that they would not base 
 their new faith on Heathenism, especially 
 since they thought that they had fully 
 proven Plato's theft from Jewish literature. 
 The first fathers of the church discovered a 
 Trinity doctrine in the Platonic school, and 
 to give the new church a solid foundation,
 
 15 
 
 this discovery had to be used as its substra- 
 tum. But they also understood that it would 
 be a cause for perpetual accusations, if it 
 once became known that the strength of this 
 new buildiug depends on heathenism. They 
 saw the necessity of making the ground- 
 work from much older and more worthy 
 material. Nothing was more fitted to be 
 the beaier of this theory than Jewish litera- 
 ture of gray antiquity, the source of Plato's 
 thoughts and views. This would be quite 
 a gain in reputation for their church as well 
 as for Jewish literature. But who was it, 
 who taught that Plato's Logos could be 
 found in the Old Testament, and thus kin- 
 dled a torch for the founders of the church, 
 by the aid of which a whole philosophical 
 system could be brought td light? They 
 were Alexandrian Jews, who for a long 
 time had thirstily imbibed all their nourish- 
 ment from the fountains of Grecian philoso- 
 phy, but without rejecting Judaism, to which 
 they clung with the fondest love. It was 
 the most difficult thing for them to choose 
 between Moses and Plato. They had to de- 
 clare themselves for both, and they soon 
 found since, they absolutely wanted it 
 that both had taught the same. 
 
 This foreign philosophy was to Judaism 
 what a light in a dark night is to the com- 
 fort of a blind man. Although, notwith- 
 standing, he has a light in his hand, he sees 
 nothing, yet others see him, and this con- 
 sciousness procures for him more safety and 
 quiet. So also the Jewish philosophers 
 in the beginning could see nothing in spite 
 of their borrowed light. But gradually they 
 deluded themselves into the belief that their 
 Plato was akin to the Old Testament, and 
 though they saw nothing in spite of their 
 boasted farsightedness, yet from this ex- 
 periment there arose an advantage of no 
 small importance to men exterior to them, 
 who began to notice and to observe Ju- 
 daism, transfigured under the Platonic light. 
 Aristobul already had made every possible 
 effort to harmonize the doctrines of Grecian 
 philosophers with those of the Old Testa- 
 ment, and moreover, to establish that the 
 former were taken from the latter. So he 
 says among other things that the divine 
 voice is not an ordinary one, serving the 
 winged word alone, but it is a creator of 
 works, and in the same sense Moses con- 
 ceived this divine voice, for it is said: "God 
 said and it was done." Pythagoras, Socrates 
 and Plato were also in unison as regards 
 this view, when they maintained "to hear 
 the divine voice." (Ap. Euseb. Praep. Ev. 
 L. xiii. 12.) 
 
 THE LOGOS OF PLATO. 
 
 Here we have already the Logos of the 
 
 Old Testament in a misty outline. In the 
 same manner we meet it again at another 
 occasion, where Aristobul identifies it with 
 the Sophia of Solomon, and, in his argu- 
 ments against the Peripatetics maintains 
 that wisdom had sat in the Council of God 
 before the creation of the world, and that 
 Solomon bad explained it much more beauti- 
 fully and more precisely than they. (Ap. 
 Euseb. Praep. Ev. L. vii. 14.) By this 
 identification of the Sophia with the Pla- 
 tonic Logos, Aristobul showed the way to 
 the Christian Logos sooner than any one. 
 Philo on the other hand sought to transmit 
 the Platonic imagination to Jewish litera- 
 ture in a more systematic manner. These 
 men of course had the very best intentions 
 at heart, but were so involved in their pre- 
 conceived opinion, that they sincerely be- 
 lieved to follow the footsteps of sacred truth, 
 while in reality they indulged the sweet al- 
 lurements of revelry. With eager hand 
 they dug after treasures and shouted joy- 
 fully when they found rain worms. Their 
 greatest aim, to prove that the powerful Pla- 
 tonic God, too unconceivable for the human 
 mind, far removed from matter, was the 
 God of the Old Testament, caused them to 
 overlook the greatest blunders which they 
 made. Keeping this aim in view and ap- 
 proaching it step by step, they could not 
 notice in their ardent zeal, that the ground 
 beneath them became more and more un- 
 stable. They watched with the greatest 
 care the unapproachableness of their great 
 God, would not even for a moment let him 
 come in contact with the "desecrating Hyle," 
 gave him Logos and Logi as attendants, so 
 that these should, as divine attributes, exe- 
 cute all that was necessary. Actions like these 
 estranged them at length from Judaism 
 without their knowing it, without their 
 wishing it. For, while the clear- minded 
 Jew, not afflicted with this manner of Pla- 
 tonism, looked upon his God as the Creator 
 and Maintainer of the world, the philosophi- 
 cal Alexandrian Jew tortured himself with 
 his Platonic principles, and considered it 
 nothing less than blasphemy to bring the 
 Highest Being in connection with matter. 
 The unity of God was thus destroyed by 
 him. In the same proportion as they be- 
 came estranged to Judaism, they approached 
 Christianity. A passage from Philo will 
 illustrate this statement. It refers to a word 
 of the Bible, and it will on the one side af- 
 ford us a clear insight into the way of think- 
 ing of a traditional Jew, of an Alexandrian 
 Jew, and finally of a father of the church, 
 while on the other side it will give us some 
 information of the sad fate of some passages 
 of the Old Testament, and of the metamor-
 
 16 
 
 phoses they had to pass through, until it 
 could finally be put aside as perfectly Chris- 
 tian. This following Hagada teaches how 
 great a difference existed between the 
 real Jewish way of thinking and the Phi- 
 Ionic sentimentality. When Moses imbued 
 with a divine inspiration wrote theThorah, 
 and when he came to the passage: "Let us 
 make man in our image," he started up 
 with terror and would write no more. 
 His whole being resisted such an expres- 
 sion of plurality, and he began to accuse 
 God, who dictated these words to him, that 
 His divine unity would sustain heavy blows 
 since men would conclude from these words 
 that there are more than one God. "But 
 the Almighty" so it continues "was not 
 confounded by his objection, he insisted 
 upon his writing down the fallacious words, 
 saying to our lawgiver that he cared not for 
 those who wished to mistake: Let him 
 blunder" said he, "who wants to blunder."* 
 
 This is the sound and unsophisticated 
 Jewish way of thinking. They pass by with- 
 out paying any attention to the resultless 
 philosophical investigations, and trouble 
 themselves not the least about those who are 
 busily engaged in those researches. "Let 
 him blunder," they say, "who wants to 
 blunder." 
 
 Entirely different is Philo's way of think- 
 ing. He also is surprised when he reaches 
 the passages. "Let us make man," etc. But his 
 surprise is not like that which the legend 
 attributes to Moses. While the latter is in- 
 consolable that he must write down these 
 fatal words, the former exults in finding 
 them. For he philosophizes with Plato that 
 God is too sublime to come in contact 
 with the material. The Highest Being was 
 not permitted to create man. Man consists 
 not alone of the divine light of heaven, the 
 soul, but also of the sinful part, the body, 
 and how was it possible, that God could 
 ever be the cause of anything bad. This 
 Moses himself teaches when he says that 
 at the creation God spoke : " Let us create 
 man," which denotes that God required the 
 help of others, so that if man does what is 
 right and just it can be attributed to God, if 
 otherwise, to his Co laborers.? 
 
 3TI13 
 
 DVI DV 
 
 Genesis Rabb. 8 
 
 npyo ania rvn minn 
 
 no oSyn n^i vjfii IDK urmm 
 
 b ION KiTDHK D'Jt& HD JinnB JHW 
 
 r\\sKh mmm 
 
 tDe muiid. opif, 8. 15, 1C, and in other places. Com- 
 pare Dahne a. a. O. 8. 322 eq. 
 
 It can easily be imagined what use the 
 fathers of the church make of this passage. 
 Their triumph is a still greater one. With 
 joy they reach their hand after that ignis 
 fatuua of Philo, and find, "that the first cause 
 had a consultation with the second cause i. e. 
 God and His Son,about the formation of man. 
 For, it is a self-evident fact that if one 
 speaks, he must speak to some one, if one 
 command somebody, this addressed, com- 
 manded person must be a body distinct from 
 him who speaks or commands.* 
 
 This passage gives some representation of 
 the various changes of a Bible passages before 
 it could make its last appearance as a corner 
 stone of the Christian church. 
 
 Notwithstanding all his mistakes, his 
 views, are nevertheless by far superior to 
 the most important fathers of the church. 
 He clings with all his might to Plato, forces 
 his Logos into Jewish literature, but it re- 
 mained here as purely spiritual as there. 
 The Logos of Philo is no more than a mere 
 contrivance to aid him in his explanation of 
 the creation. It suffered nothing by its re- 
 moval to the Old Testament. It had there 
 the same significance as with Plato, the cre- 
 ating attribute of the great God. But the 
 transplanting in itself was a severe assault 
 on Judaism, For, if it is once established 
 that Jewish literature teaches the Logos, 
 there is then no stand-still with this suppo- 
 sition, but the whole territory of Jewish lit- 
 erature is levelled for its final purpose. 
 Already they know that the Old Testament 
 not only teaches the "Logos," the "Sophia," 
 etc., but also a Messiah endowed with flesh 
 and blood, saved for the redemption of the 
 human family. How now, if some one 
 should have thought to unite this spiritual 
 Logos with the corporeal Messiah in such a 
 manner, that the hit ter,if necessity required 
 it, would lend to the former, this corporeal 
 integument, how then? Why then we will 
 already have a corporeal Logos, bodily be- 
 fore us, and Judaism will have built its own 
 coffin from its own wood. These are the con- 
 sequences of the philosophical doctrine. 
 
 And now the time has arrived to form a 
 slight acquaintance with the Logos of Philo, 
 to become fully convinced that it is in re- 
 ality nothing else but a divine attribute and 
 not a tangible or even a corporeal deity. 
 
 So much has already been written on 
 the Logos of Philo and its influence 
 upon the development of Christianity, that 
 it would be of no necessity on our part, to 
 say a word about it, if our subject which it 
 comes in slight contact with it, had not de- 
 manded it. By carefully studying the writ- 
 ings of this Alexandrian philosopher, we 
 
 Praep. Ev. L. vii., 12.
 
 17 
 
 discover everywhere, that his acceptance of 
 the Logos had a sincere motive beneath it, 
 namely, the God of the Old Testament 
 must never be brought in close connection 
 with matter. His own words may tell us 
 how he thinks of God. " But God is not a 
 compound being, nor one which is made up 
 of many parts, but one which has no mix- 
 ture with anything else; for whatever could 
 be combined with God must be either supe- 
 rior to him, or inferior to him, or equal to 
 him. But there is nothing equal to God, 
 and nothing superior to him, and nothing 
 is combined with him which is worse than 
 himself, for if it were, he, himself would be 
 deteriorated; and, if he were to suffer deter- 
 ioration, he would also become perishable, 
 which it is impious even to to imagine."* 
 
 With such a view of the Deity, it is im- 
 possible to conceive a life in the universe 
 without a mediatorial power, which should ' 
 act as the intercessor between God and i 
 man. A conception of the Logos, as sub- \ 
 lime as this, a world creating, a world-gov- ! 
 erning attribute of God, seems to him no | 
 mere offspring of an idle brain; he regards i 
 it a revelation to his soul from God. He 
 describes this inspiration in the following j 
 manner. "I have also, on one occasion, 
 heard a more ingenious train of reasoning 
 from my own soul, which was accustomed 
 to be seized with a certain divine inspira- 
 tion, even concerning matters it could not 
 explain even to itself; which now, if I am 
 able to remember accurately, I will relate. 
 It told me that in the one living and true God 
 there were two supreme and primary powers, 
 goodness and power; and that by his good 
 ness he had created the universe, and by 
 his power he governed all that he had cre- 
 ated; and that the third thing which was 
 between the two, and had the effect of 
 bringing them together, was the Logos ; for 
 it was owing to the Logos that God was both 
 a ruler and good. Now of this ruling power 
 and of this goodness, being two distinct 
 powers, Cherubim were the symbols ; but 
 of the Logos the flaming sword was the sig- 
 nal." These words need no commentary. 
 "For many things "--he continues in his phi- 
 losophy-" must co-operate in the creationof 
 anything; by whom? From what? By means 
 of what? And why? Now he, with whom the 
 thing originates, is the cause ; that from 
 which the thing is made, is the material ; 
 that by means of which it was made, is the 
 instrument; and why, is the object. Sup 
 pose any one should ask, what is required 
 to build my house or city? Must there 
 not be a builder, and stones, and timber, 
 and tools? What then is the builder, but 
 
 *Philo Judaeus Leg. alleg. II. 
 
 the cause by whom the house or citv is 
 built? And what are the stones and timber, 
 but the materials of which the building is 
 made? And what are the tools, but the 
 things by means of which it is made? And 
 for what" reason is it built, except to serve 
 as a shelter and protection? This is the 
 object. Now passing on from these particular 
 buildings, consider the greatest house or 
 city, namely, this world, for you will find 
 that God is the cause of it, by whom it was 
 made. That the materials are the four ele- 
 ments, of which it is composed ; that the 
 instrument is the "Word" of God, by raeans 
 of which it was made ; and the object of 
 the building you will find to be the display 
 of the goodness of the Creator." 
 
 In perfect harmony with the Platonic 
 schools, he describes the influences of the 
 highest being of the world by means of 
 permanent emanation. "God, the highest 
 being and purest light can not be seen by 
 mortals, owing to its stupendous splendor. 
 In widely expanded spheres about Him, 
 the Logos, with god-like splendor, is situ- 
 ated. The many divine powers convey the 
 received light by means of rays to the re- 
 motest regions, until the whole universe is 
 resplendent with the primitive light.t 
 
 AUQUSTIN ON THE PLATONIC LOGOS AND ITS 
 DIFFERENCE FROM THE CHRI8TIA.N LOGOS. 
 
 And now we are supposed to have dis- 
 covered the Logos, the suitable convenience 
 for the weak human family, the intercessor 
 between God and man, not only in the Pla- 
 tonic schools, but also in Judaism. Not- 
 withstanding this unexpected discovery, 
 dates (rom almost the same time as that of 
 the birth of Christianity, still, no one as yet 
 has dared to build up Christianity from 
 this Logos. All the preliminary conditions 
 were contracted, the necessary material was 
 at hand, the souls were in readiness for 
 that decisive change and not yet the an- 
 ticipated religious catastrophy takes place 
 And why not? The holy Augustin, who of 
 course should know it, since he was a pupil 
 of the Platonists before he adopted Chris- 
 tianity, gives us an intelligent answer. "I 
 have read," says he, "the Platonic works, 
 and they have offered me the greatest joy, 
 when I discovered in a thousand places that 
 they teach the belief in God and His Logos. 
 I have also found therein that the 'Word' 
 has existed from the first beginning, that it 
 was with God, that it was God, that every- 
 thing, that is, owes its existence to it. I 
 have moreover, read in these works, that 
 the Logos did not depend on flesh, blood, 
 
 t Phllo Judaeus de Cher. Compare Daehne a. a. 
 o. 8. 273 sq.
 
 -18 
 
 or the desires of flesh for its existence, but 
 that it had been created by God Himself, 
 and yet I have never read there that the 'Word' 
 has become Flesh and has ivalked among us." '* 
 This was the only obstacle that prevented 
 the formation of the new doctrine. The 
 Platonic, religious philosophy had not yet 
 reached that degree of popularity, by which 
 alone it could go over with an overwhelm 
 ing mass into the camp of the flesh and 
 blood doctrine. The Logos was still too 
 lofty, still too spiritual to become the re- 
 deemer of such restless and sentimental 
 people, as we have described them above. 
 It is true that everything was prepared for 
 the reception of a new doctrine; it is true 
 that Olympus, with his stock of gods, was 
 left in the lurch; it is also true that the 
 people wandered about with discomfitted 
 souls, panting after revelation, Not less is 
 it true that philosophy accommodated itself 
 gradually to step down from its lofty bight 
 and condense into a national religion; all 
 this is true, but it did not satisfy them yet 
 One day Jesus made his appearance in the 
 small district of Judea. From what circles 
 he arose and in what sphere he labored, is 
 known to all. His small band of followers, 
 yearning for redemption, saw in him that 
 Messiah, whom Jewish literature had fore- 
 told. But as such he could not claim recog- 
 nition from the Heathens, and he would 
 surely have been soon forgotten, had not 
 other very important circumstances worked 
 in his iavor. There came the heathen-con- 
 verting Paul, and behind him, at the expedi- 
 ent moment, appeared the right man in the 
 right place, and spoke the right word, and 
 his world caught fire. 
 
 JOHN, THE FIRST, WHO IDENTIFIED THE PLA- 
 TONIC LOGOS WITH THE MESSIAH 
 
 It was the Apostle John who first dis- 
 covered this world -redeeming word, and 
 who cast it to thirsting humanity. He was 
 the first who pronounced that the Platonic 
 Logos and the Messiah of the Old Testament 
 are one and the same, that he walked 
 among men, had cleansed them from their 
 gins, that the dark world was unable to see 
 him. And when he bf-gan with his infor 
 mation : "In the beginning was the ' Word' 
 and the ' Word' was with God, and the 
 ' Word' was God. The same was in the be- 
 ginning with God. All things were made 
 by him (Logos); and without htm was noth- 
 ing made that was made. In him was life ; 
 and the light was the light of men. And 
 the light shineth in darkness; and the dark- 
 ness comprehended it not. . . . And the 
 
 * Compare Basuage, hist, des Juifs. Liv. iv. c. 3. 
 
 Word' was made flesh, and dwelt among 
 us, and we beheld his glory, the glory as of 
 the only begotten of the Father, full of grace 
 and truth." 
 
 When this knowledge was spread abroad 
 :>y the apostle, a lighting, making the whole 
 world tremb e, suddenly convulsed the 
 seople, seized upon the morbid Olympus, 
 jurned the Gods of Greece, and from the 
 smoking ruins there arose triumphantly the 
 listening Platonic Trinity, having been 
 gilded in a Jewish crucible. At length 
 suffering humanity was resuscitated, ailing 
 aalf- philosophers became at once hale and 
 aeartj\ At last, after years of ineffable 
 sufferings, painful vagueness, unutterable 
 scruples, they have found what they have 
 ardently but vainly sought. The Logos of 
 Plato was no more unapproachable, it had 
 descended from its lofty sphere, dwelt like 
 a man among men, to redeem them, taught, 
 suffered and hastened back to his Father in 
 heaven, after he bad sacrified himself for 
 the everlasting happiness of the sinful, 
 human family. This was a tangible philo- 
 sophy, one that was in the intellectual reach 
 of ev-ry class of society. At last the How? 
 and Why? were known. 
 
 When this mighty word of John began to 
 spread, and to be understood in both par- 
 ties, and to seize upon the mind with elec- 
 tric force, then the last barriers, which had 
 till now existed between Heathenism and 
 Judaism, began to fall. All at once the 
 scales fell from off the eyes of these seeking 
 philosophers, after they h?d eagerly drained 
 the words of the Old Testament from cups 
 prepared by Philo, and after they brought 
 proof after proof of the truth of the Apostle 
 John. In the height of their ecstasy those 
 emigrating from Heathenism rushed upon 
 the Jewish law, plundered, robbed, till 
 nothing more could be found, and strangest 
 of all all the booty they had gained be- 
 came under their fingers a Logos. Like 
 barbarians they act now in the " Old Cove- 
 nant," quarrel with a whimsical stubbor- 
 ness, the like of which the annals of history 
 are unable to show. The enthusiasm of 
 those " from the Heathens," finally took 
 such dimension, that they, who could not 
 read a word of the Old Testament, dared to 
 fling into the teeth of the Jewish teachers, 
 the most absurd of all charges, that they 
 understood not their own writings. With 
 the most unheard of audacity young pupils, 
 who had hardly reached beyond the first 
 degree of dilettanteism, dared to upbraid 
 old sagacious teachers. What proof is more 
 evident than the bold naivete of the enthu- 
 siastic Justin trying to explain the Bible to 
 the Jews. Of course they laughed at his
 
 19- 
 
 childish, zealous fervency. And he was 
 not the only one ; many a father of the 
 church looked upon the career of this fiery 
 Justin and followed in his footsteps. They 
 claimed that the Holy Ghost dictated it to 
 them as well as it had formerly enjoined it 
 upon their fore runner. If the making of a 
 good deal of noise may be considered sub- 
 stantiated testimony, then these soul-stir- 
 ring followers of the apostles have accom- 
 plished incredible things, because a more 
 deafening verbosity, a more bombastic re- 
 dundancy of words, was never again wit- 
 nessed. Even to-day, reading their books 
 with a perfectly cool and collected state of 
 mind, we are hurried over head and ears 
 into this delusive charm, and we can readily 
 understand what effect such a garrulity 
 naturally had upon an injudicious, straying 
 populace. 
 
 THE JEWISH ANSWER TO CHBISTIAN ARGUING. 
 
 It requires no proof that it was an utter 
 impossibility to hold a quiet, scientific dis- 
 cussion with men so religiously mad as these 
 were. Such circumstances prevented an ex- 
 planation free from all passion and fanati- 
 cism. In fact,the Talmud is literally filled with 
 humorous and witty sayings, testifying how 
 the Jews considered themselves and their 
 law too much superior to condescend to de- 
 bate the question with them; how little they 
 troubled themselves to measure their 
 strength with an opponent, who brandished 
 childish weapons. At the same time they 
 were well aware of the fact, that such ideal 
 preachings would spread like wild fire 
 among the ignorant class, and where sound 
 arguments failed, fictions conceptions would 
 succeed among classes unacquainted with 
 the original sources. Therefore, the Jewish 
 teachers prohibited the Jews from any dis- 
 cussion with a Christian. AndTryphon said 
 "Sir, it were good for us if we obeyed our 
 teachers, who laid down a law that we 
 should have no intercourse with any of 
 you, and that we should not have 
 even any communication with you on 
 these questions, for you utter many 
 blasphemies," etc. (Dial. c. 38.) There- 
 fore the hot-headed, fanatical Try phon in his 
 anger exclaimed. "It is permitted to burn 
 the writings of the Christians, even 
 if the name of God occurs therein; moreover, 
 that when the threatening danger is nigh, a 
 Jew should rather seek refuge in a Heathen 
 temple, before taking shelter in a Christian 
 church ; for to him the God of the apostles 
 was not the God of the Old Testament, but 
 an idol. What should Jewish teachers of 
 the Law reply, when they are told that the 
 "Hebrew Oracles" have declared that the 
 
 Logos ia a second god? What answer should 
 they make, when the Christians try to per- 
 suade them that Moses himself had recog- 
 niz-d two Lords, for it is written: "And 
 the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Go- 
 morrah brimstone and fire, from the Lord 
 out of heaven?" What reply should he 
 make, when they boast that even David had 
 glorified the Logos in his psalms, when he 
 said: "By the word of God the heavens 
 were made." And in another place: "He 
 sendeth his word and healeth them." And 
 again: "The Lord says to my Lord, seat thy 
 self to my right." What could a well versed 
 Jew respond when he stumbled into such a 
 cataract of Biblical quotations, pregnant 
 with endless mentioniugs of the Logos? 
 What rejoinder to their vaunting that Job 
 taught the Logos by the name of Sophia 
 and that Solomon had similiarly spoken of 
 it? What else could the prudent Jew do, 
 at such ostentations of the Logos discovery, 
 but keep perfectly silent? Should he ex- 
 pound their high-sounding arguments, when 
 they referred to Aristobul and Philo, au- 
 thorities that were nothing to him, but 
 "oracles" to them? Yes, what should the 
 earnest typical representative of Monothe- 
 ism begin, when they prove from passages, 
 which are torn from all connections, meth- 
 odically arranged, leaving entirely out of 
 sight their original place and importance, 
 that Abraham, Jacob, Moses, Aaron, and 
 what else their names might be, the long list 
 of prophets not excluded, had thoroughly 
 proven the doctrines of the Logos, that the 
 preachings of the apostle John were not new; 
 that they were taught in the Old Testament 
 many and many years before him? Here 
 a scientific discussion was impossible. The 
 blows of logic would rebound from their 
 armed bosom, fallacies alone could gain free 
 admission. There was but one answer, and 
 that was mere indifference to all this frantic 
 bustle, a fact, which manifests itself clearly 
 in the dialogue of Justin with the not very 
 scholarly Tryphon. To the many pointed 
 questions of Justin, Tryphon with his bril- 
 liant, ready answers never lacks a suitable 
 passage; be it a biblical passage, an extract 
 irom the Heathen literature, or any fable. 
 The following will prove this assertion. "In 
 the fables of those who are called Greeks, it 
 is written that Perseus was begotten of 
 Danae, who was a virgin ; he who was called 
 among them Zeus, having descended on 
 her in the form of a golden shower. And 
 you ought to feel ashamed when you make 
 assertions similar to theirs, and rather 
 [should] say that this Jesus was born man 
 of men. And if you prove from the Scrip- 
 tures that He is the Christ, and that on ac-
 
 20 
 
 connt of having led a life conformed to the 
 law, and perfect, He deserved the honor of 
 being elected to be Christ [it is well"!; but 
 do not venture to tell monstrous phenome- 
 na, lest you be convicted of talking foolishly 
 like the Greeks." (Dial. c. 67.) In spite of 
 all this, the assumed airy hypothesis so 
 vague in the beginning, gradually stiffened 
 to a pillar of Christianity, which was too 
 strong to be shaken. 
 
 THE EXULTATION OF THE FATHERS OF THE 
 CHURCH ON ACCOUNT OF THE PASSAGES 
 QUOTED BY THE PLATONIC AMELIUS, WHICH 
 SPEAK OF THE PROMULGATED LOGOS OF 
 JOHN. 
 
 We naturally ask ourselves what part has 
 been assigned to the Platonic school in this 
 last grandest world redeeming drama? 
 These, of course, could not be set aside, es- 
 pecially since the Christian propaganda 
 would no longer confine itself to the mea- 
 gre, well-grazed Jewish fields ; there was a 
 greater crop to be reaped from the large fer- 
 tile plains of Heathenism. Also this is 
 readily understood when we take into con.- 
 sideration all their previous actions. 
 
 Plato and his school, who have furnished 
 all the ideas necessary for the structure of 
 the Christian church, are now titled with 
 all the attending pomp and ceremony Pla- 
 giarists par excelle. ce. Step by step their op- 
 ponents advance, forever hurling it in their 
 face. You have never been able to produce 
 an original thought, vou showed masterly 
 ability in copying, in remoulding and re- 
 shaping another man's thoughts. It was as 
 easy to prove all this, as it was to force a 
 Logos upon the Old Testament. The zeal 
 they displayed in this noble task dimmed 
 their eye and mind to such an extent, that 
 it was now absolutely impossible for them 
 to form any pound opinion; their decision 
 was biased, and for their religious enthusi- 
 asm there existed no obstacle. Let us ex- 
 emplify : Eusebius finds in the New-Platon- 
 ist Numenius the beautiful words of John 
 quoted in reference to the Logos, and this 
 amply suffices to bring him into the seventh 
 heaven of bliss. He does not ask the rea- 
 son why Numenius finds himself necessi- 
 tated to quote said passage, bestows not a 
 glance to the notes which accompany this 
 passage, has no eye, no ear for his com- 
 mentary on these words of the apostle, 
 knows not a word about the by no means 
 flattering names which are bountifully lav- 
 ished upon Saint John. Eusebius sees but 
 one thing, and it puts into darkness all 
 others, namely, the distinguished Platonic 
 philosopher quotes the apostle John, which 
 is the grandest testimony that could be 
 
 granted to the Logos. And what an abun- 
 dance of Christian love showers this father 
 of the church upon the head of this mali- 
 cious Heathen! While the latter would not 
 think of mentioning that author, whose 
 words he quotes, but by giving it anon- 
 ymously to his readers, the former most 
 graciously shuts his eye at this contempt, 
 and bestows upon him the most flattering 
 praises, calls him "our most eminent, and 
 most gifted pupil of Plato, one who is best 
 versed in the Platonic doctrine." (Praep. 
 Ev. xi, 18.) Had he studied this Numenius 
 with a little less excitement, and with a lit- 
 tle more reflection he would have discov- 
 ered at once, that the same surprise which 
 overcame him at the moment when he saw 
 a Heathen, quote the apostle John, must 
 naturally have mastered the feelings of Nu- 
 menius, when he saw the original secret of 
 his school openly expatiated upon by a "bar- 
 barian." 
 
 This philosopher expresses his thoughts 
 on this subject most clearly when he says : 
 "This is, indeed, the same Logos that has 
 existed from times immemorial, and through 
 which all that exists has been created. It 
 is this very Logos of which that 'Barbarian' 
 boasts that it has been in existence from, 
 eternity, that it is God, ... so that one 
 hearing such statements would actually be- 
 lieve that it is Heraklitus who is speaking 
 thus." (Praep. Ev. xi. 18.) 
 
 But there is no remedy ; Eusebius is deaf 
 to all that which might disturb him in his 
 religious enthusiasm. All his thoughts and 
 feelings are concentrated upon one point, 
 namely, Numenius, the great philosopher, 
 had read the words of John, had admired 
 them, and that by this testimony, rendered 
 by a Heathen philosopher, much reputation 
 for the Christian Logos was acquired. Cap- 
 tivated by this grand discovery, he expatiates 
 upon it in the following manner: "Words 
 like these Amelius could no longer convey 
 from the doctrines of the 'Barbarian' unless 
 they are free from all delusion and mystifi- 
 cations. This is aa undeniable fact. And 
 that he who is called the "Barbarian" is 
 none else but John, the Apostle, surely no 
 one will doubt, for it is he who first advanced 
 this doctrine, who first of all, in spreading 
 the doctrines of the Redeemer, began: "In 
 the beginning was the word, and the word 
 was with God, and the word was God. The 
 same was in the beginning with God. All 
 things were made by him and without him 
 was not anything made that was made," etc. 
 (Praep. Ev. xi. 19.)
 
 21 
 
 THE EXULTATION OF THE FATHERS OF THE 
 CHURCH ON ACCOUNT OF A DISCOVERY OF 
 A TRINITY IN THE WRITINGS OF PLATO. 
 
 In this manner they lost themselves more 
 and more in their fallacies. The dark apes 
 dawned, forced free research more and more 
 to the background, and laid violent hands 
 upon the former influence of Plato and his 
 school. The Trinity was now erected; 
 stripped from the Jewish- heathenish sup- 
 port, it stood now firm upon its own basis 
 like a gigantic tower. Little danger did it 
 anticipate from the philosophy of the 
 Heathens in which it had originated, for its 
 followers were now but few, and these were 
 so firm in the adherence to their old belief 
 that Christianity with its. new religious 
 training could n it shake their convictions 
 But if any one, perchance, came across 
 Plato and meditated therein, then there was 
 no end to his surprise and ecstasy.* 
 
 * Basnage, hist, des Juifs. Llv. iv., en. 4: Cepend- 
 ant, cela avoit tenement ebloui les Peres, quepeu s'en 
 iallu qu'ils n'aient fait de PJaton nn Chretien avant 
 la Naissauce du Cdristisnisme. "Que Platon sorte 
 et paroiesse ici," s'ecrioitun Theologien rtucinquieme 
 Siecle; c'est vine cnose admirable que taut de 
 Siecles avant 1' Accouctiement de la Vieree et 1'Incar- 
 natiou d'un Dieu; lon<temps avaut que la Trinite 
 
 With an expression indicating surprise 
 and astonishment he stood there, could not 
 see enough, would scarcely trnst to his 
 senses. Did he not find in the works which 
 were written centuries before the birth of 
 Christ the Trinity most excellent! v described? 
 His exultation was indescribable when he 
 discovered that the Logos of John had al- 
 ready been expounded in the primitive ages 
 by Heathen philosophers. He wept tears of 
 joy at this discovery, passionately kissed 
 the books of Plato and devotedly prayed to 
 God, when he began to learn that the 
 Trinity, so difficult for the human under- 
 standing, was nothing new, an every day 
 doctrine of the heathens. t 
 
 de Personnes dans une seul Essence ait ete preche 
 anx Nations, 11 ait par un Coup hardi, par uti (Jenie 
 heureuz, etun stile Inimitable, parlede Dieu le Here, 
 de la Parole du Pere. qui etoit son Conm-il etde 
 1' Am our de 1'iin et de 1'autre. qu'il fm-ait une 
 Divinite seule, indivisible, eternelle et Rouveraine. 
 
 t Ibid. On nous represente un Simplicien, Eveque 
 de Milan, transporte de joie, ou trouvant dans Platon 
 la Trinite atissi clairement expliquee que dans 
 t'Evangile de Saint Jean. On a vu d'aiureK Ohretiens 
 pleurer de joie et baiser avec Transport let Livres de 
 Platon. On a rendu Graces a I)k-u de oe que oe 
 Doume impenetrable a la Kaison iiunmin<> u'etoit 
 pas etranger. puisque let) Parens I'uvuiem couiu.
 
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