it restored, that is to say, the primeval severity of the divine intention, but it was even here an advance on apostolic Christianity. See, on this new character of Montanist illumination, Harnack 1.c. pp. 319323 [ed. 4, pp. 426-430], and Bonwetsch, esp. Die Prophetie in apost. u. nachapost. Zeitalter in Zeitschr. f. k. Wissenschaft u. k. Leben, Heft viii and ix, 1884.

3. However true it may be that some at least of the Montanist claimants to prophetic inspiration were self-seeking charlatans (see Apollonius ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 18), there is no reason to doubt that Montanism was really, even at first, a movement in the direction of ascetic puritanism. No doubt the establishment of the new Jerusalem in the 'little Phrygian cities of Pepuza and Tymium,' where Montanus 'would have gathered together' the children of the new dispensation 'from all sides,' was one of the many attempts which church history records to found a 'pure Church.' There the elect expected to behold the 'Jerusalem which is above' descend from heaven (Epiphan. 1.c. § 14). It was mainly the puritan rigorism of Montanism, with its special fasts (notelov voμobeola is a feature noticed by Apollonius ap. Euseb. 1.c.) and ascetic restrictions on marriage, that commended it to the impatient zeal of Tertullian. There was no doubt a tendency to worldliness, a ‘Verweltlichung,' in the Church of the third and fourth centuries, just so far as she was allowed to live at ease, which accounts for, and in part excuses, if it cannot justify, the outbreaks of puritan fanaticism to which the history of the Church in those centuries bears repeated witness.

4. If men making a claim to inspiration would inevitably, in any case, have a tendency to look down upon church officers who made no such profession, much more were the repudiated and excommunicated Montanist claimants put into the most marked hostility to the Church. Their belief in the new dispensation of the Spirit tended to make them regard the Church as antiquated; in their puritanism they would have regarded her as corrupt, perhaps as unchurched by corruption; their expectations of an immediate rapovoia made them disparage her organization, which aimed at permanence.1 Thus they would have every motive for setting the Church of the Spirit' against 'the Church of the bishops,' for setting personal inspiration against official authority, and ascetic severity against sacerdotal claims. As a fact their ascription of the power of absolution to spiritual men-in opposition to church officers-is a feature hinted at by Apollonius: 'who [amongst you Montanists] forgives sins to whom?' he asks in ridicule, 'does the prophet forgive the martyr his robberies, or the martyr the prophet his covetousness?' (ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 18. 7). In Tertullian this feature appears more prominently; see above p. 190 f.

See especially Bonwetsch Montanismus p. 139: Allem dem entgegenzutreten, wodurch die kirchlichen Verhältnisse eine dauerndere Gestalt zum Zweck des Eingehens in eine längere geschichtliche Entwicklung erhalten sollten.' This was modified in later Montanism.

I.

PROPHECY IN THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH.

(See pp. 216, 238.)

THE words of Jesus Christ, 'all the prophets and the law prophesied until John,' are clearly not to be understood as excluding prophecy from His kingdom. If His own language is not without ambiguity,1 yet in the apostolic writings the evidence is abundant. There are prophets in the Church who rank only next to apostles: see Eph. iv. 11, iii. 5, ii. 20, 1 Cor. xii. 28, Acts xi. 27, xiii. 1, and xv. 32. We should gather that not all persons who received at one moment or another the gift of prophecy, as in Acts xix. 6, would have ranked as prophets. The prophet would have been a person who habitually possessed the prophetic inspiration. There was an abundance of the prophetic gift in the Corinthian Church (1 Cor. xiv. 29-39), and the prophets appear here as members simply of the local community; but speaking summarily they belong to the general, as opposed to the local, ministry, and rank with apostles and evangelists and teachers (see esp. Eph. iv. 11, iii. 5, ii. 20, and Acts xiii. 1, where Barnabas and Saul rank amongst prophets and teachers).

We get a clear idea of the characteristics of Christian prophecy.

1. In marked contrast to the idea of a prophet in Plato and in Philo, St. Paul insists that the Christian prophet is no unconscious, passive instrument of the Spirit. Prophecy is rational, and subject to the will of the prophet in a remarkable manner; see I Cor. xiv. and especially verse 32: the spirits of the prophets' (cf. Apoc. xxii. 6) ‘are subject to the prophets,' also Rom. xii. 6, and Acts xxi. 4, II, where St. Paul seems to regard prophetic utterances as misdirected in intention though true in fact. St. Paul indeed on one occasion was the subject of something like an ecstasy. But it afforded no material for his public ministry; it was a blessing only for his own spirit, and we only hear of

1 But see St. Matt. vii. 22, x. 41: elsewhere He speaks of false prophets (vii. 15, xxiv. 11) or Old Testament prophets (St. Luke xi. 49-51) or couples prophets with ⚫ wise men and scribes' so that the language becomes analogical (St. Matt. xxiii. 34, cf. x. 41).

So Meyer on 1 Cor. xiv. 31, and Bonwetsch Die Prophetie in apost. u. nachapost. Zeitalter in Zeitschr. f. kirchl. Wissenschaft u. k. Leben, 1884, Heft viii, p. 413, and ix, on whom this note is largely based. It should also be noticed that the existence of these distinctive prophets is not inconsistent with the gift of prophecy being given to the whole Church, see Acts ii. 17, 18.

• See Bonwetsch l.c. p. 415. He gives excellent references showing how essential to the idea of prophecy in these writers is its ecstatic character: ovdeis évvovs ἐφάπτεται μαντικῆς ἐνθέου (Plat. Tim. 72a), ἐξοικίζεται ἐν ἡμῖν ὁ νοῦς κατὰ τὴν τοῦ Belov пveúμatos ãpışır (Philo Quis Rerum Divin. Heres 265 (p. 511]). It was because Montanist prophecy was of this irrational, ecstatic character that the Church rejected it.

it through an allusion made fourteen years afterwards (2 Cor. xii. 2-4). St. John's Apocalypse is a special form of prophecy of most direct inspiration (cf. Apoc. i. 3, 10, iv. 2, xxii. 7, 10, 18, 19), but St. John clearly retains his consciousness and personality throughout the revelations made to him, and the function of prophecy is defined in general terms as 'the testimony of Jesus' (xix. 10) and regarded as continuing into the new covenant (xi. 18, xviii. 20).

2. The Christian prophet is no individual oracle. He is one of a body, and his gift exists for the good of the whole body. Accordingly it is subordinated to the regulative authority in the body, in the interest of order: see I Cor. xii. and xiv. 4, 5, 12, 17, 29-33, 40. Our Lord had directed that prophets were to be known by their moral fruits (St. Matt. vii. 15, 16). St. John also directs that utterances claiming inspiration should be tested by the rule of faith (1 John iv. 1-3, 2 John 7-11; cf. 1 Thess. v. 19-21).

3. We should gather from the Acts that Christian prophets foretold, like Agabus; see Acts xi. 28, xxi. 11. So St. Peter exercises prophetic power (Acts v. 3-10) and the Spirit guides the Apostles on critical occasions by specially communicated directions or prohibitions (Acts x. 19, xiii. 2, xvi. 6, xx. 22, 23). St. Paul (1 Tim. i. 18, iv. 14) says that Timothy was pointed out for his office by prophecies, and that prophecy was the means by which he came to receive his 'gift.' It is also the prophetic function to exhort and confirm and edify (Acts xv. 32 παρεκάλεσαν, ἐπεστήριξαν, cf. 1 Cor. xiv. 3 οἰκοδομή, παράκλησις, παραμυθία). Further in Acts xiii. 1-3 prophets (and teachers) appear as ministers of the Church's worship and they are represented as laying their hands after fasting and prayer upon Saul and Barnabas. On this occasion, however, the laying-on of hands recognised, rather than gave, apostolic commission,1 and a supernatural intimation led up to it; so that it was an exceptional event. But it is probable that those who could enact the rite on this occasion could have done so under more ordinary circumstances, for 'ordination' or 'confirmation.' Who but Barnabas-one of these prophets (xiii. 1)— can have laid hands on the Antiochene Christians for the bestowal of the Spirit? See Acts xi. 22 and cf. viii. 14. It falls in with the 'liturgical' function of prophets, that St. Paul implies that there were such things as inspired prayers as well as inspired exhortations. There is a praying and praising which is by both the spirit and the reason, a 'eucharist' to which the private Christian can say his Amen with an intelligent assent, and which is none the less in the Spirit' (1 Cor. xiv. 15, 16).2

In the general sense; it is to be regarded, however, as giving them the commission of the Church at Antioch for a particular work indicated supernaturally by the Spirit-'the work whereunto He had called them.'

In 1 Cor. xiv. 16 év пveúμatɩ must, I think, mean 'in spirit only,' i.e. in an unintelligible tongue; as opposed to a blessing of the Eucharist in spirit and in reason'--such a prayer as St. Paul himself would have prayed.

The gift of prophecy continued as a recognised endowment of the Church into the second and even the third century. Certain people were recognised as prophets, e.g. Ignatius, Polycarp, and Quadratus, already referred to (pp. 250, 254). As in the apostolic Church there had been prophetesses, so too they had their late representative in Ammia at Philadelphia (Euseb. H. E. v. 17. 3). St. Irenaeus, besides denouncing false prophets (adv. Haer. IV. xxxiii. 6), protests against those who would banish prophecy from the Church under pretence of exposing such pretenders (111. xi. 9: 'propheticam . . . gratiam repellunt ab ecclesia') and witnesses, like Justin Martyr, to the continuance of prophetic gifts in his own day (11. xxxii. 4, V. vi. I; Justin c. Tryph. 82). Even an opponent of the false prophets of Montanism recognises that prophecy must continue in the whole Church to the end (ap. Euseb. H. E. v. 17. 4). The Montanist prophets were rejected by the Church specially on account of the ecstatic and irrational character of their supposed gifts. Their rejection involved no slight at all on the gift of prophecy and no denial of its claims. As a matter of fact, however, the genuine gift seems to have become exceedingly rare; Origen speaks only of slight traces of it remaining to his time (c. Cels. i. 46, vii. 8).

The documents of the subapostolic age are of special interest for this subject-the Didache and the Shepherd of Hermas. In the Didache the true prophet is distinguished from the false ‘by his fruits,' i.e. by his genuine poverty and disinterestedness and by his orthodoxy. So far he is subject to the testing of the Church. But when once his true prophetic inspiration is accepted, it becomes a sin against the Holy Ghost to judge him; see xi. 1, 2, 7-13. The remarkable feature in the prophets of this document is that, like those at Antioch in the Acts, they become, wherever they appear, the chief ministers of worship, no less than of teaching, and hold, with the less defined figures of apostle and teacher, the first rank in the church hierarchy. The Didache is, as was said above (p. 254), the last document in which prophets appear clothed with this higher dignity. After that prophetic bishops take the place of episcopal prophets. There is not, however, as was pointed out (p. 255), sufficient reason to assert that the latter ever held their quasi-apostolic position in the Church on the mere ground of their prophetic gifts, without ordination.

In the Shepherd Hermas appears as the recipient of veritable visions which are to be communicated to the Church. If thus he is to be considered as a true prophet, he gives us also a vivid picture of the false prophet inspired of Satan (Mand. xi), whose characteristic is selfseeking and ambition, and who is represented sitting on a 'cathedra,' answering the questions of those who come to consult him. No spirit given from God, says Hermas, is thus questioned, but speaks of itself according to the divine power given. The spirit which is questioned and answers according to the lusts of men is earthly and fickle. Again, in order to secure reputation, the false prophet isolates himself and prophesies in a corner, whereas the true prophet only speaks

(where the pretender is dumb) in the congregation of just men. Again, the false prophet is ambitious of ecclesiastical preferment, he desires the 'chief seat,' while the true prophet is humble and meek. Again, the false prophet requires to be paid before he will speak. Thus the true and false prophets are to be distinguished by their conduct.

6

It is clear that at the time of the Shepherd the prophet did not hold anything like the position which he held in the Didache. No doubt the abundance of pretenders to inspiration made it plain that prophecy, even if an abiding endowment of the Church, was a rare one and not intended for the Church to depend upon for a supply of her chief ministers. In the Apostolic Constitutions we have a clear intimation of the transitory character of the miraculous charismata' of the early Church, and of prophecy among them. The Apostles are there represented as declaring that, in contrast to the fundamental spiritual gift which is the essence of Christian life, miracles were only vouchsafed in view of the conversion of the world and would become superfluous when all were Christians; accordingly those who possess the exceptional gifts are warned not to exalt themselves on that account over the church rulers and the exorcist, in spite of the gift of healings which marks him for his special office without any ordination by laying-on of hands, is yet required to be ordained in the usual way, 'if there be need that he should become a bishop or presbyter or deacon.' See Apost. Const. viii. I and 26.

On the theory that the functions of the prophet passed in a certain sense to the reader of the early Church, see p. 254 n.3. When Ambrosiaster tries to explain St. Paul's catalogue, Eph. iv. II, in terms of the orders of the ministry familiar to his own day, and defines the prophet as the expounder or interpreter of Scripture, he was thinking, not of the reader, but of the presbyter, 'qui ordo nunc potest esse presbyterii': thus he equates apostle with bishop, prophet with presbyter, evangelist with deacon, pastor with reader, teacher with exorcist.

1 See Cornelius a Lapide on Eph. iv. 11, referring to 'Ambrose' (i.e. Ambrosiaster) in loc.