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MONTANISM
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MONTANISM , a somewhat misleading name for the See also:movement in the 2nd See also:century which, along with See also:Gnosticism, occupied the most See also:critical See also:period in the See also:history of the See also:Early See also: Then, in addition to this, Christians were already found in all ranks and occupations—hi the Imperial See also:palace, among the officials, in the abodes of labour and the halls of learning, amongst slaves and freemen. Should the Church take the decisive step into the world, conform to its customs, and acknowledge as far as possible its authorities? Or ought she, on the other See also:hand, to remain a society of religious devotees, separated and shut out from the world? That this was the question at issue is obvious enough now, although it could not be clearly perceived at the See also:time. It was natural that warning voices should then be raised in the Church against See also:secular tendencies, that the well-known counsels about the See also:imitation of See also:Christ should be held up in their literal strictness before worldly Christians. The Church as a whole, however, under pressure of circumstances rather than by a spontaneous impulse, decided otherwise. She marched through the open See also:door into the Roman state, and settled down there to Christianize the state by imparting to it the word of the See also:Gospel, but at the same time leaving it every-thing except its gods. On the other hand, she furnished herself with everything of value that could be taken over from the world without overstraining the elastic structure of the organization which she now adopted. With the aid of its See also:philosophy she created her new Christian See also:theology; its polity furnished her with the most exact constitutional forms; its See also:jurisprudence, its See also:trade and See also:commerce, its See also:art and See also:industry, were all taken into her service; and she contrived to See also:borrow some hints even from its religious See also:worship. With this equipment she undertook, and carried through, a world-See also:mission on a See also:grand See also:scale. But believers of the old school protested in the name of the Gospel against this secular Church. They joined an enthusiastic movement which had originated in a remote See also:province, and had at first a merely See also:local importance. There, in See also:Phrygia, the cry for a strict Christian life was reinforced by the belief in a new and final outpouring of the Spirit—a coincidence which has been observed elsewhere in Church history—as, for instance, among the early See also:Quakers and in the Irvingite movement. These I Entstehung der altkatholischen Kirche, 2nd ed. See also:Bonn. (1857). zealots hailed the See also:appearance of the Paraclete in Phrygia, and surrendered themselves to his guidance. In so doing, however, they had to withdraw from the Church, to be known as " Montanists," or " Kataphrygians," and thus to assume the See also:character of the See also:sect. Their enthusiasm and their prophesyings were denounced as demoniacal; their expectation of a glorious earthly See also:kingdom of Christ was stigmatized as Jewish, their See also:passion for martyrdom as vainglorious and their whole conduct as hypocritical. Nor did they See also:escape the more serious imputation of See also:heresy on important articles of faith; indeed, there was a disposition to put them on the same level with the Gnostics. The effect on themselves was what usually follows in such circumstances. After their separation from the Church, they became narrower and pettier in their conception of Christianity. Their See also:asceticism degenerated into legalism, their claim to a See also:monopoly of pure Christianity made them arrogant. As for the popular See also:religion of the larger Church, they scorned it as an adulterated, manipulated Christianity. But these views found very little See also:acceptance in the 3rd century, and in the course of the 4th they died out.
2. Such is, in brief, the position occupied by Montanism in the history of the See also:ancient Church. The rise and progress of the movement were as follows.
At the See also:close of the reign of See also:Antoninus See also:Pius—probably in the See also:year 156 (See also:Epiphanius)—Montanus appeared at Ardabau in See also:Mysia, near the Phrygian border, bringing revelations of the " Spirit " to Christendom. Montanus claimed to have a prophetic calling in the very same sense as Agabus, Judas, See also:Silas, the daughters of See also: Only two See also:women, Prisca and Maximilla, were moved by the Spirit; like Montanus, they uttered in a state of frenzy the commands of the Spirit, which urged men to a strict and See also:holy life. This does not mean that visions and significant dreams may not have been of frequent occurrence in Montanistic circles .l For twenty years this agitation appears to have been confined to Phrygia and the neighbouring provinces. But after the year 577 a persecution of Christians See also:broke out simultaneously in many provinces of the Empire. Like every other persecution it was regarded as the beginning of the end. It would seem that before this time Montanus had disappeared from the See also:scene; but Maximilla, and probably also Prisca, were working with redoubled See also:energy. And now, throughout the provinces of See also:Asia See also:Minor, in Rome, and even in See also:Gaul, amidst the raging of persecution, See also:attention was attracted to this remarkable movement. The See also:desire for a sharper exercise of discipline, and a more decided renunciation of the world, combined with a craving for some See also:plain indication of the Divine will in these last critical times, had prepared many minds for an eager acceptance of the tidings from Phrygia. And thus, within the large congregations where there was so much that was open to censure in See also:doctrine and constitution and morals, conventicles were formed in See also:order that Christians might prepare themselves by strict discipline for the See also:day of the Lord. 1 Theodotus, " the first steward of the New Prophecy," was a See also:fellow-worker with Montanus, and almost certainly a See also:prophet. Later on, Firmilian, See also:writing to See also:Cyprian, mentions a prophetess who appeared in See also:Cappadocia about A.D. 236, and Epiphanius (Haer. 49) tells of another called Quintilla.—(ED.) Meanwhile in Phrygia and its neighbourhood—especially in See also:Galatia, and also in See also:Thrace—a controversy was raging between the adherents and the opponents of the new prophecy. Between 150 and 176 the authority of the episcopate had been immensely strengthened, and along with it a settled order had been introduced into the Churches. As a See also:rule, the bishops were resolute enemies of the Montanistic enthusiasm. It disturbed the See also:peace and order of the congregations, and threatened their safety. Moreover, it made demands on individual Christians such as very few could comply with. But the disputation which Bishops Zoticus of See also:Cumana and See also:Julian of See also:Apamea arranged with Maximilla and her following turned out disastrously for its promoters. The " spirit " of Maximilla gained a See also:signal victory, a certain Themiso in particular having reduced the bishops to silence. Sotas See also:bishop of Anchialus attempted to refute Prisca, but with no better success (See also:Eusebius, Hist. eccl. v. 19). These proceedings were never forgotten in Asia Minor, and the See also:report of them spread far and wide. In after times the only way in which the discomfiture of the bishops could be explained was by asserting that they had been silenced by See also:fraud or violence. This was the commencement of the See also:excommunication or See also:secession of the Montanists in Asia Minor. Not only did an extreme party arise in Asia Minor rejecting all prophecy and the See also:Apocalypse of See also: 178) to have broken off all fellowship with the new prophets, while books were written to show that the very See also:form of the Montanistic prophecy was sufficient See also:proof of its spuriousness? In Gaul and Rome the prospects of Montanism seemed for a while more favourable. The confessors of the Gallican Church at See also:Lyons were of See also:opinion that communion ought to be maintained with the zealots of Asia and Phrygia; and they addressed a See also:letter to this effect to the Roman bishop, Eleutherus. There was a momentary vacillation even in Rome. Nor is this to be wondered at. The events in Phrygia could not appear new and unprecedented to the Roman Church. If we may believe See also:Tertullian, it was Praxeas of Asia Minor, the relentless foe of Montanism, who succeeded in persuading the Roman bishop to withhold his letters of conciliation.3 Early in. the last See also:decade of the 2nd century two considerable works4 appeared in Asia Minor against the Kataphrygians. The first, by a bishop or See also:presbyter whose name is not known, is addressed to Abircius bishop of See also:Hierapolis, and was written in the fourteenth year after the See also:death of Maximilla—i.e. apparently about the year 193. The other was written by a certain See also:Apollonius See also:forty years after the appearance of Montanus, consequently about 196. From these See also:treatises we learn that the adherents of the new prophecy were very numerous in Phrygia, Asia and Galatia (See also:Ancyra), that they had tried to defend themselves in writing from the charges brought against them (by See also:Miltiades), that they possessed a fully See also:developed See also:independent organization, that they boasted of many martyrs, and that they were still formidable to the Church in Asia Minor. Many of the small congregations had gone completely over to Montanism, although in large towns, like See also:Ephesus, the opposite party maintained the ascendancy. Every See also:bond of intercourse was broken, and in the Catholic Churches the worst calumnies were retailed about the deceased prophets and the leaders of the See also:societies they had founded. In many Churches outside of Asia Minor a different state of matters prevailed. Those who accepted the See also:message of the new prophecy did not at once leave the Catholic Church in a See also:body. They simply formed small conventicles within the Church. Such, for example, appears to have been the See also:case in See also:Carthage (if we may See also:judge from the Acts of the martyrs Perpetua and Felicitas) at the commencement of the persecution of Septimius See also:Severus about the year 202. But even here it was impossible that an open rupture 2 Miltiades, lrepl TOU pi, S&Iv irpo4 rIp' le kVTQQst AaAe"ay. At the same time as Miltiades, if not earlier, See also:Apollinaris of Hierapolis also wrote against the Montanists. 3It was Zephoyrmus in A.D. 202 who took the decisive step of refusing to communicate with the See also:Asiatic Montanists.—(ED.) 4 Quoted in Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. v. 16-18. should be indefinitely postponed. The bishops and their flocks gave offence to the spiritualists on so many points that at last it could be endured no longer. The latter wished for 'more fasting, the See also:prohibition of second marriages, a See also:frank, courageous profession of Christianity in daily life, and entire separation from the world; the bishops, on the other hand, sought to make it as easy as possible to be a Christian, lest they should lose the greater See also:part of their congregations. And lastly, the bishops were compelled more and more to take the control of discipline into their own hands, while the spiritualists insisted that See also:God Himself was the See also:sole judge in the See also:congregation. On this point especially a conflict was inevitable. It is true that there was no rivalry between the new organization and the old, as in Asia and Phrygia, for the Western Montanists recognized in its See also:main features the Catholic organization as it had been developed in the contest with Gnosticism; but the demand that the " See also:organs of the Spirit " should See also:direct the whole discipline of the congregation contained implicitly a protest against the actual constitution of the Church. Even before this latent antagonism was made -plain there were many minor matters which were sufficient to precipitate a rupture in particular congregations.. In Carthage, for example, it would appear that the See also:breach between the Catholic Church and the Montanistic conventicle was caused by a disagreement on the question whether or not virgins ought to be veiled. For nearly five years (202–207) the Carthaginian Montanists strove to remain within the Church, which was as dear to them as it was to their opponents. But at length they quitted it, and formed a congregation of their own. It was at this juncture that Tertullian, the most famous theologian of the See also:West, See also:left the Church whose cause he had so manfully upheld against pagans and heretics. He too had come to the conviction that the Church had forsaken the old paths and entered on a way that must See also:lead to destruction. The writings of Tertullian afford the clearest demonstration that what is called Montanism was, at any See also:rate in See also:Africa, a reaction against See also:secularism in the Church. There are other indications that Montanism in Carthage was a very different thing from the Montanism of Montanus. Western Montanism, at the beginning of the 3rd century, admitted the See also:legitimacy of almost every point of the Catholic See also:system. It allowed that the bishops were the successors of the apostles, that the Catholic rule of faith was a See also:complete and authoritative exposition of Christianity, and that the New Testament was the supreme rule of the Christian life. Montanus himself and his first disciples had been in quite a different position. In his time there was no fixed, divinely instituted congregational organization, no See also:canon of New Testament Scriptures, no See also:anti-Gnostic theology, and no Catholic Church. There were simply certain communities of believers See also:bound together by a See also:common See also:hope, and by a See also:free organization, which might be modified to any required extent. When Montanus proposed to summon all true Christians to Pepuza, in order to live a holy life and prepare for the day of the Lord, there' was nothing whatever toprevent the See also:execution of his See also:plan except the inertia and lukewarmness of Christendom. But this was not the case in the West at the beginning of the 3rd century. At Rome and Carthage, and in all other places where sincere Montanists were found, they were confronted by the imposing edifice of the Catholic Church, and they had neither the courage nor the inclination to undermine her sacred See also:foundations. This explains how the later Montanism never attained a position of See also:influence. In accepting, with slight reservations, the results of the development which the Church had undergone during the fifty years from 16o to 210 it reduced itself to the level of a sect. Tertullian exhausted the resources of See also:dialectic in the endeavour to define and vindicate the relation of the spiritualists to the " psychic " Christians; but no one will say he has succeeded in clearing the Montanistic position of its fundamental inconsistency. Of the later history of Montanism very little is known. But it is at least a significant fact that prophecy could not be resuscitated. Montanus, Prisca, and Maximilla were alwaysrecognized as the inspired authorities. At rare intervals a See also:vision might perhaps be vouchsafed to some Montanistic old woman, or a See also:brother might now and then have a See also:dream that seemed to be of supernatural origin; but the overmastering See also:power of religious enthusiasm was a thing of which the Montanists knew as little as the Catholics. Their discipline was attended with equally disappointing results. In place of an intense moral earnestness, we find in Tertullian a legal See also:casuistry, a finical morality, from which no See also:good could ever come. It was only in the See also:land of its nativity that Montanism held its ground till the 4th century. It maintained itself there in a number of close communities, probably in places where no Catholic congregation had been formed; and to these the Novatians at a later period attached themselves. In Carthage there existed down to the year 400 a sect called Tertullianists; and in their survival we have a striking testimony to the influence of the See also:great Carthaginian teacher. On doctrinal questions there was no real difference between the Catholics and the Montanists. The early Montanists (the prophets themselves) used expressions which seem to indicate a Monarchian conception of the See also:person of Christ. After the close of the and century we find two sections amongst the Western Montanists, just as amongst the Western Catholics—there were some who adopted the See also:Logos-Christology, and others who remained Monarchians 1 SouxcEs.—The materials for the history of Montanism, although plentiful, are fragmentary, and require a good See also:deal of critical sifting. They may be divided into four See also:groups: (I) The utterances of Montanus, Prisca and Maximilla 2 are our most important See also:sources, but unfortunately they consist of only twenty-one See also:short sayings. (2) The See also:works written by Tertullian after he became a Montanist furnish the most copious See also:information—not, however, about the first stages of the movement, but only about its later phase, after the Catholic Church was established. (3) The See also:oldest polemical works of the and century, extracts from which have been preserved, especially by Eusebius (Hist. See also:Eccles. bk. v.), form the next See also:group. These must be used with the utmost caution, because even the earliest orthodox writers give currency to many misconceptions and calumnies. (4) The later lists of heretics, and the casual notices of Church fathers from the 3rd to the 5th century, though not containing much that is of value, yet contain a little.3 It is evident that Montanism was by no means homogeneous. Too often the See also:primitive " heresy of the Phrygians " has been studied in the See also:light of the matured system of Tertullian. One great divergence is See also:manifest: Tertullian never himself deviated from orthodoxy and vehemently asserts the orthodoxy of all Montanists, but both Montanus ("I am the See also:Father and the Son and the Holy See also:Ghost ") and Maximilla (" I am Word and Spirit and Power ") used See also:language which has a distinctly " monarchian " flavour. There were really divided views on the question of the Divine See also:Monarchy among the Montanists as among the Catholics. The orthodox party were known See also:a4 the Cataproclans, the heterodox as Cataeschinites, and both appealed to the oracles of their prophets. Other influences tending to diversity were the rise of later prophets and visionaries, the See also:personality of prominent members of the sect (like Tertullian himself, who gave to Montanism much more than he received from it), and the power of local environment. An examination of Phrygian as distinct from See also:African Montanism leads to the following conclusions: (1) The Phrygians claimed to have received the prophetic gift by way of succession just as the bishops traced their See also:office back to the apostles; Tertullian seems to ignore the intermediate steps between the apostles and Montanus; (2) the " See also:ecstasy of the African See also:section was much more restrained than the ravings of the Phrygians; (3) the See also:original Montanists followed the example of the Phrygian native cults in assigning a prominent place to women, Tertullian on the other hand (De virg. vel. 9) says, " It is not permitted to a woman to speak in church, nor yet to See also:teach, nor to baptize, nor to offer, nor to assume any office which belongs to a See also:man, least of all the See also:priest-See also:hood; " (4) while both sections gave to prophets the power of See also:absolution, the Phrygians extended it to martyrs also—at Carthage the Catholics did this contrary to the views of Tertullian. There is also good See also:reason to doubt whether the Phrygian Montanists were anything like so ascetic and desirous of martyrdom as has been generally considered. Apollonius (Eusebius, Hist. Eccl. v. 16) accuses them of covetousness and tells us that Themiso See also:purchased his freedom from imprisonment by a considerable See also:payment. See also:Sir See also: Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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