CHAPTER VIII. INTERNAL CAUSES.-CONTINUED. Second specific cause: "Unauthorized additions to the ceremo- CHAPTER IX. INTERNAL CAUSES.-CONTINUED. 113-129 Third specific cause: "Unauthorized changes in church organ- CHAPTER X. RESULTS OF THE APOSTASY.-ITS SEQUEL. Revolts against the Church of Rome.-John Wickliffe in Eng- 150-169 The Great Apostasy. CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION: THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE CHURCH OF CHRIST. 1. A belief common to all sects and churches professing Christianity is that Jesus Christ, the Savior and Redeemer of the human race, established His Church upon the earth, by personal ministration in the meridian of time. Ecclesiastical history, as distinguished from secular history, deals with the experiences of the Church from the time of its establishment. The conditions under which the Church was founded first claim our attention. 2. At the beginning of the Christian era, the Jews, in common with most other nations, were subjects of the Roman empire." They were allowed a considerable degree of liberty in maintaining their religious observances and national customs generally, but their status was far from that of a free and independent people. 3. The period was one of comparative peace,—a time marked by fewer wars and less dissension than the empire had known for many years. These conditions were favorable for the mission of the Christ, and for the founding of His Church on earth. a See Note 1, end of chapter. 4. The religious systems extant at the time of Christ's earthly ministry may be classified in a general way as Jewish and Pagan, with a minor system-the Samaritanwhich was essentially a mixture of the other two. The children of Israel alone proclaimed the existence of the true and living God; they alone looked forward to the advent of the Messiah, whom mistakenly they awaited as a prospective conqueror coming to crush the enemies of their nation. All other nations, tongues, and peoples, bowed to pagan deities, and their worship comprised nought but the sensual rites of heathen idolatry. Paganism was a religion of form and ceremony, based on polytheism-a belief in the existence of a multitude of gods, which deities were subject to all the vices and passions of humanity, while distinguished by immunity from death. Morality and virtue were unknown as elements of heathen service; and the dominant idea in pagan worship was that of propitiating the gods, in the hope of averting their anger and purchasing their favor. 5. The Israelites, or Jews as they were collectively known, thus stood apart among the nations as proud possessors of superior knowledge, with a lineage and a literature, with a priestly organization and a system of laws, that separated and distinguished them as a people at once peculiar and exclusive. While the Jews regarded their idolatrous neighbors with abhorrence and contempt, they in turn were treated with derision as fanatics and inferiors. 6. But the Jews, while thus distinguished as a people from the rest of the world, were by no means a united people; on the contrary they were divided among themselves b See Note 2, end of chapter. on matters of religious profession and practice In the first place, there was a deadly enmity between the Jews proper and the Samaritans. These latter were a mixed people inhabiting a distinct province mostly between Judea and Galilee, largely made up of Assyrian colonists who had intermarried with the Jews. While affirming their belief in the Jehovah of the Old Testament, they practiced many rites belonging to the paganism they claimed to have forsaken, and were regarded by the Jews proper as unorthodox and reprobate. 7. Then the Jews themselves were divided into many contending sects and parties, among which the principal were the Pharisees and the Sadducees; and beside these we read of Essenes, Galileans, Herodians, etc. 8. The Jews were living under the Law of Moses, the outward observance of which was enforced by priestly rule, while the spirit of the law was very generally ignored by priest and people alike. That the Mosaic law was given as a preparation for something greater was afterward affirmed by Paul, in his epistle to the saints at Galatia: "Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ." And the fact that a higher law was to supersede the lower is abundantly shown in the Savior's own teachings: "Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not kill; and whosoever shall kill shall be in danger of the judgment: But I say unto you that whosoever is angry with his brother without a cause shall be in danger of the judgment: * * * Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time, Thou shalt not commit adultery: But I say unto you that whosoever looketh on a woman to lust after c Galatians 3: 24. |