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§ 15. Support of the Clergy.

3. The better support of the clergy was another advantage connected with the new position of Christianity in the empire.

Hitherto the clergy had been entirely dependent on the voluntary contributions of the Christians, and the Christians were for the most part poor. Now they received a fixed income from the church funds and from imperial and municipal treasuries. To this was added the contribution of first-fruits and tithes, which, though not as yet legally enforced, arose as a voluntary custom at a very early period, and probably in churches of Jewish origin existed from the first, after the example of the Jewish law.148  Where these means of support were not sufficient, the clergy turned to agriculture or some other occupation; and so late as the fifth century many synods recommended this means of subsistence, although the Apostolical Canons prohibited the engagement of the clergy in secular callings under penalty of deposition.149

This improvement, also, in the external condition of the clergy was often attended with a proportional degeneracy in their moral character. It raised them above oppressive and distracting cares for livelihood, made them independent, and permitted them to devote their whole strength to the duties of their office; but it also favored ease and luxury, allured a host of unworthy persons into the service of the church, and checked the exercise of free giving among the people. The better bishops, like Athanasius, the two Gregories, Basil, Chrysosotom, Theodoret, Ambrose, Augustine, lived in ascetic simplicity, and used their revenues for the public good; while others indulged their vanity, their love of magnificence, and their voluptuousness. The heathen historian Ammianus gives the country clergy in general the credit of simplicity, temperance, and virtue, while he represents the Roman hierarchy, greatly enriched by the gifts of matrons, as extreme in the luxury of their dress and their more than royal banquets;150 and St. Jerome agrees with him.151  The distinguished heathen prefect, Praetextatus, said to Pope Damasus, that for the price of the bishopric of Rome he himself might become a Christian at once. The bishops of Constantinople, according to the account of Gregory Nazianzen,152 who himself held that see for a short time, were not behind their Roman colleagues in this extravagance, and vied with the most honorable functionaries of the state in pomp and sumptuous diet. The cathedrals of Constantinople and Carthage had hundreds of priests, deacons, deaconesses, subdeacons, prelectors, singers, and janitors.153

It is worthy of notice, that, as we have already intimated, the two greatest church fathers gave the preference in principle to the voluntary system in the support of the church and the ministry, which prevailed before the Nicene era, and which has been restored in modern times in the United States of America. Chrysostom no doubt perceived that under existing circumstances the wants of the church could not well be otherwise supplied, but he was decidedly averse to the accumulation of treasure by the church, and said to his hearers in Antioch: "The treasure of the church should be with you all, and it is only your hardness of heart that requires her to hold earthly property and to deal in houses and lands. Ye are unfruitful in good works, and so the ministers of God must meddle in a thousand matters foreign to their office. In the days of the apostles people might likewise have given them houses and lands; why did they prefer to sell the houses and lands and give the proceeds? Because this was without doubt the better way. Your fathers would have preferred that you should give alms of your incomes, but they feared that your avarice might leave the poor to hunger; hence the present order of things."154  Augustine desired that his people in Hippo should take back the church property and support the clergy and the poor by free gifts.155

§ 16. Episcopal Jurisdiction and Intercession.

4. We proceed to the legal validity, of the episcopal jurisdiction, which likewise dates from the time of Constantine.

After the manner of the Jewish synagogues, and according to the exhortation of St. Paul,156 the Christians were accustomed from the beginning to settle their controversies before the church, rather than carry them before heathen tribunals; but down to the time of Constantine the validity, of the bishop’s decision depended on the voluntary, submission of both parties. Now this decision was invested with the force of law, and in spiritual matters no appeal could be taken from it to the civil court. Constantine himself, so early as 314, rejected such an appeal in the Donatist controversy with the significant declaration: "The judgment of the priests must be regarded as the judgment of Christ himself."157 Even a sentence of excommunication was final; and Justinian allowed appeal only to the metropolitan, not to the civil tribunal. Several councils, that of Chalcedon, for example, in 451, went so far as to threaten clergy, who should avoid the episcopal tribunal or appeal from it to the civil, with deposition. Sometimes the bishops called in the help of the state, where the offender contemned the censure of the church. Justinian I. extended the episcopal jurisdiction also to the monasteries. Heraclius subsequently (628) referred even criminal causes among the clergy to the bishops, thus dismissing the clergy thenceforth entirely from the secular courts; though of course holding them liable for the physical penalty, when convicted of capital crime,158 as the ecclesiastical jurisdiction ended with deposition and excommunication. Another privilege, granted by Theodosius to the clergy, was, that they should not be compelled by torture to bear testimony before the civil tribunal.

This elevation of the power and influence of the bishops was a salutary check upon the jurisdiction of the state, and on the whole conduced to the interests of justice and humanity; though it also nourished hierarchical arrogance and entangled the bishops, to the prejudice of their higher functions, in all manner of secular suits, in which they were frequently called into consultation. Chrysostom complains that "the arbitrator undergoes incalculable vexations, much labor, and more difficulties than the public judge. It is hard to discover the right, but harder not to violate it when discovered. Not labor and difficulty alone are connected with office, but also no little danger."159  Augustine, too, who could make better use of his time, felt this part of his official duty a burden, which nevertheless he bore for love to the church.160  Others handed over these matters to a subordinate ecclesiastic, or even, like Silvanus, bishop of Troas, to a layman.161

5. Another advantage resulting from the alliance of the church with the empire was the episcopal right of intercession.

The privilege of interceding with the secular power for criminals, prisoners, and unfortunates of every kind had belonged to the heathen priests, and especially to the vestals, and now passed to the Christian ministry, above all to the bishops, and thenceforth became an essential function of their office. A church in Gaul about the year 460 opposed the ordination of a monk to the bishopric, because, being unaccustomed to intercourse with secular magistrates, though he might intercede with the Heavenly Judge for their souls, he could not with the earthly for their bodies. The bishops were regarded particularly as the guardians of widows and orphans, and the control of their property was intrusted to them. Justinian in 529 assigned to them also a supervision of the prisons, which they were to visit on Wednesdays and Fridays, the days of Christ’s passion.

The exercise of this right of intercession, one may well suppose, often obstructed the course of justice; but it also, in innumerable cases, especially in times of cruel, arbitrary despotism, protected the interests of innocence, humanity, and mercy. Sometimes, by the powerful pleadings of bishops with governors and emperors, whole provinces were rescued from oppressive taxation and from the revenge of conquerors. Thus Flavian of Antioch in 387 averted the wrath of Theodosius on occasion of a rebellion, journeying under the double burden of age and sickness even to Constantinople to the emperor himself, and with complete success, as an ambassador of their common Lord, reminding him of the words: "If ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you."162

6. With the right of intercession was closely connected the right of asylum in churches.

In former times many of the heathen temples and altars, with some exceptions, were held inviolable as places of refuge; and the Christian churches now inherited also this prerogative. The usage, with some precautions against abuse, was made law by Theodosius II. in 431, and the ill treatment of an unarmed fugitive in any part of the church edifice, or even upon the consecrated ground, was threatened with the penalty of death.163

Thus slaves found sure refuge from the rage of their masters, debtors from the persecution of inexorable creditors, women and virgins from the approaches of profligates, the conquered from the sword of their enemies, in the holy places, until the bishop by his powerful mediation could procure justice or mercy. The beneficence of this law, which had its root not in superstition alone, but in the nobler sympathies of the people, comes most impressively to view amidst the ragings of the great migration and of the frequent intestine wars.164